Let's Travel Recommends Some Great Rides in Asia including A Cyclo Journey with La Residence Hotel &...

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9 771176 461001 THE MAGAZINE FOR CORPORATE AND LEISURE TRAVELLERS Let’s Travel ISSUE 44 OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2016 $9.95 inc GST CHINA’S Great Wall Sojourn in SAMOA Events time in QUEENSLAND NEW ORLEANS Food experience

Transcript of Let's Travel Recommends Some Great Rides in Asia including A Cyclo Journey with La Residence Hotel &...

Page 1: Let's Travel Recommends Some Great Rides in Asia including A Cyclo Journey with La Residence Hotel & Spa

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1176

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THE MAGAZINE FOR CORPORATE AND LEISURE TRAVELLERS

Let’s TravelISSUE 44 OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2016

$9.95 inc GST

CHINA’SGreat Wall

Sojourn inSAMOA

Events time in QUEENSLAND

NEW ORLEANSFood experience

Page 2: Let's Travel Recommends Some Great Rides in Asia including A Cyclo Journey with La Residence Hotel & Spa

10 www.letstravelmag.com Asia, Great Rides

Ensuring Journeys are DestinationsNo hotel ever wants its guests to leave, but if you must, and of course you should, they’d just as soon you come back. In Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Indonesia, hotels are investing in boomerangs -- transporting experiences that range from the highly dramatic (microlight aircraft) to the gritty but essential. It’s time to strap yourself in and take a journey on some of Asia’s great rides.

Anantara Hoi An Resort

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1 Anantara Hoi An Resort:Aboard Anantara Hoi An

Resort’s quaint, lantern-decorated sampan, fashioned by talented local carpenters, guests putter down the beautiful Thu Bon River and soak up a picturesque new cruise. The daily one-hour journey on the 33.0 CV-powered boat almost 13 metres in length and more than three metres in width opens up one of Asia’s most storied waterways in a whole new way. The cruise offers glimpses into the locals’ fascinating way of life on the river ranging from fishermen in sampans and coracles snaring a catch to fishmongers touting their wares at the bustling riverside markets.

2 Galle Face Hotel:Sri Lanka’s most iconic property

The Galle Face Hotel has been the place to stay in the capital Colombo for over 150 years. Now a ride in its 1954 Cadillac is just as coveted. Once used by Lord Louis Mountbatten, during the 1954 Commonwealth tour by Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, the classic car came out of retirement earlier this year. The journey is at the whim of the driver--who happens to be the hotel’s British general manager--but will no doubt involve a cruise alongside the Galle Face Green, the capital’s popular seaside park. Not bookable in advance, the experience itself is offered on a case-by-case basis.

3 Sofitel Legend Metropole Hanoi:

The two vintage Citroens parked in front of the Sofitel Legend Metropole Hanoi may not be as ‘suped up’ as Doc’s DeLorean in Back to the Future, but the brace of vehicles are time-transporting nevertheless. Since 1953 and 1956, these two old timepieces have plied the streets of Vietnam’s storied capital, as private cars initially, and more recently as the Metropole’s premier means of taking in the town. For anywhere between an hour and all-day, a white-gloved driver motors guests on plush, white cordovan bench seats to stops as varied as the August Temple of Literature to the monolithic immensity of Ho Chi Minh’s tomb.

4 The Sanchaya Bintan:The Sanchaya likens its

pristine and secluded beachfront at Lagoi Bay to the powder white sands at The Maldives, and from the open cockpit of a seaplane, it’s tough to argue the otherwise. The 20-minute microlight ride with Air Adventures Flying Club begins with the thrill of taking off on the water before buzzing the bay, banking over mangrove forests and zipping over dense tropical rainforest blanketing Indonesia’s Bintan island, only a 45-minute ferry ride from Singapore.

Galle Face Hotel's 1954 Cadillac

©M

artin Sasse

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5 La Residence Hue Hotel & Spa:

You haven’t really travelled through a Vietnamese city unless you’ve sat in the berth of a cyclo (xich lo), pedalled by a local driver perched up high on a seat behind you. Other countries in SE Asia do traffic in three-wheeled pedicabs, but no place compares with Vietnam, and nothing compares to a languorous ride on sweltering day with a canopy shielding the sun. In Hue, the one-time imperial capital of Vietnam, La Residence Hue Hotel & Spa dispatches guests on half-day food tours with stops at the market and at food stalls for such singular Hue dishes as banh beo, banh nam and banh loc.

6 The Reverie Saigon:As far as arrivals go, it doesn’t

get more auspicious than pulling up to Saigon’s hottest new address, The Reverie Saigon, in the hotel’s Rolls Royce Phantom Dragon - one of only eight in the world. The special edition car, a 2012 model to honor the legendary creature from the Chinese zodiac, has a price tag of over one million US dollars. Whether you’re travelling to or from the airport or being escorted between the city’s art galleries, museums, and cafes, passersby are sure to stare as you watch Saigon from the best seat in town.

Hotel Metropole Hanoi - Facade with Citroen

The Sanchaya BintanLa Residence Hue Hotel & Spa