8 Old Colonial Hotels You Can Still Stay In

Remnants of a bygone world, these colonial memorials are places of nostalgic luxury where century-old traditions are preserved with meticulous care. Their Victorian flavour is reminiscent of Agatha Christie stories (actually, the famous writer stayed in some of them herself).

Most of old colonial hotels are as unaffordable for the average traveller as they were a hundred years ago, but this apparent shortcoming is compensated for by their opulence, charm, rich history and a long list of famous guests. Get to know some of the most celebrated hotels in the world…

Galle Face Hotel, Colombo, Sri Lanka

Opened in 1864

Facing the Indian Ocean, this very personal and unique hotel has been hailed as a masterpiece of Victorian architecture. Some of its guests have said that staying at Galle Face is alone a sufficient reason for visiting Sri Lanka.

What is more, staying at Galle Face is affordable. You can enjoy the dramatic sunsets over the Indian Ocean from its black-and-white chequerboard terrace and know that famous guests, such as Richard Nixon, Indira Gandhi, Jawaharlal Neru, Emperor Hirohito, Roger Moore, Yuri Gagarin have probably done the same.

The hotel has its own ‘landmark’ – a world-famous doorman, eight-eight-year-old Kuttan, proudly bearing the title of the most faithful employee in hotel industry. He has served Galle Face for 66 years since the days of the British Raj.

Mandarin Oriental, Bangkok, Thailand

Opened in 1876

One of the oldest hotels in Asia, the famed Mandarin Oriental (formerly Oriental) is not cheap, but it certainly lives up to its reputation of superb service and opulent luxury. With a ratio of three staff per one guest, the hotel aims to make every visitor feel like royalty.

The famous guests include almost everyone who comes to mind – politicians, royalty, designers, celebrities such as Graham Greene, Sophia Loren, Alfred Hitchkock… Joseph Conrad did not stay at the hotel, but he was a frequent visitor to the bar.

In 1888, he arrived in Bangkok to take over the command of a ship whose previous captain died at sea, and spent many an evening swapping stories of far-off places in the bar of the Oriental. A few years later he would settle in England and take up writing full-time.

Raffles Hotel, Singapore

Opened in 1887

In 1886, the Armenian Sarkies brothers took over a harbour-facing building known as the Beach House. In December 1887, the new hotel opened and was named after the founder of the British colony in Singapore, Sir Stamford Raffles.

Rudyard Kipling, who arrived in the same year, noted that the food was excellent but the rooms were bad. It seems the hotel has improved a great deal since then and has a guest list that looks like an edition of Who’s Who. Charlie Chaplin, Ginger Rogers, William Golding, Elizabeth Taylor and David Bowie have all stayed there.

One of Raffles‘ legendary, even if not overtly famous guests, was a certain Dutch archaeologist, Professor Callenfels, who drank up to three bottles of gin for breakfast alone and once ate every dish on the hotel’s menu. He then proceeded to do it all over again, only backwards.

Rumoured to be the place of mass suicide of 300 Japanese soldiers in the end of the Japanese occupation of Singapore in 1945 – in fact, only one such suicide has been proven – this famed hotel withstood wars, crises and disasters gracefully and is now a celebrated national monument.

Eastern & Oriental Hotel, Georgetown, Penang, Malaysia

Opened in 1885

The Eastern Hotel in Penang – now a UNESCO world heritage site – was the first enterprise of the Sarkies brothers. Renamed Eastern & Oriental after a few years, it became commonly known as the E&O.

This hotel is one of the earliest major historic buildings still standing in Georgetown and is a charming legacy of Malaysia’s colonial past. Many of the historic features have been retained up to the present day, including the somewhat moody antique elevator and classic black-and-white tiled Victorian bathrooms.

E&O has welcomed celebrities such as Noel Coward, Herman Hesse, Rudyard Kipling and Somerset Maugham.

Pera Palace, Istanbul, Turkey

Opened in 1892, will reopen in April 2010

The grand and opulent Pera Palace was built for the use of passengers coming from Paris to Istanbul on the Orient Express. It is located in a cosmopolitan quarter of Istanbul on a hill overlooking the Golden Horn and Bosphorus, a place of symbolic significance, where the East meets the West.

Pera Palace been frequented by politicians, writers and artists. The guest list includes name such as Mata Hari, Greta Garbo, Ernest Hemingway and Valeri Giscard d’Estaing.

The hotel had a very special place in the life of Agatha Christie. She stayed there many times between 1926 and 1932, and also wrote one of her best-known stories, Orient Express, in the hotel.

Winter Palace, Luxor, Egypt

Opened in 1886

Winter Palace, built in a typical British colonial style, soon became famous for its New Year’s Eve celebrations with masked costume balls. Taking part in hotel celebrations became a symbol of status and recognition. It was said to be the ultimate privilege to have one’s yacht moored along the quayside opposite the Winter Palace.

Agatha Christie is once again on the list of famous visitors, and it might have been here she got inspiration for her many stories set in Egypt.

It was on the notice board at Winter Palace that Howard Carter first announced the discovery of the tomb of Tutankamon in 1922. The famous Egyptologist frequented the hotel until his death.

Oberoi Grand, Kolkata, India

Opened in 1890

One of the oldest hotels in India, this colonial mansion is a haven of privacy, peace and old world charm in the hectic and exhausting city of contrasts that Kolkata is.

Boasting celebrity guests such as Melinda Gates, Ricky Martin and the Queen of Bhutan, Oberoi Grand used to be the favourite destination of princely Indians and local and international celebrities alike.

It is still one of the best hotels in India and perhaps the best hotel in Kolkata, a city is rich in top of the range hotels. The grand dining room offers different international buffet every night of the week as well as an exquisite Sunday lunch buffet, popular with locals and tourists alike

Mount Nelson Hotel, Cape Town, South Africa

Opened in 1899

Mount Nelson Hotel was the fruit of the imagination and determination of shipping magnate Sir Donald Currie. The first visitors were the European high society travellers and the nouveau riche who partied and celebrated at the wake of Anglo-Boer war that broke out in the end of 1899. A young Winston Churchill was then a regular guest as a newspaper correspondent reporting on the war.

Since these troubled days, the walls of Nellie, as it is affectionately known, have survived three wars and many changes of government. They have welcomed the rich, the famous and the royal. Agatha Christie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., and more recently Charlize Theron, Robbie Williams, Bono and Oprah have all stayed at Mount Nelson.

This white mansion boasts breathtaking views of the Table Mountain, and is striking in its colonial grandeur that South Africa is so famous for. Mount Nelson still serves high tea in the afternoon and champagne before dinner.

Additional photo credit: Pera Palace Hotel by Inga Kastrone

Public Transportation in Malaysia: Trials and Errors

With this article I will take you on a trip to the confusing world of public transport in Peninsular Malaysia.

It’s an overview of the different ways to travel from one place to another and how we managed to (eventually) always get where we wanted to be.

There are plenty of different public transportation options from which to choose, and each of them has its own challenges, which sometimes have to be learned the hard way.

Skybus

On a sunny Sunday afternoon, after more than 30 hours of spending time in airports and airplanes, we finally arrived in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia. Our hostel owner had been so kind to provide us some directions and this started with taking the “Skybus” to get from the airport to the center of the city.

As this is the most common way of airport transport, we figured that there would be at least some signs pointing to the right bus terminal…not. No problem, they can’t put a sign for every single bus company, we will certainly find the bus at the general bus terminal…wrong again.

Luckily there was this very nice taxi driver who could point us at least the direction of the Skybus terminal. At that time we probably already looked very lost, so thanks to mister cab driver to not trick us into his taxi! After having to ask for directions another couple of times, we finally managed to find the Skybus terminal at the other side of the airport.

We easily found the ticket office and soon we were on our way to Puduraya bus station.
Puduraya is the main bus station of central Kuala Lumpur and from there (according to my directions) it was only a couple of minutes walk to the hostel. Too bad the bus didn’t stop in the station, which made us lost again. After another round of asking directions, we found out that we were only one street away from the station, so soon we were on our way to the hostel.

At that time we called it bad luck, but it wouldn’t take long for us to experience the complexities of public transport in what I like to call a “semi-developed country”.

Metrobus

The first trip we wanted to make around KL was to the famous Batu Caves. We asked the guy from the reception of the hostel how we should get there and in broken English he told us something about the metro and the bus. Now you have to know that in Dutch, and probably in some other languages too, “metro” is the name we give to the subway.
As we didn’t really have a clue what the guy was talking about, I asked him to write it down. So he wrote the word “mertubus” and told us to go to central market.

Over there we started showing our piece of paper to everyone around, but nobody knew what the “mertubus” was. So we tried asking for some variations: “mertubus”, “merubus”, “metrubus”, “metrobus”… That last one rang a bell in the head of some friendly policemen who pointed us the way to a Metrobus bus stop. Indeed, I wrote “a” metrobus bus stop.

When the bus finally came we tried to wave him down but the driver waved back at us that this wasn’t the place where that bus stopped, so we had to run to a couple of streets further where the bus finally stopped at another bus stop.

Apart from a couple of liters of sweat nothing was lost and after half an hour we were dropped off at the Batu Caves. Some hours later we wanted to catch the bus back to KL city, but there didn’t seem to be any bus stops. At arrival we hadn’t really noticed that the bus dropped us off at the side of the road and that there wasn’t really a sign or anything.
So we guessed we should try to stand on the place where the bus dropped us off and sooner or later another bus would stop there and take us back to the city. Another bus stopped there, only to tell us that we were on the wrong side of the road (okay, we could have figured that out ourselves).

So we crossed the road and waited for another half hour until we finally noticed our bus in yet another road… Again some running brought us to the right imaginary bus stop and soon we were on our way back to the center.

Subway

To get to the KLCC PETRONAS towers, someone advised us to take the subway. No, actually that’s not true, someone really advised us to take the train. But luck was on our side and we figured out in time that in Malaysia people call the subway also a train. Otherwise we might still be waiting at the KL train station.

Unlike subway stations all over the world, in KL there’s a different ticket counter for each line. So you first have to find the right line, and then buy a ticket at the counter that sells ticket for that certain line.

After that, the “train” is piece of cake. It works similar to all other subways I’ve ever taken, and it soon became our favorite way of travelling.

Long distance buses

Too bad the subway only runs within a city, so whenever we needed to get from on the move we were dependent on other ways of transport. When we wanted to get from KL to Cameron highlands for example, we asked the guy from the hostel to arrange the bus. He did some phone calls, asked some money and wrote us a pre-printed paper which mentioned our names, the time of departure and the platform where the bus would leave.

By that time we were already a bit suspicious about public transport, so we arrived half an hour in advance at Puduraya bus station. Soon someone asked us where we wanted to go and showed us the way to platform 18. There was already a bus waiting but when we asked the driver if that was the bus to Cameron Highlands the answer was “No”. Nothing lost, we still had 20 minutes, so we waited…

After another 10 minutes the bus still hadn’t arrived and there also were no other passengers. So we started asking around. Nobody seemed to know about that bus, some even told us that what we had wasn’t a real ticket, but a friendly security guy took the time to run all over the station with us only to find out that the bus we needed didn’t exist.

By that time we were already more than half an hour late, so the only thing we could do was go back to the hostel and ask what was going on. The person at the reception did another couple of phone calls and found out that we had a wrong ticket. The bus didn’t leave at Puduraya, but across the street in front of the DiGi (a Malaysian telephone company) shop.

We received a new ticket and one hour later we were at the shop. There were already some other people waiting over there so our confidence came back and half an hour later we were on the bus to Cameron Highlands. I have to mention that we never made the same mistake again. From then on we always bought our tickets directly at the bus station and we haven’t had problems like this again.

Minivan

Between every tourist highlight there are at least a couple of minivan services. They are usually more expensive than long distance buses, but they pick you up and drop you off wherever you want. Another advantage is that these vans are usually scheduled to arrive at location around checkout time (11 – 12 am), which means you have more chance on finding accommodation.

But every coin has two sides, and so does this one. It seems like the drivers really feel like it’s their van and they are doing you a favor by bringing you to your next location (although you’ve paid for it) and thus you have no reason to complain about whatever they decide. So they decide on the music, both style and volume, on the temperature of the air condition, on the speed (wannabe rally drivers are no exception) and so on.

They also decide whether they stop or not along the way and if they do, where they stop and for how long. Of course, it is kind of funny to see a bunch of people sprinting to the toilets after a six-hour non-stop drive. Just make sure you’ve went before you leave and don’t drink too much along the way. And if you ate something funny the day before, you might want to consider not taking a van.

Taxi

This is the kind of transportation we had the least problems with, I think. But of course you pay the price and we tend only to take taxis if there’s no other public transport available or if we have no clue where we are and where we need to be.

We experienced the taxi drivers as friendly and helpful persons. Because they know the area very well, most of the time they’re also able to give advice about good accommodation and sights.

Although most guidebooks will advise you never to take a taxi which doesn’t have a meter, I’ve always seen this as an advantage. You just need to make sure that you agree on the price before you leave, and it helps to look like you know the distance and about how much you should have to pay. When the price seems a little too much, it might also help to make a “hmmm-face” or to start talking to your companion in another language. This sometimes makes the drivers to reconsider their price.

When you’re at the coast or on an island, there are often boat taxis available. They normally go only to certain locations and they have fixed prices.

Boat

As mentioned before, there are the boat taxis, which are used for short distances, mostly to dive sites, other coasts or close islands. Next to that, there are the ferries. Different ferries exist towards the islands of Penang, Lankawi and Perhentian. But also to other countries like Indonesia.

The only experience we had with ferries was the one between Kuala Besul and Perhentian Kecil. It might take some time to figure out where the ferry specifically leaves. For example, when you want to leave Long Beach on Kecil by ferry, you first need to take a boat taxi to somewhere in the middle of the sea where the ferry then picks you up… You just need to know.

Train

Malaysia has two main train routes: one between Thailand and Singapore which passes by Penang and KL and close to Melaka, and another one between Kota Bahru and Gemas, which drives through Taman Negara.

The latter is also known as the “Jungle train”. In Gemas it switches tracks to either KL or Singapore, which provides a good connection between the city and the Jungle. The trains are old, and you should only take them for the experience, as the bus is cheaper, faster, more comfortably and they have and hourly schedule.

Adventurers as we are, it should be a shame not to give the jungle train a try. So in Taman Negara we went to the tourist info service to find out that the train to KL leaves Jerantut at 12:45, so at noon we were at the train station and found out that the train leaves 45 minutes past midnight… Living in a country where we use the 24 hour system instead of AM and PM, I know that I need to look out for this mistake, and honestly, I can’t remember if the timetable said “12:45 AM” or just “12:45”.

As there’s nothing to do in Jerantut which can keep you busy for more than 12 hours, and as there’s also a bus service every hour, we let go of the plan to take the jungle train and decided to take a bus instead.

Some extra notes about local buses:

Like the Metrobus in KL, every city has its own local bus service, but there are some things they have in common.

None of the local buses have a time table, but they drive quite often and you just need to appear on the right place and wait for a bus to pass by. Normally they have fixed hours when they start in the morning and stop in the evening, but we experienced that either this is a lie, or the people we asked just didn’t have a clue and made a guess.

Outside of the big cities, bus stops are not very common. Buses do stop, but don’t expect a sign or anything, so when you get off, always take a good look at the environment to be able to get back on again later.

Buses don’t always drive the same route. The advantage is that the driver might also bring you to a place where the bus normally shouldn’t pass by. The disadvantage is that it’s possible that the bus doesn’t pass by the place you expected, because it took a detour to drop someone else off. Make sure that whenever you get in, you tell the driver exactly where you want to get off.

Something else we’ve experienced is that people (even bus drivers) often don’t have a clue which bus goes where to. The tactic we’ve used is to ask at least five persons and take the bus which number has been answered most. But feel free to invent your own tactics.

You might have figured out by now that public transport in Malaysia is not that easy as it is in the western world. But luckily, it seems that the Malaysian government knows about this. One of our last days on the peninsula, I mentioned the problems we had to a Malaysian guy and he answered that their minister of transport has been to Europe to see how we handle these things over here.

So there’s hope!

Chris Guillebeau: An Interview With a Successful Entreprenuer, Writer, and World Traveler

This is the first in a series of brief interviews with some of the important movers and shakers in the travel business. In some cases you’ll be familiar with the person but in other cases they might be someone you should know about who has been playing a role more behind the scenes.

Chris Guillebeau

Chris lives a lifestyle many of us only dream about. He’s an entrepreneur and writer based in Portland, Oregon, who is currently 119 countries in to his goal of visiting each of the 197 nations on earth.

If you have any desire to travel the world while sustaining an appealing lifestyle using your talents at the same time, Chris is someone you should be following. The first part of his philosophy on life is “You don’t have to live your life the way other people expect you to,” which is a thought that should resonate with many travel fanatics who aren’t always understood by their non-traveling friends and families.

His site, chrisguillebeau.com, is loaded with interesting articles that will help you get started down the path you desire, and his first book, The Art of Noncomformity, is due out soon.

Who: Chris Guillebeau, Portland-based traveler & soon-to-be author

Blog: The Art of Nonconformity, documenting his quest to visit every country in the world and lifestyle design.

What is your favorite packing trick?

Pack less and never check bags. Terribly obvious, I know, but sometimes the obvious is the best. I also leave things like books and clothes in random stops along the way.

Do you have a luxury item that you don’t leave home without?

Not really. I suppose my laptop is somewhat a luxury, but it’s also vital to what I do. I work from wherever I am in the world.

Do you have a repeat offender destination?

Yes, I visit a number of places each year as jumping-off points to new countries. I’ve probably been to Hong Kong more than a dozen times in the past two years. I also like South Africa a lot, although I only get there about once a year these days.

What’s the most outrageous thing you’ve eaten while on the road?

I’m a vegetarian and therefore not a huge adventurer when it comes to eating outrageous things. The next time I get to Malaysia, though, I’m planning to visit an “All-you-can-eat Durian Stand” that I saw in Kuala Lumpur last month. I figure since I have to skip the Chinese dogs and African rats-on-a-stick, the least I can do is try durian sometime.

Backpack or wheelie?

Wheelie + laptop bag. It’s worked for 119 countries and counting!