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Beautiful hotel located on Sheikh Zayed Road. Stayed here on my first visit a few years back and have been there ever since. You get stunning views over the star wars part of the city from the higher rooms (and the top floors are there executive rooms complete with nice lounge and food all day). The pool is small enough to seem private yet busy enough not to seem like a loner, there are no screaming kids around and the staff seem to go out of their way to help you. They also have those curtains that open and close with a button so you can feel like James Bond.
Sheikh Zayed Road
www.shangrila.com
An open-air bath on Margitsziget on the Danube. In a very beautiful green park with many nice and fun pools and thermal water.
The Serena's burgers are to die for - and you get to eat them sitting by their pool in their beautiful grounds. If anyone can work out the secret ingredient please, please post it on Been there.
Kenyatta Avenue/Processional Way - central Nairobi
Tel: +254 20 282 2000
An old-fashioned seaside hotel with large, landscaped grounds and lots of different bars tucked around.
The Imperial also has a great gym and spa complex (to keep the golf widows happy, as it also has a beachside course).
Rooms are not special but are adequate.
For me the gym facilities absolutely made it.
Staff are really friendly and food is much much better than you would expect.
Ask for a seaview room.
Prince’s Parade, Hythe, Kent, CT21 6AQ,
Tel: 01303 267441
www.qhotels.co.uk/hotels/the-hythe-imperial-hythe-kent/
Cagayan de Oro is a big, bustling city on the North coast of Mindanao, with good transport links to other parts of the Philiipines by air and sea.
White water rafting down the Cagayan river is becoming quite popular.
One of the nicest places to stay in the area is Lauremar Beach Resort Hotel in the village of Opol, about 7km out of town by a beautiful white sand beach.
The hotel rooms are all comfortable, air-conditioned and clean. Service is excellent and the hotel restaurant is good, although the food maybe lacks any real "wow" factor.
At Php 2,300 per night it's maybe not the cheapest, but really a bargain. There is a beautiful swimming pool - open to non-residents for a Php100 fee - and the beach is great.
Opol is about 7km out of town. A taxi from Cagayan centre costs about Php 100.
A lido jutting out into the lake. Perfect when Geneva is hot and you are feeling envious of the ducks paddling around - you can join them. Entry is super cheap, there is a good cafe serving substantial salads and terrines and showers/ loos/ changing rooms. There are different sectioned off swimming areas, some deeper, some shallower (and with a pebbly beach for little ones). Super relaxing and quite fun to be bobbing around next to a family of ducks. It's open from early til 8pm and they also have a hammam and massage facilities (but think hammam is currently being refurbished and you definitely need to book for massages).
Quai du Mont-Blanc 30
1201 GENEVE
www.bains-des-paquis.ch/
Located in some woods you'll find two streams, one hot and the other cold which meet creating a beautiful natural heated bathing pool. You could even try it at night by candlelight (we did). Plus all of this is FREE, except the candles!
This was my most memorable place on my four month trip around New Zealand with my family.
By a small brige on Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland loop road 27kms South of Rotorua/Taupo Highway. Recommended campsite that we used is the Doc (department of conservation) campsite by Lake Rerewhakaaitu.
In the High Tatras there is a place called Pod Lesom where I stayed with all my family in a flat, in Febuary half term. Every day there were piles of new snow which meant that every day we could take the tram to go skiing in Strbske Pleso.
In Strbske Pleso I learnt to ski with a teacher called Roland. We got in a sleigh led by a horse called Bonty up the hill to the ski resort. After my skiing lesson I went to the Hotel next to the ski resort and got a hot chocolate. On the way to the restaurant I had a go on a skimobile. The skimobile ride went on for a long time. We then went to the restaurant called a Koliba (a traditional Slovakian mountain restaurant), where I ate garlic soup and fried cheese.
The next day I went to a place called Aqua City in Poprad where there was an outdoor swimming pool which was filled with natural hot spring water and it was huge.
On the last day we went to Lomnica where we went skiing and we went on a cable car (at that point I could ski).
From Johnnie Dowling (age 8).
Aquacity resort
www.aquacityresort.com
The Somerset Hotel on Elizabeth Street is a brilliant place to stay. It has amazing views over Hyde Park and the Anzac Memorial. There is very good room service with people coming to clean your apartment everyday when you are out. It is near the centerpoint tower and not far from a good pool called Boy Charlton. It is salt water and suspended on stilts over the actual harbour so you get really good views. There is also a brilliant open air cinema on Lady Mcquaries Point. The screen apparently folds down (we didn't get to go there but i reccommend it anyway.)
There are two really good places to eat. One is called Sushi King - it is on George Street and it does the best sushi in the world. The other is the Lindt Cafe on Martin Place - it is really good and they do this great hot chocolate (you get this jug with hot milk in and a jug with melted chocolate in and you pour them in the mug at the same time the result is an amazing rich lovely cup of hot chocolate).
Of course I also reccommend the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House (my dad conducts there.)
Somerset Hotel, Elizabeth street (museum station)
www.somersetdarlingharbour.com
Boy Charlton pool (Mcquaries Point)
www.abcpool.org
Sushi King (George Street).
Lindt Cafe (Martin Place).
The Viceroy hotel seems to have been been transplanted from Sunset Strip - it has more in common with the Standard and the Mondrian than its neighbour motels. Contemporary, chic, super-trendy, ignore the office-like exterior and head for the garden to enjoy a drink in one of the tents next to the pool or on one of the oversized white wing-back chairs. Heavenly.
www.viceroysantamonica.com
1819 Ocean Ave
Santa Monica, CA 90401
USA
Tel: 1 310-260-7500
Terme di Merano is a brand new spa centre opened last year in the spa town of Merano, in Italy near the Austrian border. It features a large number of pools (open air -even in winter - and not) and saunas, Turkish baths etc. in a stunning modern building and park from where you can see the mountains. You can book massages and treatments such as wine baths and hay baths...and the prices are reasonable.
The town is lovely, warm (it is set in a south-facing valley) and lively, the mountains around are gorgeous and the trekking fabulous.
The food, beer and wine are excellent (northern Italian and Austrian style food both available).
Just search on the internet for Merano Terme (or Meran in German) and you will find plenty of info.
Throw off your clothes, ditch that tiresome British reserve, and unwind in a series of saunas and pools in a wonderful setting just across the river on Rosenheimer Straße. It's a gloriously relaxing way to spend a chilly winter's afternoon in Munich. You might want to rehydrate before hitting the beerhalls afterwards, mind.
Rosenheimer Strasse 1, Haidhausen, Munich, 81667
Tel: 49 89 2361 3434
Up in the mountains about two hours from the ocean, the wooden lodges are perched on the edge of a 500 foot plus drop. Absolutely stunning and the pool is the best I've ever seen.
wildernest-goa.com.
Situated in the heart of Palermo Viejo, this boutique style hotel offers comfortable rooms (more than 5!), friendly and helpful staff and a beautiful roof top with a small jacuzzi pool.
4742 Honduras, Palermo Viejo.
Phone: 54 11 5235 5555
www.fivebuenosaires.com
Reading reviews of Havana and seeing the repetitious recommendations for the Nacional or the Inglaterra makes me wonder if the reviewers visited anywhere else. OK, so both have a 'history', but then so do several others if you're a Hemingway or Graham Greene buff, but that's no reason to actually stay there. No, in Havana there are two primary considerations: location and functionality.
The Nacional is a characterful hotel which is great to visit and sip a mojito overlooking the Malecon, but it is miles from the centre of things and a taxi ride to everywhere. The Inglaterra is certainly well-located but if you're going to stay on the edge of both the old town and central park there is no better choice than the eponymous Parque Central.
Because of its location you can break your day up and dive back to the hotel between forays; a major benefit when it's hot and humid. It's modern (translation: the architecture is out of step with the fine old buildings around it) and so everything works and after a hard day's sightseeing the rooftop pool is THE place for a cooling dip, with fabulous views towards the Capitolio.
Neptuno, esquina Prado y Zulueta Habana Vieja, Havana;
tel: +53 78 606627; fax: +53 78 606630;
email: nhparcen@nh-hoteles.cu;
www.nh-hotels.com
Having spent just a few days in Singapore as a stop over, I'd like to highly recommend one activity: Jacuzzi, sauna and swim at the airport.
It's well known that Singapore's airport is one of the best in the world, and for around £10-15, you can have the ultimate luxury.
Check-in first, and go straight through to departures. You can then enter the health club and lie back in an outdoor Jacuzzi and watch planes over your head, just an hour before boarding your plane. I've never felt so refreshed for a flight!
Singapore Airport, after Check-In
www.changiairport.com/changi/en/index.html
Just 20 minutes by taxi from Old Havana there are perfect Caribbean beaches – fine white sand and inconceivably turquoise water — which are the perfect escape from the heat of city. There are a few beach bars serving decent fried fish, etc. Swimming pools are a rarity in Havana, but there is a good one in the lovely Hotel Sevilla — cocktails available.
These holiday apartments are very close to the beach and ten minutes’ walk from town. Lovely swimming pools and gardens too.
337 rooms spread across 5 floors. Rossio da Trinidade, Lagos;
tel: (351) 282 764 160
This is an a amazingly immaculate late 60's hotel, which feels like being in 2001: A Space Odyssey. The Hotel Thermal has an open air thermal pool on the valley slope from which you can enjoy the incredible mini St. Petersburg, golden domed skyline.
www.thermal.cz
Tel 359 001 111
You can get very cheap spa treatments in wonderful establishments ranging from the basic health institutions such as Lazni III, a huge sanatorium on the river with huge metal baths, mineral pools, saunas and swimming pools, to the luxurious Hotel Pupp - where all the celebreties stay during the Kalovy Vary Film Festival.
Send your feedback or queries to been.there@guardian.co.uk
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