Thanks, Paul

A Luxury Travel Blog

Shortly after stumbling on A Luxury Travel Blog and mentioning it on weekendhotel here – which post I translated today with its original time stamp, in line with my policy to use the original timestamps of the Dutch posts to give the reader my historic perspective here – I invited Paul Johnson to come over and visit our small luxury hotel Haagsche Suites for a special feature that he gracefully published here.

While he visited us with his DW (DW is chat language for Dear Wife), my DW asked me: “Why don’t we do what they do: Visiting nice places, having fun, and reviewing them?” I realized that we were doing this already from time to time for quite some time, only I didn’t publish about our adventures lacking a forum. Subsequently I discussed this idea in an attempt to find some common grounds (and a forum) with Willem who appears far to busy with managing his site Weekendhotel than to expand too rapidly in other countries than say Germany and France and maybe UK and Spain for the moment.

This led me to start this English language site, albeit not until an interview with Danny Hanush of Special Hotels in a Dutch glossy magazine inspired me to use the “Happy” part in the name and the motto.

Now Paul honoured me with another intro to Happy Hotelier here. So, thank you, Paul for triggering all this.

Publishing in English about The Netherlands, about some of its fantastic accommodations brought together by Willem and in dire need to be translated fully in the English language and about the Hague in particular as a neglected travel destination is a dire necessity to my view. Such in addition to my other aims. Not because the English are too lazy as Paul suggests, but because Dutch is a difficult language for any non-Dutch and because I am not able to come to speed in for instance French, Spanish, Italian or German, to name a few languages. This said I will research the possibilities to use some translation tools that I have seen somewhere on a Blog that enables the reader to translate posts on a Blog simultaneously.

So off I am at full speed to satisfy my own curiosity and that of our foreign friends.

Hot Hotelier News

Um, just a few days after I launched Happy Hotelier Juliana Shallcross, Hotelchatter’s senior editor, launches another nice alliterative tag Hot Hotelier News with an on and off love story about NY Hot Hotelier Andre Balazs and star Uma Thurman who “burn it up again”:

Today we introduce a new feature called Hot Hotelier News where we keep you posted on the work, life and love interests of our favorite hoteliers. This week, we will do one a day. After that, we’ll scale back to one or two a week if we can restrain ourselves. Enjoy.

On and off happiness?

Who will start Hobby Hotelier, my first thought?

Google's amazing catch of Happy Hotelier

Only 7 days after Happy Hotelier is airborn and thanks to the intro of Willem on Weekendhotel, the search term “Happy Hotelier” gives this weblog a Google search rank rank # 2 after Willem’s intro as # 1

Usually it takes a lot more time until Google spots you.

The Hoxton Urban Lodge: One day til opening

Thanks to Hotelchatter and The Observer I came across this new 205 rooms Urban Lodge that will open 1st September, 2006.Opening promotions included rooms for just an amazing one (1) UK pound per night – sold out off course, but the Hoxton site promises more similar promotions for the near future. Normal rates start at UK pound 59 and become higher the nearer to the night of your choice you make your reservation.

The “Pret a Dormir” has been created by the take away sandwich (Pret A Porter) mogul Sinclair Beecham. The breakfast included in the roomrate is a nice “Pret” sandwich.

The Observer:

Everywhere you look in Beecham’s hotel there are no-nonsense feel-good touches: the internet is free, so is the coffee and the mineral water in the bedrooms, and the Pret breakfast left on a hook outside each morning. Instead of a ruinous minibar, you buy wine, champagne, beer and snacks at the reception desk for normal shop prices.

But all this is window-dressing next to the really revolutionary idea: a room pricing system borrowed from the budget airlines….

There’s no denying you get a lot of room for your money. The mattresses are by Hypnos (‘same as at the Metropolitan’, says Beecham), the towels thick and fluffy (‘same as Claridge’s’) and the lighting soft and discreet (‘done by same company as the Schrager hotels’). The TVs are flat screen and swivel so you can watch in bed, the bathrooms small but swanky, with huge shower heads and full-length mirrors.

The corridors on each of the six floors are lit with different coloured lights and there’s lots of exposed metal, giving a slightly unwelcome echo of Beecham’s previous business. The decor isn’t exactly exciting and the lobby’s industrial design – polished concrete floor, exposed bricks, dark wood – is getting slightly passe in this cutting-edge part of London. But let’s be frank: for the money, and compared with Britain’s other mid-range hotels, it’s jaw-droppingly good.

Hotelier's Horror: Hotel Bed Jumping

If I hadn’t seen it, I wouldn’t believe it: For many people the ultimate experience of a hotelroom is the first jump in the plush luscious bed, according to Hotel Bed Jumping HQ:

This Site Celebrates Hotel Beds. And we poke fun at them too.

There is something completely intoxicating about today’s hotel bed. Plush, deep, luscious, thick…and oh so bouncy. Don’t deny yourself the indulgent luxury of taking a running start and launching up over that mattress and box-spring that will surely propel you back up into the stratosphere.