Hotels – the good, the bad and the hopeless

At heart, hoteliers really want their guests to have a pleasurable experience and a good night's sleep. (Those that don't should stop pretending to be Basil Fawlty and get another job – preferably one far removed from hospitality.) More often than not, however, they slip up on the simplest things, leaving their guests spitting with fury.

I know I've ranted about hotels before, but some things need repeating – namely that it's immediately obvious when hoteliers have never spent a night in their own hotel. They've never turned up – with luggage and a companion – and discovered all the niggly things that set your teeth on edge. They've never noticed that there's only one plug socket. They've never figured out that the huge expanse of bare wall in the room's entrance would be a really handy place to hang up your coat.

But no. Some designer or architect has convinced them that style comes before function. So you dump your coat on the bed, or hang it on the only chair in the room – despite the fact that it's a double room. Hoteliers: buy some hooks. There are some very stylish ones on the market. They don't cost a bomb.

You then check out the desk, and realise that you have to move the bloody thing to get to the room's second socket. I stayed in a hotel recently that had undergone a complete refurbishment, with all new furniture – furniture that was an inch higher than the existing sockets. This room cost £250 a night.

I've noticed a new trend in which shiny new bedside lamps come with a USB port. This is a good thing. More of this, please.

I've also noticed minibars with an insidious notice warning you that if you move anything in the bar, you will be charged for it. Even if you don't drink it. You pick it up, you pay for it. Apart from the fact that it's complete tosh, you're left with a feeling of animosity. This is a bad thing.

Hotels like to show their appreciation of their guests by leaving little treats, such as bottles of mineral water. This is a lovely touch, especially when there's a tag around the bottle saying "with our compliments". This is also a good thing. Otherwise, it's not obvious that it's free. I once witnessed a stand-up row at reception when a guest was charged for the bottle of water he thought was free. It wasn't. Bad feeling all round.

Espresso machines are a nice touch too. What's not so nice are the hotels that offer you only one free capsule before they start charging you. Stop being so stingy.

Bathrooms are another story. There's a bathroom designer somewhere rubbing his (or her, but probably his) hands with glee because everyone seems to be buying his long, flat basin with the too-short taps. Looks very sleek, but totally impractical. Water gets everywhere except where it's supposed to be. And showers without shelves are a nuisance.

And if hoteliers actually slept in their own hotel rooms, they would notice that the curtains don't meet in the middle. Or that the minimalist white blind doesn't come close to blocking out the light.

Don't even get me started on wall panels with absurdly complicated light switches. Especially when they're in bright LED lights that are right in your line of sight. In addition to clothes pegs to keep curtains closed, I now have to travel with BluTack and a piece of cardboard.

These things usually happen in four- and five-star hotels. I've stayed in the simplest little two- and three-stars that have managed to get these things right, even if the materials are on the cheap side. But as design hotels seem to be following the same uniform pattern, the same mistakes are being made.

And as far as hotel websites are concerned, those that refuse to give you any indication of rates but ask you to fill out an email form ... well, those can sod off. And there's never, ever, an excuse to put music on hotel websites. Ever.

Late-season skiing in Les Menuires

While many people are happy to see the back of winter, some of us can’t get enough of larking about in the snow – specifically on skis. There’s much to be said for late-season skiing – milder temperatures, longer days, lazy lunches on mountain restaurant terraces, generally quieter slopes and cheaper accommodation. The downsides? Well, be prepared for icy slopes first thing and slushy pistes at the bottom.

Altitude helps, of course. I was based in Les Menuires in the third valley that makes up the Trois Vallées, the largest ski domain in the world. The base village is at 1850m, but I was staying in Reberty at 2000m, which is right on the blue Boyes piste. It’s a newer, traditionally styled village that isn’t filled with the modernist architecture that makes Les Menuires one of the less aesthetically pleasing resorts in France.

But what Les Menuires lacks in beauty it more than makes up for in its ski area and ease of skiing to the other resorts in the Trois Vallées. I’d had a brief taste of it a few years ago when I stayed in its smaller neighbour, Saint-Martin-de-Belleville, and had wanted to come back and explore it properly. I’d known it had excellent skiing, but I wasn’t quite prepared for just how good it was.

Over three gloriously sunny days, our ESF guide Jérôme (Saint-Martin native and all-round great chap) showed off the best of his resort. Long, wide, cruisey blue runs – including Grand Lac which started at 2,704m – snaked their way down to Saint-Martin and its extremely pretty village centre. If we wanted to, we could have swung into Méribel from several peaks. Instead we carried on back to Les Menuires and up to Reberty, where La Ferme de Reberty’s large sun-trap terrace was a convivial spot for a lunch of diots (smoked Savoyard sausages) and crozets (tiny pasta squares) smothered in melted Beaufort.

On the western side of Les Menuires is La Masse, another playground of wide blues and reds plus a few blacks that I left to more adventurous skiers. The long red Fred Covili run (named after a local champion skier) started just below the 2804m Pointe de la Masse and was an exhilarating way to get down the mountain before we had to endure the slushy lower-altitude run that led down to the village.

By the time we made it back over to the southern side of Les Menuires and up the Sunny Express, we had more than earned our lunch at Chalet du Sunny. While I was diving head first into a tartiflette, a party was getting under way on the slope side of the restaurant. Out came the silly hats, costumes and onesies as a Polish DJ and dancers did a fantastic job in re-creating the raucous atmosphere at La Folie Douce. It saved me the effort of having to trek over to Val Thorens – and back – to experience it first hand.

As it happened, Val Thorens was the destination for the final day, which was very easy to reach via the runs coming down from the 2786m Mont de la Chambre. Europe’s highest ski resort had a decidedly different atmosphere from its family-focused neighbour, appealing to a younger, rowdier crowd. It also has a giant ear-popping gondola that takes you up to Cîme Caron at a dizzying 3200m for superb views across the Maurienne Valley and over to Les Deux Alpes.

As we skied down towards the sinuous Cumin run that leads back to Les Menuires, I could see just how vast this area was – especially as we were heading all the way to Saint-Martin for lunch. Friendly family-run Le Corbeleys sorted out my cheese fixation with a bowl of gooey Beaufort ravioli.

If the lunches were superb, the evening meals were taken to another level in our catered chalet, Le Chamois, run by Powder N Shine. Professional chef Shaun Francome came up with one exquisite dish after another: succulent beef fillet, delicate goat’s cheese mousse, velvety white onion velouté and probably the best cheesecake I’d ever eaten. The high quality of the food, wine, afternoon tea and early-evening canapés matched the warm welcome from hosts Heather and Layla, faultless service, relaxing atmosphere and the cocooning pine sitting room with its big squashy sofas. Tired post-ski legs were instantly soothed in the terrace hot tub, where we basked in the sunshine and views of the slopes. For a final fix of winter, it was unbeatable.

Travel with voyages-sncf.com, which has direct trains from London St Pancras to Moûtiers. Transfers can be arranged with Skiidy Gonzales

All photos © Adam Batterbee

Kind of blue

When I tell people I learnt to ski in Canada, they immediately say: "Cool! Whistler? Banff? Quebec?" Er, no. Ontario, actually, that mainly low-lying province that's livened up considerably by the Niagara Escarpment slicing through it. It's thanks to this escarpment that you can do some skiing, even if the altitudes don't go above 500m. Still, what else is there to do during the long, seemingly endless Canadian winter?

I hadn't skied in Canada for more than 30 years, having since skied in most of Europe's top resorts. But in the same season when I'd skied in Zermatt and Megève, I was off to Blue Mountain. Never heard of it? Well, it's Canada's third-busiest resort (after Whistler and Mont-Tremblant, in case you were wondering). Since I was last there more than three decades ago, it's been bought by Intrawest and expanded out of all recognition. There's now a "village", a greatly extended ski area of 42 runs and faster lifts. In spite of all the trappings, you can't ignore the fact that its top elevation is only 452m and its longest run is 1.6km. This was definitely going to be small fry, I thought, and kept my expectations as low as the altitude.

It didn't help that I chose what was possibly the busiest day of the year to visit: a bank holiday weekend in February. What looked like the entire population of Toronto had driven the two hours up north towards Collingwood and dumped itself in the resort. That meant queues. Queues for lift tickets, which were bearable. And queues for equipment rental, which were mental. You queued for a temperamental iPad to fill in your requirements, then queued for your boots, then the skis and helmet. At least 90 minutes later, I was finally able to face my first queue for the chairlift.

But the sun was out. And there was fresh snow. And there was a stall in the village selling poutine. (That was lunch sorted.) Once you reach the summit, you're greeted with the somewhat surreal sight of Georgian Bay down below. I'd skied overlooking Alpine lakes before, but none the size of this sprawling offshoot of the Great Lakes. Yes, the runs were a bit on the short side, so we meandered our way down, taking our time with lots of big loopy turns. No need to rush into another queue.

In the end, it turned out to be a hugely enjoyable day out. There's a good amount of varied terrain, as well as a snowpark and some mogul fields if you have any knees left. My main quibble was the price. For two people, day passes and equipment rental came to just over £170. A similar day out at one of Intrawest's French outposts, Flaine, would have been £50 cheaper, and you'd get slopes at 2,500m and views of Mont Blanc. If I were to go again (and I might), I'd book passes online, where it's cheaper, and I'd try one of the off-site rental shops to save both a bit of cash and my sanity. 

Wrong side of the tracks

Every morning, the slightly dilapidated Ivo Andric train leaves Belgrade and trundles along to Budapest, eventually arriving eight and a half hours later. It's a bargain at €15, even if the four-carriage train has seen better days. Belgrade's main railway also has seen better days: as there are plans to move it to another part of the city, it's looking distinctly unloved at the moment. But there's a little café at the station that makes a halfway decent cup of Turkish coffee, which is what you need when you're going to be deprived of a restaurant car for nearly nine hours.

I had noticed a disjointed group of men hanging around the station, at times getting together, at other times splitting up. They looked as jumpy as the caffeine in my coffee. They didn't look any more relaxed when they boarded the train, again making an effort to seat themselves in separate clusters. Occasionally one would make an anxious, terse phone call. Another would scoot to the toilet every 15 minutes or so.

When I went to use the loo, I saw immediately that the men weren't suffering from weak bladders. A somewhat battered Samsung phone was charging, and obviously the men were just making certain that no one was running off with it. I wasn't sure where the men were from, but I had an inkling they were from Afghanistan – just eight or so of the countless people trying to get from Serbia to a European Union country, specifically Hungary.

Sure enough, at Subotica, the last Serbian city before the border, all of the men got off the train and scattered at once. Then began the lengthy two-part visit from both sets of border police, first the Serbs who were doing a thorough search of all the train. We then crept over the border into no-man's-land, where the Hungarian border police came on board. If I thought the Serbs were being thorough, they had nothing over the Hungarians who were checking every nook and cranny, shining torches into places I hadn't spotted.

As we crossed into Hungary, we passed the fence that the Hungarian government hastily put up to stop the flow of refugees. I took one look at the tall, spiky mass of metal and barbed wire and my heart sank for anyone who tried to get past that. The fence was briefly opened to let the train through before it was abruptly shut. Where were those men, I wondered?

They certainly weren't on the train. When I next went to the loo, I had to duck to avoid having my head smacked by the dangling ceiling that the border police opened to check no one was hiding within. I looked into the forest of insulation and tubes above me and thought that maybe a chihuahua could just about fit in there. I don't think even the most desperate refugee could contort his body to squeeze into that minuscule space.

This happens every day, on every train that goes between both countries. I wish I knew how many make it across that steel barrier between despair and hope.

Lost in Bosnia

See the photo on the left? That was the setting for a relaxing picnic lunch on the road from Sarajevo to Croatia – at a little village on Ramsko Jezero. I wasn't to know that things were going to get quite a bit darker after this little interlude.

I knew what Bosnia's roads were like, having driven on them enough times before. This time, though, I had only a very basic map and no satnav. But as I had mapped my route through Google Maps and Michelin, I thought I knew the best way of making the five-hour journey from Sarajevo to my uncle's house in the Croatian hinterland near the Bosnian border. The route had even outlined a border crossing that was within only a few miles of my uncle's village.

It was when we reached the town of Livno that things started to go wrong. We were heading towards the mountains when I spotted what looked like the right road across the mountainous ridge into Croatia. There were no signs, but the road was exactly how it looked on the map. It was a brand new road, too new for any markings. Too new for any proper surfacing as well, which we doggedly decided to ignore. It snaked jaggedly in dizzying bends up the mountain for 11km, past no civilisation apart from a single lonely cottage.

Then the road came to an abrupt halt. Maybe the workers had gone on strike, but there was nothing ahead but mountainous scrub. We were in a hire car on a non-existent road with no proper maps and a storm was making its way through the Dinaric Alps. God knows what was on top of the ridge at the Croatian border. We had to turn back.

Unfortunately, we didn't turn back on to the right road. Rather than the proper road, we ended up on a bjeli put, a white farm track rather like the Italian strade bianche that wind through picturesque parts of Italy. This wasn't quite so picturesque. By this time, the forbidding mountains were feeling quite oppressive. The threatening storm had turn into a heavy downpour. It looked bleak – and bleaker still when we realised we had no idea where we were.

It was when we passed through a shelled-out village that I really began to worry. We were in the part of Bosnia that had endured horrendous fighting during the 1992-95 war. We drove through several villages that were ghost towns, decaying wrecked farms with rusting tanks in front gardens. One farm building had graffiti sprayed on it: horribly sinister messages from Croatian and Serbian fighters made me shudder as we drove through the relentless rain.

Finally – after about an hour and a half – we came off the bjeli put on to the road we should have been on in the first place. We eventually came to Bosansko Grahovo, birthplace of Archduke Ferdinand's killer Gavrilo Princip. It was also the birthplace of my father's beloved brother-in-law, but it was too wet and too late to do any exploring. Even so, I stopped at a café to double check I was on the right road. I dashed through the driving rain into a fog of cigarette smoke. Friendly curious faces crowded round me and reassured me that I was on the right road that would take us through Knin and eventually to to my uncle's house. It was considerably far from my original Google Maps route, which seemed more irrelevant as the miles ticked by.

Another couple of hours later and we finally arrived at my uncle's house. The rain had stopped and the temperature became almost balmy as we downed much-needed shots of plum brandy in the garden. My uncle commiserated, and then told me that we had taken the right route after all. The border crossing that was closest to his village was closed thanks to the high number of smugglers passing through. That wouldn't have been the best place to pitch up after a seven-hour drive.

A taste of Calabria

Ten years ago, the food writer Matthew Fort drove a Vespa from the southern tip of Italy to Turin, having one food adventure after another. One of his earliest stops was at Le Carolee, an agriturismo in the middle of the Calabrian countryside east of Lamezia. In his book Eating Up Italy, he raved about the food produced by the warm and friendly Gaetano family, and wondered why on earth the British are so obsessed with Tuscany and Umbria, when the food of Calabria is infinitely better and much more interesting.

Ten years later, I'm sitting in the garden of Le Carolee in the dusk under palm trees and looking out over a valley of olive trees. I'm waiting for the first of four courses of deceptively simple Calabrian food, and I'm not disappointed. Antipasti of aubergine meatballs, courgette fritters and capocollo, a salami of pork shoulder made at the agriturismo. The pasta course was penne in an aubergine and tomato sauce. The meat course was slow-cooked veal that melted in the mouth. As it was September, dessert consisted of watermelon and honeydew melons that were in season and were being sold in countless roadside stalls by wizened farmers. We'd had local red wine that was just smooth enough followed by homemade limoncello. I sat back, listened to the gentle wind rustling through the olive groves and was pleased that I had three more dinners at Le Carolee to enjoy before I had to go home.

Over the next three nights I had swordfish with capers, olives and preserved peppers. And involtini of mozzarella with rocket, pancetta and tomatoes. And cracked and roasted olives grown on the estate. And thin slices of veal with pine nuts. And homemade tagliatelle – thicker than you would ever see in Britain – with sugo, over which was sprinkled a chopped red chilli and lots of parmesan. My favourite was filej con nduja – made by winding a thin strip of pasta round something like a knitting needle, and covering it with nduja, a soft sausage whose bright red colour gives a clue as to how much chilli is packed within.

It's not complicated and it's hardly Michelin-star stuff. It's cucina povera at its best. When you live in a region that's been poor for centuries, you learn how to make the best of what you have. And Calabria, poor in many ways but so very rich in others, is surprisingly teeming with produce of incredibly high quality – olives, courgettes, nuts, figs, dates, tomatoes, aubergines. The poorer the country, it seems, the more ways they have of cooking aubergines.

Same thing with chilli. Calabria's cuisine is spicy – but with warmth and depth of flavour. Red chillis, peperoncini, flavour everything from sausages to ice cream (which is delicious) and is known as the Viagra of the poor. Apparently they see chilli as an aphrodisiac. It also adds flavour and – importantly, during the old days of crushing poverty – it suppresses the appetite. I didn't have that problem. I couldn't get enough of chilli. Nor could I get enough of Calabria.

All photographs © Adam Batterbee

Christmas magic in Bruges

Bruges’s Christmas markets are a major draw to one of Belgium’s most enchanting cities during the festive season. Several dozen wooden huts cluster in the main Markt square, where a temporary ice rink glitters with thousands of lights. Horse-drawn carriages clop on the cobbles in front of the historic restaurants lining the square, their crenellated rooftops adorned with yet more Christmas lights. No business has missed the chance to cover itself with tasteful wreaths, lights and baubles.

In the shadow of the looming 15^th-century Belfry, visitors warming their hands on glasses of mulled wine wander among the stalls looking for Christmas gifts. They have plenty to choose from: among them, Christmas decorations, toys, jewellery, leather handbags and ceramics. There’s also a substantial number of stalls selling warm woolly hats, scarves and gloves, which come in handy when the chilly wind rustles through the square.

When the shoppers run out of fuel, they head to the food stalls where they fill up on delicious braadwurst sausages, waffles, apple fritters and – a gratifying sight on a cold day – tartiflette smothered in gooey reblochon cheese. Those wanting their fix of Belgian friet (chips) queue up at the distinctive green fast-food stalls that stand guard outside the Belfry.

A brief walk down Steenstraat leads to Bruges’s smaller, more intimate Christmas market at Simon Stevinplein. Sparkling white lights drape the trees in the centre of the square, where the wooden huts form a ring. Here you’ll find artisan cheeses, jams, honeys and, this being a tobacco-loving nation, a stall selling everything you need to roll your own. There’s a mini funfair here too, as well as more stalls selling handicrafts. I carry on my annual tradition of adding a new decoration to my tree, this time a cute-looking ceramic Father Christmas who’s hanging upside down. Don’t ask me why.

The Christmas markets in Bruges aren’t the only place for gifts. Affluent, agreeable Bruges has a large number of upmarket and trendy shops selling women’s and men’s clothing, many of which line the parallel shopping streets of Noordzandstraat and Zudzandstraat. Kitchenware shops thrive too, tempting you with more gadgets than you ever thought you needed but realised you just had to have.

Then there’s the chocolate. Chocolatiers are everywhere, selling everything from kitsch souvenir chocolates to exquisite creations crafted by hand. Some of the chocolates look too good to eat, and the Christmas ones shaped like snowmen and Father Christmas look too adorable to take out of the box. The ones shaped into large breasts are another story.

Then there’s the beer. If your idea of beer heaven is a shop that includes a “Beer Wall” selling almost 800 varieties (with different glass to match), head to 2be, a shop housed in a 15^th-century former mayor’s house on Wollestraat. The beer lover in your life will thank you for the beautifully presented boxed sets, and those who don’t care for the stuff will be happy with other Belgian treats including chocolates and biscuits. There’s an inviting café attached, where the terrace overlooks the canal.

To continue the self-indulgent festive mood I found myself in, I explored two of the more unusual attractions that recall so much of the city’s history. This being Bruges, that meant chocolate and chips. The chocolate museum, Choco-Story, tells the fascinating story of how first the drink and then the solid form became such desirable foodstuffs. You don’t have to have a sweet tooth to become engrossed in the displays looking back over centuries of chocolate’s history. The visit finishes with a demonstration that will have you heading straight to the nearest chocolatier. (Or the museum shop, if you can’t wait that long.)

A more savoury story is told at the Friet Museum. The scent of fried potatoes wafts over displays explaining how the humble tuber has become such a staple part of the world’s diet. By the time you’ve reached the vintage kitchens showing how chips (or friet, or frites, or French fries) were fried in decades past, you are more than ready to visit the café and scoff a cone of chips (with mayonnaise, of course).

Even the most dedicated chocoholic and chipoholic need more substantial feeding, though, and can choose from hundreds of restaurants in Bruges. Cafedraal in Zilverstraat is a classy restaurant in a 15^th-century house, where mouthwatering seafood and meat dishes are served under cosy wooden beams. The Blauw Wit beef tournedos were cooked to a perfect rare state, served with chunky Belgian chips.

Afterwards it was only a few minutes’ walk back to my hotel, the comfortable and friendly three-star Maraboe. It’s central yet has its own car park – an essential thing if, like me, you travel by DFDS ferry and car. After all, it would be a bit difficult to lug all that food and drink home without one.

All photographs © Adam Batterbee

A French road trip in style

Given the choice between taking a seven-year-old Ford Focus and an admittedly borrowed but shiny new Peugeot RCZ on a 1,500-mile trip through France, it was hardly a tough decision to make.

A chance conversation at a press lunch resulted in Peugeot lending me its latest sports coupé for my 10-day jaunt through western France. It wouldn’t be a test drive as such – just the opportunity to see how the low-slung RCZ sports coupé would cope on narrow winding country roads leading to hilltop villages as well as long stretches of motorway.

It would be a little while before I could show off this really quite beautiful car, however. The “dolphin-blue” RCZ sat patiently below deck during the civilised overnight crossing on Brittany Ferries from Portsmouth to St Malo. And then it went straight to the underground car park of the Grand Hotel des Thermes while we explored the underrated port of St Malo. But finally the car had a full six hours of being on view – and duly admired by passing motorists – as we headed south through the Pays de la Loire’s lush green countryside and Poitou-Charente’s endless sunflower fields towards the Dordogne.

I could see why the car turned heads. It resembles the Audi TT in shape and design, but has none of the WAG stigma attached. It’s also considerably cheaper than an equally tooled-up TT: mine was the six-gear GT HDi with all the bells and whistles and its on-the-road price is just over £25,000.

It was also immediately obvious that taking a fuel-efficient diesel on a long road trip was a good idea. The display showing the remaining miles before the next fill-up actually went up as we cruised along the motorway; the car was dutifully calculating that a steady speed along a smooth road was doing wonders for fuel efficiency. In fact, I didn’t refill until after 550 miles, and there was still fuel left in the tank.

I could also set the speed limit to prevent me from unwittingly breaking the law. Going at breakneck speed along French autoroutes is becoming a thing of the past, I’ve noticed over the years – at least among French drivers. Satnavs aren’t allowed to show locations of speed cameras any more, but then I had no desire to go above the 80mph motorway limit. And the car’s low position gave me the impression I was going much faster than I was.

It was only on the rather bumpy D roads towards my destination near Bergerac that I noticed that the extra-wide tyres and 19-inch wheels made the ride a bit harder. But then on the stretches where single-lane carriages briefly opened into two lanes – uphill, as they invariably do – the engine’s power made overtaking easy work.

We could nip past lumbering Dutch caravans that clogged the roads leading to the Dordogne’s most popular medieval villages: Beynac, Les Eyzies, La Roque-Gageac, Domme. Sunflowers lit up the fields along the D roads between the half-timbered village houses of Issigeac and Monpazier’s handsome arcaded square. These roads were quieter, made for pootling along – which suited the RCZ just fine.

The car would have plenty of time to glide through its six gears as we sped along the motorway through Limousin on the way north to the Loire Valley. The landscape flattened out somewhat as we reached villages along the confluence of the Loire and Vienne rivers, broken up occasionally by limestone ridges housing troglodyte caves. The car was getting heavier by this point, as the temptation to stock up on Saumur reds and rosés was proving too much. Luckily the boot was much bigger than you would expect from a coupé, with two narrow seats in the rear adding extra room. Indeed, the whole interior was remarkably spacious, with plenty of legroom and comfortable sculpted front seats.

There was just enough time to fill the boot to capacity with a last-minute shop near Calais before the return ferry crossing and the drive home. I was hoping against hope that the Peugeot driver might get lost on his way to pick up the car. Sadly he didn’t.

Images © Adam Batterbee