Short Break Destination / Hotel Suggestions

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I vote South of France also, I stay in Nice, which is nicely placed for a day trip to Monaco and Cannes, good shopping, outstanding Food and I've always found the French pleasant and helpful on the South Coast.

Sensible flight, - easy jet can be incredibly cheap.

Plenty of culture, I love museums and such....

Always Visit Alain Figaret in Nice to stock up on shirts, very nicely made (Personally I think they're better than Thomas Pink).
 
Barcelona is fantastic. same weather as the french med coast but not as expensive, its small enough just to wander round and the architecture/food/people are all nice. flights are plentiful too.

its the kind of city that you can buy a picnic at a market and find a nice park to eat it in too.... if that makes sense.
 
How about Lisbon with a side trip to Sintra (ever wondered where Vauxhall got THAT name from)?

Good food and wine and the Portuguese generally like the Brits
 
Barcelona is fantastic. same weather as the french med coast but not as expensive, its small enough just to wander round and the architecture/food/people are all nice. flights are plentiful too.

its the kind of city that you can buy a picnic at a market and find a nice park to eat it in too.... if that makes sense.


Excellent advice, they have a tour bus that you can get on or off whenever you like, 21 euros for the day or 25 for two days. The whole trip takes about 3hours 30 minutes and you go past all the famous landmarks.

My other option would be Madeira. Virtually same weather all year round with many good eating places so only need to book B & B not half or full board. I can also recomend a good hotel.
 
Well, some more excellent suggestions!

Pammy - thanks for the comments on Malta. Further research suggests that Oct/Nov is their wettest season but I'm definitely drawn to it.

Mr E - Must confess that I hadn't thought about Monaco and the Hermitage (complete with heli-transfers in November - great tip!) certainly looks tempting.

Biscuit - Agreed, Barcelona's great, but as I said we're just back from two weeks touring in Spain. We're also going back to Valencia for the Fallas de San Jose in March '09 (went last in '06 and it's fantastic), so we're trying to sort of "avoid" Spain for a while.

Mattc - Mmmm, Lisbon. I like Lisbon having had a few weekends there two or three years ago while Mrs Phil was on an assignment there. You're right about the Portuguese attitude towards the Brit's too, but Mrs Phil fancies somewhere different :rolleyes:

Geoff2 - Madeira, now that's somewhere I hadn't thought of. Must do some research...

And thanks also to everyone else who's contributed that I haven't mentioned by name. Keep 'em coming, folks!
 
Just thought I'd close this one out...

Booked up for 5 nights in Valletta, Malta. I'll tell you if it was any good in early November :)

Thanks to all of you for your suggestions which were very much appreciated :rock:
 
Last time I went to Malta I was in short pants and we flew Dan Air!

Be interested to see what it's like now....
 
What about somewhere like Berlin, or Gdansk in Poland? I would suggest somewhere in the baltic states too but it's a bit cold at this time of year; having said that I'm off to Tallinn on Friday for the weekend, to visit the Mrs.
 
A bit late now, but I have just come back from 4 days in Athens, and it was great, good weather still, lots to see and do, friendly people. Would recommend.
 
So, we're back from Malta. Had five nights at Hotel Phoenicia which is within a one minute walk to the bus terminus and a two minute walk of the main city gate of Valletta.

Didn't bother renting a car as we were only there for four-and-a-bit days, relying on buses to get us around. Although they drive on the left (the locals actual say that they drive "on the shady side" - which pretty accurately sums it up), their driving standards are, err, abysmal. In fact, I'd say they are on a par with those in Romania but with an added bit of mediteranian "flair". The buses are dirt cheap (€0.47 single fare in one zone; €1.16 single gets you most of the way across the island) and quite an experience. We used taxis from and to the airport and for one other short ride as the fares border on extortion. Our taxi back to the airport even manged to have a crash while we were in it :crazy:

Architecturally there are some fantastic baroque-style buildings both in Valletta and in Mdina, but most of them have a patina of decay about them from the outside, and many of the shops in Valletta appear to have the same facade they did in the early 60's before the Brits left. It's clear that money has been spent tarting up places such as the Waterfront where the cruise liners dock, and Mdina was much less "worn" than Valletta.

We were warned that the Tarxien Temple area is to all intents and purposes closed to visitors at the moment as, having survived for the last 7,000 years in the open, now that EU money has arrived they've decided that they need to cover it up to preserve it for posterity :rolleyes: A pity really, because it would have been good to see the structures as well as the artifacts that were thankfully still on view in the Archaology Museum in Valletta. The more recent history of the island, from the 16th century on is equally fascinating and the scale of the defences at Valletta really do need to be seen to be believed.

Temperatures ranged from lows of 20-21c to a high of 27c, but it was very humid (up to 92%) a couple of days which made it a little uncomfortable wandering up and down the hilly streets. All in all a fascinating place to visit and one to which we will definitely return.
 
How about Lisbon with a side trip to Sintra (ever wondered where Vauxhall got THAT name from)?

Good food and wine and the Portuguese generally like the Brits

Full of good destinations is our mattc, so where did we go this year? A very wet week in Wales in July! :( ;)
 

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