I was absolutely delighted to be asked to judge the Tourism Northern Ireland Young Travel Writers Competition in 2018. It was the year of European Cultural Heritage, so Tourism NI, Department for Communities Historic Environment Division and partners launched a competition challenging creative young writers to share their travelling adventures of ‘How I explored Northern Ireland this year’. I’m a keen explorer myself, so it was a pleasure to judge the competition!

For the chance to win exciting prizes and the coveted title of ‘Young Travel Writer 2018’, entrants were encouraged to share their thrilling and adventurous tales. I offered some writing tips and shared some of my own inspiration in a piece with the Irish News.

The competition was split into five categories and I judged the 6-8 age category. I chose Umar Muhammad as the winner of my category and he went on to become the overall Young Travel Writer of the Year.

It was wonderful to judge the competition and it was so lovely to meet Umar and the other finalists in person too. We all took part in a photoshoot with Rosemarie McHugh from Tourism NI.

There’s a wonderful piece about Umar in the Irish News too. I also speak about why I chose him as the winner.