So we have high hopes for the year to come — quite literally one of us has a Himalayan hike in her future, others have Mallorcan mountaintop hikes and Guatemalan volcanoes. The people behind it are the sisters Agapi and Costantza Sbokou, who also created the Blue Palace in Plaka, where I have very happily stayed countless times.
The environment of the Sbokou hotels lives up to the name and I am excited to try out the boutique version.
The sisters have a knack for creating that happy medium between a vibe that is both cool and warm! How alluring is that? Never again … Somewhere that will never lure me back is Lake Lucerne, Switzerland. I went some years ago for a supposedly romantic getaway with my husband, Ian, and the vast static lake gave me the creeps, as did the severe waiters in the silent hotel restaurant dinner served strictly between 7pm and 9pm, no music. The town was dead by 9. Taking a rowing boat out on the second morning was about as exciting as it got, and we both realised we wanted to get a flight out.
Give me the noise, fun and spontaneity of a Greek village any day. At least you feel alive! On my wish list… There are mentions of beyuls , or hidden Himalayan valleys, in the Buddhist scriptures.
A few years ago I made a pilgrimage to one of these divine lands, the Sherpa village of Junbesi in eastern Nepal. I walked with yak herders for five days, climbing up through misty rhododendron forests. When we arrived at the lake a snow leopard had just left, leaving its pug marks in the snow. In a few minutes the marks disappeared in the thickening blizzard.
