Category: Reviews

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A Regal Vacation at the Makadi Palace

The Makadi Palace is a salubrious resort situated on Makadi Bay in Egypt’s fabulous Red Sea area. Featuring a private beach and just 30 minutes in a free shuttle bus from the Grand Mall in Hurghada, it’s the perfect place to while away a few idyllic days with the family.

1 There are 475 rooms on 5 floors in the Makadi Palace and each room has a balcony from where guests can enjoy stunning views of the resort’s gardens, swimming pools or the Red Sea. It’s easy to see why the resort is often compared to a Moorish Palace. Air conditioning, satellite television, minibar and safety deposit box are all included in standard rooms.

There’s so much to do at the Makadi Palace it’s no surprise that some people barely leave the resort for the duration of their break. With 4 large swimming pools, 5 tennis courts and a football pitch, the opportunities for engaging in sport are immense here. Other activities offered include beach volleyball, water polo, aerobics and aqua-aerobics.

2Apart from the feel good factor you get from all of the exercise, it’s a great way to meet and make friends with some of the other guests in the resort. And with a unique daily sports program, featuring lots of fun games and competitions, there’s really no excuse not to get involved.

However, if sport is too much like hard work to you, other ways you can spend your time at the Makadi Palace include getting a massage from one of the fully qualified masseuses working full time at the resort or enrolling in a free Arabic language course. The only stipulation for the language course is there must be enough demand from guests to run it.

3Dining in the Makadi Palace is one of the highlights of a stay here. Guests have a wide range of options available for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The Dome and Melange restaurants offer breakfast including American, English and continental style selections and both also offer full lunch buffets. Another option for lunch includes the Sunset Grill which has a mouth-watering menu of grilled dishes.

4For the main evening meal buffets are available from the Dome, Melange and Discovery restaurants. Aficionados of Thai food though will probably spend most of their time in the Thai Garden which serves delicious, authentic Thai dishes for lunch and dinner. And if you’re worried about what the kids will eat there’s no need to be, a children’s buffet is available daily from 10am to 5pm and includes all the snacks that kids love.

After the sun sets, the atmosphere at the Makadi Palace becomes more tranquil as guests enjoy a few drinks in the Piano Bar. Every night a different act performs live music and if you still feel like dancing after this, you can get your groove on in the resort’s nightclub, which is open until the early hours every night of the week.

5The Makadi Palace also offers an extensive entertainment package for kids. There are various kids’ clubs run by the hotel, including one at Sunwing Waterworld. And if the little ones need to practice their swimming for this they have their own designated swimming pool at the Makadi Palace. Selections of children’s movies are also shown throughout the day and an evening disco completes the entertainment package.

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Five Wonderful Travel Books You Should Read

Here’s a list of five great travel-related books (in no particular order) that I recommend any and all to give a read.  They’re all quite different from each other and each author provides his own unique outlook on the world.  They should be on every travelers bookshelf.

Babylon by Bus: Or, the true story of two friends who gave up their valuable franchise selling YANKEES SUCK T-shirts at Fenway to find meaning and adventure in Iraq,

Two young Americans ditch their Yankees Suck t-shirt business and make their way to Iraq during the first year of the American Invasion.  That was all I needed to read before I purchased this book!  Babylon by Bus chronicles their experience in and out of the green zone from their drug use to mask the sounds of bombs exploding to their interactions with coalition forces which result in NGO work aiming to help Iraqis.

It’s an easy read, fun, and also allows you to step inside Baghdad from an outsider’s point of view.

Do Travel Writers Go to Hell?: A Swashbuckling Tale of High Adventures, Questionable Ethics, and Professional Hedonism

Drugs, debauchery, and writing for Lonely Planet.  That’s Do Travel Writers Go to Hell? in a nutshell.  Thomas Kohnstamm chronicles his experience in giving up everything he had in life to go to Brazil and write for Lonely Planet.  This results is more trouble than you could ever one person getting into, an impossible writing workload and the author’s conflicted feelings about guidebooks and the gringo trail.

The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places in the World

Part travel narrative, part scientific study, NPR’s Eric Weiner aims to find the happiest countries on earth and figure out what makes the people so happy.  Wealth, social equality, and beautiful weather are popular explanations yet Weiner realized they have little to do with the places that are happiest.

Marco Polo Didn’t Go There: Stories and Revelations from One Decade as a Postmodern Travel Writer

I previously reviewed Marco Polo Didn’t Go There but decided it needed to be included in this list as well.

This collection of Rollf Potts’ travel stories include a commentary about why and how he wrote each and every one.

A great resource for the aspiring travel writer, but also a great read for anybody who will enjoy Potts unique outlook on his experiences and encounters around the world.

The Great Railway Bazaar

Paul Theroux’s classic travel narrative of his journey along the Trans-Siberian Express is over 30 years old but still holds up remarkably well.  Theroux has become one of the most respected and read authors in the world and this is the book that started it all.

Sometimes brash and unapologetic about the characters he meets, some people find him off putting but it’s his brutal honesty that gains respect from everybody else.  His vivid descriptions of the people he meets and places he sees is colorful, but not overly adjectve-laiden like many lesser authors.  You will definitely feel as if you are on the railway car over 30 years ago while reading this classic.

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Marco Polo Didn’t Go There – Book Review

marco_polo_rolf_coverAttending the LA Travel and Adventure show last month I stopped by to see some of the books they were selling.  My eyes were drawn to the half price Lonely Planet books but unfortunately for me, I had just purchased my guidebook for Costa Rica and didn’t have any other trips on the agenda at the moment.

Then I noticed and picked up Rolf Potts’ Marco Polo Didn’t Go There: Stories and Revelations from One Decade as a Postmodern Travel Writer. I am ashamed to admit I had never heard of Potts before nor had I read any of his stories.  The stories in the book sounded good though so I went ahead and purchased a copy.

Essentially a collection of Potts’ stories for various websites and glossy print magazines, Marco Polo Didn’t Go There turned out to be one of my best impulse book purchases ever.  You probably could skip buying the book and find them all archived online, but then you would miss out on the great commentary Potts adds at the end of each story.  These commentaries give more information about the characters, events or even about his state of mind when experiencing or writing the story.  With no need to please a magazine editor or make sure a story captures the reader, they also act as a place where Potts can be more honest than in the original story.

Who this book will really interest ,though, is the aspiring travel writer, such as myself.  Potts shares not just the details of the experience, but why he included certain elements, excluded specific characters or exaggerated various details.  He shares his opinion on what made the story work, and will be honest about what didnt’ work.  Potts also talks about the many styles and forms of travel writing and points out why he chose to use various techniques.

Whether you are a writer or not, you will be engaged in his stories, feeling as if you know the characters. Not because of vivid, adjective heavy descriptions, but because most of stories revolve around personal interactions that you’ve certainly experienced in one form or another.

This is the first book I have read with the author’s commentary after each chapter and it was a welcomed change.  I truly enjoyed getting in to his head and understanding the why and how of his stories.

Marco Polo Didn’t Go There: Stories and Revelations from One Decade as a Postmodern Travel Writer is available on Amazon.com at a discounted price.

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