Small world

Hotels – the good, the bad and the hopeless

2017-09-27T21:42:00.000+01:00

At heart, hoteliers really want their guests to have a pleasurable experience and a good night's sleep. (Those that don't should stop pretending to be Basil Fawlty and get another job – preferably one far removed from hospitality.) More often than not, however, they slip up on the simplest things, leaving their guests spitting with fury.

I know I've ranted about hotels before, but some things need repeating – namely that it's immediately obvious when hoteliers have never spent a night in their own hotel. They've never turned up – with luggage and a companion – and discovered all the niggly things that set your teeth on edge. They've never noticed that there's only one plug socket. They've never figured out that the huge expanse of bare wall in the room's entrance would be a really handy place to hang up your coat.

But no. Some designer or architect has convinced them that style comes before function. So you dump your coat on the bed, or hang it on the only chair in the room – despite the fact that it's a double room. Hoteliers: buy some hooks. There are some very stylish ones on the market. They don't cost a bomb.

You then check out the desk, and realise that you have to move the bloody thing to get to the room's second socket. I stayed in a hotel recently that had undergone a complete refurbishment, with all new furniture – furniture that was an inch higher than the existing sockets. This room cost £250 a night.

I've noticed a new trend in which shiny new bedside lamps come with a USB port. This is a good thing. More of this, please.

I've also noticed minibars with an insidious notice warning you that if you move anything in the bar, you will be charged for it. Even if you don't drink it. You pick it up, you pay for it. Apart from the fact that it's complete tosh, you're left with a feeling of animosity. This is a bad thing.

Hotels like to show their appreciation of their guests by leaving little treats, such as bottles of mineral water. This is a lovely touch, especially when there's a tag around the bottle saying "with our compliments". This is also a good thing. Otherwise, it's not obvious that it's free. I once witnessed a stand-up row at reception when a guest was charged for the bottle of water he thought was free. It wasn't. Bad feeling all round.

Espresso machines are a nice touch too. What's not so nice are the hotels that offer you only one free capsule before they start charging you. Stop being so stingy.

Bathrooms are another story. There's a bathroom designer somewhere rubbing his (or her, but probably his) hands with glee because everyone seems to be buying his long, flat basin with the too-short taps. Looks very sleek, but totally impractical. Water gets everywhere except where it's supposed to be. And showers without shelves are a nuisance.

And if hoteliers actually slept in their own hotel rooms, they would notice that the curtains don't meet in the middle. Or that the minimalist white blind doesn't come close to blocking out the light.

Don't even get me started on wall panels with absurdly complicated light switches. Especially when they're in bright LED lights that are right in your line of sight. In addition to clothes pegs to keep curtains closed, I now have to travel with BluTack and a piece of cardboard.

These things usually happen in four- and five-star hotels. I've stayed in the simplest little two- and three-stars that have managed to get these things right, even if the materials are on the cheap side. But as design hotels seem to be following the same uniform pattern, the same mistakes are being made.

And as far as hotel websites are concerned, those that refuse to give you any indication of rates but ask you to fill out an email form ... well, those can sod off. And there's never, ever, an excuse to put music on hotel websites. Ever.

Late-season skiing in Les Menuires

2017-04-02T19:29:00.000+01:00

While many people are happy to see the back of winter, some of us can’t get enough of larking about in the snow – specifically on skis. There’s much to be said for late-season skiing – milder temperatures, longer days, lazy lunches on mountain restaurant terraces, generally quieter slopes and cheaper accommodation. The downsides? Well, be prepared for icy slopes first thing and slushy pistes at the bottom.

Altitude helps, of course. I was based in Les Menuires in the third valley that makes up the Trois Vallées, the largest ski domain in the world. The base village is at 1850m, but I was staying in Reberty at 2000m, which is right on the blue Boyes piste. It’s a newer, traditionally styled village that isn’t filled with the modernist architecture that makes Les Menuires one of the less aesthetically pleasing resorts in France.

But what Les Menuires lacks in beauty it more than makes up for in its ski area and ease of skiing to the other resorts in the Trois Vallées. I’d had a brief taste of it a few years ago when I stayed in its smaller neighbour, Saint-Martin-de-Belleville, and had wanted to come back and explore it properly. I’d known it had excellent skiing, but I wasn’t quite prepared for just how good it was.

Over three gloriously sunny days, our ESF guide Jérôme (Saint-Martin native and all-round great chap) showed off the best of his resort. Long, wide, cruisey blue runs – including Grand Lac which started at 2,704m – snaked their way down to Saint-Martin and its extremely pretty village centre. If we wanted to, we could have swung into Méribel from several peaks. Instead we carried on back to Les Menuires and up to Reberty, where La Ferme de Reberty’s large sun-trap terrace was a convivial spot for a lunch of diots (smoked Savoyard sausages) and crozets (tiny pasta squares) smothered in melted Beaufort.

On the western side of Les Menuires is La Masse, another playground of wide blues and reds plus a few blacks that I left to more adventurous skiers. The long red Fred Covili run (named after a local champion skier) started just below the 2804m Pointe de la Masse and was an exhilarating way to get down the mountain before we had to endure the slushy lower-altitude run that led down to the village.

By the time we made it back over to the southern side of Les Menuires and up the Sunny Express, we had more than earned our lunch at Chalet du Sunny. While I was diving head first into a tartiflette, a party was getting under way on the slope side of the restaurant. Out came the silly hats, costumes and onesies as a Polish DJ and dancers did a fantastic job in re-creating the raucous atmosphere at La Folie Douce. It saved me the effort of having to trek over to Val Thorens – and back – to experience it first hand.

As it happened, Val Thorens was the destination for the final day, which was very easy to reach via the runs coming down from the 2786m Mont de la Chambre. Europe’s highest ski resort had a decidedly different atmosphere from its family-focused neighbour, appealing to a younger, rowdier crowd. It also has a giant ear-popping gondola that takes you up to Cîme Caron at a dizzying 3200m for superb views across the Maurienne Valley and over to Les Deux Alpes.

As we skied down towards the sinuous Cumin run that leads back to Les Menuires, I could see just how vast this area was – especially as we were heading all the way to Saint-Martin for lunch. Friendly family-run Le Corbeleys sorted out my cheese fixation with a bowl of gooey Beaufort ravioli.

If the lunches were superb, the evening meals were taken to another level in our catered chalet, Le Chamois, run by Powder N Shine. Professional chef Shaun Francome came up with one exquisite dish after another: succulent beef fillet, delicate goat’s cheese mousse, velvety white onion velouté and probably the best cheesecake I’d ever eaten. The high quality of the food, wine, afternoon tea and early-evening canapés matched the warm welcome from hosts Heather and Layla, faultless service, relaxing atmosphere and the cocooning pine sitting room with its big squashy sofas. Tired post-ski legs were instantly soothed in the terrace hot tub, where we basked in the sunshine and views of the slopes. For a final fix of winter, it was unbeatable.

Travel with voyages-sncf.com, which has direct trains from London St Pancras to Moûtiers. Transfers can be arranged with Skiidy Gonzales

All photos © Adam Batterbee

Kind of blue

2017-03-12T18:42:00.000+00:00

When I tell people I learnt to ski in Canada, they immediately say: "Cool! Whistler? Banff? Quebec?" Er, no. Ontario, actually, that mainly low-lying province that's livened up considerably by the Niagara Escarpment slicing through it. It's thanks to this escarpment that you can do some skiing, even if the altitudes don't go above 500m. Still, what else is there to do during the long, seemingly endless Canadian winter?

I hadn't skied in Canada for more than 30 years, having since skied in most of Europe's top resorts. But in the same season when I'd skied in Zermatt and Megève, I was off to Blue Mountain. Never heard of it? Well, it's Canada's third-busiest resort (after Whistler and Mont-Tremblant, in case you were wondering). Since I was last there more than three decades ago, it's been bought by Intrawest and expanded out of all recognition. There's now a "village", a greatly extended ski area of 42 runs and faster lifts. In spite of all the trappings, you can't ignore the fact that its top elevation is only 452m and its longest run is 1.6km. This was definitely going to be small fry, I thought, and kept my expectations as low as the altitude.

It didn't help that I chose what was possibly the busiest day of the year to visit: a bank holiday weekend in February. What looked like the entire population of Toronto had driven the two hours up north towards Collingwood and dumped itself in the resort. That meant queues. Queues for lift tickets, which were bearable. And queues for equipment rental, which were mental. You queued for a temperamental iPad to fill in your requirements, then queued for your boots, then the skis and helmet. At least 90 minutes later, I was finally able to face my first queue for the chairlift.

But the sun was out. And there was fresh snow. And there was a stall in the village selling poutine. (That was lunch sorted.) Once you reach the summit, you're greeted with the somewhat surreal sight of Georgian Bay down below. I'd skied overlooking Alpine lakes before, but none the size of this sprawling offshoot of the Great Lakes. Yes, the runs were a bit on the short side, so we meandered our way down, taking our time with lots of big loopy turns. No need to rush into another queue.

In the end, it turned out to be a hugely enjoyable day out. There's a good amount of varied terrain, as well as a snowpark and some mogul fields if you have any knees left. My main quibble was the price. For two people, day passes and equipment rental came to just over £170. A similar day out at one of Intrawest's French outposts, Flaine, would have been £50 cheaper, and you'd get slopes at 2,500m and views of Mont Blanc. If I were to go again (and I might), I'd book passes online, where it's cheaper, and I'd try one of the off-site rental shops to save both a bit of cash and my sanity.

Wrong side of the tracks

2016-11-13T21:13:00.000+00:00

Every morning, the slightly dilapidated Ivo Andric train leaves Belgrade and trundles along to Budapest, eventually arriving eight and a half hours later. It's a bargain at €15, even if the four-carriage train has seen better days. Belgrade's main railway also has seen better days: as there are plans to move it to another part of the city, it's looking distinctly unloved at the moment. But there's a little café at the station that makes a halfway decent cup of Turkish coffee, which is what you need when you're going to be deprived of a restaurant car for nearly nine hours.

I had noticed a disjointed group of men hanging around the station, at times getting together, at other times splitting up. They looked as jumpy as the caffeine in my coffee. They didn't look any more relaxed when they boarded the train, again making an effort to seat themselves in separate clusters. Occasionally one would make an anxious, terse phone call. Another would scoot to the toilet every 15 minutes or so.

When I went to use the loo, I saw immediately that the men weren't suffering from weak bladders. A somewhat battered Samsung phone was charging, and obviously the men were just making certain that no one was running off with it. I wasn't sure where the men were from, but I had an inkling they were from Afghanistan – just eight or so of the countless people trying to get from Serbia to a European Union country, specifically Hungary.

Sure enough, at Subotica, the last Serbian city before the border, all of the men got off the train and scattered at once. Then began the lengthy two-part visit from both sets of border police, first the Serbs who were doing a thorough search of all the train. We then crept over the border into no-man's-land, where the Hungarian border police came on board. If I thought the Serbs were being thorough, they had nothing over the Hungarians who were checking every nook and cranny, shining torches into places I hadn't spotted.

As we crossed into Hungary, we passed the fence that the Hungarian government hastily put up to stop the flow of refugees. I took one look at the tall, spiky mass of metal and barbed wire and my heart sank for anyone who tried to get past that. The fence was briefly opened to let the train through before it was abruptly shut. Where were those men, I wondered?

They certainly weren't on the train. When I next went to the loo, I had to duck to avoid having my head smacked by the dangling ceiling that the border police opened to check no one was hiding within. I looked into the forest of insulation and tubes above me and thought that maybe a chihuahua could just about fit in there. I don't think even the most desperate refugee could contort his body to squeeze into that minuscule space.

This happens every day, on every train that goes between both countries. I wish I knew how many make it across that steel barrier between despair and hope.

Lost in Bosnia

2015-05-26T23:52:00.000+01:00

See the photo on the left? That was the setting for a relaxing picnic lunch on the road from Sarajevo to Croatia – at a little village on Ramsko Jezero. I wasn't to know that things were going to get quite a bit darker after this little interlude.

I knew what Bosnia's roads were like, having driven on them enough times before. This time, though, I had only a very basic map and no satnav. But as I had mapped my route through Google Maps and Michelin, I thought I knew the best way of making the five-hour journey from Sarajevo to my uncle's house in the Croatian hinterland near the Bosnian border. The route had even outlined a border crossing that was within only a few miles of my uncle's village.

It was when we reached the town of Livno that things started to go wrong. We were heading towards the mountains when I spotted what looked like the right road across the mountainous ridge into Croatia. There were no signs, but the road was exactly how it looked on the map. It was a brand new road, too new for any markings. Too new for any proper surfacing as well, which we doggedly decided to ignore. It snaked jaggedly in dizzying bends up the mountain for 11km, past no civilisation apart from a single lonely cottage.

Then the road came to an abrupt halt. Maybe the workers had gone on strike, but there was nothing ahead but mountainous scrub. We were in a hire car on a non-existent road with no proper maps and a storm was making its way through the Dinaric Alps. God knows what was on top of the ridge at the Croatian border. We had to turn back.

Unfortunately, we didn't turn back on to the right road. Rather than the proper road, we ended up on a bjeli put, a white farm track rather like the Italian strade bianche that wind through picturesque parts of Italy. This wasn't quite so picturesque. By this time, the forbidding mountains were feeling quite oppressive. The threatening storm had turn into a heavy downpour. It looked bleak – and bleaker still when we realised we had no idea where we were.

It was when we passed through a shelled-out village that I really began to worry. We were in the part of Bosnia that had endured horrendous fighting during the 1992-95 war. We drove through several villages that were ghost towns, decaying wrecked farms with rusting tanks in front gardens. One farm building had graffiti sprayed on it: horribly sinister messages from Croatian and Serbian fighters made me shudder as we drove through the relentless rain.

Finally – after about an hour and a half – we came off the bjeli put on to the road we should have been on in the first place. We eventually came to Bosansko Grahovo, birthplace of Archduke Ferdinand's killer Gavrilo Princip. It was also the birthplace of my father's beloved brother-in-law, but it was too wet and too late to do any exploring. Even so, I stopped at a café to double check I was on the right road. I dashed through the driving rain into a fog of cigarette smoke. Friendly curious faces crowded round me and reassured me that I was on the right road that would take us through Knin and eventually to to my uncle's house. It was considerably far from my original Google Maps route, which seemed more irrelevant as the miles ticked by.

Another couple of hours later and we finally arrived at my uncle's house. The rain had stopped and the temperature became almost balmy as we downed much-needed shots of plum brandy in the garden. My uncle commiserated, and then told me that we had taken the right route after all. The border crossing that was closest to his village was closed thanks to the high number of smugglers passing through. That wouldn't have been the best place to pitch up after a seven-hour drive.

A taste of Calabria

2014-10-09T23:39:00.000+01:00

Ten years ago, the food writer Matthew Fort drove a Vespa from the southern tip of Italy to Turin, having one food adventure after another. One of his earliest stops was at Le Carolee, an agriturismo in the middle of the Calabrian countryside east of Lamezia. In his book Eating Up Italy, he raved about the food produced by the warm and friendly Gaetano family, and wondered why on earth the British are so obsessed with Tuscany and Umbria, when the food of Calabria is infinitely better and much more interesting.

Ten years later, I'm sitting in the garden of Le Carolee in the dusk under palm trees and looking out over a valley of olive trees. I'm waiting for the first of four courses of deceptively simple Calabrian food, and I'm not disappointed. Antipasti of aubergine meatballs, courgette fritters and capocollo, a salami of pork shoulder made at the agriturismo. The pasta course was penne in an aubergine and tomato sauce. The meat course was slow-cooked veal that melted in the mouth. As it was September, dessert consisted of watermelon and honeydew melons that were in season and were being sold in countless roadside stalls by wizened farmers. We'd had local red wine that was just smooth enough followed by homemade limoncello. I sat back, listened to the gentle wind rustling through the olive groves and was pleased that I had three more dinners at Le Carolee to enjoy before I had to go home.

Over the next three nights I had swordfish with capers, olives and preserved peppers. And involtini of mozzarella with rocket, pancetta and tomatoes. And cracked and roasted olives grown on the estate. And thin slices of veal with pine nuts. And homemade tagliatelle – thicker than you would ever see in Britain – with sugo, over which was sprinkled a chopped red chilli and lots of parmesan. My favourite was filej con nduja – made by winding a thin strip of pasta round something like a knitting needle, and covering it with nduja, a soft sausage whose bright red colour gives a clue as to how much chilli is packed within.

It's not complicated and it's hardly Michelin-star stuff. It's cucina povera at its best. When you live in a region that's been poor for centuries, you learn how to make the best of what you have. And Calabria, poor in many ways but so very rich in others, is surprisingly teeming with produce of incredibly high quality – olives, courgettes, nuts, figs, dates, tomatoes, aubergines. The poorer the country, it seems, the more ways they have of cooking aubergines.

Same thing with chilli. Calabria's cuisine is spicy – but with warmth and depth of flavour. Red chillis, peperoncini, flavour everything from sausages to ice cream (which is delicious) and is known as the Viagra of the poor. Apparently they see chilli as an aphrodisiac. It also adds flavour and – importantly, during the old days of crushing poverty – it suppresses the appetite. I didn't have that problem. I couldn't get enough of chilli. Nor could I get enough of Calabria.

All photographs © Adam Batterbee

2013-11-14T23:03:00.000+00:00

Christmas magic in Bruges

Bruges’s Christmas markets are a major draw to one of Belgium’s most enchanting cities during the festive season. Several dozen wooden huts cluster in the main Markt square, where a temporary ice rink glitters with thousands of lights. Horse-drawn carriages clop on the cobbles in front of the historic restaurants lining the square, their crenellated rooftops adorned with yet more Christmas lights. No business has missed the chance to cover itself with tasteful wreaths, lights and baubles.

In the shadow of the looming 15^th-century Belfry, visitors warming their hands on glasses of mulled wine wander among the stalls looking for Christmas gifts. They have plenty to choose from: among them, Christmas decorations, toys, jewellery, leather handbags and ceramics. There’s also a substantial number of stalls selling warm woolly hats, scarves and gloves, which come in handy when the chilly wind rustles through the square.

When the shoppers run out of fuel, they head to the food stalls where they fill up on delicious braadwurst sausages, waffles, apple fritters and – a gratifying sight on a cold day – tartiflette smothered in gooey reblochon cheese. Those wanting their fix of Belgian friet (chips) queue up at the distinctive green fast-food stalls that stand guard outside the Belfry.

A brief walk down Steenstraat leads to Bruges’s smaller, more intimate Christmas market at Simon Stevinplein. Sparkling white lights drape the trees in the centre of the square, where the wooden huts form a ring. Here you’ll find artisan cheeses, jams, honeys and, this being a tobacco-loving nation, a stall selling everything you need to roll your own. There’s a mini funfair here too, as well as more stalls selling handicrafts. I carry on my annual tradition of adding a new decoration to my tree, this time a cute-looking ceramic Father Christmas who’s hanging upside down. Don’t ask me why.

The Christmas markets in Bruges aren’t the only place for gifts. Affluent, agreeable Bruges has a large number of upmarket and trendy shops selling women’s and men’s clothing, many of which line the parallel shopping streets of Noordzandstraat and Zudzandstraat. Kitchenware shops thrive too, tempting you with more gadgets than you ever thought you needed but realised you just had to have.

Then there’s the chocolate. Chocolatiers are everywhere, selling everything from kitsch souvenir chocolates to exquisite creations crafted by hand. Some of the chocolates look too good to eat, and the Christmas ones shaped like snowmen and Father Christmas look too adorable to take out of the box. The ones shaped into large breasts are another story.

Then there’s the beer. If your idea of beer heaven is a shop that includes a “Beer Wall” selling almost 800 varieties (with different glass to match), head to 2be, a shop housed in a 15^th-century former mayor’s house on Wollestraat. The beer lover in your life will thank you for the beautifully presented boxed sets, and those who don’t care for the stuff will be happy with other Belgian treats including chocolates and biscuits. There’s an inviting café attached, where the terrace overlooks the canal.

To continue the self-indulgent festive mood I found myself in, I explored two of the more unusual attractions that recall so much of the city’s history. This being Bruges, that meant chocolate and chips. The chocolate museum, Choco-Story, tells the fascinating story of how first the drink and then the solid form became such desirable foodstuffs. You don’t have to have a sweet tooth to become engrossed in the displays looking back over centuries of chocolate’s history. The visit finishes with a demonstration that will have you heading straight to the nearest chocolatier. (Or the museum shop, if you can’t wait that long.)

A more savoury story is told at the Friet Museum. The scent of fried potatoes wafts over displays explaining how the humble tuber has become such a staple part of the world’s diet. By the time you’ve reached the vintage kitchens showing how chips (or friet, or frites, or French fries) were fried in decades past, you are more than ready to visit the café and scoff a cone of chips (with mayonnaise, of course).

Even the most dedicated chocoholic and chipoholic need more substantial feeding, though, and can choose from hundreds of restaurants in Bruges. Cafedraal in Zilverstraat is a classy restaurant in a 15^th-century house, where mouthwatering seafood and meat dishes are served under cosy wooden beams. The Blauw Wit beef tournedos were cooked to a perfect rare state, served with chunky Belgian chips.

Afterwards it was only a few minutes’ walk back to my hotel, the comfortable and friendly three-star Maraboe. It’s central yet has its own car park – an essential thing if, like me, you travel by DFDS ferry and car. After all, it would be a bit difficult to lug all that food and drink home without one.

All photographs © Adam Batterbee

A French road trip in style

2013-07-19T22:06:00.000+01:00

Given the choice between taking a seven-year-old Ford Focus and an admittedly borrowed but shiny new Peugeot RCZ on a 1,500-mile trip through France, it was hardly a tough decision to make.

A chance conversation at a press lunch resulted in Peugeot lending me its latest sports coupé for my 10-day jaunt through western France. It wouldn’t be a test drive as such – just the opportunity to see how the low-slung RCZ sports coupé would cope on narrow winding country roads leading to hilltop villages as well as long stretches of motorway.

It would be a little while before I could show off this really quite beautiful car, however. The “dolphin-blue” RCZ sat patiently below deck during the civilised overnight crossing on Brittany Ferries from Portsmouth to St Malo. And then it went straight to the underground car park of the Grand Hotel des Thermes while we explored the underrated port of St Malo. But finally the car had a full six hours of being on view – and duly admired by passing motorists – as we headed south through the Pays de la Loire’s lush green countryside and Poitou-Charente’s endless sunflower fields towards the Dordogne.

I could see why the car turned heads. It resembles the Audi TT in shape and design, but has none of the WAG stigma attached. It’s also considerably cheaper than an equally tooled-up TT: mine was the six-gear GT HDi with all the bells and whistles and its on-the-road price is just over £25,000.

It was also immediately obvious that taking a fuel-efficient diesel on a long road trip was a good idea. The display showing the remaining miles before the next fill-up actually went up as we cruised along the motorway; the car was dutifully calculating that a steady speed along a smooth road was doing wonders for fuel efficiency. In fact, I didn’t refill until after 550 miles, and there was still fuel left in the tank.

I could also set the speed limit to prevent me from unwittingly breaking the law. Going at breakneck speed along French autoroutes is becoming a thing of the past, I’ve noticed over the years – at least among French drivers. Satnavs aren’t allowed to show locations of speed cameras any more, but then I had no desire to go above the 80mph motorway limit. And the car’s low position gave me the impression I was going much faster than I was.

It was only on the rather bumpy D roads towards my destination near Bergerac that I noticed that the extra-wide tyres and 19-inch wheels made the ride a bit harder. But then on the stretches where single-lane carriages briefly opened into two lanes – uphill, as they invariably do – the engine’s power made overtaking easy work.

We could nip past lumbering Dutch caravans that clogged the roads leading to the Dordogne’s most popular medieval villages: Beynac, Les Eyzies, La Roque-Gageac, Domme. Sunflowers lit up the fields along the D roads between the half-timbered village houses of Issigeac and Monpazier’s handsome arcaded square. These roads were quieter, made for pootling along – which suited the RCZ just fine.

The car would have plenty of time to glide through its six gears as we sped along the motorway through Limousin on the way north to the Loire Valley. The landscape flattened out somewhat as we reached villages along the confluence of the Loire and Vienne rivers, broken up occasionally by limestone ridges housing troglodyte caves. The car was getting heavier by this point, as the temptation to stock up on Saumur reds and rosés was proving too much. Luckily the boot was much bigger than you would expect from a coupé, with two narrow seats in the rear adding extra room. Indeed, the whole interior was remarkably spacious, with plenty of legroom and comfortable sculpted front seats.

There was just enough time to fill the boot to capacity with a last-minute shop near Calais before the return ferry crossing and the drive home. I was hoping against hope that the Peugeot driver might get lost on his way to pick up the car. Sadly he didn’t.

Images © Adam Batterbee

Bastille Day – France en Fête

2013-07-14T16:18:00.001+01:00

The French don't call their biggest holiday Bastille Day, of course. For them it's la fête nationale, or simply le quatorze juillet – even if half the country celebrates on the 13th rather than the 14th of July. If geography is on your side, you might be able to catch back-to-back festivities. Over the years, I've had the luck to be in France on both nights, and each experience has been as diverse as the country itself.

The village experience
If you're a Francophile, Bastille Day in a small village reinforces every reason why you love France. Last summer, while I was in the Lot Valley, I was taken by my hosts at Lot Cycling Holidays to the small village of Rampoux on 14 July. Several hundred people were squeezed into two long marquees, where €16 bought you five courses of rustic food and unlimited wine and water – capped off with creamy rounds of cabécou cheese. A band played old-fashioned French songs that required no dancing skill apart from a basic ability to waltz. There was raucous singing that went on till the early hours, and at some point I imagined they had set off the fireworks. We didn't stick around long enough to find out, as we had left by 2am. It was one of the most enjoyable nights I'd ever had in France.

The small town experience
Purely by chance I was in St-Girons in the Ariège one year on 13 July, intending just a quick stopover before going on to Carcassonne where I had planned to spend the festivities. I had no idea that St-Girons was one of the towns that celebrated on the 13th, so a stroll into the centre of this pleasant riverside town in the Midi-Pyrénées quickly revealed a massive party going on. More dancing, market stalls, dodgem cars for the kids and an impressive display of fireworks for such a small town.

The slightly bigger town experience
That brings me to Carcassonne, which has the second-largest fireworks display in France. (Paris comes on top, naturally.) The fireworks are set off behind the ramparts of the medieval citadel, La Cité, where the display has all the drama of a five-act play. By the end it looks as though the Cité is on fire. Utterly compelling.

The seaside town experience
A bowl of mussels on the quayside of Sète, followed by cheesy French bands playing in the main square. Then a manic bash on the dodgems before a cocktail at the water's edge and a brilliant fireworks display. I could think of worse ways of spending a July evening in Languedoc.

The twin town experience
Antibes and Juan-les-Pins sit side by side on the Mediterranean, barely a kilometre apart. By sheer luck, I was in Antibes on the 13th when they hold their festival, and in Juan-les-Pins on the 14th for theirs. As restaurants in Antibes were advertising hugely overpriced menus for the night of the fête, we decided to stock up on food from the market in Cours Masséna and have a picnic on the balcony of the seafront flat we were renting. The fireworks were being held just next door on the beach, where an orchestra was playing the theme tunes from James Bond films. It was entertaining, but there was none of the carnival atmosphere I'd seen at other celebrations. Meanwhile, in Juan-les-Pins, we were guests at the jazz festival on the 14th, when the organisers time the fireworks to go off between sets. Jazz on a summer's night and fireworks lighting up the Mediterranean. Pure magic.

Rimini: La Notte Rosa

2013-07-05T22:21:00.003+01:00

La Notte Rosa is like New Year’s Eve all over again – but with better weather and thousands more people enjoying the balmy summer air. Every July since 2005, this 100km stretch of the Adriatic has been putting on one of Italy’s liveliest festivals, la Notte Rosa, which translates inelegantly as “pink night”. Sounds better in Italian.

Everything is draped in pink – from the ancient bridge in Rimini’s old town to the hotels and bars lining the seaside strip. And everyone wears something in that colour, even macho Italian men who nonchalantly don garish pink wigs, T-shirts and shorts. Somehow, they pull off the look with complete panache.

Thousands of people stream through the streets of Rimini, all in a relaxed mood, stopping now and then to dance to a band performing on a street corner. Fireworks along the coast are set off at midnight, but that’s not the end. The party goes on all night: if you’re lucky enough to be awake after 5am, you just might catch one of the world’s biggest beach barbecues on the wide stretch of Rimini’s sands. Or sway along to the music of the pianist who managed to stay awake all night to serenade the partygoers draped on the sun loungers.

You might wonder why everyone joins in with such gusto in a festival that has no obvious link to the region. Usually festivals celebrate a seasonal event (such as a wine harvest) or some of the wonderful food produced in various parts of Italy. But la Notte Rosa has no such straightforward history.

La Notte Rosa was inspired by the summertime Nuit Blanche (White Night) in Paris, when the French capital’s art galleries are open all night in a festive atmosphere. So why pink? The local Rimini politician who came up with the idea rather liked a festival that celebrated womanhood – hence the pink. That gender segregation didn’t last long, though, as people of both sexes wanted to join the fun. It quickly turned into a festival that celebrated the beginning of the summer season.

For such a busy event, the atmosphere is remarkably chilled. The streets might be packed with people of all ages, but no one is in a hurry to get anywhere, and nor is alcohol an important part of the evening. The result is an incredibly genial and happy atmosphere that is positively infectious.

There are special events planned throughout the evening. Most are open to the general public, including concerts featuring Italian X Factor winners on specially erected stages by the venerable Grand Hotel. This former home of the film director Federico Fellini is also the setting for a sumptuous private party put on by la Notte Rosa’s main sponsor, Martini. It’s a wonderfully elegant affair, filled with the beautiful people of Italy. But you don’t need to be on the A-list to enjoy la Notte Rosa. It really is a magical feeling strolling along the seafront watching the Italian population enjoying itself. And no matter how late you stay up, there’s always the enormous Rimini beach waiting for you the following day.

Images © Adam Batterbee

Vimy Ridge: Canada's great sacrifice

2013-06-25T20:06:00.001+01:00

For nearly 20 years I’ve been zooming up and down the A26 from Calais to other parts of France. And each time I spotted the sober sign saying “Mémorial Canadien de Vimy”, I vowed I would stop one day and pay a proper visit to this monument commemorating one of the most significant battles of the First World War.

It took a recent overnight visit to nearby Arras to make me realise how easy it is to take in this evocative slice of history in a portion of land ceded by France to Canada. Restored trenches from that 1917 battle wind through one large section of the 107-hectare site, where grassy sections are pockmarked by shell holes. Signs everywhere warn you not to walk in areas where there are still unexploded munitions from 96 years ago. They can’t even use mowers to cut the grass, leaving that job instead to flocks of sheep. (Presumably they’re too light to trigger any explosions – one hopes.)

The horrors of trench warfare aren’t difficult to imagine when you see how close the German line came to the Allies’ defences. It was primarily Canadians who fought in April 1917 to take this vital ridge that had been stubbornly held by the Germans since the early days of the war.

Their success was a pivotal point in the war as well as in Canada’s young history, although the price paid for it was 3,598 dead Canadian soldiers. Their memories are kept alive in the quietly impressive monument designed by Canadian sculptor Walter Seymour Allward. Two towering pylons stand on a giant concrete base, where names of the 11,285 Canadian soldiers killed “somewhere in France” are carved. Among the sculpted figures is a woman who represents the young nation mourning her dead. Its simplicity is eloquent and almost unbearably moving.

Teams of young bilingual Canadians give informative tours of the site, mainly to other Canadians who have grown up with the story of Vimy Ridge. They all want to see for themselves the sacrifice their countrymen made for them nearly a century ago – in this corner of France that is forever Canada.

Images © Adam Batterbee

Normandy: Blood, toil, tears and sweat

2013-06-09T22:00:00.000+01:00

Normandy's D-Day beaches have a tight grip on the mentality of much of Western Europe. And rightly so, considering the vital importance of the June 1944 Normandy landings that finally hastened the end of the Second World War. Even the countless coaches of tourists trudging along coast can't diminish the impact of seeing first hand the scenes of such bravery, ingenuity and, ultimately, horror.

It was unseasonably chilly when I visited, just two days before the 69th anniversary of the D-Day landings. The wind was quite fierce along the Pointe du Hoc between Utah and Omaha Beach, the desolate spot where US Rangers took on the Germans on a rocky outcrop. The gun emplacements are still there, along the with giant craters created by falling bombs. I've seen photos of children playing in the gaping holes, oblivious to their significance. On the day I visited, only a few people were walking sombrely in the dips and hollows, visualising what the soldiers had to endure.

Just east of here is Omaha Beach, where an enormous, stark memorial on the beach is flanked by a modern sculpture that sits in the sea. A middle-aged American man wearing a Vietnam War veteran's jacket stood at the foot of the memorial, lost in thought.

Most visitors head straight to Omaha Beach's American cemetery and memorial, where the simple white crosses of the gravestones stretch into the distance towards the sea. The memorial museum is intensely moving and enlightening – and doesn't just focus on the American aspect of the operation. I thought I knew a lot about the invasion, but, thanks to one display in particular, I learnt about the vital role of the Ruperts, the 500 dummy parachutists dropped during Operation Titanic to fool the Germans. I shan't think of the name Rupert in quite the same way again.

Further east was Juno Beach, where the Canadian soldiers played their valiant role in the invasion. There is no cemetery here; in its place is an evocative and simply eloquent memorial consisting of countless names of the dead on blue plaques. On the way to the beach is a grey sculpture showing Paul Verlaine's poem "Chanson d'Automne", which was the signal the BBC used to alert the French resistance to the invasion.

Summertime on the Normandy coast brings out the crowds on the beach, eager to bask in the sun. It also evokes the memory of so many thousands of Allied men and women, whose sacrifice is inescapable.

Images © Adam Batterbee

An evening with Verdi

2013-05-20T00:51:00.000+01:00

One by one they introduce themselves, shaking hands. Nabucco, La Traviata, Rigoletto, La Forza del Destino, Otello. I was meeting the members of the Club dei 27, a Verdi appreciation society unlike any other. Every Thursday, they gather in a vaulted wine cellar in Parma, the central Italian city that celebrates the opera maestro in a particularly spirited manner.

Verdi was born 40km away in Busseto, but that’s close enough for the Parmigiani to have adopted the man who changed Italian opera, and was the inspiration behind a wonderfully elaborate opera house that rivals La Scala in Milan.

The men of Club dei 27 – and it’s only men – have been meeting since 1955 over a glass of wine, sharing their love of Verdi and genially arguing over his music. They each take the names of Verdi’s 26 operas – plus his Requiem – which makes the introductions somewhat surreal and sweetly amusing. Un Giorno di Regno (real name: Enzo) ushers me into the vaulted meeting room, where wooden chairs are neatly lined up against the wall. It’s not their usual Thursday, and about a third of them have made a special exception to meet me on a Monday.

As we all shuffle into the room, Un Giorno di Regno says: “This is what we do when we welcome guests.” The lights dim, and the club members line up in front of me. Someone has turned on the CD player, and the sound of the "Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves" from Nabucco seeps gently into the room.

The men begin to sing along to the recording, quietly at first. Their eyes are half closed, moved by the music as it crescendos. I am too, and I can feel my eyes pricking slightly. It is one of the most evocative pieces of music Verdi ever wrote, in which he transposed the 19th-century Italian desire for statehood to biblical times.

I’m still enveloped in the cocoon of sublime music when Un Giorno di Regno tells me about the other work that the Club dei 27 does. Its greatest pride is the education programmes it runs in local schools. Children as young as six are introduced to opera in an entertaining and unintimidating way, which has proved a huge success. Some have gone on to study classical music and opera formally at a conservatoire, Un Giorno di Regno tells me with a beaming smile.

I’m then shown the opera wall of fame, on which stars of the opera world have been given maestro status by the Club dei 27. Singers and conductors have been awarded this honour, some posthumously, others in the room in which I’m standing. These stars, too, are given the same musical welcome I received. I spot Placido Domingo’s photograph on the wall.

“So Placido Domingo was here too? And did you greet him the same way you greeted me?”

“Yes,” the men answer.

“But wasn’t it a bit daunting to sing in front of one of the world’s greatest tenors?”

“No,” says Un Giorno di Regno, in all seriousness. “Singing this aria is like singing our national anthem. We sing it with the same sense of pride, and no fear of who might be listening.”

Opera for the masses indeed.

A visit to Auschwitz

2013-02-22T11:10:00.002+00:00

It’s the numbers you can’t take in. The 1,300,000 people murdered systemically at the two main camps at Auschwitz, 90 per cent of them Jews. The numbers of people sent directly to their deaths at the second camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The numbers slowly or quickly tortured and terrorised and worked to death at the first camp set up in 1940 near the Polish village of Oswiecim.

It’s the corridors filled with photographs of the murdered – taken in their striped uniforms and looking dazed. Two Czech identical twin girls who died within two months of each other. Members of the Polish resistance who were betrayed and sentenced to death.

It’s the cells where prisoners were starved to death, or left without oxygen to die slowly. It’s the small wooden bench where prisoners were strapped before being whipped. Beside this barracks is the death wall, where thousands were shot after being tortured.

It’s the infirmary where prisoners who wouldn’t get better were given lethal injections. The inmates called it the crematorium waiting room.

It’s the gas chamber and the ovens.

It’s the look of shock that hits the faces of teenagers on group tours when they reach the room of children’s shoes. The long window case beside this is stacked with suitcases covered with names, dates of birth and addresses of Jews who were told they would be reunited with their belongings as soon as they came out of the showers.

It’s the knowledge that once you leave Auschwitz I and travel 3km to Auschwitz-Birkenau, you leave a camp of torture and sadism to a camp with only one purpose: extermination of the Jewish race. As quickly as possible.

It’s where the railway track goes under the gate of death to the end of the line. It’s covered in snow when I visit, and the biting wind cuts through layers of modern hi-tech winter clothing.

It’s knowing that most of those who survived until January 1945 had died on the death march when the Nazis evacuated the camp.

It’s realising that only 7,500 were found alive by the Red Army.

It’s the numbers you can’t take in. And the evil.

... In with the new

2013-01-02T15:43:00.002+00:00

We decided to see the year out in northern France, with nothing planned beyond booking a hotel room in Boulogne-sur-Mer's old town. The French love New Year's Eve – probably more than Christmas. Time to bring out the oysters, foie gras and champagne, and it's on New Year's Eve – not Christmas – when people sell bunches of mistletoe to be kissed under at midnight. With this in mind, I thought that even a diabolical weather forecast shouldn't get in the way of a fun French new year.

It did, of course – at least in the beginning. The ferry crossing was truly awful as the ship bounced its way across the channel. Thank goodness seasickness disappears the moment you step off a ship.

Most of the old town's restaurants were resolutely shut, or had no plans to stay open for le Réveillon de la Saint-Sylvestre, as New Year's Eve is called in France. Eventually we found Le Parisien, a cosy little place that was taking bookings, albeit with a €5 deposit. Seconds after walking out, we were accosted by a restaurateur we tried earlier but who wasn't opening that evening. He was out of breath. "I tried to stop you. Did you make a booking there?" Well, yes, we did. "Oh God, it's horrible. Really nice owner but the food is terrible. You'll regret it in the morning." Marvellous news.

Still, there was the town to wander round, which we haven't done for many years. Twinkling lights hung everywhere, keeping up the festive air. The mulled wine in Le Français café was delicious, and it was just as entertaining watching the elderly locals file in two by two for their glass of sparkling wine.

Dinner ended up being perfectly adequate – nothing worse than some of the mediocre meals we'd had in France before. As it was only just past 10pm, we headed into the lower town to find a place in which to see in the new year. Bars we had seen open earlier were closing their doors. It wasn't looking promising. We spotted a crowd outside Le Français smoking under the awning. Ah, just the spot. "Soirée privée" said the sign. Oh. The smokers commiserated with us and helpfully pointed out another bar down the road that should be open. "Where are you from? Are you from the region?" We're from Britain. "Eengleesh!" said one woman delightedly. "Oh, they'll let you in. Come on, let's find the owner." Sure enough, the anglophile owner – who had a poster of Princess Diana and Union flag bunting on one wall – was happy to let a couple of strangers loose among what was obviously a close circle of friends.

Hilariously dire French television was broadcasting a cabaret extravaganza as we drank wine and waited until midnight. The bar owner ostentatiously placed a chair under a large bunch of mistletoe hanging from the ceiling. Midnight struck and the room erupted in a frenzy of cheek-kissing – four pecks each in this part of France. Not surprisingly it took a while to get to everyone. The person who gets kissed under the mistletoe is guaranteed happiness for the year. I stood under it and my husband gave me the now customary four pecks. "Not like that!" the crowd chorused. "On the lips!"

Another glass of sparkling wine later (on the house) and we left the bar on a tide of goodwill and shouts of "bonne année!". Even the rain had stopped, and we were ridiculously pleased with ourselves for having stumbled into such an unexpectedly delightful New Year's Eve. The glow carried on into New Year's Day, when the sun came out and we joined what looked like half the northern French population taking a seaside stroll along the promenade in the nearby beach resort of Wimereux. Lunch of mussels and whelks at the Cap Nord restaurant on the seafront was an excellent way to start the year. Even the sea behaved itself and was as smooth as glass on the return crossing.

As so many of my travels have to include meticulous planning ahead, sometimes it can be a joy just to go with the flow.

Out with the old ...

2012-12-30T18:47:00.000+00:00

I'm not alone in thinking that New Year's Eve is horribly overrated. Too many expectations, too much hysteria and far too many restaurants charging five times the usual rate for a "special" menu. I like the idea of marking the end of a year and the beginning of a fresh new one, but I'm not so keen on the forced jollity.

The best New Year's Eves are the ones that take you by surprise – when nothing is planned yet everything falls into place. Some years ago when I was living in Bristol, my friends and I were at a loose end one New Year's Eve, having left it too late to sort anything out. The only restaurant table in town was for 7pm. All right, we thought, at least we'll be well fed. Just around the corner from the restaurant was the only pub in town that didn't require buying a ticket in advance – and it had a decent DJ. Great, a bit of dancing would go down well. There we ran into mates who told us about a nearby party hosted by mutual friends. Armed with plenty of booze we had the foresight to buy earlier, we were welcomed with open arms. Snow was falling gently when we walked home at 4am, marvelling at the night sky and pleased we weren't shivering in a horrendous queue for non-existent cabs.

I had the great luck to spend a couple of New Year's Eves skiing in France, and if I had my way (and the budget) I'd do this every year. The French love the occasion even more than Christmas – and why not, when it's another excuse to bring out the oysters and champagne? In a Pyrenean village we joined the party in the local ice skating rink, while people of all ages strolled with streets with bottles of champagne and somehow turned outdoor drinking into a civilised event.

And this year? Well, it's France again, but not quite in a magical mountain setting. We decided on a whim to book a ferry to go to Boulogne on the northern French coast, a place we'd visited many times before – but never on New Year's Eve. A quick trawl through the internet revealed a distinct lack of restaurants that can be bothered to open, and those that are have put on one of those dreaded "special" menus. So we're off with no plans, nothing in place – apart from emergency supplies of cheese, pâté and fizz. The only thing that's certain is the dreadful weather forecast. Wish me luck. And Happy New Year.

Olympics guide to London transport

2012-05-01T18:08:00.000+01:00

This summer, London's beleaguered public transport system will be hammered as rarely seen before. The expected mass exodus of the natives to avoid the Olympics is unlikely to happen to any great extent, so millions upon millions of people will have to be squeezed on to our antiquated Underground. This will result in an awful lot of grumpy people (that'll be me, then) muttering in disbelief at tourists' inability to grasp the basics of travelling in London. Here are a few tips to reduce the grumpiness, if only by a smidgeon.

1. How to use the escalator in a Tube station
Patronising title, I know, but believe me, people still need a lesson in this. It all boils down to this: STAND ON THE RIGHT AND KEEP THE LEFT CLEAR FOR PEOPLE TO WALK. Wonderfully simple logic, I know, but hard for many to grasp. It's not just tourists who ignore this, of course. But, really, it's just good manners. That leads me to ...

2. Don't block the entrance
You reach the entrance, or the exit, or the ticket gates, or the train platform, and there they are – a cluster of people who arrive and just stop. And don't move. And then wonder why you're scowling at them as you try to get through the throng. Shuffling over just a few feet will make a difference.

3. How to board a train
More patronising tones, but I'm standing firm on this. A Tube train finally arrives and what do you do? We'll, what you don't do is stand in front of the doors and prevent people from getting off. Because this will just delay your chance to get on the train. Another simple piece of logic routinely ignored. And once you do board, bear in mind that there's a pretty good chance that someone will be behind you and will want to get on the train as well. This is not the signal for you to saunter on and just stand in front of the doors. Expect to get nudged forward, with varying degrees of politeness.

4. A couple of Tube tips
London Underground trains have buttons on the doors that indicate "open". They don't actually do anything. The doors will open automatically. Also, regular Tube passengers are accustomed to a juddering stop-start motion of the train as it tries to leave a station. This means people are leaning too heavily against the doors, which will prevent the train from leaving. So don't lean on the doors. Yes, it is your fault.

5. Other forms of public transport, namely Boris Bikes
London's bike-rental scheme has been a huge success – too much so for many people (yep, me again) who find it considerably more difficult to find a functioning bike now that everyone can rent one easily. The problem is that many people who happily hop on one of these things have no idea of the rules of the road. You wouldn't get in a rental car and blithely ignore the law, yet that's what people do with bikes. Not just naughty, but dangerous. Here are a few basics.

5a. We drive and cycle on the left – gauche – sinistra – links – izquierda – esquerda – levo – etc
That also applies to bike lanes. Do try to bear that in mind. And don't let your kids weave all over the path, even if it's within a park. You might think you're in a safe place, but there are plenty of speeding cyclists (this time not me) who are in a hurry and have little patience with people who get in their way.

5b. Know when to give way to oncoming traffic
When you come to a crossing or any sort of junction and you see broken lines in front of you on the road, that means you do not have right of way. Let other people – be they pedestrians or other cyclists – pass first. I really wouldn't ignore this rule. People will get hurt.

5c. Indicating when you're going to turn would be helpful now and again
Stick the appropriate arm out if you're turning left or right. We can't always read your mind. This inability to indicate applies to cars as well, but that's another story.

What all of these points boil down to is to remember that there are other people travelling with you – in London's case, anything up to nine million people. So take a moment to pay some attention to your surroundings and you might just keep some of the natives (including me) from growling too loudly behind you.

Hotel websites – less is more

2012-03-04T15:04:00.015+00:00

It's an easy trap to fall into. A hotel wants to revamp its website and has a quick trawl through the web to see the latest concepts. It finds a web designer who assures the client that all the latest online bells and whistles

will be just the thing to entice potential

guests. The result is a website that is so

teeth-clenchingly annoying that the punter is put off before he even thinks of setting foot in the place.

This is a familiar whinge from travel writers, whose needs are often different from an average holidaymaker. We're usually up against a deadline and need to find basic information very quickly. A phone number, for example. Or an address. These would be quite handy to have on the opening page. Too often they're not. And I don't want to know about a toll-free number that doesn't work for international callers. (US hotels, I'm looking at you.)

But surely travel writers aren't the only people who sit impatiently while an elaborate intro wastes your precious time. If a website gives me the choice to "skip intro", I always will. There's nothing in the intro that shouldn't appear in the main site.

And then there's music. It doesn't belong on hotel websites. End of discussion. No arguments. The mute button goes on at once.

Photo galleries are lovely, useful and all part of the fun. Please make them easier to click through. Don't have each photo open its own window. It's very tiresome.

My biggest bugbear is one that involves a fundamental reason for choosing a particular hotel: the room rates. I want a list of tariffs for all types of rooms and showing the different seasons. A minimum and a maximum. Very simple. What I don't want is to have to input my dates before I'm told what offers fall on those dates. I need to know early on if the hotel is within my price range. Going through the whole inputting-of-dates rigamarole is another time-wasting nuisance. It also doesn't endear me to the hotel, as I automatically assume that it's afraid to be honest in its dealings. Why does price have to be something to hide? I'm fully aware that hotels want to have the flexibility to drop their prices at certain times and will offer incredible discounts. But I'd rather have a reasonably clear indication of the price range to begin with.

When I read flowery prose about the "essence" and the "philosophy" of the hotel, my eyes glaze over. And then I get angry when they neglect to tell me important information about the hotel's layout – such as that new annexe they built that is a 10-minute walk from the hotel.

But all of this matters not a jot when I can't get on to the site to begin with – because it's only in Flash. So that immediately excludes iPhone and iPad users, those people who are being continually bombarded with brilliant new travel apps for their devices. So don't forget to ask that clever web designer to come up with an HTML version too.

I'm curious to hear what experiences hoteliers have had with their websites and how they've affected business. Feel free to pass on your thoughts.

Are excursions worth it?

2011-08-17T11:08:00.004+01:00

Some friends of mine were visiting Europe for the first time, and they chose to take a guided tour that zoomed through four countries in 10 days. You know the sort: if it's Tuesday this must be Belgium. I'm not necessarily criticising this kind of tour, as many tourists find that it's their best economical option. What does annoy me, however, is the excursions offered by the tour companies. They argue that it's the way they make money out of these cut-price tours, as the travel costs are kept to a minimum. That might be true, but it's unfair on the customer.

The tour operators rely on the fact that many of their clients are first-time visitors and don't know what they want to see, or that they don't feel confident enough to strike out on their own. Or even that they can't be bothered and prefer to be led. But do the companies really need to charge up to four times what a tour is worth – or, worse still, charge for attractions that are free to begin with?

To take some examples: an excursion in Paris takes in the Louvre and Notre-Dame, charging €45 for the privilege. A full ticket at the Louvre is €14 and Notre-Dame is free. If this hugely overpriced excursion includes jumping the horrendous queues at the Louvre, then people who are pressed for time might consider it money well spent. But it's free to visit Notre-Dame, and the cathedral even organises its own free tours. Similarly, a "special" night-time trip on a bateau mouche (excluding dinner) on the Seine costs €32, when a trip usually costs only €11.

The Rome excursions are just as daft. You can pay €69 to visit the Vatican and Colosseum with the tour company, or pay €30.30 for both on your own. There's even an excursion to Piazza Navona and the Pantheon (pictured) for the ludicrous sum of €32. Both places are free, so why not just buy a map?

It doesn't take much effort to do a bit of research on your own before you set off and make some decisions about what you want to visit. If you have only one day in Paris or Rome, you might just want to take in one major attraction and leave the rest of the time to explore and have a delicious lunch. You might enjoy getting a feel for the place rather than just ticking off a list of places you feel you have to see.

What all hoteliers should know

2011-06-05T12:44:00.005+01:00

For the past four weeks, I have been in France researching the latest Frommer's guidebook to Provence. This involved 21 different hotel/apartment stays in 27 nights. Over the years, I've stayed in more hotels than I can remember, but having this prolonged period away from home has really focused my mind on what hoteliers consistently get wrong – as well as what they do right.

First things first: all hoteliers should spend at least two nights in their own hotels – with their luggage. If you're male, then get your wife, sister or other frank female to do the same. Too often no one bothers to get a woman's point of view. This is daft, as it's usually the woman who chooses the accommodation for the family holiday.

Secondly, the bathroom. I've stayed in brand-new five-star hotels with fantastic showers that have leaked all over the floor. And why can't people put a shelf in the shower? All those lovely fittings and nowhere to put your shampoo except on the floor. If a designer tries to tell you that shelves will "spoil the line", slap him. Oh, and a strong hook wouldn't go amiss either for people with hanging toiletries cases. (In fact, hooks in general are a good thing. More, please.)

Beautifully designed bathrooms with very deep basins look lovely. But spare a thought for short-sighted women who need to get close to a mirror to put on makeup. If the main mirror is three feet away, have the decency to put a small makeup mirror on the side wall. To those hotels that have already done so, thank you. It's very appreciated.

A special plea to French hoteliers that, unfortunately, will go unnoticed: put up a shower curtain. Otherwise, if you're determined to have an open shower, then leave a huge pile of towels to mop up the floor. If you've gone to the trouble to put up a shower screen, try to find one that actually works.

Small pedal bins in the bathroom are the work of the devil and should be banned. As are those chrome covers for the toilet roll. It is not aesthetically displeasing to see an uncovered bin or a naked toilet roll. We can handle it, trust me.

Very rarely are there enough plug sockets for today's traveller. These days, not many of us go around without a mobile phone, laptop, digital camera, iPod, etc, and all of them need to be charged up at some point.

And another thing: full-length mirrors. They don't need to take up much space and can easily be fitted behind the door of a wardrobe. Speaking of wardrobes, can we have more than five hangers? And can we have deep enough hanging space for dresses? I recently stayed in a supposedly "superior" room whose wardrobe was too short to hang a T-shirt.

I want to hug hoteliers who have the trust to leave a proper hair dryer in the bathroom – one that doesn't require constantly pressing a button to get the silly thing to work. Some people's hands cramp quickly. Thankfully, some manufacturers have come up with a model that is stuck to the wall but has a proper on-off switch. They do exist; I've seen them.

If you advertise free wifi, do make it clear when it works only in reception and not in the rooms. During this trip, I stayed in everything from two-star to five-star hotels, and not a single one charged for wifi. The luxury hotels that do are just being greedy. Add it to the cost of the room if you feel the need.

I have yet to see the point to a turndown service, except for the chocolates and perhaps a bottle of water. They're intrusive, almost always done when you're still getting ready to go out, and it's not very relaxing to feel compelled to tidy up before you go out for the evening. Leave the chocolates and the water during the morning clean-up.

Hotel breakfasts have become ridiculously overpriced and this is something that deserves its own blog post. Since when did the cost of breakfast equal or exceed the price of lunch?

Most of these suggestions require very little expense, and most hotels can certainly afford the odd hook or mirror here and there. These little things might sound insignificant, but they all add up.

Done roaming – a cautionary tale

2011-04-19T17:25:00.004+01:00

You would think, with the amount of travelling I do, that I would have sussed out the confusing world of mobile phone roaming charges. Evidently not, as my recent phone bill from Orange shows. I seem to have fallen into a classic trap of getting severely stung by extortionate roaming charges while abroad. And all thanks to a rubbish little app.

Ever since I got my first BlackBerry, I have been careful to buy additional travel data bundles that would allow me to access my emails without spending a small fortune. The trouble started when I apparently responded to an Orange text while I was in France early this year. As I was approaching the limit of my travel bundle, Orange asked me if I wanted my roaming limit lifted. Although I don't remember sending the text, Orange maintains that I did – even though I hadn't reached my data bundle limit. And no one pointed out that lifting the limit is for all time – not just for that trip.

Two trips to France later, I came home to find a massive bill, even though I had bought data bundles. What on earth was causing my phone to rack up this huge bill? I always turned off the updating facility on Twitter, for example, and even deleted the official Twitter for BlackBerry app that didn't give you this option.

Then I remembered that I had downloaded the only free BlackBerry app that tracks the number of Boris bikes that are in London's docking stations. The default setting meant that the app was merrily updating itself EVERY 30 SECONDS while I was in France. How can I have been such an idiot not to check all the settings? I've since deleted the app (which didn't work very well anyway), put the roaming limit back in place and bought another data bundle for my trip next month. If I bust the limit, so be it. Bear that in mind if I don't respond to your emails relatively quickly.

Right, must get back to work and make some money to start paying off this monstrous bill. By the way, has anyone figured out quite why mobile phone companies charge such ridiculous amounts for roaming? I'd like to hear a rational answer.

When readers fight back

2011-03-07T15:52:00.004+00:00

I was happy to see a feature in the Daily Telegraph recently about one of my favourite French ports, Sète. Anthony Peregrine wrote an enjoyable article about this unpretentious town that isn't really on the radar of most UK visitors. It's a bit scruffy, yes, but it's a real working port that has more important business to attend to than pandering to tourists: namely its huge fishing industry. Anthony was up front when he described some parts as run down. St-Tropez it isn't, nor does it want to be. I discovered it accidentally 10 years ago, and have been visiting ever since.

So I was quite taken aback when I saw the scathing comments from readers at the bottom of the article. Several called it a dump, suggesting that people would be better off visiting Slough. Another wondered if Anthony had ever actually visited the place. Considering that Anthony has been based on the South of France for a couple of decades, my guess is that he would have made Sète's acquaintance by now. Then there was that inevitable comment about writers swanning off on all-expenses paid trips and feeling compelled to write something good about a place even if it's a slagheap. (Why does everyone assume that all travel writers are on expenses? Most of us aren't.)

I've been to Sète numerous times over the past 10 years, and – bar one occasion – in a personal capacity. Why do I come back again and again to this place that supposedly makes Slough look good? For precisely the reasons Anthony explains in his article, and in one I wrote a couple of years ago (which you can read here if you fancy). If you want overcrowded expensive beaches, stick to the Riviera. If you want exquisite seafood and long, empty sands that stretch for miles, then give Sète a go. With any luck, you won't run into Sète-baiting Telegraph readers.

In praise of the vaporetto

2010-10-27T16:25:00.008+01:00

For regular visitors to Venice, vaporetti are old hat. They're the large water buses that lumber up and down the Grand Canal and back and forth to the various islands in the Venetian lagoon.They're as ubiquitous as the old London Routemaster bus used to be, and just as convenient. What I found odd, though, was the number of people I've spoken to who had visited Venice but never bothered to use this basic and important form of transportation.

Some people confuse vaporetti with water taxis, which are plush and comfortable but very expensive – about €30 for a journey in the centre. And far too many visitors still think that the gondola is the only way to travel on the water. (It would be if you fancy squandering €70-80 for an hour's ride and feeling a bit silly when other tourists gawp at you.) I had one gondolier badgering me and refusing to believe me when I said they were too expensive and that I had no intention of going in one. He then dropped his price to €60, which I'd rather spend on dinner, frankly.

Vaporetti, on the other hand, are big, functional and not very attractive, but they get you around the city and beyond in a scenic yet practical way. Some have an open section at the front, where you can get views of both sides of the canal. Others have the same in the rear. Then there's a central part that's under cover with seats and an open-sided covered bit. Once you've had a few journeys on these, you'll head inside for the comfort of a seat rather than be exposed to the elements. Having said that, my first view of Venice was from the open section in the middle, where even the relentless rain couldn't obliterate the beauty of the city.

Unless you're in Venice for only a few hours, it's definitely worth getting a transport pass which will give you unlimited journeys within a set period. As a single journey on a vaporetto costs €6.50, regardless of distance, this makes sense. Venice Connected is the city's transport site where you can book tickets in advance (and it's in English).

I had a 72-hour pass that cost me €28. It paid for itself in five journeys, two of which I had to take anyway to get to and from the bus station at Piazzale Roma to catch the Treviso airport bus. I ended up taking about 14 journeys in total, as it became much more

fun to walk out to the further reaches of the city, such as Cannaregio, and then relax on a vaporetto for the journey back. It was so easy to pop over to the cemetery island of San Michele, or the church and bell tower on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore. Even the Lido was only 20 minutes from Piazza San Marco.

The final vaporetto journey back to the bus station was on a fine evening, when the sun was just beginning to set. The open section at the rear was empty, allowing us to enjoy the golden views in peace. Now that's the way to take your leave of this glorious city.

Guidebooks vs the web

2010-10-03T13:07:00.003+01:00

Guidebooks – past their use-by date or still an important part of travelling? We never tire of debating this, especially as more apps arrive that promise to take the place of physical (and heavy) books.

I was intrigued by an article in the Observer celebrating all the wonderful apps you can use if you happen to pitch up in a place without a guidebook. The writer makes some very good points, but misses a few others. The most important is, of course, access to the web. While he mentions the fact that roaming costs are coming down in Europe, they're still terrible for European users visiting North America. And not everywhere has 3G, as I recently discovered in Montenegro. (Luckily I had my trusty guidebook to read when the hotel's dodgy internet access conked out again and again.)

If you're travelling throughout the UK and you have an iPhone, it can be enlightening and entertaining to explore a new place using only your phone (not so much on a BlackBerry, though). But when I'm walking through a continental city and I want to stop for a coffee, out comes the guidebook for a relaxing read – and one I can share with the people I'm with. I have turned up in places unexpectedly and tried to find decent maps and info on my BlackBerry, but found it a frustrating experience.

There are arguments against guidebooks, of course, one obvious one being that they go out of date in seconds. But I take great pleasure at looking at my shelves of books that remind me where I've been and where I'm off to next. As far as I know, there isn't an app for that.

London on two wheels

2010-08-05T21:55:00.005+01:00

It's been a week now since London introduced its bike hire scheme, and thousands rushed to register as a member. I was one of them, on my computer at 7am on 30 July to get in there early. Everything went smoothly until the website crashed just as it was processing my payment. So far, so expected. Things were bound to go wrong with such an ambitious scheme, weren't they?

Straight on the phone, then, to a helpful but not entirely clued-up Transport for London staff member. At least he managed to get my membership sorted and told me the key would arrive within a few days. A week went by – nothing. Back on the phone. They said I hadn't paid for access. Oh, right. Access (daily, weekly or annually) isn't the same as usage (the most quoted one being the first half hour being free). So I've set up an automatic thingy that means I can hop on a bike as often as I like within 24 hours for only £1 – assuming my journeys were less than 30 minutes. As I planned to cycle only from the Tube station to The Independent's office in Kensington no more than three times a week, I thought that was the best option. No journey would take more than half an hour.

I insert my new black key into the docking station near Queensway Tube. Red light. Even if you're not familiar with the system, you can assume that a red light doesn't bode well. Back on the phone. (By the way, use the 020-8216 6666 number from your mobile rather than the expensive 0845 number.) Problem with the system, madam. Can you try again in two hours? No I can't, as I have to be in work in 10 minutes. I trudge through Kensington Gardens in a bad temper, wishing I could swoosh through it on a bike.

I get the chance on my lunch hour. Hurrah! It works. I pootle along Kensington High Street, dock the bike at a station, nip into the supermarket, pick up another bike with my shopping and return to the office. Later, when I'm going home, I cycle through Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park, ending up at Speaker's Corner before I reluctantly dock the bike and head into the Tube at Marble Arch. If Oxford Street hadn't been such a nightmare, I could have gone on and on and on...

Yesterday morning, I try the bikes at Lancaster Gate. Obviously a popular spot, as only two bikes are left. Neither would accept my key. More swearing. I stomp through Hyde Park towards the Serpentine to the next docking station was, all the time on the phone to a TfL staff member. Thousands of people have registered, madam, and only a few have had problems. Yes, and I'm one of them. But I cheer up when my key works and I get a bike. Lovely ride through the park to the office. And then another lunchtime bike ride. Great exercise. Who needs a gym?

Leaving the office to go home, I insert my key. Red light. A man beside me tries his key. All the bikes are dead. We walk to two other stations. Red lights. He gets on the phone to TfL. They've been having problems ... could take up to two hours. Another bad-tempered trudge through the park.

I know a scheme like this would be full of glitches, and I'm not the only frustrated one. But much as London Mayor Boris Johnson annoys me, I have to admit his bike scheme is an excellent idea. I love the Boris bike, and I'm now officially a fan. Just get the sodding thing working properly, please.