GirlAhead

I cannot wait to go back, to Hotel Rangá, in the middle of Iceland. This is the retreat for 360° views and as far as the eye can see, no other signs of habitation – there is, admittedly, about two minutes' walk from the main building, a hut that turns out to be an advanced astronomical observatory that so excited two NASA scientists they have…

Hamburg is the centre o Germany's musical universe, thanks to its unique Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle concert halls. I was heading for this culture, and the…

Ashford Castle, three hours’ drive west of Dublin near Cong, County Mayo, is now the Irish treasure in Red Carnation Hotels’ portfolio. Red Carnation’s owners,…

Start planning now for a mid-2021 trip to the west of Ireland. Fly into Shannon, 14 kilometres from the Dromoland Castle – a Preferred Legend hotel near Newmarket-on-Fergus, in County Clare.

Two great European hotels spring to mind when saying ‘art afternoon tea’. One is Waldorf Astoria Cavallieri, above Rome, famed for its Tiepolos. The other, run…

Forbes Travel Guide, seriously the most transparent and unbiased global ratings systems for hotels – plus restaurants and spas – held its annual gathering from…

"The hills are alive with the sound of music," sang Julie Andrews in the 1965 movie The Sound of Music. It appears that much of the world, including such luminaries as the Dubai-based President of Kerzner International (Atlantis and One&Only), are also SoM fans. Melinda Gates is such an SoM aficionado that she and her entire family celebrated…

San Francisco always reminds this traveller of the Grand Old Duke of York – the old one, note, not the current one. This is a city of marching up the hill, Nob…

It was time for an update on Vancouver, and the best place to start was its iconic hotel, Fairmont Hotel Vancouver. What a trophy it must have been when the…

Mandarin Oriental Jumeira is a Dubai hotel that does things differently – and it is not only spelling Jumeira like that (everyone else seems to use Jumeirah). For a start it has an Austrian GM, Werner Anzinger who has a passion for Napoleon, and a wife from Melbourne. It has, as we will see, Dubai’s only tree-sculpted lobby, and a proper beach-set…