Surfing Australia and Ireland - Sunday travel section digest
Following its recent campaign against unfair car-hire charges, The Sunday Times this week reveals that up to 20 per cent of British travellers are being overcharged when renting a car. A managing director of a tour operator (working mostly in Spain) has turned whistleblower and says that "overcharging is rife within the industry, and that one in five of its clients is being overcharged". Mark Hodson reports that holidaymakers who have booked their rental cars through their tour operator can complain through them, but DIY bookers are on their own. However, The Sunday Times' postbag reveals that many readers are using the advice published in past weeks to complain successfully to customer-service departments in the UK.
News from the other side of the holidaymaker-company relationship is carried in The Observer. Simon Orr discovers that "middle-aged, middle-class 'Aga-louts' bring their own set of, ahem, challenges".
Andrew Spooner (The Independent on Sunday) reports that the recent Land Reform (Scotland) Act ensures the public's right to "camp in any wilderness area" and he tests this by doing some wild camping on the Isle of Skye, and cool campers have voted on their favourite British camping sites. The Observer has the list of favourites. The Shetland Islands are closer to Oslo than London and the islands make much of their Norway connections - "it has a neo-Viking celebration every last Tuesday in January when islanders set fire to a longship" for example - but it will acquire an air link from June 23, when Atlantic Airways starts flying direct from Stansted to Sumburgh (cost about £156). Jeremy Lazell (The Sunday Times) writes that he had one of the best weeks of his life there. The words "life affirming" are written and Lazell waxes lyrical about "guillemots and gannets".
Lazell doesn't surf while on the islands, although he does a bit of kayaking. The way he writes about the wind, it sounds like it might be a challenging sport up there. On the other side of the world, conditions are much more favourable. Cameron Wilson (The Sunday Telegraph) chooses his ten favourite beaches to surf around Australia and has some suggestions for where beginners can pick up the sport. Wilson writes that "telling people you learned to surf at Byron Bay is like saying you honed your football skills in Brazil". Alex Wade (The Independent on Sunday) goes on "surfari" to Dingle in the south west of Ireland (next stop America). The surf was not up while Wade and his family were there, but he consoled himself with the thought that "this is the most beautiful place I have ever surfed in the world".
Jim Kerr was merely a Glaswegian pop star when he and Simple Minds first visited Sicily in 1982. Apart from playing a gig on the island, he had a birthday lunch in Taormina, just "100 yards" from where he would later build his 21-room hotel. Kerr says that Taormina is often called the St Tropez of Sicily, but it has more to offer than the odd celebrity sighting. There is architecture, history, a film festival and music. In an interview with Charles Starmer-Smith (The Sunday Telegraph) Kerr reveals that he will be playing at the Womad festival in Taormina in July.
The Sunday Telegraph also has the pick of the best hotel rooms in Vancouver (Opus, Fairmont, Sylvia) and in The Sunday Times, Sasha Wilkins presents five hotels for all tastes in Ibiza. The Independent on Sunday's hotel of the week is The Crescent Town House, Belfast. There's a new way to stay in Paris. David Wickers (The Sunday Times) reports that Paris’s tourist office is running a new scheme that allows visitors to book "a chambre d’hôte or B&B that meets basic standards of comfort, and whose owners have at least a smattering of English". Wickers writes that: "As well as enjoying the least expensive accommodation in town, guests staying in private homes enjoy a far more authentically French experience than they would in a cheap hotel." In a related feature, Sean Newsom writes that the coming summer in Paris is set to be a lively one. There are new and renovated museums, exhibitions and a "host of happening bars and restaurants".
An extract in The Observer from a new Lonely Planet book - Code Green: Experiences of a Lifetime, to be published tomorrow - says it is possible to enjoy a luxurious holiday and contribute to the local economy. The extract looks at sustainable options in Dubai, Mozambique and Morocco among others. It's a fascinating piece with ten holiday options and the green credentials of each (advanced energy, water recycling systems, solar power, conservation projects etc). For example, it mentions that in Tonga where tourism is in its infancy, proceeds from whale-watching give the country a much-needed economic boost.
Across the Irish Sea, in its Ireland Special, Independent on Sunday writers take a quick spin around the Emerald Isle. Aoife O'Riordain and Kate Simon take in the sights in well-trod tourist counties (Sligo, Kilkenny and Wexford) and less discoverd spots (Laois, Offaly and Carlow). Sir Christopher Frayling spends some time in Ashford Castle in Mayo. The feature is part movie history - John Ford's The Quiet Man, the classic starring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara was filmed in the area - and part castle history with the odd celebrity thrown in. The Reagans stayed there when Ronald made his pilgrimage to Ireland to discover his roots and Pierce Brosnan got married there. Sharon Stone and Russell Crowe also visited. Finally, Bill Tuckey and family visit Crom Castle in Co Fermanagh. Tuckey writes that the castle is made for Swallows and Amazons adventures, and is "about as close as you could get to a slice of authentic aristocratic living" without having blue-blooded pals yourself. The children may not be satisfied with anything less ever again.
© Cheapflights Ltd Oonagh Shiel
