Asian Travel Blog

With its colonial elegance and sheer old world charm, its cool white structure with inner courtyard and garden, and its elegant bars with memories of days gone by, Raffles Hotel Singapore has the most delightful ambience that I have ever found in a hotel. Opened in 1887, Raffles is the oldest hotel in Singapore, and has accommodated the likes of Noel Coward, Rudyard Kipling, and W. Somerset Maugham.

Raffles even has its own world famous cocktail - the Singapore Sling was invented here, in the Long Bar, and they will even give you the recipe on a printed card!

The hotel has an amazing fourteen different restaurants and lounges. The food at Raffles is of good quality and the staff are polite and attentive. The curry buffet in the Tiffin Room is highly recommended.

The hotel also has a Victorian-style theatre, a culinary academy, a shopping arcade, a rooftop lap pool, and a 24-hour fitness center.

Raffles is an all-suite hotel, and the rooms are really huge, with 19th-century furnishings, DVD players, marble bathrooms, high-speed Internet access, and complimentary 24-hour valet service.

The hotel is only three blocks away from the Raffles City convention and shopping complex, the Singapore Art Museum, the Asian Civilisations Museum, and a subway station.

As well as having a long history of famous guests, Raffles has been featured many times in films and TV series, such as the highly acclaimed BBC’s Tenko.

A room for two people can cost around three hundred pounds a night, but there are special offers available if you shop around online.

Even if you don’t manage to stay at Raffles on your trip to Singapore, you can still visit it, and enjoy many of its fine facilities. It really is a treat not to be missed.

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I don’t know if I should tell you about Choeng Mon – it is a very peaceful, quiet resort, and it will be great if it stays that way, so, shhh – keep it to yourself. Choeng Mon is on the north coast of the Thai island of Ko Samui, and is made up of a series of bays of beautiful soft, white sandy beaches. The waters and the beaches of this area are very clean. Choeng Mon beach itself is a small bay with a wide sandy beach, with a rock formation on one side and a small island that you can simply paddle out to on the other.

The area is very family friendly, and so it is a great place to take children, and they will love playing on the undisturbed beaches. The whole area is fairly upmarket, with the hotels coming within the three to five star categories, hence budget travellers are not particularly in evidence around here.

As well as enjoying the beaches, which are great for swimming and sunbathing, other popular activities are snorkeling, and scuba diving.

There are a fair number of boutique-style restaurants and cafés throughout the area, including beach restaurants where you can admire the excellent night view over the bay, while enjoying a good Thai meal. There is also plenty of international cuisine of different types available, catering to visitors from all over.

The hotels regularly lay on Thai dancing in the evening, which is fascinating to watch. Overall, the nightlife is relaxed rather than noisy.

Choeng Mon is one of the best places to go on Ko Samui.

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Winter is on its way to the northern hemisphere, and in Sapporo, on Japan’s northernmost main island, that means The Snow Festival, which is held every February mainly in Odori Park, and attracts two million visitors from Japan and all over the world.

During the festival hundreds of fantastic snow statues and ice sculptures line Odori Park, the grounds of Satoland, and the main street in Susukino, turning Sapporo into a winter wonderland of white crystal ice structures and pristine snow sculpture. The sculptures literally are breathtaking – there are fabulous recreations of famous buildings, such as Nijo Castle and the Taj Mahal, crystalline white dinosaurs jostle for attention with giant snowmen.

The Snow Festival began in 1950, when local high school students built six snow statues in Odori Park. Then in 1955, the Self-Defense Force joined in and built the very first massive snow sculpture, something which they now continue to do. From these small beginnings the festival grew to become one of the biggest and most well-known of Hokkaido’s winter events.
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Sapporo is not only famous for its Snow Festival, but also for its lovely beer – well known Hokkaido brands include Sapporo Beer, and the traditional Yebisu beer. Sapporo is also famous for its ramen noodles, and you can also get a very good Genghis Khan here – I don’t mean the Mongolian warlord, but the very excellent Chinese style sauteed lamb with onion and vegetables.To me, the perfect evening in Sapporo is to stroll around the wonderful Snow Festival, marvel at the magnificent sculptures, and then repair to a good eatery for Genghis Khan and Yebisu. Enjoy!

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Kuala Lumpur is the capital and the largest city of Malaysia. If you find yourself flying to the east with Malaysian Airlines, then I strongly recommend that you break your journey with a stopover in Kuala Lumpur, and take a look at this interesting city.

The name Kuala Lumpur literally means “muddy estuary” in the Malay language. Kuala Lumpur has grown from being a small village to a major city of some seven million, in a mere half century. In Kuala Lumpur you will find five star hotels that do not break the bank, excellent shopping, (I once did a wardrobe restock on my stopover between the UK and Japan). The food is also excellent and I have particularly fond memories of an excellent vegetable curry eaten at an outdoor restaurant. A little off the usual tourist track, Kuala Lumpur is starting to become more popular with travellers.

As in most of Malaysia’s big cities, about 55% of Kuala Lumpur’s population is of Malaysian Chinese descent, and this is reflected in the availability of excellent Chinese food, and a bustling Chinatown. A good proportion of the population is Musilim, and many Malaysian women wear traditional Muslim dress.

The centre of the city lies between Jalan Sultan Ismail, Jalan Bukit Bintang, Jalan Pudu, Jalan Tun Perak and Jalan Ampang, and this is where you will find most of the city’s fabulous shopping malls, five-star hotels and good places to go for an evening out. At the northern edge of the city are the famous Petronas Twin Towers. A little to the south you will find Merdeka Square where there are some of the old colonial buildings. Going a little further south you will find, the suburb of Bangsar which is famed for its restaurants and nightclubs.

For its good food, the marvellous view from the Petronas Twin Towers, great shopping and good hotels, Kuala Lumpur is a great place to spend a few days.

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When you think of Hong Kong, you probably think of skyscrapers and shops, bustling streets and double decker buses. Hong Kong has all this, but I found that one of the most scenic and enjoyable parts of my trip to Hong Kong, was my journey up, and walk around, the Victoria Peak.

Victoria Peak is a mountain in Hong Kong, located in the western half of Hong Kong Island, and is 552 metres high. Although the summit of Victoria Peak is occupied by a radio telecommuncations facility which is closed to the public, the rest of the peak is mostly publicly accessibly park land, including a circular Hikers’ Trail around the peak, which affords magnificent views over the city of Hong Kong, its harbor, and the surrounding islands. The Trail is well laid out and signposted, and a stroll around it is a wonderfully peaceful way in which to spend a day, well away from the hustle and bustle of lively downtown Hong Kong.

You can get to the top of the Peak by means of the Peak Tram, which is a funicular railway, and in a mere 12 minutes whisks you from Hong Kong’s busy financial district to the top of the Peak. Alternatively, you can catch a bus, as I did, having chosen the one day that the Tram was closed for maintenance. Both tram and bus bring you into the shopping and leisure centers above the park, composed of the Peak Tower, and the Peak Galleria. At either of these you can grab a nice meal, with fine views, before setting off on your hike.

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The Heian Shrine, (“Heian Jingu”), is a famous Shinto shrine located in the ancient Japanese capital of Kyoto, and is not far from the city center. The torii, which is a traditional Japanese gate found at the entrance to to Shinto shrines, is one of the largest in Japan.

Japan is predominantly Buddhist, but Shinto is a native Japanese religion, and the two religions seem to happily co-exist side by side, with the Japanese generally making their weddings Shinto, and their funerals Buddhist.

One of the major sights of Kyoto, the striking thing about the Heian shrine is its eye-catching colors of vermilion painted woodwork, and contrasting green-tiled roofs.

The shrine was built in 1895, and hosts the Jidai Matsuri, “Festival of Ages”, which is one of the three main festivals of Kyoto, and which takes place on October 22nd every year. Portable shrines are carried through the streets starting from the old Imperial Palace and ending at the Heian Shrine, and it is an amazing sight to see so many people in traditional, colorful Japanese dress. Around 2,000 people take part in the procession, and so it stretches for some kilometers in length!

The shrine also has beautiful gardens with ornamental ponds, irises, water lilies, cherry trees and other eye-catching detail. The best times to visit the gardens are in the spring when there is a profusion of cherry blossom, and fall, when the leaves have turned to gold and red.

Kyoto has plenty of top hotels, as well as more modest places to stay such as backpackers’ hostels, and a Hostelling International Hostel.

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Now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the beautiful Taj Mahal, located at Agra, is one of the most popular sights in India. This wonderful monument is in fact a mausoleum built by the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his much-loved third wife, Mumtaz Mahal, who died in childbirth.

The Taj, made from white marble, with wondrous inlays, and with its distinctive dome, is considered to be one of the finest examples of Mughal architecture, which combined elements from Indian, Islamic, Persian, and Turkish architectural styles. It took seventeen years to build, and was finally completed in 1648, with then a further five years for the completion of the beautifully laid out gardens.

Old documents reveal that Ustad Ahmad Lahauri , who was also involved in the construction of the Red Fort at Delhi, was most likely the chief architect of the Taj Mahal. It seems also that Shah Jahan was closely involved in the construction of the Taj, consulting daily with his architects.

In the right light, the image of the Taj can be seen in the wonderful reflecting pool, which makes for a dramatic view.

Agra, located in Uttar Pradesh in northern India, has a number of top hotels including Hilton, Sheraton and Holiday Inn, and there are also budget places to stay, including bed and breakfast places, and backpackers’ hostels. Agra has other examples of Mughal architecture that you might like to see while you are there, such as the Agra Fort.

The best time to visit the Taj Mahal is at dawn, so be sure to set your alarm clock early.

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