Travel News from Times Online

Channel Description:

Latest Articles in this Channel:

05/14/10--17:01: It’s spewing ash, but Iceland is very cool (chan 2720774)

Even before it became a naughty troll kicking out financial and geological mayhem from the top of the world, I had longed to visit Iceland. It was that intriguing brew of age-old and hip ultra-new, which had once attracted the singer Damon Albarn and writer Dave Eggers to live three. I love quirky countries that have somehow eluded the dull homogeny of globalisation: Iceland produced the first lesbian head of state; has one in four citizens who believes in elves; and Björk, who attended the Oscars dressed as a swan.


05/14/10--17:01: The waves are hot in Costa Rica (chan 2720774)

I was tired. The surf was big — between 6ft and 8ft — and I’d been in the water for four hours. My son, Harry, had called time on this, our final day’s surfing in Costa Rica. I watched him ride a wave smoothly to the shore, and envied him as he stood on the beach of Playa Grande, palm trees waving gently behind him and the setting sun warming his seaward gaze.




05/15/10--08:03: 20 great family getaways in Europe (chan 2720774)

1 Villa Pia, Lippiano, Umbria, Italy


05/16/10--23:13: No let up in travel misery as BA strike looms (chan 2720774)

Restrictions to UK airspace were mostly lifted this morning as a change in wind direction pushed the volcanic plume further north but passengers were still delayed as airports struggled to deal with the backlog from earlier closures.




05/17/10--11:18: BA granted injunction to stop cabin crew strikes (chan 2720774)

British Airways has been granted an injunction to stop the Unite union from carrying out cabin crew strikes that had been due to start at midnight tonight.




05/18/10--04:41: The dusk til dawn guide to New York (chan 2720774)

18.00 While everyone naps before dinner, you’d be wise to chalk up some crowd-magnets: on a Saturday, the Guggenheim is open until 7.45pm (guggenheim.org ); while on a Saturday, the MOMA closes at 8pm (moma.org). Or begin queuing now to ascend the Empire State Building– this is about as short as the line gets; alternatively, the last lift is at 1.15am (esbnyc.com).




05/20/10--17:00: BA strike starts on Monday on after court strikes down injunction (chan 2720774)

Tens of thousands of British Airways passengers face flight cancellations over the Whitsun Bank Holiday and school half-term after the Court of Appeal overturned an injunction that was blocking a strike yesterday.




05/20/10--17:01: Read the books and seen the films? Now visit Harry Potter’s world (chan 2720774)

Professor Dumbledore is speaking to me in his study, the Hogwarts headmaster’s holographic projection so real that I feel I can touch it. The corridors of the school for wizards are lined with talking portraits, the final chamber filled with floating candles, and Harry Potter himself appears, urging me to follow him on a magical journey.


05/21/10--17:01: A guide to Britain’s 20 wildest walks (chan 2720774)

The week before last I walked the sea walls of Canvey Island. No one would call this shore of the lower Thames conventionally wild — there were fuel tankers in the channel and oil refinery flames in the sky. But there were also skylarks singing, shelduck feeding on the mudflats and reed buntings nesting along the ditches. The wild and the workaday were co-existing very nicely on the RSPB’s brand new West Canvey Marsh Reserve.




05/21/10--17:01: 30 chic hotels in budget flight destinations (chan 2720774)

1 Château de Bagnols near Lyons, France




05/21/10--17:01: An insider’s guide to the World Cup cities (chan 2720774)

Cape Town




05/26/10--08:26: Q&A: your options during BA strikes (chan 2720774)

When are the strikes?




05/28/10--17:01: Travel by train though the Lake District (chan 2720774)

The train breezes down the Cumbrian coast, on one of Britain’s most absorbing — and least known — rail journeys. The morning mists are lifting, the couple opposite are sharing their first Polos of the day and I’m studying a chart showing how many passengers use the two dozen stations along the line, which runs from Carlisle to Barrow-in-Furness.




05/28/10--17:01: The 40 best British beaches (chan 2720774)

Beaches for swimmers




05/28/10--17:01: Kilimanjaro: my nightmare climb (chan 2720774)

I had never thought about climbing Mount Kilimanjaro until I learnt of its statistics. Of the 25,000 climbers who attempt it each year, 40 per cent don’t make it to the top and a handful don’t make it down at all. A ghoulish curiosity set in. Would I be a winner or a loser? What price that one moment of looking down on the world?




05/29/10--09:55: The world’s 20 best hotel pools (chan 2720774)

1 Perivolas, Santorini, Greece




06/04/10--17:01: The forgotten islands off Sweden’s coast (chan 2720774)

Karin Holmstrom lives at the ends of the earth, but it’s easy enough to pay her a visit. Just give some kroner to a boatman in the village of Fjällbacka on the west coast of Sweden and he’ll run you 12 miles (20km) out to sea to a place where water and sky are broken by low, bare rocks that seem to inhabit the middle of nowhere. On one of these stark, treeless outposts, waiting to greet you at a little wooden jetty, is Karin.




06/04/10--17:01: 20 wild days out in the UK countryside (chan 2720774)

Pony express, Dartmoor, Devon Explore 400 sq miles of moorland on horseback — children even get to ride the famous Dartmoor ponies. Trot past rocky outcrops, gorse and heather, and splash through streams. dartmoorstables.com, 01364 621281




06/04/10--17:01: Where Raymond Blanc eats on holiday (chan 2720774)

I have always said that food is the best healer. So when I smashed my leg in five places by falling down my stairs in March, I knew that I needed to find an hotel with a great restaurant where I could convalesce. Naturally, I thought that France would be the best antidote to melancholy and the Provençal spring sun the best provider of vitamin D.




06/04/10--17:01: 20 great chef-owned hotels (chan 2720774)

ENGLAND




06/05/10--17:01: If it’s good enough for Keats... (chan 2720774)

Iquestion if there be a room in England which commands a view of mountains and lakes and woods superior to that in which I am now writing.” If you read that in a holiday-home company’s blurb, you might dismiss it as a touch flowery. But when you learnt that the copywriter was a Mr Coleridge, you’d sit up and take notice. You might even want to stay there. And you can.




06/11/10--17:01: Times Walks: Slieve Gullion, Co Armagh (chan 2720774)

Ever smelt pine needles properly?” inquired my companion, the walker and naturalist Ron Murray, as we strolled the Forest Drive along the southern flank of Slieve Gullion. “Crush ’em like this between your finger and thumb.”




06/11/10--17:01: 20 best seaside villas in Europe (chan 2720774)

1 Eco Fisherman’s Cottage, Lanzarote, Spain This solar-powered fisherman’s cottage on the seafront in the pretty fishing village of Arrieta, northeast Lanzarote, is a stone’s throw from a sandy cove. It sleeps two adults and two children, and has been lovingly converted: wood furniture, cream throws, plants and paintings, a fully fitted kitchen, two bathrooms and lounge opening out on to the promenade. The balcony has superb sea views and the shaded courtyard is perfect for alfresco dining. There are good coastal walking and cycling trails from the doorstep, and the mountain village of Haria is just a short drive away.




06/11/10--17:01: Six of world's best wild-water swims (chan 2720774)

Mexico Can’t do cold water? Then the Sea of Cortes should tick your boxes; the average temperature in the briny here is 25C . You will be based on Espiritu Santo island in Baja California, and the swimming during the week-long trip (about 6km each day) is along beaches and through coves and bays where you may be an object of curiosity for inquisitive sea lions.




06/11/10--17:01: Wild-water swimming in Turkey (chan 2720774)

Despite living two centuries apart, I feel that I share a lot with Lord Byron — 18th-century poet, lover, dandy, bon viveur, icon.