Making the most of wherever you are.
The Guestbooks is a family travel and lifestyle site, written by father-and-daughter team Chris and Kate.
It started with a love of travel, restaurants and finding the best places to stay — and has evolved considerably since then. Today, Kate is the editor behind The Guestbooks, sharing practical travel guides, family-friendly things to do and the discoveries that make living somewhere new feel like home.
Kate has lived in Dubai, Singapore, Switzerland and the UK, and has travelled extensively with her husband, Josh, and their two daughters. She particularly loves finding the places and experiences that make everyday family life in a new country a little more fun — from the best playground to a great weekend escape.
Chris is the original inspiration behind The Guestbooks and its co-founder. A lifelong North Wales resident, yet very much an enthusiastic traveller, he has always had a remarkable talent for researching restaurants, hotels and pretty much anywhere worth visiting. His curiosity, eye for a good recommendation and love of discovering somewhere new were the inspiration for creating The Guestbooks in the first place — and he still enjoys contributing his own recommendations and stories when something catches his eye.
Between us, we hope to share the things we’d genuinely want to know ourselves: where to go, what to do, where to eat and how to make the most of wherever you are.
How did it all start?
The Guestbooks began in 2018, although the idea had been years in the making.
Kate and her husband, Josh, had long joked about buying her dad Chris a website called The Guestbook. His surname is Guest, and he has always been a prolific researcher of restaurants, hotels and travel — so it seemed almost too good an opportunity to miss.
From a young age, Kate remembers family journeys taking considerably longer than planned because Dad needed to investigate the menus of every restaurant along the way. What was once mildly irritating became surprisingly useful as she got older!
Even though Chris has always lived in North Wales, Kate regularly relied on him for recommendations when she lived in London — particularly for new restaurants and places to visit. His passion for finding somewhere good has always been infectious.
So when Kate moved to Dubai in 2016 with Josh’s work, she decided to start writing about her own travels and The Guestbooks was eventually born.
A lot has changed since then…
Quite a lot, actually!
What started as a travel blog has grown alongside our lives.
Kate has since lived in Singapore and Switzerland, as well as spending time back in the UK, and has gone from travelling mainly as a couple to travelling and exploring with two young children.
That has changed the things we look for.
We’re still interested in great hotels, restaurants and destinations, but we’re just as interested in the family-friendly playground around the corner, the best rainy-day activity, the day trip that’s actually worth the drive and what’s happening this weekend.
Living abroad has also taught us that discovering somewhere isn’t just about the big attractions. Sometimes it’s the small, everyday things that make a place feel like home.
That’s increasingly what you’ll find here.
What you’ll find on The Guestbooks
Family travel
Practical guides, destination inspiration and ideas for travelling with children — from weekend breaks to bigger adventures.
Things to do
Family-friendly places, activities, attractions, walks, playgrounds and days out, particularly around the places we know and love.
Living abroad
The practical and enjoyable side of making a life somewhere new — discovering your neighbourhood, finding your favourite places and making the most of your surroundings.
Our recommendations
We love researching. We love exploring. And we love sharing a good find.
Where possible, our guides are based on places we’ve visited and experiences we’ve had ourselves, with the aim of giving you the useful details we’d want before making the trip.
And what about Dad?
He’s still very much part of The Guestbooks.
Although Kate now does most of the writing and editing, The Guestbooks remains the family project it was when it began. Chris still has an impressive talent for finding a restaurant worth trying, a hotel worth bookmarking or somewhere neither of us has thought to visit yet — and he’ll continue to pop up with recommendations and articles when inspiration strikes.
After all, without Dad’s slightly obsessive travel research, there probably wouldn’t be a Guestbooks to begin with.
Thanks for stopping by. We hope you’ll find somewhere new to go, something fun to do, or simply a little inspiration to make the most of wherever you are.
Kate & Chris
