Culture Archives - Page 10 of 65 - Jim Murty’s TravelTravelTravel

Dunluce Lodge is a McCool place to stay

30th May 202430th May 2024 funtime65

And it’s why we love the Giant’s Causeway and the North of Ireland and why five-star Dunluce Lodge is a McCool place to stay.

Northern Ireland’s newest five-star hospitality venue has unveiled The Stookan, its private annex.

Where you’ll be able to look out on to the UNESCO geological wonder and the Dunluce Links at Royal Portrush Golf Club where the Open Golf Championship returns following its success back in 2019.

Boasting eight private suites, an intimate dining space and a fireside lounge that can be hired for exclusive use, The Stookan is inspired by myth and legend.

You want to know more?… thought so.

Well, this one is from 60 million years ago and involved an Irish giant and a Scots lass.

And it has been replicated across the ages only our family’s history involves a handsome Scotsman and an Irish maiden.

Finn and games

Finn McCool is the man of myth who is said to have fallen for a Scots girl and tried to build a causeway across to Scotland.

Only to be kiboshed by his Granny..

And in truth Irish grannies or mammies haven’t changed much over 60 million years.

We’re told that when news reached Gran about how Finn had collapsed from the efforts.

Of building the causeway she kept ripping down, and crossing, she was devastated.

She climbed to the top of a hill to witness his death throes, and horrified turned to stone where she stands to this day.

When you visit the Giant’s Causeway, look to the West of Port Ganny (the bay before the Little Causeway).

There you can see the stooped figure of Granny heading up the Stookans headland frozen in stone.

Drams are made of this

It all makes sense, and even more so on the way back from the world’s oldest distillery at Bushmills.

Although we’d recommend that you don’t take on the rickety Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge if you’ve had a Bushmills…

Maybe do the bridge first.

Being golfing country Dunluce also boasts an onsite putting green, designed by renowned golf architect, Martin Ebert.

Benchmark: With the Son and Heir, a Queen’s post-graduate

While more high-falutin, there are complimentary private transfer.

To the nearby helipad and clubhouses at Royal Portrush and Portstewart Golf Club.

And a small and intimate spa and fitness facility.

Dunluce Lodge is operated by the global full-service hotel management company, Valor Hospitality Partners, in partnership with the US based Links Collection.

Countries, Europe, Ireland, Music, UK

Our deal of two Irish music cities and beyond

20th May 202424th May 2024 funtime65

In best gigging tradition today we’re greeting you with Hello, Belfast, Hello Dublin… with our deal of two Irish music cities and beyond.

Now the northern and southern powerhouses of Ireland have given us some of the most enduring acts of our lives.

Stiff Little Fingers, Rudy, Christy Moore, Gary Moore, and, of course, Van ‘The Man’ Morrison.

Dublin’s Fare City

While Dublin has boasted The Dubliners, Phil Lynott, U2, the Boomtown Rats, Aslan, Kodaline, The Script, Imelda May and Sinead O’Connor.

All of which have been a joy to see live and even better if they’re on your doorstep.

The same of which can be said for artists beyond Ireland who rave about playing for an Irish audience.

And I swear fellow Scots The Proclaimers were speaking right to me at Dublin’s best music venue Vicar Street.

But what of the musicgoers who part with their hard-earned to see their favourite stars?

Well, whisper it down in the Fair City but going to see your favourite musicians in Dublin is a considerably dearer night out than if you head north.

Even taking into account the cost of travel.

And even more galling for the Irish music fan, or those of a different blood, who live there but Britain is cheaper still.

If you stay out of London which we all know is its own country.

Our friends at luggage company Radical Storage, who regularly provide us with relevant travel insights, have compiled this information for you giggers out there.

The bill of Belfast City

Say it with Flowers: The Killers’ Brandon Flowers

And they have discovered that Britain’s regional towns and Belfast, the pride of the north of Ireland, are a giggers’ go-to.

With Nottingham (£58) in the English Midlands topping the list for concertgoers with Birmingham (£78) third.

And Antwerp (£76) sandwiched in between in second and Belfast (£81) fourth.

We had hoped that Continental concerts would be akin to European football prices but alas not.

With only Assago (£81) in Italy and Madrid (£81) featuring.

Milan is the most expensive city in Europe with (£322), ouch, Dublin (£143) in fifth.

All of which you’d think would mean that you would squeeze as much music out of your concert as you can.

And not as is the way of the concertgoers I literally bumped into at anyone from The Killers in Marlay Park to Paul Simon at the RDS turn your back on the artist.

And push past you with rounds of drinks while shouting at each other through the lyrics.

Now, granted, we can’t all get hospitality at the Europa Hotel in Belfast for a jazz cabaret night and dinner to see Van Morrison (guilty!)

But there is value and craic out there.

Perhaps not if you’re a Swiftie (average £375) or a Coldplay (£229) or Stevie Nicks fan (£185).

But Take Me to Hozier (£48) proud Bray native and one-time neighbour of ours when we lived for 13 years in Greystones, Co. Wicklow.

So our advice, and that of Radical Storage, is to do your homework on your favourite acts, and destinations.

And it all starts here with our deal of two music cities and beyond.

Countries, Culture

Play nice on the Dublin-NY portal

15th May 202415th May 2024 funtime65

They’re brothers by a different mother, sisters by a different mister, so come on just play nice on the Dublin-NY portal.

Because, guess what, you’ve only just gone and got this interactive twinning of two of the world’s great cities suspended.

By flashing body parts and images of the Twin Towers on it.

Now we all know the bonds and family links that tie the Fair City and the City that Never Sleeps.

Including our own, with all four of my Irish mum’s brothers making their way to America and swelling its population.

And that Dubliners and New Yorkers share the same edgy, anti-establishment view of their world.

Sign of the times

But there is a line that’s been crossed and spoiled the fun for all those stepping into each other’s worlds.

Whether looking out of O’Connell Street into Broadway or back the other way.

All of which brings up again the Holidos and Don’ts of proper responses at tourist sites and historic attractions.

Particularly following a trip last week to the Hollywood sign.

Or at least as close as you can get which is about 800m.

Now it’s only 50 years since we could all, if we were fit enough, clamber up to the sign.

Before antisocial types forced the authorities’ hand through graffiti and desecration of the site.

Now if you try to get near the sign the LAPD will warn you off by loudspeaker that you will be fined $3,000 for your troubles.

Not that that seems to deter folk as we witnessed on our trek in the Hollywood Hills.

Please do not touch

The same has become true of Uluru, Ayer’s Rock to the old father-in-law when he lived out there and went walkabout.

Sometimes, of course, it’s mere overexcitement that causes people to go too far.

And mean that the guardians of the Pere Lachaise Cemetery have now had to put a glass screen over Oscar Wilde’s grave in Paris.

Or entitlement as pushy photographers try to capture a corner of a cherub on the Sistine Chapel.

Of course, alas, tourist desecration is nothing new with the original Vandals, a tribe from the East, sacking Rome.

And generations helping themselves to Classical infrastructure lying around for their own home.

We should be grateful then for what is left and how complete the centrepiece of that other Classical powerhouse, Athens’ Acropolis is.

No thanks, of course, to Britain, who hold on graspingly to the Elgin Marbles.

Reach out across the oceans

Now, coming back to the question of today and our cri de coeur…

Modern technology allows us to reach out across oceans to the descendants of those who left generations ago and could not come back.

So play nice on the Dublin-NY portal because remember they’re brothers by a different mother, sisters by a different mister.

Countries, Europe, Music

I won’t give in to Eurovision’s dark tourism

12th May 202412th May 2024 funtime65

My head’s busting today (and not because I joined the house girlie party) but I won’t give in to Eurovision‘s dark tourism around this year’s contest in Malmo in Sweden.

In what was meant to be a celebration of 50 years since its greatest champions Abba won the competition with Waterloo.

The music fest has become more of a war than a channel of peace and unity.

The protests around the Israel entry and the original lyrics to their song, the subliminal messages in Driuid Ogham on the body of the Irish singer and the Dutch singer’s disqualification have all betrayed the spirit of the competition.

Now not for one minute do I intend to descend into the politics of the Middle East.

Only to say it seems to me be only humane to take an even-handed empathy and sympathy for both sides.

But the bullying of the Israeli singer was wrong both on a personal level and because it ignores the country’s history in the competition.

Much of that harassing has come from an LGBTQ+ lobby who do not take into account that Dana International from Israel was Eurovision’s first trans winner in 1998.

Keep it neutral

Thankfully then next year’s competition, a return to the scene of the first in 1956, will be more neutral.

Or you’d hope so as it is being held in non-aligned Switzerland.

And kudos to winner Nemo for not getting embroiled in the politics in their acceptance speech.

All of which is a slightly strong-handed introduction to all things Eurovision tourism related.

For it is a thing all right.

With Liverpool getting a £40m boost from holding the extravaganza on behalf of Ukraine last year.

Obvious really when you think that Eurovision is the biggest cultural event in the world.

With its three live broadcasts drawing 162 million viewers.

Big noise in the hood

There’s still a point: But lose the politics

It’s all eyes on your town and a marketing guru’s dream to provide a showpiece of what’s best in your hood.

It helps, of course, to be one of the world’s richest countries… think all those Swiss banks.

Iceland ran a subpar candidate in 2020 Netflix comedy Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga which was really rooted in reality.

Hosting the event could cause the country to go bankrupt.

A fear long held in Ireland, which holds the record for most competition wins along with Sweden on seven.

With its national broadcaster RTE said to have almost gone bankrupt hosting the event.

While in 2012 when Azerbaijan welcomed the contest in capital Baku, it was reported that the country spent upwards of €55 million hosting the event.

Not including the €92 million stadium they built for it.

Swede sounds of the tills

Some 100,000 visitors descended on Malmo this last week swelling its 350,000 population.

That including ticket buyers from 89 countries, fans without tickets, sponsors.

And the performers from 37 participating countries, each with around 20 crew members.

All of which had the hoteliers in the city rubbing their hands with glee.

With business hotel Clarion Malmö Live, sold out months before the event with rates from €167 up to €790 per night.

While boutique Malmo hotel MJ’s is just one to have gone all-out kitsch for Eurovision.

Its rooms sold out on the day Malmo was announced as host city last July.

While the few remaining “x-tra” small rooms (just over 100 sqft) came in at upwards of $300 a night.

Swiss timing

International appeal: Dana International

None of which should put us off what should be an annual celebration of the power of music.

To unite and the common values we share across Europe and Eurofriendly countries like Australia, and yes, Israel.

So let’s not be ambushed, and I won’t give in to Eurovision’s dark tourism.

And rather sing out loud for what a great continent we have and why we should promote all our great destinations.

MEET YOU AT EUROVISION IN SWITZERLAND

America, Countries, Music

Get Ziggy with it

7th May 20248th May 2024 funtime65

Diana Ross kicked it all off here in LA on Saturday and set off a chain reaction… and we’re not finished yet as we get Ziggy with it.

It makes sense that the City of Angels draws those who are blessed with the voices of angels.

And in Ziggy Marley, our entertainment for our last day at our American Travel Fair, IPW, his dad Bob is here with us in spirit.

Ziggy, you’ll remember from the One Love biopic is the cute kid Bob wrote Three Little Birds for.

Who went on to carve out a Grammy-winning career himself.

And truly we don’t worry about a thing here this week as our LA hosts have taken care of it all.

Wyld about Keanu

Diana, of course, is no warm-up act for anyone but the entertainment which has followed could easily pack an auditorium.

With Keanu Reeves’ band (no, not Wyld Stallyns) but Southern Californian schtick combo Dogstar bringing the house down.

And left the Italian delegation in particular weak-kneed as they shouted out their love for him from the floor.

While the legends that we so loved and lost couldn’t obviously be with us we were treated to the next best thing.

Regards to Broadway

With a Michael Jackson tribute act heading up the MJ musical which he gave us a taster of.

All part of a Broadway Musicals hour.

Where the casts of Chicago, Six, Back to the Future and new sensation Water for Elephants all featured.

Kicks on Route 66

We’ve been treated too to the best hip hop and jazz in Louis York to promote Travel South USA Y’all.

And house and blues to project Chicago for next year’s convention.

There is a synergy to all of this with Route 66 which connects LA to Chicago celebrating its centenary.

This week has as it always is at IPW been about one love… for travel.

And we have of course been getting Ziggy with it.

America, Countries, Music

Bossin’ it with Boss Ross at the LA Coliseum

6th May 2024 funtime65

She’s Detroit born and bred but she’s also pure Hollywood… and we’ve only been bossin’ it with Boss Ross at the LA Coliseum.

Where the 1932 and 1984 Olympics were held and the 2028 Games will take place.

Diana is not shy (she never was) about telling our convention at the American Travel Fair, IPW, that she is 80.

So we can forgive her for not running around the stage like she once did.

Although she’s still got the moves even in the glitteriest of gowns.

Diana the goddess

Diana truly belongs here as much as any of the heroes who have graced this colossal arena.

The LA Memorial Coliseum, to give it its full name, honours Fallen Americans from the First World War.

Its rich history which has seen anything from big fights Jack Dempsey to big flights Charles Lindbergh grace the hallowed ground will be enhanced.

By the 3rd iteration of an LA Games.

Holding a torch

The torch with the eternal flame is a constant reminder of the City of Angels’ place in the Olympic story.

With the Games in four years’ time seeing LA make history as the first city to host the greatest show on Earth three times.

That other sporting colossus, the Football World Cup will act as a tasty hors d’oeuvre in two years’ time.

Diana on target

Where Diana has history for missing her penalty and bringing the posts down.

She didn’t miss the target though here this week.

When we were bossin’ it with Boss Ross at the LA Coliseum.

I’m staying at the JW Marriott Los Angeles L.A LIVE, having flown Glasgow through Dublin with Aer Lingus to LAX.

MEET YOU AT THE PARTY

Countries, Culture, Europe

With ein little help from der Freunde

24th April 202424th April 2024 funtime65

So how do I feel by the end of the day? Well, I get by with ein little help from der Freunde in Berlin.

I am on the last leg (and my last legs) of my whistlestop tour of Deutschland for the annual travel convention, the German Travel Mart.

And as is my wont when left on my own I have gone off piste.

Despite the best efforts and planning of Nicole, my planner extraordinaire and Deutsche Mark as I’ll now know him.

My globetrotting English buddy and human sat-nav who I rely on every year at this convention.

Which last year took us to Essen in the Ruhrland and this year Chemnitz (or Karl Marx Stadt) in Saxony.

Strassed out

And so, pulled along by the German history in front of me and my wheelie rucksack, I over-reach when I see the sign for Charlottenburg.

And rather than double-back to go to the central station, the Haubtbanhof on Europaplatz.

For my simple eight-minute ride to Charlottenburg, my billet for the night I decide to march in.

I have done the de rigueur Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag and Potsdam and got my picture in front of a block of the Berlin Wall.

Which this year has been down 35 years, longer than it was up, but worthy of commemorating and celebrating.

Which I have also done in Leipzig outside the church where the protests which triggered the revolution began.

A day in the strife

Emboldened by that spirit of freedom blowing through an icy April eve in the German capital I feel like taking on the world.

Literally… springing past the embassies of the world and always keeping the signs for Charlottenburg in my sights.

No going back now even when the guard at the booth at the Japan embassy alerts me to the fact that I am 5 miles from my destination.

Having my now trudged that distance in my excitement.

Ich bus ein Berliner

I am though blessed to see a part of Berlin few do.

And with a little help from der Freunde at a hotel and a bus stop I am pointed towards a stop where I can take another bus.

To Adenhauerstrasse where hopefully I will be able to find my hotel, the Yggotel Ravn, on Albrecht-Achilles Strasse.

Of course with low battery on my phone and no internet I cannot turn to Google Maps so I go old-fashioned.

And ask at the Apothekary where a helpful assistant (the first couldn’t speak English never mind Glaswegian) got me on track.

Berlin haul

Weary of bone I slumped on the desk of my hotel half an hour later.

And after booking in asked how best to get to the airport in the morning.

Only to be told it would be €70 by taxi.

Now working on the proposition that four heads are better than one I asked her colleague for help.

And the two travellers who had just arrived through the swing doors and I recognised from our Chemnitz party.

All of which would save me €65 and take just a 15-minute walk to the Charlottenburg S, or train station.

Of course I did a recce that night which took me around an hour and introduced me to the backstreets of the district and a Russian supermarket.

One way or another I did get my train to the airport the next day with ein little help from der Freunde.

Countries, Europe, Music

Der top brass of Chemnitz

22nd April 202422nd April 2024 funtime65

He’d rather be back home on his Gameboy but the little boy will look back on it all in future years when he becomes one of Der top brass of Chemnitz.

Well what child wants to dress like their dad?

Or worse still when he is in ceremonial dress.

But then we’ve all been there and where once I hated being decked in a kilt…

Now I don’t skirt any opportunity to flash a leg.

The Chemnitz miners share with our own Britons, who worked in the bowels of the earth, a love for brass music.

And costume and a drape to tell us of their mine’s proud tradition.

Blowing our own trumpets

As well as the birthright of Germans, a natural affinity with oompah music.

Which I have loved from the moment I first heard it.

As a 19-year-old at the Oktoberfest in Munich.

And decided to climb up on the bandstand, take the mic and belt out ‘My bonnie lies over the ocean’.

Before my body lay outside the Lowenbrauhaus, ejected by two bucksome Berthas.

Modern kraftverk

It’s taken a while to learn my lesson but here I am willing to let others take their deserved spotlight.

And so I let the miners’ brass band, the young orchestra, the street ballet dancers, Peace Ride cyclists and a mine host from Haddington take centre stage.

It’s kraftverk for the modern Saxony.

And it is all on show this week, a showcase for next year’s European Capital of Culture experience.

The miners’ story can be explored in the communes in the Oral Mountains above Chemnitz, 162 miles north of the Czechia border.

And here at the Kraftverkehr Chemnitz.

Captains of Industrie

Chemnitz, or Karl Marx Stadt as you might have known it back in Communist days, has reinvented itself as a post-industrial travel destination.

By putting the art into artisan as evidenced by the Industriemuseum which chronicles Chemnitz’s relationship with tools, motors and automobiles.

And to think that the burghers had drilled holes in the walls for dynamite to blow it up before it was salvaged.

The Industriemuseum boasts an array of artefacts automobiles.

And explores Chemnitz’s relationship with the Enigma code, Bauhaus and even a mummified body preserved appropriately by tar.

My own shell is similarly pickled these past three days by Marx and Gluck Auf beer.

And threatens to be further bolstered at the German Travel Mart closing event.

At the August Horch Museum Zwickau where we’ll tinker around classic Audis and East German Brabants.

All in the company of Der top brass of Chemnitz.

America, Caribbean, Countries, Europe, Music

Ich bin vinyl Berliner

20th April 202420th April 2024 funtime65

And to mark Record Store Day ich bin vinyl Berliner.

And I warn you you’ll be seeing a lot more of these lame Teuton rib-ticklers in the next few days’ odyssey of east Germany.

There will be much to fit in during my whistlestop transit through Berlin en route to Chemnitz, next year’s European Capital of Culture.

Wax lyrical

But one stop-off we’ve been recommended is the Hard Wax Berlin record store at 44A Paul-Lincke-Ufer.

No David Hasselhoff here… Hard Wax Berlin is known as a dance destination.

Situated in an old factory building behind the canal in Kreuzberg it keeps the theme going with a metal counter.

Where DJ Hell, Modeselektor and Marcel Dettmann have all polished their acts over the years.

Of course music and musicians played a key role over the Fall of the Berlin Wall despite The Hoff’s interruption.

And we’ll also delve into the part heavy metal played and the Leipzig protests 35 years ago… stay tuned.

Jammin’ in Jamaica

But getting back to those beats.

And today’s celebration of record stores allows us to take a spin around other cool vinyl shops across the world.

Now if you’ve been watching One Love, the Bob Marley biopic, and if not why not?

Then you’ll be familiar with the Jamaican record store scene.

And particularly Orange Street, Kingston, where everyone from Sir Coxswane Dodd to Bob flicked through the records.

Known to locals as Beat Street, Prince Buster was even born here.

Rockers International and Randy’s keep the tradition alive.

The vinyl Trade

Now we all know the rich crossover between reggae and punk.

And indy label royalty Rough Trade started life in Notting Hill, London as a reggae record store.

If timing is what music is all about, and it is, then Geoff Travis had it in spades when he bought his shop in 1978.

And he was open to the fusion of reggae and punk… today Rough Trade spans the whole range of indy music.

Bigger in LA

Of course when it comes to size the US of Eh tries to do everything bigger and better.

And few could argue with the credentials of Amoeba Records in Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles.

Where I’ll take time to frequent when I’m in La La Land next month.

The hangar-sized emporium occupies an entire city block and is across two huge floors.

We’ve been pointed to the Jazz room, the Out of Print section, the Punk aisle by the excellent guide The Vinyl Factory.

But whatever your thang is you’ll find it there.

LA though is for next month… Germany is my appetiser this week.

Where I’ll be happy to say Ich bin vinyl Berliner.

Countries, Culture, UK

A Durham Bede&B and the true meaning of Eostre

31st March 202431st March 2024 funtime65

Happy Easter all, and for the day that’s in it we champion a Durham Bede&B and the true meaning of Eostre.

Because while the resurrection story will always begin in a cave in Jerusalem, Easter we owe to the Venerable Bede.

And the oul’ monk is as relevant today in the year 2022 AD (Anno Domini, the year of the Lord) as back in his day in the 700s.

Bede was a Jarrow boy so may well have spoken in a singy-songy voice and called the nuns ‘pet’.

You’ll most likely know him from his work, Ecclesiastical History of the English People.

For which he gained the moniker of ‘The Father of English History.’

All of which you can learn, and more, in the ancient and beautiful cathedral town of Durham in the north-east of what is now called Engerlund.

Computus says

Such as Bede describing Eostre as the name of an Old English goddess and behind the name Eosturmonath, the equivalent of the month of April.

Now the fact that our Easter is a moveable feast is down to Bede and the science of Computus.

That’s the calculation of the date of Easter to you and me and which if you’ve got a Bede-sized brain instead of a brain the size of a bead you’ll understand.

Because it brings together the monk’s interests in history, theology and astronomy.

The system required a thorough understanding of the movements of the cosmos and the relationship between Easter and the Jewish Passover.

Bede cracked the code at the Synod of Whitby in 664AD which meant that everybody would now follow the Roman Easter cycle.

And that is the first Sunday after the full Moon that occurs on or after the .

And if the full Moon falls on a Sunday then Easter is the next Sunday.

Ain’t half Bede

Of course, Durham is worth a visit any time of the year.

Now cribbing from their bumph at the Bede museum at Jarrow Hall:

‘We are home to Europe’s largest collection of coloured glass from the 7th and 8th centuries alongside unique stonework, artefacts, and the Abbadia Reliquary.

‘This was gifted to Jarrow Hall as part of our twinning with the Museum of the Abbey in Tuscany.

‘The museum also hosts a full-sized reproduction of Codex Amiatinus; the oldest complete Latin Bible in existence.’

Of course, if you want to venerate the Venerable Bede you’ll want to see his grave at the ornate Durham Cathedral.

And if it looks familiar it’s probably because the cathedral has been used as film locations for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

And do climb the central tower’s 325 steps for views over Durham and take a tour of some of the cathedral 1000 years of history with our guides.

Durham dreams

Also recommended while you’re in these parts is the Beamish open air museum which brings the history of north-east England to life.

From 1820s Pockerley to the 1900s Town, 1900s Pit Village, 1940s Farm, 1950s Town and 1950s Spain’s Field Farm exhibit areas.

The excellent This Is Durham site will give you a swathe of other things to do around Durham, which is a half-hour drive south of Newcastle.

And the best accommodation available.

So now you know about a Durham Bede&B and the true meaning of Eostre.