Afaranwide

NEWSLETTER 54: October 2020

Hi, and thanks for your interest in the Afaranwide travel blog!

We’re Moving On

Our time in Hong Kong is coming to an end, and we’ll be flying out under British Airways’ strict Covid-19 rules (bring your own masks) soon. The past few weeks have been a flurry of admin, visits to places we’d “always meant to see”, and goodbyes. Our apartment has been let, the removal men are booked and we’re taking a staycation package at The Pottinger hotel in Central for our last 36 hours here. We’re also reminiscing about how our five years in Hong Kong have flown by, and how much we’ve packed into our 14-year adventure working abroad. These strange times mean everyone’s plans are uncertain, but we’ll keep you posted. – SB

Disney During Covid – Still Fun?

Preparing to leave somewhere certainly concentrates the mind about doing things you’ve never quite got around to. Sue and I have lived close to Disneyland Hong Kong for the past two years but, apart from once having dinner with friends who were staying at one of the hotels there, we’d never been. I decided to put that right when it reopened after being shut for months because of the coronavirus. A range of Covid-19 measures and restrictions are in place, and I was curious to see how they would affect the experience. READ MORE – CS.

Tourism Today – Go Figure!

If statistics are a true measure of anything, then the United Nations’ latest tracker service will send the most optimistic among us into a spiral of gloom. Click on the new UN World Tourism Organization gizmo and you can find all the stats you could possibly want about how tourism is faring around the world. It’s a work in progress, so it’s not all running yet, but up till August flight reservations worldwide were down 77 per cent on last year, tourist arrivals had dropped 65 per cent, and hotel bookings had halved. Good on the UN for calling it the tourism recovery tracker. We travel in hope. – SB

Defiance on Menu in Marseille

Marseille has been in the news as some restaurants defied a government order to close for two weeks to help contain the spread of Covid-19. City politicians, restaurant owners and staff say the shutdown is out of proportion and will wreck the local economy. They’ve launched a petition calling for the order to be overturned. While we don’t condone actions that could put people at risk, we’re not surprised to see the residents of the French Mediterranean port city reacting in this way. We would expect nothing less from them, as there’s something tough and uncompromising about the city and its people. Marseille is nevertheless a great place to visit, and before the recent upheaval we posted a guide to the five best things to do there – READ MORE

Loving This Good News

Ras Al Khaimah is Dubai’s next-door emirate and, truth be told, poorer cousin. I always liked our trips there when we lived in Dubai; we used to stay for peaceful weekends, or drive through it on the way to the amazing fjords of Musandam in Oman – which is when I took the picture above. But how times have changed. Now a two-time winner of the World Travel Awards’ Middle East Leading Adventure Tourism Award, RAK opens a Bear Grylls Explorer Camp this month in the cool(er) mountain air of Jebel Jais. RAK already has the world’s longest zip wire, and is adding a mountain biking trail and 81kms of hiking trails to its attractions. Oh, and also on the mountain – 47 luxury villas each with their own swimming pool. They’ve obviously learned a thing or two from their glossy neighbour.

Bargain Michelin-Star Meal

One of the things we’ll miss about Hong Kong is the Tim Ho Wan chain of dim sum outlets. Remarkably, one of the branches has a Michelin Star, yet they all sell delicious freshly cooked dishes at bargain prices. The first restaurant opened in Hong Kong in 2010, and since then more have appeared across the city and in other Asian countries and the US. Our favourite items from the menu? Turnip cake, steamed shrimp dumplings, and barbecued pork buns. READ MORE

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