British Airways Christmas Market Breaks
British Airways is marketing a selection of Christmas Market city-breaks for the entire family to enjoy.
Included in the airline’s selection of Christmas market cities is Berlin. Customers can visit Berlin, the capital city of Christmas Markets with over 60 to wander around, including the market at Charlottenburg Castle, which boasts over 150 stalls and Winter World at Potzdamer Platz. It also hosts the largest mobile toboggan run in Europe and an ice skating rink for the less daring.
British Airways will also be offering breaks in Vienna this season. Well-known for the Magic of Advent Christmas market by City Hall and the traditional Viennese Christmas market on Freyung, Vienna is also known as a place of nostalgia, romance and music. The aromas of candied fruits, cotton candy and other delicacies like Christmas punch fill the air of Vienna’s Christmas markets with festive aromas.
Prague is another city on the list of British Airway’s Christmas market destinations, with flights to Prague expected to increase in popularity during the holiday season. The Czech capital has a range of tourist attractions and Christmassy treats in what many would call a true winter wonderland setting. The Prague Christmas markets run daily in the Old Town Square and Wenceslas Square and feature brightly decorated huts selling traditional Czech handicrafts and local delicacies, making Prague one of British Airway’s top selections for Christmastime city-breaks.
Paris may not be the first city one would associate with Christmas markets; however, the Parisians have their own version of this festive outdoor shopping tradition. The Christmas Market on the Avenue des Champs-Elysées is the largest Christmas market within Paris’ city limits. A cluster of wood chalets, it offers traditional holiday treats including mulled wine, gingerbread, sausages and specialties from various regions of France.
Switzerland is another destination that British Airways has included in its collection of Christmas market city-breaks. This year, Zurich will be hosting a new Christmas lighting display on Bahnhofstrasse, the city’s celebrated shopping high street, and special ‘Night and Sunday Shopping’ hours so visitors can shop late into the evening. Zurich has a packed events calendar over the Christmas period that includes the Lichterschwimmen floating candles display, Christmas circuses, the Live On Ice skating rink and a Singing Christmas Tree.
Radisson Blue East Midlands Airport Hotel opens
The first ever guests to stay at the new £22m luxury Radisson Blu hotel at East Midlands Airport have now been welcomed. The hotel’s first guests were presented with a bottle of champagne by the hotel’s General Manager, Daniel Keane.
A family from Staffordshire were the first to check into the hotel’s luxury presidential suite, which includes a separate lounge and seating area, a complimentary mini bar, bathrobes, slippers, newspapers and breakfast.
Paul Rose, of JPR Group, brought his wife Anna and daughter Roxie Marandi to experience the hotel’s offer in advance of their company’s motor racing championships awards dinner.
Paul said: “The last time I saw the presidential suite I was in a hard hat and wellies. The hotel looks fantastic today and all the staff have been very welcoming and friendly. I have never used the East Midlands Airport Hotels before for my company but now we have this standard of hotel available, it makes perfect sense for my customers as it’s very easy to reach by road and by air.”
Of all the hotels near East Midlands Airport, this Radisson Blu hotel offers a unique experience. The four-star standard hotel includes luxury leisure and spa facilities, free high-speed wireless and a gourmet restaurant which uses the best of local produce. A feature wine room is available for wine tasting led by the hotel’s in-house experts. A regular shuttle bus provides passenger transfers to East Midlands Airport.
In addition, Radisson Blu Hotel East Midlands Airport is setting environmental standards for new hotel builds across Europe. With an Energy Performance Certification rating of 2, the hotel is the most efficient in Rezidor’s European portfolio of over 400 hotels. Designed to the highest green credentials, its carbon neutral build supports East Midlands Airport’s aspiration for its ground operations to be carbon neutral by 2012.
The 218-roomed hotel includes:
- 9 executive suites
- Full service restaurant and bar with wine cellar
- Conferencing facilities with function suite
- Full leisure and health facilities including swimming pool, sauna and steam rooms.
The hotel’s 195 standard rooms feature a flat-panel television, individual climate control and free high-speed Internet access.
Fourteen business class rooms include extra amenities designed for corporate guests and discerning leisure travellers. Added touches include the Super Breakfast Buffet, espresso coffee machine, free pay-per-view movies, daily newspaper and free high-speed Internet access.
Holland for Families
An Advertising Feature
As a family with young kids, finding a suitable holiday each year to keep both adults and children happy is always something of a challenge. But a couple of years ago, having firstly trawled the car hire comparison sites for a good deal on a five- door hatchback, we took advice from some good friends who for the past four years had been going to Holland and booking a chalet at the Dutch Center Parcs at Zandvoort on the North Sea coast. Now, before you jump to any conclusions, let me say right away that we aren’t your classic Center Parcs sporting fanatics, and neither are our friends. No, the thing that really attracted us to Zandfoort is its brilliant location, only a stone’s throw away from Haarlem, and not much further from Amsterdam. And, of course, its other great attraction is its famous flatness and extensive network of cycle lanes.
I have to admit here that I hadn’t actually sat on a bicycle for some considerable time, so the idea of cycling did at first fill me with a little trepidation. But as a role model I clearly had an important job here to set a good example to my nine-year-old son who had only just learnt to propel himself on two wheels without stabilisers.
Center Parcs at Zandfoort is a perfectly good place to stay. It’s not exactly the height of luxury but it’s certainly good enough. The chalets were clean and had all the facilities you’d expect. In fact, I think the chalets may well have been upgraded recently, judging from the latest pictures on its website. There is a good indoor swimming pool with slides, which is free to use and a decent bakery too. But our intention was to just use the place as a base from which to drive, walk and, yes, cycle.
You can hire bicycles from the centre. Being Dutch, they have a strange system of breaking; instead of using the handlebars you have to cycle backwards. It sounds very Heath Robinson, but believe me, it works pretty well. So having parked in the car park, we ventured out on our bikes and discovered the joys of Dutch cycle ways. These are, in fact, more than just cycleways, they are separate road systems, often with two lanes, and not always running adjacent to those used by cars. So you really do feel safe, even if, like me, you’re a bit wobbly to start with.
From the centre you can cycle along the coast for miles, and like us, park at one of the many smart cafes overlooking the beach and sit with a good book while the children play on the beach.
Of course, when not cycling, there are the local cities to take in. Haarlem is a little gem of a place, with its intricate network of beautiful canals, stately canal houses and charming cobbled streets. And the Franz Hals Museum is a must. Then there’s Amsterdam with so many wonderful attractions. We just confined ourselves to the Vincent Van Gough museum and Anne Frank’s house, which is an incredibly moving experience.
The combination of cycling, sightseeing and swimming meant that the kids didn’t moan too much about being dragged around museums when they knew that we’d soon be on our bikes, quite literally.
Alex Pearl is a freelance copywriter and author of ‘Sleeping with the Blackbirds’.
http://sleepingwiththeblackbirds.co.uk http://alexpearlmini.carbonmade.com
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