Top 30 places to visit in 2015 part 1
MUST visit destinations in 2015 take us from the fashion centre of Milan, where Expo opens in May, to the parks and bike paths of Bristol, this year’s European Green Capital.
​MUST visit destinations in 2015 take us from the fashion centre of Milan, where Expo opens in May, to the parks and bike paths of Bristol, this year’s European Green Capital. There are birthdays to celebrate: Singapore’s 50th, it’s 25 years since reunification in Berlin, Vienna’s Ringstrasse turns 150. Improved access from Australia puts Dallas on our travel map while fans of The Second Best Marigold Hotel can fall in love all over again with the pink city of Jaipur. And if you want to beat the rush, go now to Myanmar, Cuba and Oman.
Here are 30 great places to go in 2015.
Australians fell in love with this magical island a long time ago but tourism has grown in fits and starts, hampered by unrest. Stable postwar government has led to a surge in pent-up infrastructure investment driven partly by the country’s most famous export, Dilmah tea. The company’s leisure arm Resplendent Ceylon (operators of a coterie of charming high-country bungalows) has opened the luxury Cape Weligama on the south coast, 30 minutes from Galle, boasting hot and cold running butlers and 40 stunning cliff top rooms designed by leading Thai architect Lek Bunnag. A tented beach camp in the Yala National Park, famous for its leopards, opens November; early next year the 28-room Red Rock Beach Camp opens near Trincomalee on the island’s formerly off-limits northeast coast. Meanwhile Tri, a contemporary, sustainable design hotel, opens on Lake Koggala near Galle; while Hong Kong based Shangri-La will open the Hambantota resort and 18-hole golf course on the south coast, with a high-rise 624-room Colombo hotel overlooking the Galle Face Green opening in 2017.
The room key card at Hotel Hotel is made of biodegradable maple wood. It’s typical of the detail inherent in this intensely handcrafted hotel, vision of the Efkarpidis brothers Nectar and Johnathan, whose family has created the cosy NewActon arts and cultural precinct overlooking Lake Burley Griffin, featuring a wine bar, gallery, artisan bakery and even a bespoke bicycle company. The first in a wave of groovy hostelries helping to dispel Canberra’s fifty shades of public service grey, Hotel Hotel was followed by the theatrical QT Canberra with its cheeky wallpaper, speakeasy bar, retro barber shop and members lounge. Even the old Kurrajong, Canberra base for Ben Chifley, has been made over while the new Avenue hotel adds yet more five star clout. A spot of cultural gluttony is always in order; this year the NGA has a James Turrell retrospective featuring purpose-built installations, in late summer the wonderful Enlighten has national attractions opening their doors after hours (plan ahead for next year), in early spring Australia’s premier flower show Floriade also includes a fantastic after-dark program.
Every season more luxury river cruise vessels set sail in Myanmar (this year look out for the Cruisco Explorer, Sanctuary Ananda and Avalon Myanmar), so travellers keen to encounter something of the Burma described by Orwell and Kipling should go now before the political reforms begun four years ago (and subsequent flood of international investment) bring a rush of tourists and the temple city of Bagan becomes as busy as Angkor Wat. The gateway city of Yangon (formerly Rangoon) is already changing. Even so, this is a magical place of gilded pagodas, faded colonial buildings and red robed monks where the teahouse tradition is alive and well and sundowners still means pink gins at the old Strand Hotel. Watch for new hotels springing up everywhere including The Lake Garden, MGallery in Nay Pyi Taw and Sanctum Inle Resort on Inle Lake in Shan State.
There are few places on earth where wilderness rubs shoulders so convivially with the good life. From the thriving food truck scene and more than 700 sushi restaurants of cosmopolitan Vancouver it takes only an hour or two to fall off the map, providing you don’t mind small planes and helicopters. Summer brings with it some of the world’s best wildlife viewing and plenty of aprés safari luxury in remote but glamorous lodges. See grizzlies at close quarters on the Orford River when the salmon are running while staying at the spectacular waterfront Sonora Resort. On Vancouver Island it’s black bears at 10 paces at the tented Clayoquot Wilderness Resort. Whale watching, surfing and kayaking are the drill at Tofino’s Wickaninnish Inn on the island’s wild surf coast. Back in the big smoke, join those lunchtime food truck queues for a Kurobuta pork hot dog at Japadog or wild caught, hot smoked salmon sandwich from The Kaboom Box. Then dip into Vancouver’s lively craft cocktail scene at L’Abattoir in Gastown.
Art hotels are not new to Hong Kong. The Langham Place Mongkok, housing a stellar collection of contemporary Chinese art, opened more than a decade ago. But the scene is moving south to Wong Chuk Hang where the Ovolo Southside, the city’s first hotel warehouse conversion, features a dedicated gallery space, rooftop murals by Los Angeles art duo Cyrcle and corridors daubed with graffiti art; the 162 pared-back guestrooms offer great views through floor-to-ceiling windows. This rapidly evolving industrial district, well off the tourist trail, is home to more than 20 international galleries tucked away in converted warehouses and workshops, part of a booming southern Hong Kong Island cultural precinct that also takes in Tin Wan/Aberdeen. In Central the old police married quarters on Aberdeen Street (PMQ) have been transformed into a lively amalgam of pop-up shops, galleries and restaurants including Michelin-star chef Jason Atherton’s Aberdeen Street Social. Art Basel Hong Kong is in its third year with an expanded program and half the participating galleries hailing from Asia.
For old India hands a return to the Pink City reveals old treasures and new pleasures: an annual literary festival that this year attracted almost 250,000 visitors, and designer stores (don’t miss the smart atelier in the city palace). On the food front, New York based fashion designer Marie-Anne Oudejans has opened quite possibly the prettiest restaurant in the world. Tucked away in the Narain Niwas Palace Hotel, the effortlessly chic Bar Palladio combines Rajasthani whimsy with European flair in lush bird murals, tented ceilings and romantic canopied seats in the garden. Lemongrass martini anyone? The city’s hotel stocks have also been given a boost with the opening of the Rajmahal Palace hotel following a glamorous makeover by Indian design guru Adil Ahmad. The former home of Gayatri Devi, author of A Princess Remembers, and popular polo pit stop for the Prince of Wales, the hotel’s suites are named for previous guests of Jaipur’s royal family including Jackie Kennedy and Queen Elizabeth.
Get on your bike and explore this year’s European Green Capital. BBC’s prodigious Natural History Unit is headquartered in Bristol, reason enough for a green gong you’d think, but this pretty West Country city built around the River Avon also boasts bicycle paths aplenty and a slew of eco-friendly initiatives. City streets are closed to cars on Sundays, when you’ll find many locals enjoying one of Bristol’s 400 parks (more than any other British city). The redeveloped quayside is home to restaurants, bars, and a contemporary arts centre; Gloucester Road is Europe’s longest thoroughfare of indie shops, famous for its street art. Keep an eye out for Banksy’s daubs; the world’s most famous graffiti artist is a product of the Bristol underground scene of the early 1990s. Even restaurants have got into the act, offering ethical fast food (check out the Californian-inspired Friska chain). And there are plenty of events scheduled to coincide with the green year, including nature and food festivals.
While Denmark and Sweden were busily churning out gritty crime shows, Norway was pioneering slow television, broadcasting hours of knitting, salmon spawning, even a five-day boat journey. It’s not only typical of the quirky nature of this lesser known of the Scandi trio, but makes perfect sense. Norway’s astonishing scenery deserves nothing less than a leisurely approach to television ... and travel. Not surprising then that coastal cruising through the Norwegian fjords is on the rise. Australia’s APT is refurbishing a small luxury expedition ship, equipped with onboard zodiacs, to ply the waters along these fractured shores. And cashing in on the global success of the animated movie Frozen, Disney is deploying its 2700-passenger Disney Magic to the fjords for the first time this year. The hit movie Ex Machina is making a star of Norway’s Valldal Valley (standing in for Alaska). In Oslo the action is on the tiny, car-free island of Tjuvholmen, one of Europe’s most exciting urban renewal projects that includes the Renzo Piano-designed Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art and, next door, The Thief hotel.
Officials are on a mission to make Tokyo more tourist friendly in the lead-up to the 2020 Olympics. In an effort to double visitor numbers, plans are afoot to introduce multi-language information services at major attractions (shopping centres are trialling their own apps) but if you want to plan ahead, check out the snappy new Tokyo Precincts guide by Melbourne based Tokyo-philes Steve Wide and Michelle Mackintosh. They’ll set you straight on everything from outré bars to cat cafes. On the hotel front Aman has entered the Japanese market for the first time with a Zen-like hotel perched atop the Otemachi Tower in Tokyo’s financial district featuring some of the largest guestrooms in the city, interiors hewn from camphor wood, washi paper and stone, and a fine-dining restaurant with views of the Imperial Palace Gardens and distant Mount Fuji. Hyatt Hotels has also secured a premium high-rise possie for its lifestyle Andaz brand.
This year’s 150th anniversary of the stunning Ringstrasse, the monument-cuffed boulevard surrounding inner Vienna, heralds celebratory cocktails (try mixologist Kan Zuo’s sparkling “sound of the ring” at The Sign Lounge Bar) and a year-long calendar of events and exhibitions including Klimt at the Lower Belvedere and a rather more chilling display detailing Hitler’s plans for a reimagined Vienna at the Architekturzentrum Wien. Sigmund Freud’s alma mater the University of Vienna turns 650. Concerts, seminars and behind-the-scenes tours are on offer. The shiny new €1 billion Hauptbahnhof (the city’s main train station) is open for business. Feeling the effects of a weakened Aussie dollar? Grab a new Vienna Pass, providing entry to more than 60 attractions (in some cases skipping the queues) and a seat on the city’s hop-on, hop-off sightseeing buses. And while sachertorte and Strauss never go out of style, Vienna is also home to a growing community of contemporary artists and designers. Explore the galleries housed in Ankerbrotfabrik, a former industrial bread factory.
A champion in and out of the ring
His remarkable personality apart, Muhammad Ali was unquestionably one of the greatest talents to grace the boxing ring.
A champion in and out of the ring
Muhammad Ali beat formidable champions as both a young and old fighter, and was universally loved for his wit and courage.