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Ross Bonetti Velib Biking in Paris

See Paris For Pennies (Yes, Really—It’s True)

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How cool is this: cruising around City Of Light on a bicycle you can rent for a song.

Ross Bonetti Velib Biking in ParisTRAVEL ADVISORY | The next time I visit Paris (in my dreams!), I’m going to ride a bicycle just like the one Ross Bonetti is sitting on in this picture. Ross, who owns LivingSpace Interiors in Vancouver and travels to Paris twice a year to attend the Maison et Objet trade show, has always crisscrossed the city by taxi or metro—until a year ago September when he started renting bicycles. Now he can’t imagine getting around the city on anything but a two-wheeler. Read more

Pueblo Ingles

How To Stay Free At Resorts In Rural Spain

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Wanted: English speakers to stay for free at resorts in the Spanish countryside.

Pueblo Ingles TRAVEL ADVISORY | Are you friendly, flexible and fluent in English? Then for the price of a plane ticket to Madrid, you can spend eight days but zero money at a four-star resort in rural Spain. Pueblo Ingles, meaning English Village, is an organization in Spain that allows Spanish speakers to interact with English speakers. Instead of cash, you exchange your life experience, stories and patience with learners for luxurious accommodation, exquisite meals and a lounge chair by a pool. The Spanish speakers get to practise speaking real or “raw” English, as the program likes to call it, in a totally English environment; not even a “hola” allowed. Read more

The Cheapest Chicest Hotels in Palm Springs

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If you can take some heat, this California city is a great place to get a room right now.

 

 

Colony Palms Hotel, Palm Springs

STAY HERE There are two schools of thought on travel accom-modation. There is the group who say: a bed is a bed and all I need is somewhere clean to lay my head because I don’t plan to spend time in my room anyway; and there is the other group who feel that where they stay should be memorable in the way it looks or contributes to the place’s overall experience.

I understand both these points of view and have fallen into one or the other of these groups depending on the occasion. But I do love design—and the idea of regionality where hotels are concerned—so I’m always on the lookout for accommodation with what I call original spin, hotels that “have a look” and feel local. Oh yes, and I want them to give great service AND be reasonably priced. Read more

Rememberance Day Poppies

Remembering

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Remembrance Day is the string around my finger that reminds me to meditate on all of the people—here and gone—that I love.

Rememberance Day Poppies

WHAT NOT TO MISS | What’s your favourite holiday? Christmas, Easter, Halloween? Mine’s Remembrance Day. I love it because it’s a plain day with nothing to buy and no baggage like costumes, candy, cards, parties or gifts. I love that it’s a cultural unifier, and about honour and sacrifice and all sorts of other things that are so much bigger than me. Read more