Happy Hotelier

Like a Local is a sited developped by fellow Dutchman in order to accomodate the traveler who wants to enjoy the real couleure locale (French for local circumstances).

You can search for accomodation. You can find locals who are willing to take you on a city tour or who like to offer you a meal at their home. Off course they ask an amount to at least cover their costs for it.

Like A Local started solely devoted to Amsterdam, but is branching out over various European cities. When it started, it was a bit overhyped on the internet. Now it is slowly, but gradually building up momentum.

Doutzen Kroes, Dutch (Frisian) Top Model

If you live in The Netherlands, you are so used to the beauty of our Dutch ladies, that you tend pass them by without even noticing their beauty. It happens to me, although I use to brag having a keen eye for female beauty with my fair share of a beautiful wife, two beautiful daughters and a number of photo shoots in my small hotel with likewise very nice photo models.

So it is great getting an eye opener via Dutch News that featured:

Friesian model Doutzen Kroes (23) is the fifth best paid model in the world, earning €3.8m in 2007, according to Forbes magazine. The top earner is Brazil’s Gisele Bunchen who earned €22.4m.

As an aside: I did it automatically: writing Frisian, and not Friesian. Why? because a Friesian is a type of horse bred in Friesland.

Also thank you for this Eye Opener Forbes with your top 15 list of models’ earnings:

Doutzen Kroes

$1.5 million

The Dutch model, 22, rapidly rose through the pages of Vogue, where she’s been featured in the last three issues (including the May cover). She’s also bagged contracts with Calvin Klein’s Eternity fragrance and L’Oreal.

Just a thought for the the (French based) Michelin Guide: They should start giving stars to countries on the basis of their womans’ beauty. Most certainly The Netherlands would end up with three stars, meaning: The Netherlands is worth a trip solely to enjoy the Beauty of its woman!

The Dutch Do Dance! Even their Queen!

Happy Queen’s Day!
On January 30, 2008 our Queen Beatrix reached the venerable age of 70. The Dutch Queen´s birthday is celebrated officially on April 30th, since Queen Beatrix ascended the Throne. It is a public holiday and everybody goes out partying. In Amsterdam you can walk over the heads of the visitors. Many cruise the Amsterdam canals in little boats totally clad in Orange. Other people use Queen´s Day as their annual garage sale day, because everybody is allowed to sell everything freely all over the cities. So did my family.

Under Queen Juliana´s (Beatrix´mom’s) reign there was an official defile at her palace which went on for hours and hours. Beatrix changed tis rather boring tradition satisfactorily and decided to pay two Dutch cities a visit in celebration each year. Today the Frisian cities Makkum, world famous because of their polychrome “Delf” blue ware, and Franeker had their turn.

She does that with the whole Royal Family. This often leads to humorous situations as the young Dutch princes are always in for a little playful game. Today you could see some princes trying to collect rings from poles while riding on a small tricycle.

The Queen herself made a few dancing steps with a Frisian Salsa dancer in Makkum. I was glad I found this nice photo to prove my right in my previous post.

The Salsa dancer was clad in a dancing dress made of the pattern and colors of the Frisian Flag over an orange dress. The Frisians have their own flag and own language and are very proud of it.

I found this excellent photo on Flickr where it appeared to have been uploaded by Ethiopian Eyasus Solomon. Thanks Eyasus.

The Dutch can now put their orange clothes in the cupboard until the European Football Championships.

The Dutch Don’t Dance, Photo © by Wouter Hogendorp and Canon

Recently I found this apt picture with apt title and color.

1. The picture is apt because the wooden shoes or clogs stand as a sort of fake national symbol for The Netherlands, whereas hardly any Dutchman (or Cloggy as I am actually teasingly call my fellow countrymen) actually wears wooden shoes.
2. The Title is as aptly untrue as the clog as national symbol as the Dutch do Dance, even on wooden shoes (later more on the subject of wooden shoe dancing).
3. Actually the color is the only really apt element of this picture for today as orange is the Dutch national proud, not the national color because that is red white and blue, because it is the color of the House of Orange. Our Queen is a descendant from William of Orange who led the Dutch in their 80 years war against the Spanish. Tomorrow , 30th April is the official celebration of her 70th birthday this year and we will celebrate and dance!

The official 2008 Haagsche Koninginnenach Poster

But before the Dutch celebrate Koninginnedag or Queens day several cities celebrate the night before the day. In The Hague we celebrate Koninginnenach. It is a free pop festifal throughout the city. There are several Pop- and Jazz podia. In several theaters and bars there is life music and all is one big party.

On the 2008 Haagsche Koninginnenach you can actually hear the music of several groups performing tonight.

I will not get permission from my dear wife to enter the festivities with my cameras because I am just recovering from a flu alas. It is her good excuse to keep me from partying:-)

I had some luck that I found some photos on Flickr © by Fiona Bradley that give a view of the preparations for Koninginnenach. Thank you Fiona for being so quick.

one of the pop podia

Part of the The Hague Queens Day Fair

If you want to have a nice overview of Konininnenach pictures do a Koninginnenach search on any photo site.

Update:

And you should read the post about Dutch Orange Day in New Holland from antipode (from Down Under) James Clarke from the Australian I Travelnet Blog. Then you will understand why I am proud to be a Dutchman. And I am curious whether Nomadic Matt will report about his Amsterdam Queensday experience.

Update May 1, 2008: Nomadic Matt did indeed post about Koninginnedag :Queens Day. He was in Amsterdam…Who wasn’t :-)

Travel Blog author Darren Cronian has won the Travolution Award for best consumer travel blog with his Blog Travel Rants.

He was chosen from the following shortlist:

• Travel Rants (Darren Cronian)
• TravelMail Blog (various authors)
• Viator Blog (various authors)
• Select World Travel (Lee Harrison)

I believe winning from these great blogs will add extra to this award for Darren.

The Laudatio says:

“Darren Cronian has single-handedly set the benchmark to which other consumer-focussed blogs should aspire. Controversial, relevant, thorough and, perhaps most tellingly, much better than something mainstream media organisations are trying to achieve.”

In the week before the award Darren was very nervous and even in bed with the flu.

I wasn’t aware how nervous he was until, only after I had heard of his success on Twitter, I red his post Travel Awards and Blogging:

I’m not sure why but I’m nervous about the awards; I’m not too great around people I don’t know, and what about if I do win, the thought of getting up and collecting my award – nervous.

You can follow and re read the TList Twitters on TravelTwit.com

I still remember fondly that Darren once kicked my *ss to go on with blogging and he became a real virtual friend in the meantime: Never hesitating to share his experiences with anyone.

Keep on the good work Darren !

The opening Screen

Some time ago I came across Piclens from the company Cool Iris via a recommendation from Internet Guru Doc Searls. Doc has no search function on his Blog. A severe neglect! At first I couldn’t find his post back.

As an aside: He also recommended Flickrfan in a post Less T, More V , but that is for the Mac aficionados. I have no Mac.

Eventually my persistence did find me Doc’s: Nice Plugin.

Another aside is that a commenter to that post advised to have a look at Photo Synth. I didn’t (yet).
What is Piclens?
Piclens is available as a plug in for Firefox and some other browser flavors to view large numbers of pictures on sites like Flickr. It is an amazing quick way of browsing around a lot of photos. Much quicker than Flickr’s slideshow and also much quicker than Adobe Bridge or Adobe Lightroom of Adobe for those who work with it. Brilliant!

The Full Screen

My first impression:
Wow! Cool! but you can’t link to the photo you like. This has been fixed with version 1.6.3 and hence I believe it is ready to become a mainstream plug in.

The Full Screen with one photo in the centre zoomed in
and following you each time you move your mouse

A video wall alike browsing screen

For these examples I used the ITB2008 Berlin Travel Blogger Summit Flickr Pool.

A Screen with one photo zoomed in maximally

Be aware!
Today the plug in page of Firefox only offers version 1.6.2 without the tagging and linking possibilities and not yet version 1.6.3 with the tagging and linking! That you should obtain from the Piclens site.

Piclens now for Youtube!

It took me some time to find out how Piclens would work with Youtube. It is only a small indication somewhat forlorn on the site of Piclens:

You always should launch Piclens first from your tool bar where it installs itself. In the Piclens screen you then open the Youtube search tool of Piclens which you find at the top of the Piclens screen.

But then you have something!

The result of a Piclens search on Youtube. The video starts playing immediately!

I like this instruction video and its song best

Here is the video itself:

Further goodies

You can download a tool to make your own site Piclens compatible.

There is a Wordpress plug in: A must investigate.

Disadvantage
I see one big disadvantage of Piclens. Flickr Photos are uploaded under various licenses and cannot be copied easily. With Piclens you can make a screen dump and avoid the license protection of Flickr easily.

Rest assured: I am not trespassing copy rights here, because most photo’s I showed you are my own.

Post Alia
Today again Philippe Wolff was talking about the perfect storm he sees in the online travel world. See Kevin’s post at Travolution’s Blog. Well I would say this small plugin will definitely add to that storm!

Director of Sleep

In my prior post I asked: “What is a Director of Sleep?”

I probed a bit further.

Usually a Director of Sleep is someone in a Hospital, a Mental or a Geriatric Institution who has specialized in sleep deprivation.

Thanks to the Learning Journey Blog and Cater Research I now know a bit more about the Director of Sleep of Travelodge.

As first Director of Sleep at a hefty UK pnd 60,000 Travelodge appointed Wayne Munnelly in January 2006: “To ensure that guests get a good night’s sleep in the hotel group’s 25,000 UK beds.” Apparently he was succeeded by Leigh McCarron.

He does not “sit on” the Board of Travelodge and he is not “married with children”. Puns intended, because although English is not my mother tongue I doubt Travelodge is using proper English on their site.

So where other hotels only have a Pillow Menu, Travelodge has real pro and he shows it:

According to an April 7th, 2008 Press Release Research by OnePoll in March 2008 carried out among 2248 Britons showed that the top 5 artists getting Britons sound asleep are:

1. Coldplay
2. James Blunt
3. Snow Patrol
4. Take That, and
5. Norah Jones

I kind of like it. I may even continue with a separate category: “The Director of Sleep Sez”

The “New” TravelPod

The “New” TravelPod Interior

The Travelpod is Travelodge’s answer to a tent and can become a movable Pod Hotel.

From its July 28th, 2006 Press Release:

Travelodge has produced the ultimate accessory for lovers of outdoor entertainment. Forget waterlogged tents - now you can have for the first time, a mobile bedroom or ‘Travelpod’ to make even the fussiest festival-goer feel at home.

The room comes complete with a luxury double bed, bedside tables, lights, duvet, pillows, fully carpeted floor, dressing table with light, mirror, chair and even its own WC.

The palatial pod is sealed in a 6 metres (Length) by 2.4 metres (Width) x 2.6 metres
(Height) clear polycarbonate glass box but inside has features that you will find in any Travelodge hotel across the country…

Wayne Munnelly, Travelodge’s Director of Sleep said:…”This summer we are running a few private trials which will allow me to work on the levels of light, noise and privacy allowed by the Travelpod. We will be opening up the test to customers next summer, targeting festivals and other major outdoor events.”,

From its August 20th, 2007 Press Release:

Today Travelodge unveiled its second generation Travelpod - the world’s first mobile hotel room. This latest version has been designed with new features in response to findings from the initial Travelpod trials in 2006.

The modified Travelpod is 40% bigger than the initial prototype. It has been styled in the hotel company’s contemporary room design, incorporating a red, white and blue colour scheme… and has - Air conditioning - Heater - Flat screen TV - DVD player with a collection of DVDs - Ambient lighting which includes bedside lights and a illuminated headboard - Tea / coffee making facilities - Washroom with biodegradable toilet and washbasin with running water facilities.

In addition, the furnishings are made from recyclable timber and lighting has been designed to use low wattage bulbs. The room comes complete with a luxury double bed, bedside lights, duvet, pillows, fully carpeted floor, window blinds, dressing table with light, mirror and chair.

The palatial pod is sealed in a 6 metre (length) by 2.4 metre (width) x 2.6 metre (height) clear polycarbonate glass box, but inside, the features replicate the conventional Travelodge hotel room just recently re-designed.

Leigh McCarron, Travelodge’s Director of Sleep said: “The Travelpod is a ground breaker in outdoor accommodation. We ran some tests on the original Travelpod concept last year and those findings have been used to develop this second generation model for customer trials.”

The new Travelpod will be tested over the next couple of months and the general public will have the opportunity to participate in trials by entering a prize draw at www.travelodge.co.uk.

My musings:

1. It seems a great concept, a trailable hotel room, or is it just a publicity stunt and aren’t they planing to do anything with it?
2. Do I miss something? The dimensions are exactly the same. Then where does the 40% more come from?
3. I wonder who will be the present Director of Sleep..and whatever that may be “A Director of Sleep”?

This is a re edited post originally dating back a year. (Yes I am trying to getting organized).

Some time ago I was inclined to kick my MyBlogLog widget from this Blog, because its server didn’t respond quick enough and caused hung pages on this Blog and several other Blogs.

My first introduction to Bloglog was by Guillaume of Hotel Blogs who had the widget already quite some time. I got curious and registered in January 2007.

Basically MyBlogLog was about counting. Counting the incoming and especially the outgoing links as a tool for the Blogger. The main reason seemingly to make it possible for the Blogger to see the clicking through in detail, as Google Adsense gives such a tiny little bit of information. Community building is also possible, but only as an afterthought I believe. The best part of MyBlogLog still is its recently revamped widget, especially because you can visualize your visitors if they also have a MybloLog account.

In January 2007 My Bloglog was acquired by Yahoo. See: The Jig is Up.

Browsing around I hit upon the Everybody Hurts post on the Blog of Mybloglog

Quickly thereafter I found The Rise and Fall of My Bloglog

and here is the other side of the story: Shoemoney is part of the problem

It all came down to the fact that a lot of people were using MyBlogLog to spam. Shoemoney pointed it out and the result was he was banned from MyBlogLog. An example of killing the messenger. MyblogLog cured the problem and apologized to Shoemoney and case closed.

In their recent revamp they are trying to make MyBlogLog a sort of center of your community building. It is not bad, but BlogCatalog does it a bit better. I don’t like it that MyBlogLog apparently allows non Blog authors to join and seemingly to incorporate non claimed blogs as well. The advantage of the also recently revamped BlogCatalog is that you can unfollow feeds of “friends” in you dashboard. But both are worthwhile to pursue.

Getting organized is high on my wish list. Sometimes I see ideas from the corner of my eyes: I found some ideas, but are curious whether my readers have thoughts on the following gadgets:

• BackPack It or
• Samurize It or
• Springnote it?

Any thoughts?

A couple of recent articles drew my attention:

• Death By Blogging, NY Times;
• 10 signs that you’re addicted to Twitter, Andre Philippe;
• For bloggers, a digital sweatshop called ‘home’, International Herald Tribune;
• In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop, NY Times;
• Killed By Blogging, Burst Blog
• Becker Posner about compensation under competition
• Not Productive Enough? Turn Off The Internet, Scobleizer

Just remembering that GTD (Getting Things Done) author and organizing yourself guru David Allen stopped blogging even before I started this Blog….

Read on and gimme your thoughts.

Today a short review of Pension Manfred Klauss, because one of our Austrian relatives called for their address and I want to be able to find its address back here at my blog.

This little Inn (”Pension” in German) is located between Wurzburg and Nurnberg in Germany.
This is about half way between The Netherlands and Vienna in Austria which we visit frequently. It is also nicely half way if you like to go skiing in Austria from The Netherlands.

We have stayed there many times. It started more than 40 years ago when my parents in law stopped for a couple of hours of sleep at the Motel Steigerwald next to the gas station Steigerwald along the A3 / E45 motorway in Germany, see the map. The motel had no vacancies and the attendant at the gas station directed my father in law along a rural back road (actually only allowed for local traffic) that brought him just 500 m from the motorway to a very peaceful little inn operated by his parents in law. The gas station attendant still works for the gas station (more than 40 years now) After his father in law passed away, his wife and his mother in law still run the place. Last December I stopped at Steigerwald under way to Vienna to refill my car and I visited them for a cup of coffee, while I offered the hostess a couple of roses to stress our enduring relation. In recent years we use to fly more than to drive to Vienna so we see each other less.

They offer you a very clean bedroom with a good bed nice crisp sheets and an excellent breakfast. I if you arrive late, you can buy a nice bottle of local wine: The Wurzburg Nurnberg region has excellent wines that the locals like so much that you can hardly find them outside the area. All for a very decent price. So although it is not a luxury hotel, it offers you the luxury of a clean comfortable bed to crash in and go on with your traveling. In addition, in a nearby restaurant they serve excellent food. Reservations for both the pension and the restaurant are recommended.

Off Topic
This is my first post from a computer with the Linux operating system. It is the Suse 10.3 distribution. It is a steep learning curve, but I am glad that I may be able to say good bye to the Windows operating system….

Thank You, Claude

After my previous post there was some more discussion on Twittter and in the meantime an unrelated Twitterer, The Carol of the Chines language Blog 太妃糖憂鬱狂歡節│Carol's Carnival mentioned the the possibility of Group Twittering via Group Tweet. That ticked us off.

In the meantime Elliot NG of the Uptake blog posted about the Travel Bloggers on Twitter in his post The T-List does Twitter: Join the Twitterati and gave a list of Twittering Travel Bloggers.

At the same time Elliot took it one step further and formed together with me Twitter | T-List as a Twitter Group.

It is very simple to use. If you want to join you simply follow Tlist. For the time being everybody is welcome. As a sort of group e-mail you can send a private message to the Tlist either via the update screen as “d Tlist” with your message. Alternatively you can send a Direct Message via the sidebar of your homepage on Twitter. The third possibility is to message in the homepage of Tlist (provided you are a follower). If things get hairy it may be necessary to close some possibilities in order to make the group more private.

Before I even knew how it worked The LA Times Travel Blog took notice and posted about it in their Daily Post

Chris of Vacant Ready, formerly located in Vancouver but now in Cairo, took it another step further and created a mini Blog that is fed by the RSS feed of Twitter | T-List at TravelTwit. On TravelTwit you can get an impression of the discussions. This is also a great way to follow our conference tigers like Kevin or William.

A real Mish Mash!

This all is going really fast and is really exiting. I hope the travel community and travel blog sphere adopt this tool as a great and easy way to connect and communicate.

Until they launched their Ginger version I wasn’t much impressed by Netvibes. I like their new Ginger public page idea and the possibility to group feeds on one page. A bit unfortunate is that I see no possibility to make screen shots of public pages on Netvibes.

Following a Twitter conversation with Elliot NG of Uptake, which was formerly known as Kango until they changed their name into Uptake (sounds as the artist….), I put some travel bloggers that I follow on twitter together on the page Happy Hotelier | Travel Bloggers @ Twitter.

For those of you who are not yet Twitterers (or Twitnits?), it is easy to sign up with Twitter and use the feeds of my collection to start following your favorite Travel Bloggers.

Despite several attempts to build a real Travel Bloggers Community the result is not very promising. On Twitter there is at least some ongoing communication.

Again if you want to follow me on twitter: Twitter | Happy Hotelier

As a matter of fact I was experimenting with Netvibes and its Ginger version already. Just before noting Travel.Alltop I had made a public page on Netvibes by the name of Happy Hotelier’s Travel Readings, which was inspired by the way Edu Williams had formed his public Turismo (En) page.

Look for yourself if this is an alternative for your rss feed reader and give me your thoughts.

Off to baking my own bread:-)