World’s weirdest hotels

Posted by Freyja Oddsdóttir - 06/11/09 at 11:11:04 am

Have you ever wanted to live with giraffes or sleep with the fish in the sea? Or do you simply wanna try something weird like sleeping in an open sewer or an escape pod? Now you can, because Dohop has found you the weirdest hotels in the world!

Giraffe Manor in Langata, Kenya, is arranged so that roaming giraffes can poke their heads into any open window or doorway and lather guests with their sticky, prehensile tongues. Talk about a friendly wake up call! Your guesthouse is their guesthouse, so the silly creatures pop up everywhere, including over the breakfast table, in the lobby, and through the curtains.

Jules’ Undersea Lodge in Florida, USA, is a former marine lab, 21 feet underwater, close to the bottom of the mangrove-filled Emerald Lagoon, in Key Largo. Guests will have to scuba dive to reach their room, and if you don’t have the mandatory certification you must take a course at the hotel. Once in your room, you’ll see angelfish, anemones, barracuda, oysters, and other creatures through your 42-inch window.

Das Park Hotel in Linz, Austria consists of three unadorned, 10-ton segments of drainage pipe, each 6.5 feet in diameter and barely long enough to accommodate a double bed. Artist and designer Andreas Strauss punched the pipes with skylights, added doors with electronic locks, and placed it by the Danube River. Amenities are skimpy, as you might expect: You get a lamp, a mattress, and a few sleeping bags. On the bright side, the hotel has no fixed rates. You leave whatever amount you think is fair.

Dog Bark Park Inn in Cottonwood, Idaho USA, is a two-story, beagle-shaped B&B. Guests enter the structure from the deck that lines one side of the pup’s rib cage. The main quarters are in the belly of the beast; the sleeping loft is in the pooch’s head. And, yes, pets are allowed.

The Capsule Hotel consists of bright-orange ’70s-era escape pods for easy visibility and rotates its fleet around the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe. At the moment, two are in the western Dutch town of Vlissingen and another is in The Hague. The pods once hung outside oil rigs, ready to be deployed in case of an evacuation but these are different times and now you can opt to book your pod with a disco ball and all the James Bond movies on DVD.

The Igloo Village can be found at multiple locations in Switzerland. The Swiss have plenty of snow but no igloos, so an enterprising hotelier in Scuol built one. The beds are made of snow and price of a night’s accommodations includes a down-filled sleeping bag rated for North Pole expeditions.

Don’t worry if you budget is tight or if you would like a fancier experience… Das Park Hotel is ideal for backpackers and Harlingen Harbour Crane suits those looking for something extravagant.. this list is just the top of the iceberg!

Packing the sensible way

Posted by Freyja Oddsdóttir - 04/11/09 at 08:11:36 am

It has been said that the happiest traveller is the one that can fit his bag under a seat on the bus, or take it as hand luggage on a flight. You may not believe this is feasible… but most of us learn the hard way that this is not only true, but actually possible! Take a hint from someone who “backpacked” around Europe with a 40 kg suitcase that broke in country number 3 (out of 12) and learn to pack light!

#1. Make a list. The things that make it onto your list should be “I cannot survive without this” type of things, rather than “I might need this” type of things. This also means that last minute, you won’t allow yourself to add things to your bag because you think “you might need them”… there’s a reason why they weren’t on your list in the first place, so stick to it.

#2. Make sure that all the clothes you take fit with most other items in your suitcase. Don’t take that yellow pattern shirt that only fits with that one pair of pants!

#3. Pick the smallest bag/suitcase you can get away with. If you bring a big bag, you will most likely either fill it up with stuff “you think you might need” before you leave or while you’re travelling… it’s human nature.

#4. You’ll be doing yourself a big favour by keeping everything liquid in either a water-proof wash kit or zip-lock/money bags tightly fastened with an elastic band. An item leaking into your bag is a pain that’s worth avoiding.

#5. Roll your clothes into tight tubes instead of folding them, they will take less space and are less likely to wrinkle.

#6. Should you be backpacking, you may thank yourself later for bringing little things like earplugs, a padlock, wet wipes and a travel washing line for hanging your clothes after washing.

#7. Remember that wherever you are going, you will most likely be able to buy whatever you didn’t bring. It will probably a lot cheaper than home and you support the local economy at the same time.

The less developed your destination is and the more you plan to move between places, the more important it is to pack light. There are heaps of extensive packing guides out there for any occasion… all you really need to do is to believe me when I say that you don’t need all this stuff you’re tempted to put in your bag… and you’re good to go!

Packing the emotional way

Posted by Freyja Oddsdóttir - 02/11/09 at 09:11:29 am

Are you about to embark on a long  trip? Are you moving to another country? If you are, you may have started to feel the agony of deciding of what to take with you and what to leave behind… especially when you realize that you can only bring 20 kgs with you. Most of us have collected quite a share of material belongings, so how does one decide what is worthy of being part of our 20 kg suitcase?

There are so many packing guides out there. But my problem was that all of them were very sensible but none of them helped you deal with the emotional side of having to leave your things behind… so here is a guide to packing  that takes your emotions into consideration, although I recommend looking at the sensible way to pack as well!

#1. Start early! Yes, everyone knows that… but apart from Bree Van de Kamp, does anyone ever do it? I recommend starting at least 2-3 weeks before scheduled departure (this goes for anything long term)… bring out all your stuff and start planning.

#2. Categorize all your stuff into 3 piles: things you absolutely must take with you, things you would like to take with you and things you know you don’t want to bring.

#3. Start packing the things that you absolutely must take with you. If your suitcase is already overflowing after this step, you may wanna go back to #2 and re-evaluate.

#4. Have a good look at the things that you would like to take with you and decide which of them would be of most use where you are going. You can even prioritize them and pack them one by one until your suitcase is full.

#5. Pack the things that you would have liked to take but couldn’t fit in your suitcase into boxes and store them where a friend/family member can reach them. If you realize upon arrival that you desperately miss some of them, you can always have them sent and the thought of that can give you peace of mind if you feel sad about leaving them (this saved me a lot of tears when I packed my collection of high heels in a box).

#6. Store or give away the things you didn’t want to bring.

Voilá! You are ready for your trip!

Marin County, California

Posted by Katrín Sif - 30/10/09 at 08:10:41 am

If you cross the Golden Gate Bridge, just north of San Francisco you will find Marin County, a beautiful, sparcely populated oasis of redwoods, beach and countryside. I roadtripped with a friend north up the 101, and then went west towards Muir Beach, until finally driving along the coast up to Stinson Beach. The drive over the hills was a little trecherous, speckled with road-side grazing deer, but the small, single lane highway made it seem like we were miles and miles away from the city when we were really only about a 30 min drive away.

Once we arrived at Stinson, we tipped our hats to the (amazingly) good weather by heading straight to the beach, where kids were still swimming and surfers still catching waves, despite it being late October. There was barely a breeze, and luckily enough no fog either. We ate lunch at a locally run, organic, open-air cafe before heading out for some surf. We drove around Bolinas Lagoon to the north side of Bolinas Bay where the town, Bolinas is actually situated. We rented boards and wetsuits and spent the next 3 hours riding waves without ever feeling cold.

We welcomed the evening by settling on the beach ontop a sleeping bag we took from the Bolinas “free box,” a place where you leave or take what you dont need or have. We stayed there throughout one of the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen, and on through to the darkest point of night where the only light you could see was the distant city glow of San Francisco, still within eyesight but definitely out of mind.

The following day we drove through Samuel P. Taylor Park, home to some enormous redwoods, and all the way to Pt. Reyes Lighthouse which sits at the end of Drakes Bay in Pt. Reyes National Seashore Park. Enroute we stopped in some tiny, historic towns like Pt. Reyes Station, Inverness and Olema, and dipped our toes in the sandy beaches of Drakes Beach and North Beach.

It was the perfect getaway out of the city, only a short drive away, with enough natural beauty, solitude and quietude to make us totally forget about the stresses awaiting our return home to the huslte and bustle of the bay.

The Coffee-chase!

Posted by Júlíana Björnsdóttir - 27/10/09 at 09:10:29 am

Last Friday morning was rather unusual for me, I found myself roaming around Kringlan, Iceland’s first shopping mall, and actually purchasing a couple of items. Kringlan is an excellent place to do your shopping when visiting Iceland during winter or on a rainy day.  On this particular occasion though, my initial plan, to which I stuck eventually, was to hang out at my favourite cafe, Kaffi Roma.

Ever since my Paris years coffee has not been just coffee.  A good cup of coffee is made with passion by baristas who themselves (with few exceptions) are quite particular about what makes for good coffee.  I always order the same single-shot latte with extra milk;  to me consistency in quality is the exception with most cafes, but Kaffi Roma always gets it right!

Kaffi Roma is located on the second floor of Kringlan; its location is not the quietest but to me that’s not an issue. A second branch is supposedly located on Laugavegur 118 in the centre of Reykjavík (although I am convinced the actual location is Rauðárstígur, across the street from the Kaupthing ATM).  I would most definitely recommend with Kaffi Roma if you are as particular (and passionate) as I myself am where it comes to good coffee. Not to mention that occasionally I even get a chance to refresh my Spanish a bit as the cafe in Kringlan is run, or at least managed, by a native Spanish-speaker!

What I would appreciate is if those of you who read this blog take a minute and let us know what your favourite cafe is where you live, and where it is located.  I for one would find that very useful!

Massaging South East Asia

Posted by Erna Eiríksdóttir - 26/10/09 at 09:10:55 am

When traveling in Asia, long flights, hours on trains, more hours on buses, hours on foot while exploring something new, uncomfortable beds and even an upset belly are bound to follow you. A good massage seems to fix all of the world’s problems – the problem is that there are too many of them. The following is a list of the most common massages to have.

Khmer Massage: Your body will be massaged with a body. After changing in to pajamas your tiny masseuse will stretch you in all directions and massage your body with her entire body. For a sore body that needs to be set straight, this massage is terrific. The masseuse frequently puts all her body weight on one spot of your body to help the muscles loosen up. My favorite part of the massage is when the girl sort of kneels on your back and puts her hands under your arms (your hands locked behind your head) and holds your neck. She proceeds to swing you around, slowly at first, until she really cracks it and you think your back is going to break in million pieces. However, you do feel like a million bucks afterwards.

Thai Massage: similar to Khmer massage except you need to participate a bit more. The massage is quite yoga-esque and differs from South to North. In S-Thailand the main focus of the massage is acupressure while in the North stretching is the focal point.

Balinese Massage: a soft aromatherapeutic oil massage from the Indonesian island of Bali. Your muscles are kneaded in a wonderful relaxing with warm, lovely smelling, oil.

Hilot: a therapy from the Philippines. As so many Asian massages it is to relieve sore joints and kneads muscles. But, Hilot is so much more, the technique is often used to reset dislocated shoulders and help with childbirth, amongst others.

Fish Massage: It is exactly what it sounds like. Tiny fishies massage you by eating you, mostly your feet and callus. Tickles a bit and feels a little odd at first, but your freshly eaten and smooth feet will love you for it. You can have fish massage in other parts of the world but this seems to be very popular in the region.

Foot massage: as the name says your feet will be massaged. Sometimes it is infused with reflexology but generally your toes and heels will be very happy campers. Best thing is that most often you get a hand massage, and a short but revitalizing head, neck and back massage too.

Lulur: one of my favorites is this lovely massage and scrub from beautiful Indonesia. Traditionally, brides to be have this treatment for 40 days before their wedding to sweeten and soften their skin. First you are massaged with coconut oil mixed with pandan leaves and cempaka flowers. Followed by a soft scrub made of rice, turmeric, jasmine and sandalwood. To end the treatment is a flower bath filled with aromatic flowers such as frangipani and jasmine along with astringent leaves. During the bath you should drink a liquid remedy called jamu which is made of turmeric, ginger, egg yolk and herbs. After the three steps of Lulur your skin will be rejuvenated and so sweetly scented

A tip for the ladies, they will, most likely, massage your breasts, especially if you have a non-traditional massage and there is no way to stop it in most cases, as the masseuses normally don’t speak English except for a few words.
Unless you go to a spa where the staff knows what they are doing I suggest that you just go with the traditional massage. I’ve had some very interesting massages through out the years in Asia, claiming to be Swedish and whatnot ended up being the same as the traditional but more expensive.

A profile of a Café Kaffismiðja Íslands

Posted by Rúna Vala - 22/10/09 at 08:10:59 am

I enter Kaffismiðja Íslands and ask for Sonja Björk Grant, with whom I have already made an appointment.

I’m directed to her as she is working in a back room. We sit down in the office and she brings me a delightful Chai latte.

Rúna Vala: What was the reason you came up with the idea?

Sonja: There was the two of us, Ingibjörg Jóna Sigurðardóttir (Imma) and me, that thought that Iceland needed a little extra color to the café flora in Reykjavík. We have both been doing this for a long time. Imma has competed in barista competitions, and I have been training and judging in such competitions. We were on crossroads and wanted to roast my own coffee and play a little with it. This seemed the logical next step.

RV: What’s so special about this place?
S: Everything is so visible. The customer sees when we roast the coffee and grind it and where we store it. We have two grinders by the coffee machine, each with different coffee. Instead of an already made blend, the barista needs to tend to and blend each cup to a perfection. This is our way of adding to the diversity of cafés and it is a challenge for the barista each time.
The windows are big, so you can clearly see the weather outside which is very cozy in bad weathers. The furniture is all from friends and family. When we started we almost only used money to buy equipment, the rest we got for free. We don’t advertise. If someone really wants to come here they can just look for us.
This place is more a workplace than a café. It’s a place for experiments, as there is no school to learn more about coffee, this is the place to learn.

RV: What is the place specialty in eating and drinking?
S: The coffee is number one, two and three, but we also have white and black tea. We have the basic expresso drinks, but no syrups or coffee cocktails. Then we have chai latté that we brew every morning in a pot with all sorts of spices and soymilk.
We don’t serve big sandwiches or lunch, but we have cinnamon scones and croissants. We get them from a baker who makes it with icelandic butter. He is the only baker in Iceland that makes his own butter dough pastries. We also have porridge with jam, it’s very popular in the morning.

RV: What kind of people come here? Are there stereotypes that specially drop in?
S: The morning traffic brings in a lot of young designers that work in the neighborhood, clothes designers, architects and such. Media people come here to prepare themselves for the day and to find out how the downtown politics look that day. A lot of young parents bring their children here, mothers and fathers on birth leaves. The other day I think I counted seven strollers outside the house. Older women come here with their girlfriends and have a coffee and pastries and talk about the old days when this used to be a milk store.

RV: What kind of music do you play here?
S: We have a vinyl player and records that span a wide range of eras: classical, 50’s, 60’s American Graffiti, Elvis Presley, The Smiths, U2, The Kinks, The Beatles, etc.
Yesterday a young boy was here who was going for tryouts for Oliver Twist and we put on the music for him. We have a regular couple from Mexico that put on The Cool and the Gang because that’s something they have in common. The people who sit at the tables closest to the vinyls usually control the music.
When it’s ten minutes to closing time we put on Daddy Cool with Boney M. Then people know that we’re closing.
Before I leave I take a few pictures inside. I leave this vortex of people, friendliness and experiments knowing that I will be there  again soon.

Kaffismiðja Íslands (Iceland coffee factory)  is located at #1 Kárastígur, down townReykjavík.

Autumn in Berkeley

Posted by Katrín Sif - 21/10/09 at 08:10:45 am

Today is the first day of rain I’ve seen since moving to California in August. And boy is it raining; 4 inches in just one day, with lots of wind and grey clouds to complete the miserable day. The leaves are starting to turn auburn, the days are getting slightly shorter, and the air is begining to cool, but I still have nothing to complain about since the coolest day here is still substantially warmer than the hottest day in Reykjvaik. I just find my wardrobe unprepared for the cool, since I ignorantly expected sunny California weather until December, and walking around in my flip flops and tank tops hasn’t proven viable for the last couple weeks.

The houses here seem to expect the same thing, since lack of insulation and the delayed arrival of fall mean that overnight, my room gets so cold and getting out of bed in the morning is one of the most difficult things I have to do. Once I get out of bed, there really isnt any relief til noon or so, since it takes the whole morning for the house and outside to warm up. Then it will get deceivingly warm for a few hours and sunbathing on the lawn would be totally acceptable, until the sun starts to set and dusk brings a cool front over you again.

It is beautiful to see the greenery on campus right now. There are mixed forests sporadically dispersed between school buildings, palm trees, evergreens and deciduous trees happily coexisting. The melange almost stays as green as it always is, except for the oaks and maples slowly turning into hughs of gold and copper. No leaves have actually started falling, but soon the ground will be speckled in orange, red and yellow, and seeing the bare trees among the palms and evergreens will also be a sight, especially if the sun keeps coming out.

With fall comes more pressure in school, so students are too busy and too stressed to really enjoy their days or nights. For some reason I find myself doing just the opposite – wasting my time trying to maximize playtime in the shortening days outside and avoiding staying at home in the evening in fear of being too cold. However, there is actually lots to be done, so hopefully the blissful, romantic days of fall can pass, not to be forgotten, but just to stop tempting me with their distracting appeal.

Damascus – a historical wonder

Posted by Júlíana Björnsdóttir - 20/10/09 at 10:10:16 am

When I was 21 years old I had a sense of being invincible! I wanted to experience a proper adventure, and found my solution in an overland trip.  4 months of camping, driving all the way from London to Cairo, and from Nairobi to Cape Town.  The purpose of the trip for me was to get to know the continent I had dreamed of seeing since I was a little five year old, looking at pictures from the dark continent (as Afeica was once called).  I did not want to be staying in hotels away from the nature; I wanted pure exposure to the elements.

Prior to arriving in North Africa, the trip took us through an enchanting part of the world, the Middle East.  Ten days prior to the departure date two planes flew into the World Trade Centre, changing the world as we knew it.  My plan of going to the Middle East certainly concerned my family a great deal, but I was determined to go.  And so I did, along with an equally adventurous friend of mine!

We passed through Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordon, and Egypt.  My favourite city in this part of the world, is without a doubt Damascus.  Damascus is the city in which I felt utterly miserable health-wise but the one city that fascinated me the most.  It is a wonderful city.  Unlike other cities I had visited, the buildings and the narrow streets told a story of a great city; first sign of inhabitation can be dated back as far as 8-10.000 years.

But what I loved the most was the people, the Damascene.  Syrian people are the friendliest I have ever encountered.  Being an olive-skinned brunette I did not feel like an outsider wearing my shawl to cover my hair, a long skirt to cover my legs, and a long-sleeved shirt to cover my arms and middle section.  I remember a conversation I had with a store-owner in the market by the Umayyad Mosque where he asked me why I was not married.  I was not offended in any way, I understood that in their culture that is simply a tradition.  He even offered me tea, and I politely accepted.

But I was not invincible! This city is so remarkable that yours truly, suffering from a nasty case of diarrhea, walked around on a hot day, all covered up, until I had no choice but to go back to the campsite.  Imagine looking for toilet facilities every 15 minutes!  The diarrhea part was my fault, but it was worth it… The street vendors do after all make the best kebab!

American Rural Life

Posted by Katrín Sif - 19/10/09 at 01:10:56 pm

As part of the international student body here at Berkeley, I decided to sign up for a day trip offered by the International House (in collaboration with the Rotary Club) that was intended to take exchange students on visits to a handful of different farms and homes of traditional American, rural family life.

We started by going to Village Nursery, a plant farm that sold beautiful flowers and trees, and also seeds and gardening supplies. It was about an hour drive east from San Fransisco, over in the dry, hilly area called Contra Costa county, but they somehow managed to sprinkle enough water to keep acres upon acres of green houses as humid as a rainforest, with uncountable sprinklers keeping the vegetation alive.

Our next stop was at Smith Family Farm, where we stayed for one hour wondering what to do after walking through a corn maze that had only one path out and poking our heads into a recreated Indigenous Indian village that comprised of one straw & mud teepee-like hut.

Then was Roddy Ranch, a working cattle farm where Jack Roddy, a retired rodeo champion, rode around in wranglers, a plaid shirt, cowboy boots and a cowboy hat on his stocky quarter horse saddled up in western, all the while chewing tobacco and spitting between sentences.

Then we visited a family run winery, with bottles of wine priced so cheap I had to wonder if they weren’t secretly franchised by Walmart. I bought a bottle of port for $7 and didn’t ask any questions.

Finally we went to an old-time family ranch that had been bought by the city and turned into a public park, preserving all the turn-of-the-century buildings on the lot and making them into a museum-like exhibit. A man dressed in ranger uniform (star badge and all) called Ranger Joe showed us around, with hints of a southern drawl in his stereotypical American accent, and we ended the day with a delicious BBQ dinner hosted by members of the Walnut Creek Rotary Club.

All in all it was a wonderful day tour, getting an intimate view on rural life in California, but still getting the satisfaction and curiosity of wondering “is this really how some families live, fulfilling these little quirky stereotypes you thought you only saw in movies? they must have known we were coming and staged this…”

Search