A Luxury Travel Blog

On selected flights during May, Upper Class fliers with Virgin Atlantic will be ‘treated’ to a new in-flight innovation.  More comfortable seats, free WiFi, a new menu or maybe improved cabin staff, you might wonder?  Think again. No… their great idea – which has reportedly been the culmination of the efforts of four designers working for six weeks – is novelty ice cubes that look like Sir Richard Branson’s head.  Yep, that’s it… something I’m sure you always wanted.  Apparently it’s actually a move designed to celebrate the launch of the airline’s new in-flight bar.  Ridiculous though it might be, I guess it will have the desired PR effect.

There’s uproar at one of Paris’ most exclusive restaurants this morning after it was revealed last night that it’s been serving up nothing but fast food since its inception in the early 1990s. Manger dans L’obscurité was one of the first ever restaurants to latch on to the idea of eating in total darkness. It received rave reviews from some of the most respected dining critics the world over and was praised for being a “taste sensation”. But, unbeknown to diners, all the food was actually sourced from a fast food joint just next door.

One critic, who has preferred to remain anonymous, said “I am outraged. I gave an exceptional review of their ‘fromage fondu’ but apparently it was the same processed cheese that they were using for the cheeseburgers next door. They have made complete fools of us.”

What’s your take on it all? Does it just go to show that restaurant critics don’t really know what they’re talking about? Should the restaurant be punished in some way for charging more than 40 times the price of its next door neighbour?

We’ve touched on the much-debated subject of hotel reviews on this blog before. Whether you like them or loathe them, it seems they are here to stay. And, since it’s Friday, here’s a light-hearted look from comedian Michael McIntyre about them:

Hoteliers… look away now!  It’s Friday so we thought we’d let our hair down a little and share this video with you.  It would seem Natalie Tran likes to have breakfast in her room, but doesn’t want to pay for room service.  Instead, she shows how you can make your own cooked breakfast using one or two items that can be found in your room.

Disclaimer: don’t try this at home (or in a hotel)…

This is clearly fake but it’s Friday so time for a little fun… sit back and admire what is possibly the world’s shortest train! And when you’re done, feel free to re-tweet, share on Facebook, Google+ or whatever… enjoy!

This week’s photograph is of a young boy, aged around 8 years old, in Dahab, Egypt, attempting to drag his father’s camel into the sea for a bath at dawn. He didn’t succeed and instead had to go and fetch his brother for assistance!

Thank you to Michael Shelford Photography for permission to re-produce the image.

If you have a really special photograph you would like to share with  A Luxury Travel Blog’s readers, please contact us.

OK, so the subject is perhaps a little misleading… but hopefully you still won’t be disappointed with this fascinating timelapse video of the Boeing 777-200LR being slowly – or quickly, depending on how you look at it – pieced together in Everett, Washington, USA.

Whilst for many Glastonbury may be a distant memory, festival season is still upon us with numerous dates in July and August seeing a wealth of artists taking to the stage and with them some rather unusual rider requests, as Kensington’s five red star Royal Garden Hotel can attest to.

Frequently the hotel of choice for entertainment and music stars, in addition to personalities from the sporting world, the independent hotel has recently revealed some of the more unusual requests that have been made as part of riders over the last year when checking VIP guests into the hotel.

These include:

Rose petals in the toilet
Oxygen tank in the room
Dumbbells in the room
Microwave popcorn (freshly popped)
Bags of Raw Almonds with skin
Numbers in the room number must add up to an odd number
A bowl of blue M&M’s only
Halogen Heaters
Red fruit only in the room
Mc-Evoy Blueberry and Vanilla Candles
Extra long telephone cords

Think of the Netherlands, and you’ll most likely think of clogs or windmills. Some may even think of Delftware, a blue and white tin-glazed pottery that dates back to the 16th Century, a heritage that the Dutch airline KLM has recognised for some time as for many years it has been giving out little blue Delft houses to passengers on business class flights (I know, I’ve had a few over the years!).

Now, in a rather curious campaign, KLM is embracing the 21st Century and has turned to its social media fans and followers and invited them to create a Delft blue tile showing their profile picture, along with a personal message, for use on a real Boeing 777-200. The campaign was launched yesterday and you can learn more or get involved at www.tileyourself.com

This post has nothing to do with travel but, since it’s almost the weekend, it’s time for something a little different!  This year we will experience four unusual dates:1/1/11, 1/11/11, 11/1/11 and 11/11/11.  Now then… take the last two digits of the year you were born and add the age that you will be this year. Tell me if you don’t get the answer “111″…!

America’s only floating chapel has surely got to be a contender for the world’s most unique church.  It can currently be found in Sarasota, Florida, and offers Weddings on Water to anyone looking for a ceremony that’s a little different.

Shown below is footage of the chapel from one of its previous locations, St. Petersburg, FL.

First off… I’d like to apologise. Please forgive the title for it’s completely misleading.  There is no free luxury vacation here – this is in fact nothing more than a Twitter experiment.  Once published, this blog post will automatically go out on Twitter with the subject line “Please RT to win a FREE luxury vacation!” and I’m curious to see how much people re-tweet material on Twitter without actually reading it.

I have a strong suspicion that this goes on quite a lot and this experiment will hopefully confirm or deny that. Of course, the subject line is deliberately provocative and aims to entice retweets.  According to Dan Zarrella who is something of an expert when it comes to retweeting, some of the most re-tweeted words include ‘please’, ‘retweet’ (or ‘RT’ – I used the shorter version with Twitter’s character limitations in mind) and ‘free’.

Watch the Tweetmeme figure in the bottom right hand corner of the post. If I’m completely wrong with my suspicions, then the number of re-tweets will remain at “1″.  If instead that figure starts to rise, then it would seem to suggest that a number of Twitter users are ‘guilty as charged’ – unless of course, people are just re-tweeting the post merely because they are interested in the experiment (if that were the case, I’d expect some kind of comment to be added, rather than just an unedited re-tweet!).

I apologise once again for the somewhat misleading nature of the subject line (and it isn’t even my first offence!) but at the same time would urge people not to re-tweet something if they haven’t read it in full first.

EDIT: Tweetmeme is seeming to be slow to update (it’s still showing zero at the time of writing) and I’ve often suspected does not count all re-tweets.  In the first few minutes of the post going live on Twitter, this is what happened. I’ve edited Twitter usernames/faces as I’m not looking to humiliate anyone, rather it is here just to highlight the problem.  The snag is, those that need to see the message that you should read what you re-tweet, clearly aren’t reading this!

Having already waited an hour and a half to take off, the Amsterdam Sinfonietta chamber orchestra gave a spontaneous concert on a delayed KLM Boeing 747 at Shanghai Airport.

We’ve scoured the Web to bring you some of the most unusual hotels out there. They not all that luxurious but curious nonetheless and so I think worthy of a mention on any travel blog due to their quirky nature.

Free Spirit Spheres, Canada

Seemingly floating among the treetops, you could be forgiven for thinking these spheres are UFOs if observing them from a distance.  They sway in the breeze and with people’s weight and typically accommodate two people at a time.

The Capsule Hotel, The Netherlands

Moored (yes, I said ‘moored’!) in the Hague, these orange capsules are in fact old 1970s survival pods rescued from an oil rig.  They’re tight for space but can accommodate up to three, and there’s still space left over for an emergency chemical toilet.

Sala Silvermine, Sweden

This single suite can be found 120km from Stockholm and 155 metres underground in a mine that produced more than 3 tons of silver a year at the height of its production.  You can take a tour of the mine but, come nightfall, you’ll be the only occupant.  Thankfully there’s intercom access with the outside world should you need it.

Dog Bark Park Inn, Idaho, USA

I’m not sure what the thinking is behind this bed and breakfast hotel, but who’s to say you can’t put two rooms in a giant, wooden beagle structure and then charge people to stay?

Das Park Hotel, Austria

If someone told you they were going to use segments of sewage pipes to make a hotel, you’d think they were nuts.  Due to their construction, though, they serve as quite cool rooms in the summer and, weighing in at almost 10 tonnes each, they are extremely robust.

The magical Northern Lights have bewitched humans since time began. Now you can create your own Aurora Borealis, against a fairytale Norwegian backdrop at Visit Norway.  Paint the sky above a dramatic northern Norwegian coastal landscape with your mouse, or use your astrological constellation, in a palette of colour reflecting your mood, to create your own Aurora Borealis. Your personal Northern Lights display will be saved for you to share with your friends via Twitter, Facebook or email.

Ever been ‘caught out’ in the great outdoors?  These items are far from luxurious but marginally beat having to dig a hole for yourself in order to do the deed.  The amusingly named Brown Corporation has come up with the Shit Box (that’s the ‘bog standard’ version), the somewhat more acceptably-named Ploo and, for the little ones, Little Jack’s Box, so you’ll never get caught short again. At around £15 each, it brings new meaning to the phrase ’spend a penny’.