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The Pensive Traveller is off on her travels! From next week on, I’ll be bringing you a brand new column, Tales from Shanghai, which will explain exactly what it’s like to live and work in China’s buzziest city.
So visit the FlightComparison blog next Friday for the first installment.
PT
There are some places in the world that are charged with so much history that they are difficult to visit. I’ve never been to Cambodia’s Killing Fields, nor to the concentration camps of Poland and Germany, so I can’t speak from personal experience about what is to be seen and felt there. But I did visit Anne Frank’s house in Amsterdam, and was emotionally silence by what I saw. To stand in the very room where she hid, and to learn that she was discovered only days before the war finished, was something so incredibly visceral that it evades description.
I was talking to a friend recently about his experiences at the Killing Fields. He said he couldn’t speak for many hours after his visit. “What can you say to people, after seeing all of that?”
Many people avoid going to such places because they feel it would put some sort of ‘downer’ on a holiday that is meant to be fun, and I can well understand this. But it is so incredibly important that we educate ourselves about the horrors and mistakes of history so that such things are never allowed to happen again.
When you’ve travelled the world, most of the places, faces, beaches and hotels blend into one fuzzy memory after a while. But certain things stick in your mind. For me, one such place is Grunberg House.
Back in September 1999 I was reaching the end of a road trip that had taken me all the way from Key West up to New England. I was due to fly home from New York in a week’s time so I had a few days to explore. It was Autumn time - the best season to see New England. The trees were a patchwork quilt of reds, browns and ochres; it was picture-postcard perfect.
I drove out of Montpelier into the Green Mountains of Vermont one quiet afternoon. I stopped to see Mount Mansfield and Camel’s Hump Mountain before finding a motel for the night. My accommodation throughout the trip had thus far involved the sort of all-American motel you see in road movies. A novelty at first, but I was quickly tiring of the monotony. So you can imagine my happiness when I drove past a sign painted in cheery German script - Grunberg House. Finally, a hotel that didn’t look like a 1940s pre-fab. I parked up and went to investigate.
Grunberg House rose out of the pines like a Tyrolean mirage. Dark wood beams, carved balconies and a chalet roof. It was beautiful. And, even better, they had a room for me. The inside of the chalet was like an Austrian living room. A piano with Bach music scores, shelves upon shelves of books, over-sized sofas..
I spent three nights at Grunberg House and all but forgot that I was in the United States. Sitting with my morning coffee on the back terrace, I felt as if I was staying at some quaint Tyrolean retreat. I guess that’s the beauty of travel - finding something completely out of the blue that stays with you forever.
Experience New England for yourself. Find cheap flights to America at FlightComparison.co.uk.
Find out more about Grunberg Haus here.
One of the things I love most about travelling is the first day in a foreign city. It’s like stepping out into uncharted territory.
I went to India a couple of years ago. I had arranged to meet an old friend in the Karol Bagh district, and I arrived before him so I had a whole day to myself. It was my first time in India and I was filled with a mixture of curiosity and apprehension. Once I’d found my hotel I went for a walk through the streets of the district. It was incredible. So utterly unlike any other city I’d been to. And what made it all the more amazing was that a mere ten hours previously, I’d been walking through cold, sterile London. Absolutely everything was different - the smell of the air, the sound of the car horns… (if you’ve ever been to India you’ll remember that strange duck-like quack that stands out from the rest of the traffic noise). India will never be truly familiar to me, but I got used to it after two weeks, and never recreated that first morning of awe.
I guess it’s for that reason that I love the places I’ve been to, but I like the ones more that I haven’t yet been to.
Find cheap flights to world destinations at FlightComparison.co.uk.
There’s nothing quite like watching a sunset in foreign climes. They are beautiful full stop, but the view over a damp British city to the sun fading behind a grey horizon dotted with tower blocks doesn’t quite have the same appeal as watching it fall in a shimmer of vermillion behind a tropical sea.
The most beautiful sunset I’ve ever seen was in Santorini. They make quite a thing of it there. It’s best viewed from the tip of the island in the village of Oia. Islanders and tourists throng the streets as dusk begins to fall. The summer sun is a big disc of misty orange, toning the sky with murmurs of azure and cerulean before disappearing like molten topaz behind the distant hills of Eos. When it finally sets, applause breaks out among the gathered crowds. You feel like you’ve witnessed something almost theatrical.
Another great place for sunset viewing is Mallory Square on Florida’s Key West. It’s a similar set up to Santorini. After a day soaking up rays, boating, or dining on Key Lime Pie, everyone flocks to the square to watch the day’s end made manifest over the ocean.
I’m not sure what makes holiday sunsets so romantic. Maybe it’s because it’s a natural end to a day of relaxation, tinged with the promise of more the next day. Perhaps it’s the knowledge that the folks back home haven’t had their sunset yet, or had it hours ago. Whatever it is, you really can’t beat it.
Find cheap flights to sunset destinations at FlightComparison.co.uk.
This week our globetrotter muses on the architectural treasures of Miami Beach.
Some of my favourite cities in the world are ones whose architecture is completely unique. I could spend hours wandering the streets of Barcelona in the shadow of the Sagrada Familia with its weird spires, or staring at the melted-wax façade of the Casa Batllo. I love it when a city is typified by its architecture.
That’s why I’m so fond of Miami Beach, famous for the candy colours and soft lines of its Art Deco district. Walking down Ocean Drive is like taking a step back in time to an era when Cadillacs cruised the boulevards taking swells and hustlers to the nearest speakeasy.
The Art Deco area lies between the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Lenox Court to the west, 6th Street to the south and Dade Boulevard to the North. It has the largest number of Art Deco buildings in the world, all built between 1923 and 1943. The area fell into disrepair after the Art Deco boom was over, and the buildings were threatened with dereliction. That was until former interior designer Barbara Capitman came to the rescue and made it her business to preserve them. The district was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, and there is now a street named in Barbara’s honour.
Miami is one of America’s most popular party towns and the sun shines for most of the year. But what makes it really magical for me is that stretch of pastel coloured buildings.
See Miami Beach for yourself. Get the cheapest flights at FlightComparison.co.uk.
This week our whimsical wanderer muses on travelling companions old and new.
It was late afternoon. I was sitting on the terrace of my hostel on the outskirts of a small village in the north of Bali, sipping from a bottle of beer and listening to the cicadas warming up for their evening chorus. A man coming up the road caught my eye. He was clad in the normal traveller garb - baggy hessian trousers, old t-shirt and a cowry shell hanging from a leather cord around his neck - and I almost didn’t look at him twice. Then, as he approached, I recognised him.
“Sam?”
I couldn’t believe it. Laughing as we embraced, I remembered how we’d shared a room in a Delhi hostel back in 2004. He’d had to leave early so we never exchanged numbers. What were the chances of us ever meeting again? But here we both were in a remote part of Indonesia. I guess with world travel being so easy nowadays it’s not so strange that old friends should meet along the well-worn routes, but even still it made me sit back and take stock.
As Sam and I reminisced over dinner that night we both agreed that the people you meet along the way are the main reason we travel. Sure, the temples, jungles and cities of the world are attractive in themselves, but it’s the people who make it special.
After a brief spell staying in hotels around the world I realised that hostels are more my thing. In one backstreet auberge in Budapest I met a man who was travelling from London to Shanghai over land. Last Easter in Rome I joined the hostel owner for a lavish lunch spread with his entire family - you just don’t get that in the Hilton.
Facebook means that you don’t have to lose touch with your new-found friends once you part company. And who knows, it’s such a small world that you might just end up meeting them again.
Find cheap flights to world destinations at FlightComparison.co.uk.
This week our roving romantic talks about that bastion of la vie bohème, the Paris métro.
Paris. Pure romance in two short syllables. The view over the Seine at nightfall to the twinkling Tour Eiffel, Haussmann’s wide boulevards, the neon of Pigalle… Paris exudes passion potential, so much so that it’s almost a cliché. So I won’t dwell on the typical traits that travellers laud. Let’s talk instead of the subterranean city.
There’s something fascinating about the Paris Métro. The ornate art nouveau signs with ‘Metropolitain’ in those iconic dripping green letters are as evocative of Paris as Nôtre Dame. And then there are the names of the stops, which paint a technicolour map of Paris – Miromesnil, Gambetta, Javel, Oberkampf.
Even the Métro map is a work of art. There’s none of the spider-like limbs and garish colours of London’s Tube map, nor the clutter of New York’s nightmarish grid. The Paris Métro on paper is almost as beautiful as it is in real life. Muted colours, soft lines, wonderful names that make you wonder just what goes on there. Bir-Hakeim sounds like an aromatic spice bazaar; Arts et Métiers, a place of erudition where robed scholars and philosophers roam.
The Métro is one of Europe’s oldest underground rail systems. It has sixteen lines, 300 stations and a total length of 133 miles. Plans began in 1845 and the first line opened 1900 during the Exposition Universelle world’s fair. The network grew rapidly until the First World War and the main portion was finished by the 1920s. Extensions into suburbs were built in the 1930s. After World War II new trains were introduced to ease congestion and a sister system, the RER, was built to relieve the network in the 1960s.
Usable as well as beautiful, the Métro is well known for the frequency of its stops. It has the most closely spaced stations of any underground network in the world, with 245 stops within sixteen square miles. It also has the world’s biggest subway station, Châtelet-Les Halles and is the second busiest metro system in Europe after Moscow, carrying 4.5 million passengers a day.
Discover the romance of the Paris Métro for yourself. Find cheap flights at FlightComparison.co.uk.
Welcome to our new Friday column, The Pensive Traveller. Each week our thoughtful globetrotter will wax lyrical about the more bohemian aspects of travelling. This week, the romance of airports.
There’s something incredibly romantic about airports. Not just the emotional farewells and reunions played out in Departures and Arrivals. Not merely the promise of adventures to come. Not even the unmistakeable smell of fuel and tarmac, or the low hum of jets taking off. No, it’s something that’s harder to define. Maybe it’s the hustle and bustle of folk on a mission, or the concept of people gathered for a short while in one location before setting off to far-flung places. Perhaps it’s the thought that when you next emerge into fresh air you’ll be in a different part of the world.
Whatever it is, I love airports. One of my favourites is Singapore’s Changi. Situated just outside the city, Changi connects east and west. Many long haul east-bound flights stop off here before delivering passengers to other parts of Asia, Australia and New Zealand.
The first time I landed at Changi I was on my way to Auckland. I had three hours to spare before my connecting flight - awkward because there wasn’t quite enough time to leave the airport and see something of Singapore. So I spent the time stretching my flight-wearied legs, wandering the airport’s endless boulevards and window shopping in the boutiques. Then, with an hour left before my Auckland flight, I came across a little garden reserved for smokers. I pushed open the glass door and emerged onto a little terrace latticed by pergolas hung with honeysuckle. The air was stuffed with humidity and I could see the city lights in the distance. There was a unique scent in the air: I was in Asia.
What intrigued me most about my time in Changi airport was the small glimpse I got of Asia between taking off in London and landing at my final destination in New Zealand - a spicy sandwich filling between two slices of familiarity. In this way airports are a world of their own, little enclaves dotted across the globe where people alight, embark or pass through, all going their separate ways. To me there’s something irresistibly romantic about that.