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Three injured in crash near Grasmere
5:00pm Tuesday 11th November 2008
THREE people have been seriously injured following a collision involving a BMW and Jaguar on the A591 near Grasmere.
Comments (1)Europe looks to strengthen timeshare laws
10:16am Wednesday 22nd October 2008
Westmorland Euro MP and Labour’s Transport and Tourism spokesman Brian Simpson has welcomed moves in the European Parliament to strengthen laws in regard to timeshare property.
Winter sun...
10:00am Friday 26th September 2008
As bargains go, this has to be one of the best breakfasts anywhere on the Spanish Costas and at home too. Two fresh eggs, two rashers of bacon, two plump tomatoes and two slices of toast: all for an eye-wateringly single euro! It’s 10am and the temperature is warm enough for the gaggle of hungry grey heads to linger on a boulevard café overlooking Benidorm’s pristine Levante Beach. “I come here for a month every winter,” confides Eileen, a seventy-something former Blackpool landlady. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world. It’s just like a home from home.” Her companions nod agreement. “We all meet up here every year,” says Betty, from South Wales. “Better than shivering at home worrying about fuel bills.” Despite the high value euro, which has significantly pushed up prices, life in Benidorm’s slow lane is still where the smart holiday money is heading this winter. Locally, the over-50s are known affectionately as ‘The Orange Express,’ because from November until April oranges in the Alicante province on the Costa Blanca start to swell and droves of money-conscious Brits – and Spanish too - migrate here. Prices for a 28-day full board holiday costs less than £250 a week in a comfortable downtown hotel, leaving plenty of room in the wallet to ignore the hotels substantial buffet and spend a euro on a belt-stretching English-style breakfast at the Beach Rock Cafe. Chris Hackney, general manager of product for giant operator TUI UK tells me: “We have a very loyal customer base to Benidorm, with many guests returning to the same hotel every year. Some go back to the hotel three or four times a year. “At one hotel alone, a number of guests have returned on more than 50 occasions.” He points to the resort’s two blue flag beaches – Lavante and Poniente – as a magnet, the great year round climate, fabulous entertainment and a huge selection of bars and restaurants. “Benidorm is arguably the most affordable destination in Spain,” he adds. “It is not uncommon to be able to find bars offering a large beer for one euro and good, cheap eats.” Thirty years ago, Benidorm truly was the resort that the Brits knocked around a bit. However, much like the maturing tourists themselves, the resort has grown up and long buried its wild association with larger louts. Sure, there are hotels, acres of them, pushing towards the Mediterranean like a shimmering steel and concrete army. And yes, there are still lines of market stalls on the sunny avenidas, overflowing with cheap – sometimes tacky – dresses, shoes, coats and hats. But Benidorm, boasting more beds than the whole of Portugal, is unique: mixing the very cheap with the truly glitzy rolling out along two beautiful sandy beaches. And if sweet soul music is your bag, Alexander, a 56-year-old Scot, is on hand to play if you want some good, old-fashioned ballroom dancing (thousands do), there are legions of welcoming hotels and bars ready to waft you in with affable smiles. Take a gentle stroll down scrupulously clean tiled pavements to an impressive headland rising above the Playa de Malpas, separating the two beaches. Then relax and absorb the resort’s glorious sweeping views under waving palms and listen to a real, live harpist playing tunes from Bach to The Beatles. And make sure you take time out for a canter round the magnetic old town: narrow, shaded streets with tall, shuttered windows. Cool tapas bars, dinky delis, up-market fashion houses and a cosy British pub selling home cooked nosh. A mid-morning or mid-afternoon coffee, a large brandy and slice of fluffy cake costs around £3.50 at downtown bars with a bewildering choice of a lunch or dinner venues offering mixed seafood, salad, tortilla or homemade steak pie with mash and gravy for just over a fiver a head. But if you really want celebrate in style, I’d recommend a visit to the fantastic Benidorm Palace with its stunningly costumed dance show with a belt-busting meal for a great night out. Here, a candlelit dinner, show and dancing costs from just £27 a head.
A Rotterdam City Guide
3:34pm Wednesday 24th September 2008
Bored of bumping into other Brits, drunken Stag-dos and the all out debauchery a trip to Amsterdam usually entails? Then Rotterdam, the Netherlands’s second largest city, is undoubtedly the place to go for a true taste of the Netherlands, as Dale Lovell, Editor of travel guides and deals website, www.travelconnect.co.uk discovered.
Food for thought...
3:04pm Thursday 4th September 2008
I HAVE cringed at the melting antics of Gordon Ramsay when he turns would-be cooks into simpering blobs of gravy, because when it comes to cooking, I simply don’t know a capsicum from a carrot.
It’s quids in as Birmingham-Scotland route gets cheaper
8:46am Wednesday 2nd July 2008
Just a penny for around two miles – that’s the average cost of the cheapest fares to be introduced for a long-distance rail journey when Megatrain joins the Virgin Trains routes linking Edinburgh and Glasgow with Birmingham.
See the Earthwatch wild side of New York City
3:00pm Thursday 26th June 2008
Earthwatch, the international environmental charity, is inviting volunteers to book that last-minute summer trip and see the wilder side of New York.
Shed load means train chaos
8:36am Saturday 1st March 2008
TRAIN travellers on the West Coast Main Line face delays on Saturday after the line was closed between Lancaster and Penrith.
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Editor's Choice
Donald Campbell's Bluebird challenges Conistons 10mph limit
BLUEBIRD will power its way across Coniston Water once more if a public consultation into changing the lake’s by-laws is favourably received, reports Matthew Taylor.
Hopes rise for bakery facing collapse
An award-winning Lake District baker is putting together a rescue package for the bakery he closed down last week.
Mountain festival in full swing
KENDAL Mountain Festival is in full swing after the event kicked off with a string of films and lectures at venues across the town.
Use the Web to find good advice on the recession
Although the recession has, “technically,” only just begun, most businesses have been noticing a slowdown in the economy for months. A few have been experiencing it for more than a year!
We're All Doomed - But Not Yet
Without wishing to sound a gloomy note in this era of credit crunch and climate change, have you noticed that we appear to be doomed? We’re not really taking this climate change thing at all seriously, are we? A recent experience in Windermere made me realise that sustainability, local and sourcing are just empty words in a dictionary.
Exhibition hailed a big success
REPRESENTATIVES from more than 250 businesses visited the first-ever South Lakeland Business 2 Business Exhibition, making the event a big success.
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