Innholdsfortegnelse for June 2017 i Travel + Leisure Southeast Asia, Hong Kong & Macau

isn’t solely a break from our routines, but a time to explore new places and ideas. In short, our vacations turn us into kids again. Remember the first time you flew in a plane? In my case, typical of my generation, I was in my twenties, though these days five-year-olds with dog-eared passports are common. Hopefully, what hasn’t changed is that child-like inquisitiveness that accompanies any journey like a good carry-on bag. For my part, I’m still fascinated by the intricacies of airplanes and, at street level, I am always curious about what is around the next corner. This month, we’ve got a guide (“50 Tips for Family Travel,” page 57) that aims to ease parental concerns with advice from experts, bloggers and even a few of our savvy readers.…

Who says history isn’t black and white? Mono, a new 46-room boutique hotel set in six heritage shophouses in Singapore’s Chinatown, brings a slick, minimalist color scheme to Mosque Street—as well as a “like”-happy design that is unabashed in its Internet ambitions. The interiors, by Spacedge Designs, were crafted to appeal to social-media-maven travelers: “We wanted to make sure most spaces were photogenic and served as a good backdrop for Instagram photos,” says general manager Glenn Quah. “Everything is symmetrical.” Yet the modern look didn’t require abandoning the building’s heritage. They kept much of the original mosaic tiling and hard-wood flooring, and broke down barricades over the windows and airwells so the layout would be more true to the first blueprints, sometimes opting for authenticity over navigability. “It is slightly…

vietnam | cambodia + more A generation ago, Shenzhen was just a quiet fishing village of some 30,000 across the border from Hong Kong. Then, in 1979, the Chinese government turned it into an experiment to grow capitalism in a test tube, designating it as the country’s first Special Economic Zone. Today, the city’s population is more than 16 million, driven by an influx of laborers from the countryside who make everything from real iPhones to fake Chanel bags. Shenzhen— and the surrounding Pearl River Delta—has become known as the world’s factory floor. So a first-time visitor might be surprised to find not gray factories but sleek museums, sprawling technology marketplaces, and chic breweries and bars. Shenzhen is now China’s wealthiest city, with real estate prices that last year surpassed…

I WANT TO SEE WILDLIFE FROM THE SHORE. sku ll beach, langk awi, malaysia Langkawi combines animal encounters with palm-fringed, crowd-free stretches of sand. On the island’s northwestern coast, Skull Beach, or Pantai Pasir Tengkorak, is one of Langkawi’s few public beaches with amenities (toilets, showers, shaded gazebos and food vendors on weekends). Bring your own chair, towel and binoculars to view whitethroated kingfishers and rare Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins while soaking up some rays. Or book a tour with Jungle Walla (junglewalla.com) to kayak through mangroves or hike through the jungle to see waterfalls. WHE RE TO STAY Less than 10 minutes from Skull Beach, the Datai Langkawi (thedatai.com; doubles from $450) has its own white-sand beach and offers nature walks led by renowned naturalist Irshad Mobarak. On the opposite…

JILL SMOKLER Author of Confessions of a Scary Mommy and the domestic satirist behind Scary Mommy (scarymommy.com). JOANNA GODDARD Founder of the motherhood and travel blog Cup of Jo (cupofjo.com), which was voted one of the top 10 lifestyle websites for women by Forbes. MANDY SMITH Mother of seven, who recently launched Best of Bangkok (fb.com/BKKbestof), a chronicle of the best familyfriendly activities in the city. CHERYL HO Mother of three and a flight attendant for Singapore Airlines (singaporeair.com). KIM ORLANDO Founder of Traveling Mom (travelingmom.com), a resource for parents with wanderlust.…

When Dylan Ong and Robyn Liang (above) started having children, they realized the kids’ garment industry was lacking. “We wanted Asian-made, well-fitting, versatile and, most importantly, comfortable pieces that would take our girls from the party to the playground,” Robyn says. In 2012 they launched Le Petit Society (lepetitsociety.com), a clothing brand for children—newborns to age 12— specializing in charming graphics and versatile silhouettes. “We set out building Le Petit Society to bring good style at an affordable price to the masses,” Dylan says. This month will see the launch of their first brick-and-mortar store, combining URL and IRL (in real life). “The store will be nontraditional and provide a unified customer experience,” Dylan says. For example, you can place your order online and pick up the package in-store to save on…

28 “Ask the flight attendant for a plastic cup with ice and straws. Toddlers find the combination weirdly entertaining.” Joanna Goddard (below) EXPERT TIPS CHERYL HO 29 “Have their favorite snacks handy. Munching while watching cartoons on KrisWorld, the Singapore Airlines children's entertainment program, will make the flight feel shorter.” 30 “Enjoy it. Kids usually mimic their parents’ moods and behaviors. Happy parents equal happy kids.” JILL SMOKLER 31 “Never pre-board. Why on earth would you want to be stuck on the plane for any longer than absolutely necessary?” Mandy Smith 32 “If you have a child who weighs under 14 kilograms, request a bassinet when you book your plane ticket. This allows you to strap baby into a cot when he falls asleep, giving you a break.” 33 “Dress…

a woman long divorced, my children grown and gone, I had been for many years a solo traveler. And though there were times that I didn’t enjoy sitting alone at dinner, looking at couples all around me, I did love heading out into the world with nothing but my backpack weighing me down. Like a rolling stone, I said. That was me. Then, a bit more than five years ago, I met Jim, the man who would become my second husband. We had been together only six weeks when he accompanied me to Paris on a book tour. And here’s what I discovered: I might not need a man at my side, but I actually loved the presence of this one. Many adventures followed: Guatemala and New York, New England…

On the 40-minute light-rail ride from Seattle’s well-polished airport to downtown, I couldn’t help thinking of the city’s other train, the famous Jetsons-age monorail built for the 1962 World’s Fair. It once represented an idea of Seattle’s future—but it was clear to me as I watched the city go by that that future has arrived, and was being built and rebuilt right before my eyes. Of course, the spectacular geography is as I’ve always known it, since I started coming here to visit friends and family a decade ago: against the dark Puget Sound with Mount Rainier off in the misty distance, it remains one of the most gorgeously improbable urban settings. But the city that always seemed a bit unsure that it wanted to commit to even being a…

China’s Tropical Getaway Hainan Island is on the cusp of a luxury tourism boom, with a spate of new hotel openings in the pipeline. Why Designer Filipino Bags Are the Next Big Thing Creatives across the Philippines are turning heads with eye-catching, utterly original accessories. Glamping Off the Beaten Track in Camb odia A socially responsible tented camp invites you to explore the ancient ruins of Banteay Chhmar temple complex. LOOKOUT A striking Australian boutique debuts; why you should visit Phu Quoc now; two tropical tours on Langkawi; and more. travelandleisureasia.com DOWNLOAD US T+L Tablet Editions Available on iOS, Android, Win 8 and Zinio Desktop Reader. FOLLOW US twitter.com/travleisureasia facebook.com/travelleisureasia pinterest.com/travleisureasia instagram.com/travelandleisureasia KEEP UP WITH US Sign up for our newsletter for monthly highlights and offers from T+L Southeast Asia.…

Many countries celebrate Father’s Day this month, and what better gift is there than time? The sleek new Patek Philippe Men’s Perpetual Calendar wristwatch, in 18-karat white gold with a hand-stitched alligatorleather strap, is made to last forever. It is self-winding and displays the full calendar, even leap year cycles, in perpetuity. A manual adjustment only has to be made once every 122 years, when the moon cycles must be corrected by one day. The brand’s slogan is: “You never actually own a Patek Philippe. You merely look after it for the next generation.” So when you give one to your dad, you are essentially giving it to your future self, and your children, and their children as well. Talk about the gift that keeps on giving. patek.com; price on…

1 Chiang Mai Thailand 2 Luang Prabang Laos 3 Kyoto Japan 4 Siem Reap Cambodia 5 Bangkok 6 Hoi An Vietnam 7 Ubud Indonesia 8 Udaipur India 9 Tokyo 10 Lhasa…

EXPERT TIP JILL SMOKLER 1 “Go into every trip with low expectations... Bottom-ofthe- barrel expectations. If the trip is anything but a complete bust, you can consider it a success!” READER TIPS KRISTEL DA SILVA CURRAN 2 “Don’t limit yourself to where you can go. Most holiday destinations now cater specifically to families. Your children are probably more versatile than you think. Give them a few days and most will adapt easily to their surroundings.” KAT PATEL 3 “If at all possible, bring the nanny. Even if you spend every waking minute with your kids, this gives you the option of sneaking out for some grown-up time after they fall asleep.”…

EXPERT TIPS MANDY SMITH 14 “Consolidate. Less really is more when it comes to air travel with the family, so keep bags to a minimum.” KIM ORLANDO 15 “Dirty clothes take up so much more space in a suitcase than clean clothes. Vacuum-seal bags are the answer. They’ll deflate your laundry into a manageable little bundle.” Available on aliexpress.com. READER TIP JACQUELINE DE SEGONZAC 16 “Keep a travel bag ready to grab for any trip, loaded with the essentials: Band- Aids, Tylenol, thermometer, sunscreen, bug spray, shampoo.” T+L TIPS 17 Pack based on your destination. If you are headed to off-the-grid hinterlands, bring everything you might need, but if you are going to a city, leave the suitcase full of diapers at home. 18 Use packing cubes: one per child,…

EXPERT TIP Kim Orlando 37 “Book a resort residences. They have all the amenities of a hotel (housekeeping, activities, concierge) and the benefits of a home rental (kitchen, space, doors between rooms). Or if you go the hotel route, opt for a suite with a separate bedroom for the parents. At the very least, book a room with a balcony. Put the kids to bed in the room, then grab a bottle of wine and two glasses and head out to the balcony for some quiet conversation.” READER TIPS Jacqueline de Segonzac 38 “Bring a small Tupperware to the breakfast buffet and load it up with kids’ snacks for later.” KAT PATEL 39 “Call ahead to see if the hotel has any ground-floor rooms within 100 meters of the pool…

It didn’t unreasonable seem like an request. I was on the southern coast of the Italian island of Sardinia in early July, and I thought I might find some seafood on the menu. But when I asked if the restaurant served any, my waiter answered firmly, almost with a touch of disdain: “No.” I was sitting at one of the small outdoor tables at Pani e Casu, a restaurant near the ancient battlements of Cagliari, Sardinia’s capital, high above the city’s busy port. The blue waters of the Mediterranean twinkled in the distance. I could smell salt in the air. Surely, I thought, those waters must hold some fish. Before I visited, I had never thought of Sardinia as an island of shepherds. I had thought of it as an…

1 SCOTT WOODWARD Photographer Wish You Were Here Page 114 Woodward had the trip of a lifetime in Mongolia. “As we were driving across the great steppes outside Ulaanbaatar, we came upon a few gers and this small horse corral in the midst of the vast grasslands. I approached with my camera and the herdsman just went about his work taming them—man versus nature. But the most memorable time was photographing the famed Khazakh eagle hunters. A father, his son and their two Golden Eagles had traveled across the country to be with us. It was remarkable to be so close to these magnificent creatures and witness them at work.” Instagram: @iamscottawoodward. 2 CHARLOTTE PERT Photographer Wild Woods Page 42 Pert has lived in Cambodia for seven years, working with…

News + trends + discoveries Bangkok foodies are in for a treat. Garima Arora, previously the chef de partie at Noma and sous chef of Gaggan, has opened a restaurant of her own. Sitting in stark contrast to the white, airy dwellings of its accolade-collecting sister restaurant and Arora’s former stomping grounds, Gaa is set across the street in a spacious, hard-to-miss, yellowand- pink shop house that, at one point, had served as a brothel. Hailing from Mumbai, Arora originally made her way from Copenhagen to Bangkok to help Gaggan Anand open an Indian curry house. When plans fell through, Anand looked to Arora to fill the neighboring shophouse, and what she made of it might be even more impressive than Anand’s Keralastyle curry. The space itself is an exercise…

Making memories on a family vacation has never been more fun than with a Canon Selphy CP1200 wireless printer. Singapore-based international travel photographer Lester Ledesma and his family recently toted one with them to Istanbul, and came back with a scrapbook full of kaleidoscopic keepsakes. But you don’t have to be a pro to print with this lightweight wonder, whether using the Wi-fi connectivity or the SD card slot. “It’s very, very simple,” Ledesma says. “Just pop in the memory card and the menus are easy to navigate.” The Selphy’s convenient portability, with its external battery pack, makes foreign places easy to navigate, too. “The Selphy is a great tool to interact with the locals. We gave away prints to people we met in Istanbul and it opened doors to…

Halfway down the ridge, Pech Mogn stops in his tracks, plants his tall, shiny telescope in the coppercolored earth below us and whips his head around to face us, whispering for us to be still and quiet. A sudden flash of turquoise flies through the goldflecked, emerald canopy below us. Pech’s eyes light up. “Banded kingfisher,” he says with a grin, flicking to the listing in his chunky bird-watching tome. Pech is an enthusiastic bird-watching guide with the acclaimed Sam Veasna Center (SVC), and I’m on one of their newest adventures: a trek through to Mondulkiri’s Seima Protected Forest, a biodiversity hotspot in the northern reaches of Cambodia covering some 3,000 square kilometers that was declared a protected area by the government in 2009. We’ll spend the remainder of our…

4 Tokyo “Attractions like Disneyland, DisneySea, Sanrio Puroland, Ueno Zoo and Sega City are great for families with young children.” 5 Taiwan “Famous farm stays with a lot of activities will keep the children occupied. The Taiwanese are great hosts and the food is so yummy.” 6 Phuket “There are activities on the island to satisfy every age group, along with childrenfriendly resorts to set the scene for a relaxing vacation.”…

EXPERT TIPS JILL SMOKLER 19 “Baby wipes. Don’t have a baby? Doesn’t matter. Kids of any age need to be cleaned up at some point, and wipes are the perfect, portable solution.” MANDY SMITH (below) 20 “A good baby carrier instead of a stroller. Travel (and life in general) is simplified by a sturdy carrier that allows you to be handsfree for toting luggage or holding hands. By contrast, strollers are a hassle to take through security lines... and to check under the plane upon boarding... and to wait for on arrival.” CHERYL HO 21 “An inflatable ball. This light, space-saving toy comes in handy when we decide to rest in a park or open area. Just inflate it and the kids will have a good time running around and…

EXPERT TIPS MANDY SMITH 45 “Have your kids create a journal about their trip. Every day, give them 30 minutes to write about or draw a highlight. Each child will love having their own blank journal to fill with puttputt golf ticket stubs and napkins from that ice cream parlor. This helps document their memories, giving them something special to leaf through and show grandma later, and it gives you half an hour to grab a bath in that hotel-room Jacuzzi tub.” CHERYL HO 46 “Set aside some downtime for reading at the end of the day to help your kids unwind before bed.” READER TIPS KRISTEL DA SILVA CURRAN 47 “Stick to your regular routine as much as possible. That’s doesn’t mean being a nap slave, but if you…

LONDON After the Brexit vote, the pound slid, making the United Kingdom more affordable. The Langham is offering four nights for the price of three until September 30. PARIS A weaker euro plus terrorism worries have made Paris a budget-luxe locale. Le Bristol’s “I Love Paris” offer includes a room upgrade, cocktails and dinner at Michelin-starred Brasserie 114 Faubourg, for $1,150 per night. RIO DE JANEIRO A lot of new hotels were built for the 2016 Summer Olympics, and now there is an abundance of empty rooms. The Miramar Hotel by Windsor in Copacabana is offering a fourth night free through July 31. SINGAPORE Hoteliers, especially in the upper-mid tier, went on a building spree, but have had no big events recently to draw the masses. So you can find…

SUPERSA VER GRAND HYATT MACAU Mezza9, the must-try buffet dinner spot at this hotel, boasts an impressive spread of made-to-order veggies, meats and seafood in dishes from around the world. With this deal, along with free laundry services and an open minibar, you’ll get a complimentary dinner for two at Mezza9. The Deal Grand Offer package: a night in a Grand Deluxe room, from HK $1,999 for two, through December 31. Save 56%. macau.grand.hyatt.com. CITY BANGKOK Sala Rattanakosin Perched alongside the Chao Phraya surrounded by the cultural gems of Bangkok, this small hotel packs a big punch when it comes to location and cool aesthetics. With this package you get one free night for every three nights you stay, meaning more time to explore one of Bangkok’s hippest areas, temple…