‘You see, my dear, it’s all about the little grey cells,’ I say smugly, tapping my head with a wise forefinger and reaching to twirl my moustache…Nick Hammond arouses his inner Poirot on a visit to Knightsbridge newcomer, The Wellesley.
If you haven’t had slush shoved down the front of your salopettes, been drenched in ice cold water by a passing snowplough or found yourself late-night ice skating with a seven-foot snowman, you haven’t experienced true hypothermic delirium.
Sometimes you visit a place that just speaks to you. It fits you like a glove. Every nuance, every little touch and gesture sounds a chord…
The Four Seasons Sultanahmet is often described as the central pearl in the string of Four Seasons across Europe. That old ‘Istanbul Murderers Jail’ as it was once known has morphed quite astonishingly…
The Compleat Angler hotel takes its name from Isaak Walton’s famous angling book of the same name, also known as The Contemplative Man’s Recreation (1653) and not one I intend to read.
“At approximately 11am, a white silence steals our breath away as we step almost seamlessly from the plane door on to a train that would carry our winter-coated crocodile through a snow-clad Switzerland…”
We all know that when you book a skiing holiday the last thing you think…
“It’s a cold December afternoon and I’m having lunch with my friend and fellow Arbuturian Mark O’Brien in a gloomy antique inn on the Isle of Wight…” Tom Garton embarks on an culinary tour of Italy’s UNESCO district.
“I considered the buying of fine jewellery something for the older me: wise enough to know what to invest in and solvent enough to swallow the minor mortgage required…”
“Air, water and road traffic flies, floats and rolls beside the strategically located Runnymede-on-Thames hotel. Although its face is arguably blighted – the blank facade from 1974 oddly leaves the impression of a slap head forehead…”
“It’s hardly surprising that the hotel once known as Twatley Manor decided to have a name makeover in favour of the more elegant Whatley Manor – now considered one of the most sophisticated hotels in the UK.”
“A stay at a country house hotel always puts me in mind of JG Farrell’s literary masterpiece Troubles…” Tom Leahy swaps London for a weekend jaunt to North Wales.