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I started collecting Wallpaper* City Guides sometime last year after first stumbling upon one in a coffee shop. After reading tons of white texts on numerous Rogue Guides and Lonely Planet, the concise and design-led manner in which Wallpaper presents its city guides caught my eyes. Text were minimal, but always informative. Suggestions were limited to one venue per page or two, sometimes even three! Wallpaper* City Guides are supplementary guides aimed at design, style and culture conscience travelers. These are not meant to replace your typical Lonely Planet, which are good for pointing out obvious tourist stuff. Published by Phaidon, City Guides books on the other hand are guides for architecture and design fans seeking a more sophisticated and curated experience on whichever cities they are visiting. For example, a listing in Copenhagen suggested a visit to an Arne Jacobsen designed petrol station about 20km outside Copenhagen. Our current City Guides collection currently number ab...

The Harbour of Portofino The Italian Riviera, also known as the Liguria, is one of those ridiculously beautiful places, you have to wonder why it isn't on more lists of places to visit in Italy. Not that we mind. While busy with tourists, both local and international, it never felt like a tourist trap like much of Italy's more popular tourist destinations. It is here where you will find the Cinque Terre national park, a UNESCO world heritage site. The entire park is only accessible via railway, boats or trails. You could drive within a mile or so distance to a couple of villages, but Cinque Terre is best enjoyed walking. The five villages of Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggioreare are connected via four well marked trails (though two are currently closed due to the devastating floods of 2011), and is via these trails that I recommend you enjoy the national park. There are also other off the beaten path hiking trails around Cinque Terre. Have a cockt...

Continuing with our recent January travels (I promise this will be the last travel-logs for a month or so), we recently spent four nights in Budapest. We flew Ryanair again via London Stansted Airport. We stayed at the City Ring Hotel, short walk from Budapest-Nyugati Railway Terminal and the Hungarian Parliament building. The hotel itself was fairly comfortable and based on what we paid for, I can't find any fault with it. There's free (but flaky) WiFi connection accessible from our room and a mini-fridge in the room. There is however no kettle (we brought our own kettle), something which we have learned never to expect in most European hotels. Fisherman's Bastion As there aren't any direct railway service from the airport to the city centre, we took the frequent 200E bus from outside the airport terminal to the closest metro station (Kőbánya-Kispest) before taking the M3 line into the city. It was rather straightforward if a little tiring process (the bus isn't on...

Our January trip continues with a quick 24 hour trip to Stockholm. Well the entire trip was closer to two days if you factor in the flight time and the bus to and from both airports. This was our first time to a Scandinavian country, so it was worth the stress. We stayed at the Anedin hostel on-board the M/S Birger Jarl, one of many boat hotels around Stockholm. It was moored near Slussen, Södermalm (where other cruise ships were moored as well) only 15 minutes walk from tourist island Gamla Stan, and also a short walk to the trendy district 'SoFo' in Södermalm. The cabin itself was small, though it does have its own en-suite bathroom and toilet. As we were only in Stockholm for 24 hours, we knew that this was more or less an exploratory trip - one designed for us to get our bearings and to see if we like Stockholm enough to warrant a proper holiday there another time. We limited ourselves to the two islands, Gamla Stan and Södermalm, while also getting a metro pass to explore ...

Petrin Hill Early this January we spent six days and five nights visiting four cities in three countries in Central Europe. The budget for the entire trip was roughly £500, including tickets, hotels, attractions, transports, souvenirs, food and coffee. We flew easyjet, and because it was a post-Christmas/New Year period, tickets were as cheap as you can imagine (the entire return flights for both of us were cheaper than lunch for two at Hawksmoor, or a train trip to the North of England). The itinerary were two nights in Berlin, followed by taking the train to Prague, but with a six hours stop in Dresden, a night in Prague, then the coach the following evening to Vienna (the coach trip takes the same time to get to Vienna as the train, but is significantly cheaper). Then it was two night in Vienna before we flew back to London. Reichstag dome Despite our modest budget, we still managed to snag a private room with en-suite shower room at the Generator Hostel in the so-called trendy Mitt...

RipCord by iFLY is the first, according to Royal Caribbean, skydiving experience on cruise ship. Located on the stern of a Quantum-class ship, above the FlowRider surf simulator, guests can finally learn how to fly in the safety of a skydiving simulator. Last weekend we were given the opportunity to participate in a teaser course on board the Anthem of the Seas. Unfortunately, yours was unable to participate because he has had one too many cocktails. However according to other guests, they are first outfitted in a skydiving gear (minus the parachute obviously), jumpsuit and all before being a 30 second go on the 7 meter tall wind tunnel. On a typical cruise, each guests will be allowed two, one minute flights with an instructor. Embedded is a video of a truly awesome (and terrifying to me) of a flight instructor showing off his mad skydiving skills.

Last weekend we were invited to sail on Royal Caribbean's most technologically advanced cruise ship yet, the newest Quantum-class Anthem of the Seas. The pre-inaugural sailing was held from the port of Southampton. During our trip, we stayed on one of the superior ocean view stateroom with balcony. These staterooms are typically about 198 sq ft in floor size and comes with an additional 55 sq ft ocean facing balcony. Our room, 210, was located on deck 7 (7210). The stateroom cabin is mostly the same as the one we stayed on the Quantum of the Seas , apart from the bed which was configured close to the balcony with the sofa in the middle instead. It is also located on deck 7 just above the rows of double height yellow lifeboats. The views however are not obstructed. An interior door also connects this cabin to room 728, a deluxe ocean view stateroom with balcony. The room comes with a large super king size bed, shower room, air conditioning, a large LCD smart TV, numerous storage sp...

Casa Howard is a guest house in Florence, Italy. We stayed there for two nights when we visited the city in December of last year. The guest house is located on Via della Scala, a street just behind Basilica di Santa Maria Novella. Its location, just five minutes from the main SMV railway station, and the value for money was what drawn us to book here after a failure of a Airbnb host to confirm a booking. Florence city center is small, but it was still neat to find that the guest house was less than ten minutes walk away to the Santa Maria del Fiore cathedral. A far cry from the dreadful Airbnb flat we had in Rome. Casa Howard is located in a very old house (I can't put a date on it but the architecture style is renaissance) with a grand staircase and old fashion lift. It was a delight to find something with character, as most value for money guest house and hotels are lacking in this department. The guest house occupies the first two floors of this building. As it was a quiet time...

During our short weekend trip on Royal Caribbean's Quantum of the Seas  pre-inaugural sailing, we stayed at a superior ocean view balcony stateroom. These rooms are typically about 198 sq ft in size in addition to a 55 sq ft ocean facing balcony. Our cabin is room 228 located on deck 10 (10228). The room comes with a large king size bed, shower room, a large Samsung TV, numerous storage space, a desk with two USB sockets, a telephone and sofa. Our room also has a connecting door to the adjacent cabins, which can be formed together as a family connected junior suite with a single large balcony. This can accommodate 8 to 10 guests via three separate bedrooms. Configurations will vary, but the short video above will hopefully give you an idea to the layout and size of a typical balcony stateroom.

Me, on board our first ever cruise Last week my partner and I were invited to board Royal Caribbean's newest ship, Quantum of the Seas , at their pre-inaugural sail from Southampton for two nights. This was an event catered for the media, members of the press, bloggers, VIPs, travel agents and staff members. Two70 lounge which can be reconfigured as a performance theatre This was our first cruise so I had no idea of what to expect. The closest I have ever experience anything like this was in Vegas almost twenty years ago. A mini city resort on a giant boat is probably the closest I can describe this ship. Quantum of the Seas is the first of a new breed of smart ships called the Quantum-class, and is currently the second largest cruise ship in the world, just behind Royal Caribbean's own massive Oasis-class ships. Read on for my impressions. NorthStar and the Sky Bar on Quantum of the Seas We arrived at Heathrow Airport in the early morning of Friday and were immediately whiske...

Taruna Homestay is a family run bed and breakfast in Pemuteran, North Bali. We stayed there for two nights during our trip to Bali last month (wow, has it only been that long?). Of all the places we've been and stayed in, Taruna was in one of the least touristy and developed area, which suited us just fine. Each of the twelve bedroom is designed as an individual villa, with their own private entrances and terrace via the courtyard (which leads to a small but nice swimming pool). The bedrooms comes with their individual outdoor shower and toilet area, which we found unnerving at first. Pemuteran beach Our room has air conditioning but we did not use it often preferring to use the ceiling fan instead. The room was clean, if a bit outdated in decor and dark. As a budget homestay, there isn't such luxuries like a TV (why would you want one?), but you do get a kettle, daily mineral water and free wifi access for your Instagramming needs. You won't get much privacy as each rooms...