Late breaks
GREAT DEALS ON LAST-MINUTE HOLIDAYS
THE HILLS ARE (ALMOST) ALIVE
THE beautiful Portals Hills (portals-hills.com) opens again for the 2020 season on April 2 and is a delightful spot from which to appreciate the island of Mallorca.
Perched upon a hillside within the prestigious neighbourhood of Portals Nous, Portals Hills is a chic boutique hotel with 30 suites that overlook the Mediterranean below.
Described as ‘Miami in
Mallorca’ it marries an art deco vibe with welcoming Mallorcan hospitality and offers an enticing infinity pool, wellness lounge and fusion cuisine, while the hotel’s own 54ft yacht is moored in the celebrated Cala Nova Marina. Prices start from €292 (approx. £268) per room per night including breakfast for two.
SURVIVAL INSTINCTS
SANI RESORT, Greece (saniresort. gr), is to open a Survival Academy from April. In partnership with TV adventurer Bear Grylls, the Survival Academy will cost 40 euros per day (with a 10% discount for families or fiveday courses).
Bear Grylls survival courses are also available in the UK.
NEW ROUTE TO GREECE
NORWEGIAN has just announced a new route for summer. Flights from Gatwick to Aktion, Greece, (for Preveza and Lefkada) from £60.50 one-way. Starts on May 3 and will operate Thursdays and Sundays (norwegian.com/uk).
DIRECT SERVICE TO AMSTERDAM
AT LAST, a seamless way to get to and from Amsterdam.
From April 30, Eurostar will offer direct services from London St Pancras to Amsterdam. Previously, the return journey included changing in Brussels. From £35 one-way.
Visit eurostar.com
tastebuds of master distiller Noel Sweeney, whose expertise in the field is currently all but unrivalled. The 75-minute, €35 tasting tour features a visit to the warehouse containing 2,800 casks of the amber nectar, and the sumptuous aroma as gallons and gallons of whiskey mature in the oaken barrels, is alone worth the admission price.
Alongside is Powerscourt House, a magnificent stately home and estate named by National Geographic as No. 3 among the best ornamental gardens in the world.
The place is truly stunning, featuring delights such as the Triton Lake with its 100-foot fountain, the Italian and Japanese Gardens, the Dolphin Pond and the Pets’ Cemetery, the final resting place of so many much-loved residents of Powerscourt, including Eugenie, the Jersey cow who had 17 calves and produced more than 100,000 gallons of milk.
The estate’s history can be traced back to medieval times, when a castle stood on the site, but, in 1730, the 1st Viscount Powerscourt wanted to make his mark in the district by building the grandest of elegant mansions.
In 1961, the Slazenger family of sports kit fame bought the estate from the 9th Viscount Powerscourt, and embarked on a long-term project of restoration and development work to enhance the area as a visitor attraction, but, after completion in 1974, a devastating blaze took hold of the top floor and reduced the main building to a roofless shell. Sadly, explained current head gardener Alex Slazenger, his grandparents subsequently went off to live in the Isle of Man, and never recovered from the disaster.
Today, however, it is impossible to see the joins, following a renewed building
Pictures: CRAIG COLVILLE
programme and the reopening of the estate in 1997 by then-Irish President Mary Robinson.
Twenty miles away, at Ballyknocken, in Ashford, County Wicklow, TV chef and third-generation B&B proprietor Catherine Fulvio (née Byrne), who runs a cookery school on site, had us all developing our catering skills in ways we never thought possible.
As a veteran hack, I have long hacked onions in the only haphazard way I knew. Once we had donned our aprons, Catherine and her chef, Edel Proctor, showed us the correct, efficient way of doing it. I cried tears, I think, of joy at this eye-watering experience.
Then it was on to the complicated stuff: Irish Guinness soda bread; carrot and cumin and spinach soups; beef and stout cobbler; herby champ; green salad with honey and lemon dressing; and Baileys Irish Cream truffle torte with roasted honey plums and orange cream. Catherine, who has appeared on Saturday Kitchen and NBC’s Today programme as well as her own cookery show in Ireland has made a special art out of Italian cuisine with a Celtic edge to it.
Her ingredients couldn’t be fresher – the kitchen garden at Ballyknocken, lovingly tended by gardener Mark Smyth, provides a comprehensive range of vegetables and salad leaves, and our self-prepared salad was garnished with edible borage, marigold and calendula flowers. Food tastes so much better when you have done it yourself and acquired new skills in the process.
Much more of that, however, and I will definitely need my own “fatbike” on a permanent basis.
DANIEL CRAIG injured his ankle while filming action scenes for No Time To Die in Jamaica – also the setting for both Dr. No and Live and Let Die. Scott Dunn is offering the ultimate Bond experience, staying at the beautiful GoldenEye hotel, where all 14 original 007 books were penned by Ian Fleming.
Guests will be treated to excursions including a private boat trip to Laughing Waters Beach, where Dr. No, was filmed. There will be private guided snorkelling experiences, trips to Firefly – Noel Coward’s former estate – and a private tour of the Ian Fleming Villa.
After adventure-filled days, guests can retreat back to the beautiful boutique GoldenEye hotel. The package also includes a bottle of Bollinger, La Grande Annee – the famous champagne featured in many Bond films – and a copy of the book Goldeneye: Where Bond Was Bond by Matthew Parker, about Jamaica’s strong influence on Fleming’s spy series.
A seven-night stay at the GoldenEye hotel, Jamaica is from £3,059 per person on a B&B basis,
HOW:
including economy flights, transfers and the Ultimate Bond Experience Package. Visit scottdunn.com
SKYFALL SELF-INDULGENCE
SCENES from 2012 Bond movie Skyfall were filmed in Scotland, and The Gleneagles Hotel offers guests luxury and glamour that 007 would approve of.
Set beneath the Ochil Hills, in the heart of Perthshire, Gleneagles offers seclusion and adventure, with its array of outdoor pursuits including golf, fishing, shooting, horse-riding, off-road driving and falconry. Dinner at the iconic Strathearn restaurant is a decadent affair, with traditional gueridon service from bespoke dining trollies bringing excitement and energy to the room as a selection of classic dishes are finished at the table.
Daniel Craig as James Bond in No Time To Die