Travel deals, tips, insider news and comment by 101 Holidays editors, Mark Hodson and David Wickers
Holiday details: Visit Sicily this spring and stay at the 7 room boutique BB22, a peaceful retreat in the heart of the fascinating city of Palermo.
Take time to explore the crumbling churches, catacombs and palazzos or shop in the flea markets and on the designer, decadent drag of Via della Libertá.
Date: Various, February – March
Price: £144 pp for 3 nights B&B (not including flights)
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Looking to escape the busy Christmas period already? Real Holidays have had a last minute cancellation for a fully staffed villa in Sri Lanka, which could be the answer for you.
The luxury 3-bedroom South Point Villa is located on the south coast, a 15 minute drive from the historic city of Galle. As well as your very own chef it offers al fresco dining, an infinity pool with jacuzzi and stunning sea views.
Price: £2,650 pp for direct flights with Sri Lankan Airlines, private transfers from Colombo to Galle, and 10 nights accommodation.
Date: 17 December 2011
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Real Holidays are offering a saving of £264 pp on week long stays at Villa di Monte Solare in Umbria.
The sleepy spa-hotel is nestled in elm trees, and set on a hilltop amid leafy gardens. The hotel boasts an excellent restaurant and extensive spa facilities and is furnished with an 18th century feel.
Price: £655 pp, saving £264 pp. Price based on 2 sharing a 7 night stay in a Classic Room on a B&B basis and includes return flights from London Stansted and car hire.
Date: departs 16 October 2011
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Real Holidays are offering 30% off stays at Tenuta Le Piane inside Sibillini National Park in Italy.
A collection of converted 16th century farm buildings, Tenuta Le Piane offers rustic-feel accommodation with wooden beams and original fireplaces, an hour from Adriatic beaches and in the heart of beautiful walking country.
Price: £135 pp, saving 30%, based on 2 sharing a week’s stay in a 2-person apartment. Flights extra.
Date: departures throughout September
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Real Holidays are offering 10% off a week’s B&B stay at their Relais Torre Marabino, tucked in the south-eastern corner of Sicily.
Part of a winery and organic farming estate, the property offers just 7 rooms and suites, as well as pool and restaurant, with a location perfect for exploring local beaches and the surrounding island.
Price: £413 pp, saving 10%, based on 2 sharing a week in a double room on a B&B basis. Flights extra.
Date: book by 10 August for departures in September and October 2011
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Real Holidays are offering a saving of £145 on the price of a weeks stay at Le Terrazze in Umbria, Italy.
A beautiful stone built casale, La Terrazze sleeps 10 and boasts a pool, as well as options for a cook and holistic massage.
Price: £276 pp, based on 10 sharing a week with flights extra.
Date: depart 6 or 13 August
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Real Holidays is offering a 20% saving at the beautiful Masseria Torre Maizza in Puglia, Italy, for stays of 4 nights or more.
A restored 16th century watchtower, the 26 bedroom property is stunning, sitting in olive groves and boasting views over the Mediterranean. The offer also includes welcome cocktails and a complimentary supper as well as entry to the stylish spa.
Price: £482 pp based on 2 sharing a 4 night stay, saving 20%.
Date: departures throughout May 2011
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday Details: Real Holidays are offering a saving of £237 pp at the beachside Reef Hotel, Sri Lanka.
This villa hotel has 7 deluxe suites each with a vintage four-poster bed and a shady veranda. The hotel boasts an infinity pool, Jacuzzi, tennis court, private spa and its own unspoilt beach.
Price: £1,850 pp based on 2 sharing a 7 night stay on a B&B basis. Price inclusive of return flights from London and private transfers.
Date: departures in May or June 2011
Book with: Real Holidays
Holiday details: Real Holidays are offering £100 pp off the price of a week’s self-catering holiday at the Casal dei Fichi in Le Marche, Italy.
Casal dei Fichi, a converted farmhouse, sits on Le Marche’s picturesque hillsides, and boasts a 15m pool and extensive orchards.
Price: £263 pp, saving £100 pp, based on two sharing 7 nights self-catered accommodation.
Date: departures in April and May
Book with: Real Holidays
Enjoy a week in southern Marche in Italy with Real Holidays this month for just £159pp self-catering, based on two sharing.
Stay at Tenuta le Piane, a cluster of converted 16th century farm buildings, each with an original fireplace for cosy nights in after a day’s sightseeing in the local spa towns, walking the beautiful countryside and indulging in the superb seafood.
Close by is the Castel del Monte, the hilltop comune where George Clooney’s hitman holes up in the heartthrob’s latest movie, The American.
Fly to either Ancona or Pescara and hire a car. Contact Real Holidays for more details.
Each week at 101 Holidays we interview one of the people behind the UK’s finest travel companies. This week we turn the spotlight on Philip Davies of Real Holidays.
Philip worked as a teacher and pop promoter before 1989 when he launched Real Holidays, an independent travel agency in Islington, North London, that pioneered the promotion of small specialist tour operators. Using his team’s hard-earned knowledge of Italy, Greece and other destinations in Europe and Asia, Real Holidays now also puts together its own trips to hidden gems overlooked by the big tour companies.
• Where are you planning to go on holiday this year, and why?
Too often my holidays are inextricably linked to our growing tour operations and I’ve just come back from a few days looking at new properties in the Pelion, my favourite part of mainland Greece. To balance that, and demonstrate our Grecophile credentials further, my wife and I are sneaking off for a week next month to unspoiled Milos in the Cyclades to relive memories of the 1970’s. Then it’s a family and friends week in the Marche in late August before a big trip to southern India after Christmas where we have our Indian portfolio, although this will be covering a route I last took in 1980 – just upgrading the accommodation several notches this time round.
• What is your favourite bolthole in the UK, and why?
It’s got to be north Cornwall where my wife’s family are from. On a clear day the views around Trevose Head are equal to anywhere, and as her brother (Rick Stein) has several restaurants in Padstow, I get to eat like a king.
• If you could spend a long weekend in any city abroad, which would you pick, and why?
I went to New York for the first time last year and know I’ll be going back for more but that sort of amphetamine rush has to be taken in doses, and it is Italian cities that are more within my comfort zone. Naples and Palermo win on liveliness and food, Rome on walking through different eras of history, but it’s got to be Florence as the front runner with so much art to see and that lovely feeing of renaissance ghosts walking alongside you through its squares and over its bridges.
• Please tell us three items that are always found in your luggage.
I’m a sucker for guide books – one of those sad tourists you see comparing the Cadogan Guide’s description of the Duomo in Orvieto with that of the Blue Guide. My wife can’t believe how many polo shirts I pack too, but they can look smart enough for a meeting and relaxed enough for the beach. Lastly, you’ll find vast amounts of steroids that keep me alive, as I have Addison’s disease.
• What one thing would most improve people’s overall holiday experience.
Delays at the larger airports in the UK are a price most people are prepared to pay for getting to their holiday destination, but not the appalling customer experience and service that go along with that thanks to bankrupt BAA’s poor management, cost cutting, and outsourcing. Grrr! I would force BAA to sell its airports.
• What has been your worst holiday experience?
Many years ago I was hitching back from Yugoslavia, as it then was, and after walking miles through the Karavanke Tunnel, I emerged in the mountainous Austrian border country in a midnight thunderstorm. Soaked to the skin, starving and nearing hypothermia, I clambered up the mountainside to a small farmhouse where I could see a light. Met by a double barrelled shotgun toting farmer speaking no English, I was ready to give up travel and life for good. Several plates of goulash later, and a night sharing the family bed (I remember at least four others bodies), I left refreshed the next morning convinced of the essential kindness of the human condition.
• Tell us your favourite hotel: in the UK; in mainland Europe; in the rest of the world.
My brother-in-law’s Seafood Restaurant in Padstow wins for its food and views of the Camel Estuary, but last time I stayed at his simpler St Petroc’s in the bed just vacated by the fragrant Delia Smith, which was equally satisfying.
It’s a couple of years since I’ve been, but a stay at Le Silve di Armenzano (pictured top left), surrounded by the beautiful autumn colours of the Monte Subasio Natural Park near Assisi provided that rural simplicity that restores the heart and soul.
It’s old fashioned in so many ways, and hipper Caribbean rivals like Carlisle Bay may leave it looking more so, but the lovely setting, sophisticated style, and charming staff of Jamaica Inn (pictured top right) would call me back any day I could afford it.
• What is the most exciting project your company is working on right now.
No secret project, but as that strange hybrid creature of travel agent and tour operator with our growing Indian and Italian Portfolios and budding Pelion programme, it’s getting the balance right between building up our tour operating arm and tailor-made holidays, and providing excellent service as a traditional travel agent, that is taking up our creative energy right now.
• Thank you, Philip.
By 101 Holidays newsdesk
We’ve known self-confessed ageing hippy Philip Davies, the boss of Real Holidays, for many years and when he gets passionate about somewhere, you know it’s a place where he (and his clients) can relive that ’70s vibe. True to form, Real Holidays’ newest destination is the Pelion, that bit of Greece which most of us have heard of but might struggle to place on a map.
There’s little development, thanks to strict building regulations, and the sort of unspoiled bays, sleepy hilltop villages and ancient stone-built houses which scream “the real Greece”. Philip told us: “‘This is the ultimate sitting at a taverna, drink in hand, watching fishing boats in the bay destination..… add a ski resort, half-man half-horse mythological creatures and Boris Johnson’s dad, and you know you’re in the Pelion.”
Philip has selected a handful of private houses and boutique hotels in and around the peninsular such as The Old Stone House, (centre image) a 3-bedroomed villa spectacularly located in the mountains overlooking the bay and the 12-room child-free Pounda Paou hotel (top right) close to Horto. There are a couple of cycling holiday ideas too.
The closest airport is Volos (approx. an hour’s drive away) but flights are pricey; Thessaloniki (3 hours away) is an option or two-centre with Skiathos and a spot of sailing in between. Click here for more about Real Holidays’ new programme to the Pelion.
