My Holidays: Ruth Scott

What's your earliest holiday memory?A caravan park in Rosses Point, in Co Sligo.

I am the youngest of eight kids. We used to have a tent pitched outside the caravan for my three brothers. I have a shameful memory of wetting a bed in the caravan. My poor mother.

What was your worst holiday?A couple of years ago a bunch of us went to China. I tried food from one of the road stalls and got septicaemia in a town in the middle of nowhere. At the local hospital the doctors had no English, and I was trying to explain to them that I was highly allergic to penicillin. The hospital was so dirty. When they were giving me a drip with antibiotics they brought me to a room with three occupied beds. I thought maybe I'd sit on the window sill. But an elderly man got out of bed and threw back his blanket, and the nurse gestured for me to get in. The bed was warm and disgusting. I did sort of a complicated Pilates move trying not to touch the sheet.

What was your best holiday?I was changing jobs from 98FM to RTÉ and ended up with a five-week gap in the middle. I had to decide on a last-minute trip. I opened up the atlas and picked New Zealand. It was amazing. I drove all around and went hiking on a glacier. The south island reminded me of small-town Ireland. It was a good experience to be off by myself. So much of the time you are bombarded by noise, but there was not even a radio station available when I was in the middle of nowhere.

If budget or work were not a restriction, what would be your dream holiday?I've never been to Nepal or Cambodia. There's probably a touch of "everybody else has been there". But I'd have to have a look and go hiking and trekking.

If you had your pick, who would you bring on holiday with you?Damien and Elaine, the married couple I went to China with, are particularly good company on holidays. She is super-organised and would have all of the information laminated in a folder. They're also really game for a laugh.

What's your favourite place in Ireland?Galway and west Clare, because it's like the end of the world over there. It's so dramatic and spectacular that it looks like dinosaurs should be roaming around.

Your recommended holiday reading?I love really light books on holidays, such as Patricia Scanlan and Claudia Carroll. You can lose yourself in them for an hour, fall asleep by the pool and pick them up the next day.

Where will you go to next?I went to America for two weeks at the start of the year, so I am not making any plans just yet. The only thing in the offing is the wedding of a college friend in Brussels.

• Ruth Scott is training for the Flora Women's Mini Marathon as part of Team Flora (florawomensminimarathon.ie). She presents RTÉ 2FM's weekend breakfast show

In conversation with GENEVIEVE CARBERY