Gourmets will enjoy fine dining and wine tasting on France Cruises’ 14-passenger canal barge Luciole in the waterways of Burgundy. In addition, daily cooking lessons will be given by the onboard chef, and there will be a visit to the restaurant La Côte Saint Jacques (three Michelin stars) for a cookery demonstration supervised by the chef and owner, Jean-Michel Lorain, followed by a gourmet dinner.
• The restaurant Karpatia Etterem es Sovozo (Inboda Ferencier Tere 7-8, Budapest, Hungary; phone 0036-1-317-3596) is located in Buda, not far from the Danube. This elegant, old restaurant has it all: a variety of excellent food plus ambiance, music and reasonable prices (at least, for Americans and Brits).
The cost for dinner for five people, including wine, dessert and tip, was 29,200 florints (about $26) per person in April ’04.
Being celebrated in England as “Drama & Debate,” 2004 marks the 400th anniversary of two auspicious events in King James I’s court of 1604: Shakespeare’s debut performance before the King in the Great Hall, and the Hampton Court Conference which led to the commissioning of the first King James Bible. With that in mind, every weekend from April 9 to May 31, 2004, the Great Kitchens of Hampton Court Palace will demonstrate Jacobean Cookery.
Pannir of Sayang Holidays (220 Montgomery St., Ste. 469, San Francisco, CA 94104; phone 888/472-9264) did a fantastic job making all the arrangements for our Viet-Nam/Laos trip, Dec. 3, ’03-Jan. 2, ’04. The price from Savannah, Georgia, was $3,600 each — a good price, considering the considerably higher cost of traveling during the Christmas season. We had a lavish buffet breakfast daily.
As a teenager, I read Roy Chapman Andrews’ books about his expeditions to Mongolia in the 1920s and 1930s and dreamed of someday traveling there. That became a reality when I joined the MIR trip “The Gobi Desert and Beyond” in July ’03.
On a quick trip to Portugal and Spain in November ’03, we discovered two beautiful palace hotels.
Four of us took a 5-week trip to Germany, Switzerland and Austria, June 3-July 10, ’03. We had first-class railpasses and by the end of the trip had taken 74 trains, 12 local buses, one tour bus, seven taxis, five trams, eight boats, four subways, four funiculars, two cable cars, five personal cars and four vans. The following establishments were the ones that were most outstanding.
In January ’04 we spent 15 nights at the beautiful Curaçao Marriott Beach Resort & Emerald Casino (phone [599-9] 736-8800, fax [599-9] 462-7502). This 5-star resort is first class. We paid $229 for a nice double with a beautiful view of the blue and green waters of the Caribbean.
The open-air lobby, typical of hotels in this area, was so pleasant to walk through anytime of the day or night.
My husband and I began planning our January ’04 trip to Australia and New Zealand about a year ahead. Several people mentioned that a stopover in Fiji would be a good way to end it. About that time, we read about a “Whale’s Tale day cruise.” We had our trip coordinator, ElderTreks (Toronto, Ontario; phone 800/741-7956), check it out and then made arrangements to include it in our trip.
We arrived in Venice, Italy, on April 8, ’04, flying from Chicago via Madrid on Iberia Airlines — excellent service, comfort and food. Luggage was handled promptly and efficiently.