I hope to bring Ljubljana to life for you here on Inside the Travel Lab, piece by piece, over the course of 2012 as part of my #IronRoute Project. Yet to spare you the overload experienced by my hard drive, oh long-suffering reader, I’ll start with this bite-sized list and fill in the gaps later.

Seatbelt fastened, tray tables stowed and seats in the upright position? All right, then. Let’s go.

1 Ljubljana: What it is and where it is.

Perhaps you know this, perhaps you don’t. To spare your blushes, I’ll tell you myself.

Ljubljana is the capital of Slovenia, which was part of Yugoslavia when people my age were growing up. Before that it was part of the Habsburg Empire but before we disappear down the rabbit hole of history for this part of the world, let’s stop and make sure we’ve got our bearings.

This is where Slovenia lives, landlocked between Italy, Croatia, Austria and Hungary.

2 Its nickname: White Ljubljana

Apparently, Ljubljana earned this nickname thanks to the pale churches & mansions that appeared during the Habsburg era – but I have another theory.

Wander along Ljubljana’s riverside Christmas Markets and you’ll find that the mulled wine scorns the traditional reds found across the rest of Europe – for an unmistakeable Ljubljana white.

3 Ljubljana’s Art Nouveau

4 Ljubljana’s Chic Boutiques

5 Ljubljana’s Fine Food:

Ljubljana’s gourmet restaurants offered up some of the best meals I found along the #IronRoute. Alas, there were too many to taste them all! Here’s Restaurant Spajza, which I’d highly recommend if you ever find yourself in Ljubljana…

6 Ljubljana’s Hearty Food…

Though simple jota warmed me up a treat as well.

7 Ljubljana’s “Traditional” Street Art

Wander around the streets near Hostel Celica (which itself used to be a prison) to catch up with plenty of street art and edgy living.

8 Ljubljana’s “Unusual” Street Art

Yet you can find sweet street art like this as well…

9 Ljubljana and the Dragon

Ljubljana has not one but four dragons guarding the, er “Dragon Bridge” (one of the earliest asphalt bridges in Slovenia, if you’re into that kind of thing.) From paper dragons in China to scarlet flag-emblazoning ones in Wales, to patriotic dragon slayers called George in England and Jordi in Catalunya, I’ve never quite worked out why so many different cultures have such similar takes on this mythical, fire-breathing creature.

10 Ljubljana and the Iron Curtain

OK, here’s where we get serious again. For all the above-mentioned frivolity, the iron curtain is the real reason why I came to Ljubljana on this particular trip. Apologies if you know this already, but I’d started in Istanbul and travelled by InterRail up to Berlin in order to zigzag across the former iron curtain, the barrier that carved up Europe while I was at school.

Slovenia, and hence Ljubljana, and to an extent all of the former countries of Yugoslavia, formed a vital part of this route. But not, perhaps, for the reason you might imagine.

To be continued…The story continues over here with The Cold War, the Iron Curtain & Somewhere In Between
. To put the iron route into context, visit the #ironroute page or watch the video.

Disclosure: #IronRoute was sponsored by InterRail at www.interrailnet.com. As usual, I had complete editorial control.

Ten Things You Never Knew About Ljubljana, Slovenia first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

The Rubens Hotel, London

The feeling of a country manor in the heart of the big smoke.

Like many a hotel in London, a Union Jack flag hangs over the doorway of The Rubens at the Palace, the fabric swaying with all the haste of an oak tree expanding its roots. Unlike many hotels in London, the Rubens maintains that slow-paced country tempo well after you’ve left the frazzled streets of London behind.

Decked out in chestnut browns and rich deep plums, a stay at the Rubens transports you back to a time when royals ruled and guests dined in elegant country manors. Gilded portraits of kings and queens gaze down from the walls, while busts of the noble stare into the drawing room.

Black chandeliers hang from the ceilings and the cocktail of the month blends bourbon, bitters and brown sugar into a firestorm called, somewhat appropriately, Old fashioned.

With 143 guest rooms (and 161 rooms in total,) this four star hotel is not quite an intimate boutique. It has a bar, a lounge, a drawing room and a Leopard Champagne Bar. Yet each room feels intimate, a private bedroom in an aristocratic country home.

A home that has moved with the times, of course, with wide screen TVs and wireless internet, plus the signature touch of a single red carnation. Rubens belongs to the Red Carnation family of hotels, a network with properties in Geneva, Cape Town and beyond.

Closer to home lies Buckingham Palace and the convenient transport hub of Victoria Station (with direct links to London Gatwick Airport and a crossroad for the District, Circle and Victoria lines.)

As for the rooms themselves, they come with touches of luxury such as a white fluffy dressing gown (with a signature stitched carnation) and an assortment of pillows to suit every sore neck. Those expecting a full luxury service should remember the four stars, however, as details such as turn down need to be booked in advance and don’t always run smoothly.

However, in every other way this is a four star hotel with five star service.

Overall: the Rubens at the Palace offers a cosy London retreat with easy reach of the rest of the city.

Disclosure: I received a complimentary stay at the Rubens Hotel in order to write this review. Reviews, like the rest of this blog, are always completely independent.

The Rubens At The Palace – An Independent Hotel Review first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

Wireless Internet Wherever You Are

To a frequent traveller like myself, portable wifi sounded like a dream come true.

Hire a mobile wifi device, take it with you. Be online wherever you are. Luxury hotels, business hotels, vacation rentals, wherever.*

So when Fonmigo (now TEP) asked me to test out their product, I jumped at the chance.

FonMigo (Now TEP) – An Independent Review

THE IDEA

If you’re new to the concept (as I was), here’s how it works. A small, smooth device about half the size of an old mobile phone arrives by post. You charge it up as you do a mobile phone, switch it on, then log in to the wifi connection it produces using the username and password supplied.

Easy peasy.

You hire a certain amount of data (which you can top up later if needs be) and away you go. At the end of your trip, you pop it back into the envelope provided and send it back to Fonmigo (now TEP.)

That’s the idea – and it’s a dreamy one. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to get online – if only for a short time – while abroad, without having to pay extortionate prices or roam around carrying my laptop through the rain.

THE REALITY

Just like mobile phones, these devices struggle in certain situations. Any time you’re moving – working on a train or a coach, for example – the signal dies.

Also, any time you head away from the major cities you’re left with internet Russian roulette. Widespread areas of the Costa Brava region in Spain, most of south Wales and even a number of spots in London had no signal at all.

The TEP devices also don’t like sharing. Advertised as allowing up to four people to connect to a single device at any one time, after testing in two countries and umpteen configurations, I only managed to do this once – for about 20 minutes. Usually, the first to log on is the only one able to get online.

Finally, there’s the issue of getting hold of and returning the mifi (as the cool kids are calling it these days.)

As I say, I tested this out four times. On two occasions, the device arrived a day late (leaving me without a roaming facility and paying for two days of hotel internet access.) On one occasion, I received an email from TEP to say that the device had not been received (a situation that would normally result in a fine.) On the 4^th occasion, in Spain rather than the UK, there were no delivery problems.

Having spoken to FonMigo (now TEP), they assure me that these glitches have been resolved and wish to remind me that I used the devices during their testing phase.

I explained that, as ever, I’d have to give my honest opinion on how things did or didn’t work. They replied to say they wanted me to publish my experiences now rather than re-test.

THE CONCLUSION

So…In conclusion. Great idea, didn’t quite work out when I tested it. May be better now.

TEP – A Portable Wifi Device first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

I’m heading off the grid for a while to travel around Malaysia (I know, poor me.) However, I’ll also be doing a lot of thinking as to what to do with Inside the Travel Lab in the future.

I’d love to know what you think – so I’ve devised a questionnaire that’s quicker and easier to fill in than putting water into a kettle.

All the answers are anonymous, so you don’t need to worry about, er, anything. Cheers!

Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey, the world’s leading questionnaire tool.

Over To You, Dear Reader first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

]]> http://www.insidethetravellab.com/over-to-you-dear-reader/feed/ 0 http://www.insidethetravellab.com/swimming-with-dolphins/ http://www.insidethetravellab.com/swimming-with-dolphins/#comments Mon, 25 Jul 2011 20:31:33 +0000 Abi http://www.insidethetravellab.com/?p=7406 As a child, I always wanted to swim with dolphins. And if I’m honest, as an adult as well. Swimming with dolphins has become a cliché in the repertoire of half-formed dreams, wishes and wonderings of those who realise that their time on this earth is limited. Yet...

Not Quite Swimming With Dolphins first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

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Dolphin leap at the Dolphin Research Center

Swimming with Dolphins

As a child, I always wanted to swim with dolphins. And, if I’m honest, as an adult as well.

Swimming with dolphins has become a cliché in the repertoire of half-formed dreams, wishes and wonderings of those who realise that their time on this earth has limits. Yet it wasn’t until I sat down to write this post that it occurred to me to question why.

Dolphins in the Wild

I’ve been lucky, catching sight of dolphins in the wild off the shores of Oman, Tenerife and even Dingle in Ireland (although, to be fair, it was dolphin singular in that last case.) Each time, even in Ireland, sunbeams sparkled across the waves, almost daring onlookers with their brilliance.

“Are you sure?” they seem to say. “You’re sure you want to see dolphins? Look closely, then, and prepare yourself for staring into the light of the sun itself.”

Wet dolphins reflect light like diamonds. They’re also fast: blazing through the water, throwing crescents above the sea while they race besides the boat.

The Dolphin Research Centre, Florida

Yet today there wasn’t going to be a boat. I was standing in the Dolphin Research Center in Florida - and training, instead of chasing, was the name of the game.

To the sound of whooping and hollering, we lazed through the Florida Keys sunshine to meet the team, led by aficionado Mary Stella.

“Y’know,” she says to us in a sunshine state drawl. “If I were a dolphin, I’d want to be born here.”

There’s a tricky moment, I think, when talking to anyone who deals with animals in captivity. For a start, you have to remember to avoid the word captivity, a task that inexplicably becomes impossible as soon as you have to remember to do it.

Research centres, sanctuaries and programmes like these are clearly gallons of water away from cramped zoos and performing circuses. And there’s no doubt in my mind that Mary, and the other members of the team, show far more devotion towards the animals in their care than I do.

I’ve written before about my unease and unanswered questions about aquariums – and my eyes and mind have been opened by the replies in the comments sections.

Yet still, as someone besides me murmurs under his breath about wanting to live free in the oceans, questions arise and I just wish we could talk more openly about one or two things.

Perhaps burned by the press in the past, the staff remain cautious today.

The Dolphin Research Center lives, no soaks, in the Florida sunshine. The trainers wear splash vests and swim suits and the dolphins really do seem to wear smiles.

Nets and fences carve up the ocean into spaces for the dolphins, who roam freely in between.

A Male Dolphin Lets Off Steam

Dolphin Psychology

“During Hurricane Wilma,” says Mary, “the water covered the walkways and the dolphins could have left. But they didn’t.”

This is exactly the kind of thing I wish they’d talk more about. They’re a specialised research centre, performing robust tests into dolphin counting, object permanence (remembering where you left the car keys,) foetal echocardiography and more.

They should know, then, psychologically speaking, that just because an animal doesn’t try to escape, doesn’t mean it wants to stay. There’s the phenomenon of learned helplessness, whereby animals realise that no matter what they do, they cannot break through a certain barrier. Eventually, when that barrier is removed, they no longer try. It leads animals to starve themselves when food is plenty; it’s thought to explain why abducted children stay with the adults who molest them. After enough failed attempts, animals simply learn that it’s too dangerous to keep on trying.

Of course, this may have nothing to do with the dolphins here. The science geek inside me would just have liked to explore it as a possibility.

Everyone seems happy...

Training Mice, Men & Dolphins

As it is, just a short afternoon here opens up all kinds of questions about animal training (and yes, that includes husbands who won’t pick up their socks, children who won’t tidy their rooms, women who won’t stop nagging and writers who won’t stop using clichés.)

In each pen, we see different stages of training. In the main one, the adult males leap into the air, turning somersaults, twisting and shimmering beneath the sun to the whoops of encouragement from the team.

“We use positive reinforcement here,” Mary explains, as the males munch their way through a coolbox load of fish and good cheer. “We don’t punish.”

A dolphin trainer with fish

Behind me, I see what happens when something goes wrong.

Two small platforms bob into the water, where children take turns at touching or training the young dolphins. With a deft, quiet signal, everyone walks away.

“What happened?” I ask.

“Someone did something they’re not supposed to,” replies one of the trainers, leaving me to wonder whether we’re talking about child or dolphin.

“Dolphins are just like you,” says Mary, when I try to find out what happened. “They get grumpy. They have mood swings, too.”

A scurrilous accusation.

“Dolphins are just like you,” says Mary. “They have mood swings, too.”

Across the way, a baby dolphin takes its baby flips through the training routine. It wins a fish each time it correctly touches the target pole. The next stage involves correctly identifying its name as a symbol – a cross or a crescent or a circle, say, – next to the target pole.

“Dolphins pick out the symbols with echolocation,” explains Jennifer, a Senior Education Officer. “They can only see for about 10 metres – and they can’t see well ahead.”

Babies watching babies

Besides the merry baby in training, baby humans are at play.

At the Dolphin Research Center, you can pay to swim with dolphins. You can also, as I saw, learn to paint with them as well.

This is dolphin training at its most subtle. The trainer before us, sporting a hat and a trademark suntan, merely touches his fingers and thumbs together in the slightest of moves to exact the most intuitive of responses.

“You want a photo?” he says. “You don’t need to ask me. Look.”

At a quiver of his fingers, the mother dolphin pauses from painting to swim by and pose.

It’s impressive. Even breathtakingly, cliché-ridden, awesomely so.

The boy’s face fills with delight as he braces the T-shirt against the dolphin’s paintbrush, while I still can’t explain why dolphins, rather than tarantulas, pigeons or rats, hold such appeal.

Perhaps it comes down to this worldly-wise quote from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

“Man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much — the wheel, New York, wars and so on — whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man — for precisely the same reasons.”

 

Or perhaps, it comes from another:

• The last ever dolphin message was misinterpreted as a surprisingly sophisticated attempt to do a double-backwards-somersault through a hoop whilst whistling the ‘Star Spangled Banner’, but in fact the message was this: So long and thanks for all the fish

As for me, I still have more questions and, in spite of that, I’d still love to swim with dolphins.

In the meantime: So long and thanks for all the tweets.

Small gestures are enough...

Swimming with Dolphins -Disclosure

I visited Florida as a guest of Virgin Holidays as part of a Florida Photo Safari both at the Dolphin Research Center and elsewhere. The usual, exciting, disclosure policy applies…Find more photo adventures in the Florida Keys here

Swimming with Dolphins in Florida

PS – You can swim with dolphins at the Dolphin Research Center

Not Quite Swimming With Dolphins first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

My favourite London cathedrals

Ask many people where London’s cathedral is and they’ll confidently point to Westminster Abbey – which isn’t a cathedral and isn’t even in London (at least not the City of London).  The correct answer, of course, is St Paul’s… except that it isn’t.  Not quite.  London has more than one cathedral.

London’s Cathedrals: Secret London

There’s Southwark Cathedral, for instance, over on the south bank of the Thames.  It’s true that it wasn’t a cathedral in medieval times – it was the church of St Mary Overy; it only became a cathedral in 1905.  But its medieval presence, its collection of interesting tombs (including Shakespeare’s brother’s) and its size all make it feel like a ‘real cathedral’ and not a jumped-up parish church.  My favourite part of the cathedral is the delicate retro-choir, in the simple, elegant Early English style of Gothic.  Visit on an overcast day and it feels like a giant aquarium swimming in grey; but go when the sun is out and the pale stonework comes alive, creating a huge and almost undivided space crowned by a wide white vault.

The nave on the other hand is Victorian Gothic – dating only from 1895, not the real thing.  But the great screen dates from 1520 and the jewel-like tomb of the poet John Gower (a contemporary of Chaucer’s) glows with colour.

Westminster also has a cathedral, not to be confused with the Abbey.  That’s because Westminster Cathedral is not an Anglican but a Catholic cathedral.

Built at the end of the nineteenth century, it combines a neo-Byzantine style with the expert engineering of its day – its massive interior always reminds me of one of the great train sheds of the age of steam (and did so even more when there was more plain brick to be seen, before the more recent mosaics were added).

It’s got real character – the assertive exterior with its white and red brick and its tall campanile (which can be ascended for a good view of Westminster), as well as the interior with its glittering marble and mosaic.

 St Paul’s Cathedral, London

We shouldn’t forget St Paul’s Cathedral either, the Anglican heart of London. Sir Christopher Wren’s Italianate Baroque church replaced the medieval Old St Paul’s after the Great Fire; Wren’s original ideas were watered down by dubious clerics, but it still must have been surprising and even shocking to many – compare it with Westminster Abbey, Salisbury or Lincoln cathedral and you can see just how disturbing this new classical style of architecture was.

I find St Paul’s hard to love, though, compared to Wren’s many City churches.

I think it’s the huge size; it always feels rather chilly (I mean emotionally rather than in terms of temperature).  But it’s full of interest; Tijou’s wrought iron gates to the choir, intricate wood carving by Grinling Gibbons, Nelson’s monument in the crypt, and the weird acoustics of the Whispering Gallery under the great dome.

My favourite London cathedral, though, is St Sophia’s in Bayswater.  It’s the Greek Orthodox cathedral, full of dark wooden furniture and bright gilded mosaics and the smell of incense.  Built in the 1870s, it looks almost like a brick-built baptist chapel from the outside, quite unassuming and plain, but the interior gleams with marble.  Turn up on Sunday and you can hear Byzantine chanting in a tradition that goes back over a thousand years.

Andrea writes, amongst others, on behalf of the Milestone Hotel – a luxury boutique hotel in Kensington – a short tube or taxi ride from St Sophia’s and several of the London cathedrals featured above.

Secret London: Hidden Cathedrals first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

Hospes Palacio de Los Patos – An Ugly Duckling Story

The Hospes Palacio de los Patos, a luxury hotel in Granada, has a story. Maybe even a story and a half.

Built in 1890 or so, as a grand expression of fine living in Granada, it quickly acquired the nickname of the “Palace of the Ducks” – a cheeky reference to the model swans that, well, swanned about inside the main gate.

Framed by palm trees and basking in the Andalucian sunshine, the Palacio enjoyed one hundred or so years as a private family home. Then UNESCO recognised its status: great news for the building, expensive news for the owners.

To comply with UNESCO preservation techniques, the family felt forced to sell.

What had become a crumbling building shrouded in cobwebs became a sparkling new hotel with an interesting twist of old and new at the hands of the Hospes group of luxury hotels.

Hospes Palacio de los Patos - View Beneath the Fountains

Granada’s New Luxury Hotel

 A Hospes Facelift

They pulled off an interesting idea: keeping the old old and making the new fresher than a shower of ice cubes dropped by a younger brother down your back.

Where marble remains, it looks as grand as it ever did. Yet where modern light fittings, TVs and bathrooms are concerned, they’re as futuristic as possible so that guests can tell the difference between history and right now.

Rooms at the Hospes Palacio de los Patos

Each room is unique – and the style varies greatly.
My room (room 43) made a feature out of the latticed stone window, leaving the rest of the room to dazzle in white. Others had rooms in muted shades, where golden mesh curtains rested on dark, polished wood. The bride woke up in the palatial presidential suite.

Luxury Spa & Gardens

Downstairs, an intimate spa offers a small pool, steam room and massage facilities.

The walled gardens provide tranquillity, while the conference rooms open themselves to the public for poetry readings and more beneath the speckled reflections of the fountains overhead.

It’s obvious by now that I’m a fan and, as it happens, I paid a reduced rate to stay here. Yet, as for every review I write, I always give my opinion and I always make suggestions for how things can be improved. Otherwise, what’s the point?

For a hotel in the centre of Granada, this is hard to beat. It’s beautiful and luxurious, yet its service has a few minor kinks to iron out.

Summary: Hospes Palacio de los Patos, Luxury in Granada

Chic, traditional and modern. Somehow this luxury hotel in the heart of Granada combines these words to create an unforgettable stay. Highly recommended.

Reception: Hospes Palacio de los Patos, Granada

Gardens - Hospes Palacio de los Patos

Room 43 - Hospes Palacio de los Patos

Luxury Spa

Funky Sofa in Room 43

Keeping the old...

A Luxury Hotel in Granada – Hospes Palacio de los Patos, An Independent Review first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

Alone in Agra

Rummaging through the archives this week, I stumbled on my photos of the Taj Mahal, taken on an old point and shoot digital camera. While I have plenty attempts at the “classical” shot, many more of the crowds and a couple of others that I still really love, this image of a solitary man, gazing out at the mayhem below has always been a favourite.

Just for fun, I decided to play around with some filters and see what he’d look like in other guises…Which one do you think suits him best?

The Taj Mahal in Paint

Taj Mahal in Black and White

Taj Mahal as a Drawing

The Taj Mahal, India first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

Photo Quiz

This week’s photo quiz comes from Europe…This city was the birthplace of the man who invented the biro…but where is it?

Previous Photo Quizzes

Photo Quiz – Giant Eggs & Sunshine

Photo Quiz – Curved Daggers & Water

Photo Quiz – Film Strips & Clouds

Photo Quiz: Classical Europe & Home of the Biro first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...

So, the last photo quiz took us to film strips and clouds in the US of A. This one might stretch you a little bit more…Take a look at the scale – that’s a boat in the background.

Where is it? What is it? Over to you…

Photo Quiz: Giant Eggs & Sunshine first appeared on Inside the Travel Lab. Head over there for more juicy fresh travel goodness. Or, you know, something you might like to read...