Hotels
Ten annoying things about hotel bathrooms
In ascending order of the level of teeth-gnashing involved, these are 10 annoying things about hotel bathrooms. […]
Hotels
Checking In
Could do better, review of Quinta das Vinhas, Madeira
We love small, semi-rural hotels in historic buildings, especially ones set in a vineyard overlooking the ocean. Quinta das Vinhas in Estreito da Calheta, a workaday village on the Madeiran hillside, ticked many boxes. With […]
Checking In
To unpack the suitcase or not?
The idea of not unpacking the suitcase in a hotel room just doesn’t make sense to me. It conjures scenes of ugly chaos and inefficiency. Clothes strewn across a room seem no different to me than litter on the roadside […]
Checking In
Hotels with personality, Trigony Country House Hotel, Dumfries & Galloway
Image a world where in the late afternoon in September In Scotland you could sit outside your hotel room and feel comfortably warm. I don’t mean in a parallel universe, or even sometime in the near future when the Northern and Southern Hemispheres have switched places. […]
Checking In
Hotels with personality, Waldhotel Fehrenbach in the Black Forest
I could give you a raft of reasons why the Waldhotel Fehrenbach in Alpersbach, little more than an extended meadow in Germany’s Black Forest, sticks in our minds as being a hotel with a stand out personality. […]
Europe
Poets and palate-pleasers in Sanquhar
Visiting a lead mining museum (entrance £12.50) would not have made it on to our ‘things to do’ list. What a treat we would have missed. For a start, Wanlockhead near the head of the Mennock Pass is Scotland’s highest village… […]
Gastro-hike Destinations
Scotland Is One Of The UK’s Top Gastro-Hike Destinations
With the food expectations bar set at a romantically reminiscent high, and walking expectations right up there with it, it was fitting that some thirty years after first awakening our taste buds, Scotland should receive pride of place as our first UK gastro-hiking destination […]
Checking In
No hiding place, the transparent trend in hotel bathrooms
I’m sure it was meant to be sexy chic, but to me, the first time I saw the frosted glass bathroom wall it seemed too good an opportunity for indulging in some silly shadow puppet theatrics. […]
Checking In
Lodge living along Chile’s Carretera Austral
We expected rough ‘n’ ready accommodation along the main ‘highway’ through Chile. What we got was something quite different. […]
Chile
Paradise found at Posada Quelat in Chile
Patricio is owner of Posada Quelat, a series of wooden cabins dotted around a garden of Eden with gunnera’s so huge I could have used one as a hammock. […]
Checking In
Hotel La Roya in St Florent, Corsica
A chic boutique hotel with a Michelin starred restaurant, set at the rear of the lovely Plage La Roya in the Gulf of St Florent in northern Corsica. […]
Checking In
The best and worst of Paradors in the Canary Islands
We’ve stayed in all of the ones in Canary Island Paradors and each has thrown up a variety of experiences that weren’t always consistent with the others. […]
Hotels
Why I Hate Some Hotel Beds
It was one of those hotels which still used blankets and sheets – not fitted ones. Sheets which were crisp, clean and tucked in so tightly that we had to call room service to ask the to send up a crowbar… […]
Food & drink
Can You Trust Tripadvisor Reviews?
A recent travel article claimed between a third and a half of reviews posted on the travel website Tripadvisor were fake. There is no doubt there are fake reviews on Tripadvisor. But most of the ones I’ve seen are clumsy and not particularly difficult to spot. […]
Europe
Review of citizenM in Glasgow
When did city hotels become so cool? I can say, hand on heart, that staying at the citizenM in Glasgow was the best British city centre hotel stay I’ve experienced… […]