Dante, a 104-year-old bar in Greenwich Village, has been voted top of the World’s 50 Best Bar list for 2019. It’s run by two Aussies, but don’t hold that against it.
* In last week’s magazine we said the Jungfrau Railway was in Austria. Obviously it’s not, it’s in Switzerland. There was a mistake in the editing. Shout out to Max, who rang us from Switzerland to point this out.
How travellers hack it
Rick Klau’s hack will appeal to anyone who has struggled with hotel blackout curtains that don’t meet in the middle. Rick posted an image of curtains held closed with the trouser clips on the hotel room clothes hanger. And because no one’s ever thought of anything until it appears on social media, it went viral and others shared their hacks: using the TV to charge devices if there aren’t enough power points, using the ironing board as an adjustable desk, and using a shower cap to cover the TV remote, which probably isn’t cleaned often.
We wonder why
Simon Wilson visited the world’s seven wonders in seven days. Simon, 27, flew 50,000km on his six-day, nine-hour, three-minute marathon. He left Manchester on a Sunday at 4.45am, flying to Rome to see the Colosseum. He stayed two hours then flew to Egypt — where he took a taxi to the Pyramids and Sphinx. Simon jetted to Jordan that night and slept in a fully-fitted cave before walking to Petra. On day four he took two flights to India and a four-hour cab ride to the Taj Mahal in 42C heat. He spent an hour there before flying to Beijing for the Great Wall, then to Mexico for day six at Chichen Itza, then Rio to see its statue of Christ the Redeemer. He got home at 1.48pm on a Saturday. Before anyone quibbles, these are the contemporary wonders, agreed on in 2006.
Holidays with an adrenaline twist
Another Brit, Andy Drury, claims to be the first person to holiday in the ruins of the Islamic State. The 53-year-old father of four had no visas and was in danger of kidnapping by militia during his $7750 three-day break in Mosul, northern Iraq. He’s spent the past 20 years touring areas most people do not dare to go and first visited this area in 2016. The businessman is meticulous in planning his trips and has holidayed in no-go-areas like Somalia, North Korea and Afghanistan, as well as spending time with the Ku Klux Klan.
Aussies’ New York bar best in the world Dante, a 104-year-old hostelry in Greenwich Village, has been voted top of the World’s 50 Best Bar list for 2019. The bar has been a hot ticket since it was reopened in 2015 by its current owners, Aussies Linden Pride and Natalie Hudson. It’s one of six New York bars on the list; the UK was also well represented, with 10 entries including venerable institutions The Connaught (No 2) and The Savoy (No 5).