My Kind of Holiday
Where did you spend your last holiday?
California: San Francisco and Monterey; then we hired a black Ford Mustang and drove to Los Angeles.
What was the best thing you did while there?
We bought rollerskates in San Francisco and took them wherever was flat and legal. We inadvertently skated right into the epicentre of the Bay to Breakers marathon in the Golden Gate National Park, tens of thousands of college students with smatterings of naked guys and topless girls.
Your favourite destination abroad and why?
I’m pretty keen on California — San Francisco and Los Angeles. People are really friendly and engaging and it’s not hard and aggressive like New York.
What must a first-time visitor see there?
Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. The sidewalks are occupied by jogging celebrities and diamond-encrusted septuagenarians in pastel-coloured tracksuits … and that’s just the men.
In San Francisco, the intersection of Haight and Ashbury streets formed the iconic centre of the flower-child movement in the ’60s and ’70s and is now the focal point of the city’s hipster movement, with couture taxidermy boutiques and vintage clothing stores.
What was your best holiday, ever?
A friend and I once drove from New York, down the coast through Philadelphia, Washington DC and Atlanta. Ultimately, we landed in Savannah, Georgia, a decadent old Southern town of landscaped squares and loose virtues that General Sherman quite rightly thought too beautiful to burn in the Civil War.
One place you want to see before you die?
I once got randomly upgraded to first class on Emirates and it is my life’s intention to one day claw my way back there.
Have you had any embarrassing moments as a traveller?
I got searched at Beijing airport because of potential explosive canisters in my luggage. The police rummaged through my old underwear to find 10 cans of Tresemme Ultra-Strong Hold Hairspray, which I’m known to pack liberally.
What’s your best piece of travel advice?
There’s no such thing as free wifi. There’s also no such thing as a free lap-dance.
Robert Silke is a writer, filmmaker and architect