“Caroline Phillips is a tenacious and skilful writer with a flair for high quality interviewing and a knack for making things work.”
It’s a Grand Cru classé of a hotel. Its quality akin to vintage Dom Pérignon meets grade 5 Wagyu beef melded with Iranian Beluga. First division, first class and first-rate, in other words. Such words of undiluted praise are rare for me, and I’ve been reviewing five-star properties for 30 years.
There are naked children splashing innocently in the water by the river’s edge – why would anyone waste much-needed kyats, the local currency, on swimwear? Others are climbing like mini Tarzans on anchor ropes that run high above the water from a ship to the shore.
My family and I clamber aboard a traditional wooden longtail boat — used locally for transporting custard apples, dragon fruit and piles of mustard leaves as well as for ferrying people. Nearby young men in longyis (like sarongs) stand waist-high in the water washing their hair with acacia bark (a natural shampoo) and scrubbing their bodies. This is the scene at the riverside in Mandalay, Myanmar (Burma).
You may see Dannii Minogue if you stay there. Or perhaps the famous Dutch film director, Jan de Bont of Twister renown. Welcome to Sevon One Seven, the first and only boutique hotel in the Netherlands when it opened two decades ago. And still, arguably, the best.
Tabata? Burpees? Pad work? Double Dutch to me. But, hell, I’m about to find out what these are. I’m on a Target Human Performance fitness holiday – if doing five hours’ exercise a day can be called a ‘holiday’. I’m here for a five-day ‘get fit fast’ retreat. A so-called health, fitness and wellness break.
High-end luxury has yet to make a big inroad in Ethiopia. Outside of Addis Ababa, you may get patchy Wi-Fi (the government tends to switch the internet off from time to time), bumpy rides and restaurants where many of the choices on the menu are unavailable. But don’t let this deter you. This is perhaps the most intriguing country in Africa. A place of scale, biblical beauty, canyons and chasms. Of historical treasures aplenty. And, above all, of a colourful, gracious and welcoming people. So here are some of the fabulous options for a trip there, many of which are hidden secrets that you won’t find with an internet search, because they don’t have a website.
It’s like a studio that houses some of the capital’s greatest artists. Think of it as a curated exhibition or art gallery — but instead of artworks for sale, it has some of the world’s best hair maestros and therapists offering their services. These are the sorts of things that are said about Gielly Green, a tip-top boutique salon cum one-stop beauty lounge in Marylebone, London. It has also garnered glowing reviews in magazines like Tatler and Vogue.
Coco Chanel, who never had a good word for anyone, called Cristobal Balenciaga ‘the only couturier in the truest sense of the word. The others are simply fashion designers.’
There are people who have created global businesses after doing it. Others who have seen their profits leap after attending a seminar. FTSE 100 companies that swear by its approach.
‘The first thing I want to do is get rid of this mystique,’ says Barry Webb, an English scholar and former Oxbridge admissions tutor, as he kicks off the first session of a three-day intensive residential course for Oxbridge interview preparation with a talk about what our interviewers will be looking for.
No calorie counting, no low fat, no deprivation. Just excellent, abundant gourmet meals. Who knew that losing weight was so much fun? Or who realised that the gut is the control centre of good health? That there are the on-going clinical trials that have used a gut-friendly diet to reverse early onset Alzheimer’s, improve diabetes and treat depression? And that you can sort out digestive issues and improve sleep and skin conditions with food? Welcome to The Gut Makeover Retreat in Menorca. The brainchild of Jeannette Hyde, an erstwhile journalist turned nutritionist. And author of The Gut Makeover – a four-week programme to revolutionise your health. She’s evangelical about the gut – having burnt out ten years ago and, finally, healed herself with ‘real’ food.
It was opened in 1969 by an emperor. That’s pretty good for any hotel. But the ceremony for this one was performed by Haile Salassie, the Ethiopian who was his country’s regent until 1974. And the man revered by the Rastafari movement as God incarnate. That makes for an enticing introduction to a hotel. Welcome to the Hilton, Addis Ababa.
Ethiopia, it’s said, is perhaps the most intriguing country in Africa. It’s a place of scale, Biblical beauty, and oodles of historical treasures. It’s a land boasting a colourful, gracious and welcoming people. And somewhere with awesome landscapes, the likes of which are rarely seen outside of good dreams. This is an impressionistic account of its wonders.
Sunday 14 December. It’s a perfect afternoon: sun, sand, surfers. I’m in Sydney visiting my two Londoner daughters who are here living the Australian dream. My 28-year-old, Ella, is at the beach with friends; her elder sister Anya, 30, is out with her boyfriend. So I go for a swim alone at…
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I am onstage in front of 65 strangers who think I’m a stand-up comedian. I’ve never done anything like this before. Why have I agreed…