HOTEL CONFIDENTIAL The chef and food writer tells Lisa Grainger about six hotels with recipes for success 60 THOMPSON, NEW YORK place is really central, with a great bar and Thai restaurant. Plus, the rooms are a good size and modern. And itfun; the DJ attracts a young crowd to the bar (you wouldngo if [...]

New water-quality standards aim to make our beaches better for surfers and swimmers, says Paul Miles At the beginning of this summer British beaches were shown to be cleaner than theybeen for decades. Of those tested, almost 70 per cent achieved the gold standard of the Marine Conservation Society (MCS), meaning ’for bathing. An EU [...]

Most visitors to New York City have only three islands on their itinerary: Manhattan, of course, plus Ellis Island and Liberty Island (for the statue). But although it may not rival Venice or Hong Kong in this respect, New York is something of an island metropolis. Its harbour and waterways have more than two dozen [...]

WHAT IS IT? A Victorian hotel on a narrow street close to the harbour in Mousehole, on Cornwallsouth-west coast. The property faces the sea and St Clements Isle. A large bar and garden at the back have all the requisite features for long Sunday lunches in summer and for lingering autumn afternoons, with a real [...]

DEEP IN THE AMAZONIAN JUNGLE, I Was discussing maggots with a Huaorani tribesman. Sinking his axe into a fallen trunk, Bei opened the rotten wood as deftly as a surgeon and lifted out a handful of squirming yellow grubs, the larvae of an Amazon beetle. His smile was as wide as the river mouth. Bei [...]