Inspiring Travel Writing from Graeme Harwood
Graeme Harwood lives in London. As a European Tour Guide and avid world traveller for over 20 years, he spends most of his time in hotels. His interests include wine, history and flying, and he is the author of two books: "Caissa's Web: The Chess Bedside Book" and "The Eng. Lit. Kit", a comic history of English literature.
Articles by Graeme Harwood
-
Before You Die: Hotel des Iles
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Morocco
|
Atlantic Coast
|
Essaouira
From 1948, until the recent opening of The Sofitel, The Hotel des Iles ruled the roost. Sharing, at that epoch, the same architect/designer as La Mamounia in Marrakech, it was the automatic choice of stars like Orson Welles. In 1949 he spent 8...
-
Eating Out in the Baltics
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Latvia
|
Riga Region
|
Riga
A ‘bombe surprise’ is about to land upon the culinary world. And , in the nature of surprises, its provenance is largely unexpected. Only an intrepid few know that all three capital cities – Tallinn, Riga & Vilnius – have...
-
Sleeping in the Baltics
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Latvia
|
Riga Region
|
Riga
Back in Soviet times (pre-early 90’s), the rock stars Metallica, Depeche Mode and Michael Jackson had one thing in common: straight after their gigs, they hopped the first plane out of every Baltic capital – possibly abandoning their...
-
Russia: What to Know Before You Go
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Russia
|
Central Russia
|
Moscow
Russia may be the largest country in the world but for 80% of her incoming tourism she’s just a tale of two cities: St.Petersburg and Moscow. And then only in one season: May-October. April/May & September/October are good times to visit...
-
Sleeping in Moscow and St Petersburg
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Russia
|
Baltic Coast
|
St Petersburg
The current Russian hotel scene is simple to summarise: in winter, they haven’t got enough clients; in summer, they don’t have enough rooms. Which, basically, means give winter a chance and book well ahead for summer. But things they are...
-
Eating Out in Moscow and St Petersburg
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Russia
|
Central Russia
|
Moscow
Growth, lucrative to the point of hand rubbing, in the numbers of overseas visitors, expats on assignment, ‘New Russians’ – and with increasing frequency these days middle-class Russians too – has gifted the restaurateurs of both cities with a...
-
Budapest: Know Before you Go
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Hungary
|
Budapest Region
|
Budapest
More than any other European capital city, Budapest is horribly easy to get wrong. Stay in a dreary part of Pest (i.e., most of it), eat as you go along, find no shops of any interest, get ripped off by a taxi driver on your way to being scammed by...
-
Cuba: Know Before you Go
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Cuba
Cubana or Virgin? For a night out on the town, no contest – but when it comes to flights the extra £100 to fly Virgin is arguably travel’s most worthwhile investment. Mainly because Cubana is so awful and seemingly content to be so...
-
Budapest Hilton
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Hungary
|
Budapest Region
|
Budapest
My favourite and first port of call whenever I return to Budapest, this Hilton must rank in the Hilton’s top ten. Even 007 lost his cool here; that is, Roger Moore, who in a moment of implausible generosity, gushed over “this wonderful hotel – the...
-
The Gellert Hotel
|
Graeme Harwood
|
Hungary
|
Budapest Region
|
Budapest
I’ve embroidered the title of this place by two extra words – as the hotel itself feels that ‘GELLERT’ alone, albeit in capital letters, is quite sufficient to let you know that you’ve arrived at the doors of a legend. Sadly, however, this erstwhile...