Sometimes travel can be just pure fun and Amanda Statham, glossy magazines travel editor, honeymoon expert and happy camper-van-owner, has made the fun side of travel her life’s work so far. She’s dived with sharks in the Galapagos, tracked rare animals on night safari Costa Rica, danced at sunrise in Trinidad Carnival covered in mud and spent a rather enviable amount of time perched at New York City rooftop bars sipping cocktails at sunset. Laugh your way through this light-hearted chat about the love of all things travel.

On this episode we cover:

Falling into the job at Cosmo

Working with inspiring women – Sam Baker, Louise Court, Farrah Storr,

How Cosmopolitan has cleverly weathered the print storm by becoming ‘3D’ with online, events and more

3.3 million monthly unique visitors How the buzz of reading a magazine is unbeatable

Worrying about forgetting her trips!

How travel pictures help you remember

How New York and Cosmo go hand in hand

Rooftop pools and brilliant bars in NYC

Norwegian Air transforming transatlantic trips

Discovering new areas of NYC – like Williamsburg

The incredible rooftop bar at the INK hotel in NYC

Knowing it’s the best job in the world

How money isn’t the most important thing

Being editor for Women’s Health Magazine

Specialising in honeymoons

Being as happy being in a camper van as in a 5 star hotel in the Seychelles

How since becoming a mum long-haul flights solo can be very relaxing

Poor Lisa’s middle class holiday-home dilemma

The beautiful warm seas of the Caribbean

Sunrise mud-covered dancing at the Trinidad Carnival

Trinidad Carnival being just as good as Rio

Jake’s Hotel, Treasure Beach and the best beach bar in Jamaica

The mosaic, shells and decor being ‘like Gaudi on acid

Fishermen watching you in the shower

Getting tipsy in Floyd’s Bar on a sandbank in the middle of the sea

Bob Marley and a tour around Kingston

Her once in a lifetime trip to the Galapagos with Celine Cousteau and Contiki

Diving with hammerhead sharks

(not with Kid Rock – Lisa’s dodgy hearing…)

Not great PR to lose a journalist to a shark attack

The secrets behind press trips

Being travel editor for You and Your Wedding

A seven course aphrodisiac menu on the Almafi coast that food poisoned everyone

Lisa getting bitten by the worst mosquitos in Maldives

How travel changes as a parent

How travel can be the best things for children

Exploring at home as much as abroad

Going on holiday for a day

The urge to give it all up and take the family off around the world

The dream to send the kids to Green School in Bali – an international school with a focus on environmental leaders of the future

How to balance travel with worrying about the environment

Carbon off-setting with Forests Without Frontiers

Her recent trip to Costa Rica

Travelling around Italy by train instead of flying

How the journey can sometimes be the holiday

Resorts and hotels becoming more environmentally focused

How Instagram has changed travel

Social media fuelling over-tourism

How there’s room for everyone; bloggers, instagram and press

The trend for ‘second cities’ finding the place less travelled

‘Hidden gem’ being Lisa’s biggest travel writer cliché

Luxury safari tents at Libelula Lounge in Costa Rica

The family who left the UK with their kids to set up the above

Indian-Jones swing bridges on night safari

Narrowly avoiding venomous snakes

Are there any downsides to her incredible job?

Being lucky as she does spend a lot of time with her children

The nine day trip to Grenada she struggled as her son was a baby

Going to Jordan with the kids for half term

Easyjet from London to Aqaba being incredibly cheap!

Travelling for 30 hours to get to Raratonga

Being fined by the school for taking her son to the Arctic

The incredibly beautiful Fez World Music Festival

Jack Johnson’s acoustic in Hawaii