Star travel tips

MSC Cruises has announced that MSC Virtuosa will set the backdrop for Channel 5’s newest drama, The Good Ship Murder, premiering at 9pm BST on Friday 13th October 2023. With each episode set to take place in a new port including Lisbon, Valencia, Barcelona, Le Havre and Valletta.

In my latest column where I interview actors, singers and other creatives about travel as it relates to their craft, I interviewed Ryan McKinny, a bass-baritone singer who plays the role of Joseph De Rocher in the MET’s blockbuster production of “Dead Man Walking.”

Saudi Arabia wants to write and uphold official “7-star standards” at its upcoming ultra-luxury Sindalah Island. The idea of ‘7-star’ anything dates back to the opening of Dubai’s Burj Al Arab hotel, a distinction that operator Jumeirah has never liked using, nor has the emirate officiated.

Ultra-luxury hotels — think of brands like Aman, One&Only, Rosewood, and The Peninsula — don’t always perform to their full potential. 

Amsterdam - with its beautiful canals, world class museums, and vibrant culture – is one of Europe’s most popular tourist destinations, earning the distinction as no less than the continent’s best capital city for tourists in this year’s VisaGuide World survey. Yet, as popular as it is, Amsterdam has long suffered from a lack of true 5-star luxury hotels. At least one Amsterdam hotel, however, fits that profile from top to bottom – the Waldorf Astoria Amsterdam.

Scandinavian Airlines plans to leave the Star Alliance frequent flyer group it helped found more than 25 years ago.

Since last summer, I've spent over one hundred hours crisscrossing the globe on a variety of different international airlines.

I’m skipping traditional methods of trip planning in favour of guidance from my planetary alignments.

Born in California, Alex Brightman is a two-time Tony nominee and writer living in New York City. He loves watching baseball and basketball when he's not on stage. Right now you can see him as Richard Dreyfuss in “The Shark is Broken” on Broadway.

The concierge is the hotel world's equivalent of a genie in a bottle — except some guests make far more than three wishes.

As bellhops grabbed my bags, a valet driver swiped my car keys, and a receptionist handed me a key to my room at The Little Nell, a five-star hotel in Aspen, Colorado, I was already feeling the pressure of time.

Stargazing is a time-honored tradition that has been an integral part of history in Saudi Arabia for millennia. The night sky was a crucial navigational tool in the vast and often featureless stretches of Saudi’s desert. Just as sailors use stars for navigation at sea, Bedouins relied on them to find their way across the sand. Those traditions are still honored today, and if you’re interested in learning more about the culture while enjoying the outdoors and vast star-studded sky, there are few locations in the country that can rival the natural beauty and vastness of AlUla.

Deepanker “DK” Khosla, the chef of Thailand’s pioneering Haoma restaurant, won me over with breakfast at his regenerative farm in Bangkok. The eggs were still warm when we collected them from his chickens’ nesting places, and even when his colleagues dropped them into the water to soft-boil them. The freshness of the egg, the vibrant orange gooeyness of the yolk and the bucolic countryside setting were divinely unexpected.

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Sleeping under the stars is a romantic notion but getting a really good look at them in today’s artificial-light-filled world can be challenging.

Chef Michel Roux Jr. has announced that his two-Michelin star London restaurant Le Gavroche will be closing its doors permanently in January.

New York City is home to 73 Michelin Star restaurants, with a new batch of awards due this fall. Before the official ceremony on November 7, the world renowned guide has announced a batch of 15 new restaurants that can be up for stars or Bib Gourmand recognition this coming year.

“People feed on good ideas in Zurich,” announces Ity Tiwari, an Indian-born, Zurich-based vegetarian food blogger and chef. “As a vegetarian, I’m continually delighted by the creativity and quality of dishes here. But I’m just as obsessed with Zurich’s humanity and the determination to do things the right way, with many restaurants pioneering zero-waste and community-driven initiatives.” 

Seen from Paris’s Pont de la Tournelle, the eight-story facade of the landmark restaurant La Tour d’Argent looks about the same as it did when its third-generation owner André Terrail grew up there in the 1980s, deploying toy parachutists into quayside traffic. But the interior is no longer indifferent to the 21st century: Late last month, La Tour d’Argent reopened its doors after a yearlong renovation led by the Paris-based architect Franklin Azzi. “It’s my Tour,” says Terrail, who took over following his father’s death in 2006. “The same, but more exacting, more thoughtful.” The new look draws on the outsize history of the classically French fine-dining institution, which has been serving diners since 1582, taking particular inspiration from the streamlined motifs of its Art Deco era. On the seventh floor, the redesigned restaurant — overseen since 2020 by executive chef Yannick Franques — functions more than ever as a theater. The airy dining room, in shades of indigo and silver, looks onto an open-plan kitchen and an elevated platform where the restaurant’s signature pressed-duck dish is prepared nightly. Upstairs and downstairs are new bars suited to less formal occasions: Le Bar des Maillets d’Argent, an all-day lounge with a fireplace, andLe Toit de la Tour, a rooftop terrace. Given that it has the welcoming air of a boutique hotel, it’s no wonder that the building can now host overnight visitors in a private apartment on the fifth floor, complete with a touch of Scandinavian-style minimalism attributable, in part, to Terrail’s Finnish mother.

Colorado’s culinary scene is officially on the Michelin map: Five restaurants have earned Michelin stars and dozens more garnered recommendations from the esteemed guide.

United has doubled down on its commitment to The Mile High City. While travelers have had to duke it out for space in airport lounges nationwide, the airline is offering its loyal fliers some breathing room in the form of a new lounge at its Denver International Airport hub—and it’s the largest in the brand’s history.