Surely Narnia has to be on this list – reached by a little girl playing hide and seek in a wardrobe in a spare room:

This week over at the Fantasy Review Barn Nathan is taking us Tough Travelling looking at the tropes of fantasy.  This week the topic up for discussion is:

PORTALS TO ANOTHER LAND

Fantasyland often has some unique entry points; not every traveler is born within its boundaries.  It is a regular event for someone from a non-magical place to suddenly find themselves in this world of dragons, magic, and danger.

Now, I’m not sure all of these are portals but here goes:

1. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly – in which a young boy called David climbs through a hole in the Garden Wall straight into the land of fairy.  A wonderful retelling and mismash of lots of old favourite fairytales in a lovely coming of age story.
2. Howl’s Moving Castle by Dianna Wynne Jones- in which Howl’s castle has a door in which depending on which way the handle is turned leads to a number of different places.
3. Coraline by Neil Gaiman in which Coraline finds a small doorway with a tunnel beyond and an alternative family that seems to be too good to be true.

Is the rabbit hole a portal?  I can’t make my mind up – it certaiinly leads to a different world.  I tend to think of portals as being doorways and whilst this rabbit hole doesn’t have a door it’s certainly the entrance????

Anyway, what about these doorways:

ddd