Bath Shower Ha Na

Photo: Lauren Bath Billed as Australia’s first professional Instagrammer, Lauren Bath was working as a chef when she quit her job in 2011 to follow her passion for travel photography. Six year’s later, she is one of Australia’s most powerful travel influencers , with 464,400 Instagram followers, and counting. She also runs a successful business consulting on social media to the travel industry. LAUREN’S TRAVEL TIPs Join a frequent flyer program , and try to stick to the same airline each time. Standardise your packing: having a routine and always putting things in the same place makes your packing so much faster and easier. Maintain a regular sleep schedule when you’re not travelling, and do your best to sleep on long-haul flights. Travel with snacks, especially if you have a dietary requirement. Buy a local SIM card . It’s the first thing I get at an airport. It lets me keep my friends in the loop, and allows me to access the internet, like Google Maps. Bring your camera. How did yo...

After visiting Germany's greatest Gothic Cathedral in Cologne, we'll enjoy the good life German -style at a top mineral spa and try our luck at the Versailles of casinos in Baden-Baden, then crank some old-time music and explore an open-air museum in the romantic Black Forest . Roman-Germanic Museum One of Germany's top Roman museums offers minimal English among its elegant and fascinating display of Roman artifacts : glassware, jewelry, and mosaics. All these pieces are evidence of Cologne's status as an important site of civilization long before the cathedral was ever imagined. Cologne Cathedral The Gothic Dom — Germany's most exciting church — looms immediately up from the train station in one of Germany's starkest juxtapositions of the modern and the medieval. One-hour English-only tours of the cathedral are reliably excellent (2/day Mon–Sat, 1/day Sun). For a workout of 509 steps, you can enjoy a fine city fiew from the cathedral's spire, ...

Photographer: Norman’s Photographic The Ford EcoBoost made easy work of towing the Escape fifth-wheel. This compact combo is ready for adventure. A molded fiberglass body seals this unique, fully equipped fifth-wheel from the elements while projecting an aura of durability and adventure “Bigger is better,” seems to be the mantra these days, as the RV industry responds to consumer demands for trailers and fifth-wheels with high-livability factors. Lightweight materials and modern building practices have allowed manufacturers to churn out a plethora of larger trailers that not long ago would have enthusiasts scratching their heads as to the wisdom of such lengths. Not everyone wants big, but few want to sacrifice livability, comfort and quality. Those who gravitate to smaller trailers are usually more adventurous and relish destination freedom or simply are not enamored with material things and opulence. Escape Trailer Industries in Chilliwack, British Columbia, thinks it can satis...

If you like having your cultural compass skewed , you' ll love Pantelleria . The map says Italy, but everything about the island spells North Africa . Villages have names like Bukkuram, Bugeber, and Gadir. Dwarfed by palm trees and built of rough volcanic stone , clusters of one- story cubic dwellings with humped roofs erupt from the prickly black-brown landscape like oases. The port's architecturally challenged concrete apartment blocks and souk-like alleyways lend it the louche, scrappy allure of Tangier. The heat is the heat of the desert, with sun so strong that only crazies leave the cool of a shop awning to cross the street without first picking out a patch of shade on the other side. Citrus trees are grown in circular, high-walled giardini arabi that protect them from the wind. Locals count the days until restaurants serve the weekly special—fish couscous. I first visited Pantelleria , which is marooned in the strait between Sicily and Tunisia and has a mere 32-mile ...

European bathrooms can be quirky by American standards. Your hotel’s WC may come with luxurious heated towel racks — or a rattling fan and leaky sink. Just keep an open mind, and remember that nothing beats a good bathroom story when you get home. No matter what, my advice is to wash up quickly and get out and about in the place you came to enjoy. First, don’t expect big spaces . Over the years, hotel owners have carved out chunks of elegant bedrooms to shoehorn in prefab private bathrooms — and they can be very tight. Counter space is often limited, and showers can be surprisingly tight, especially if you’re a larger person. Be careful bending over to pick up a dropped bar of soap — you might just hit your head on the toilet or sink. Even in top-end hotels, I find some things poorly designed . Once, I used a particularly narrow shower stall with the hot/cold lever directly in the center. If I nudged it accidently while washing, it would either scald or freeze me....