Travel news: gourmet guides in Bolivia, green trips to the Azores and family activities to enjoy | Travel | The Guardian

Travel news: gourmet guides in Bolivia, green trips to the Azores and family activities to enjoy

Plus 'affordable luxury' at a new London hotel, a whistlestop tour of the UK and some holiday destinations to warm you up

• The Guardian, Friday 5 April 2013 16.00 EDT

Noma co-founder Claus Meyer is to open a new restaurant in La Paz, Bolivia that will source all its ingredients from the country. Photograph: Alamy

Escapism

The co-founder of Noma in Copenhagen, voted best restaurant in the world for the past three years, is opening a restaurant in La Paz. Claus Meyer's venture, Gustu (meltingpot-bolivia.org), will source all ingredients from Bolivia. To coincide with this, HighLives Holidays is launching new gastro trips to the country, taking in the wine-growing region of Tarija, the salt flats at Uyuni, the Andes plains where quinoa is grown and the markets of La Paz. On the last day, there's a 15-course dinner at Gustu.
• From £3,000pp, 020-8144 2629, highlives.co.uk

What's new?

Accommodation
A new London hotel, the Nadler Soho, is opening on 1 June on Carlisle Street. The base2stay group, which also has hotels in Liverpool and Kensington, says it offers "affordable luxury". The Soho retreat will have 78 rooms with mini-kitchens, costing from £145 a night, and is taking bookings now.
• 0845 262 8000, thenadler.com

Garden trip
The sunny Azores islands are lush and tropical, with thriving wild plants. But aspiring horticulturalists may also love to visit several private gardens on the "green island" of São Miguel, on a new tour with Sunvil. The seven-day trip, led by Azorean plant specialist David Sayers, who wrote an Azores Bradt guide, also takes in botanical and palace gardens, hot springs and Europe's first tea plantations. Accommodation is at the Hotel Terra Nostra Gardens.
• Departs 8 June, £1,691pp based on two sharing, including flights from Gatwick, 020-8758 4722, sunvil.co.uk

Edinburgh will be one of the stopoffs on a new UK holiday tour that will also take in Liverpool, York and Cambridge

UK tour
For those who feel guilty about holidaying abroad when there's so much to see at home, Encounters Travel has the answer: a whistlestop tour of Britain. The group tour takes in London, Cambridge, York, the Scottish Highlands, Edinburgh (pictured), Liverpool, Stratford, Stonehenge, Cardiff, and Bath in a week.
• From £599pp, 0800 088 6002, encounterstravel.com

Snow watch

If you didn't get your ski fix this season, it's not too late as, unusually for this time of year, there has been fresh powder in the Alps. April is a great time to bag a bargain, and some resorts have stayed open longer than usual. Last weekend there was fresh snow in Nendaz, the Grand Massif, Val d'Isère and Zell am See.
• See skiclub.co.uk for snow reports

Where's hot now?

37C Phnom Penh, Cambodia
28C Montego Bay, Jamaica 
24C Larnaca, Cyprus 
21C Tenerife 
17C Brindisi, Italy

Out and about Easter family activities

There is still another week of the Easter holidays to go, so here are some ideas to keep the kids entertained in the great outdoors. Zip World (£50 adults/£40 children/£160 family of four, zipworld.co.uk), the longest zip wire in Europe, opened in Bethesda, north Wales, two weeks ago. "Zippers" (right) fly for about a mile, 150m above a mountain lake, with views of Snowdonia and Anglesey. The operators describe the experience as psychologically challenging, but it is suitable for brave seven-year-olds and above.

A new festival this weekend in St Agnes, Cornwall. Outsid'er (st-agnes.com) aims to get families active, with kayaking, coasteering and geocaching; competitions include a fancy dress surf contest and a raft race, and there are craft workshops and a foraged food feast. After dark there is sunset photography, star-gazing and a ghost walk.

Kew Gardens (free for under-16s/£14.50 adults, kew.org) in London has Easter activities until 14 April. The Chocolate Quest is an interactive trail teaching the history of chocolate. Children can try origami and Georgian cooking, make their own chocolate and play in an explorers' camp.

It's a time for farm visits – at Almond Valley farm (£6/£4.50/£19,almondvalley.co.uk) in West Lothian, Scotland, kids can meet lambs, chicks and other newborns, go on an egg hunt or a treasure trail and make Easter bonnets and rabbit masks.

And at the National Wetland Centre (£8.70/£4.80/£24.30, wwt.org.uk) in Llanelli, Wales, children can go pond dipping, build dens, visit baby birds and make a cuddly duckling.

Cheap date

Want to celebrate Easter again, asap? Book a trip to enjoy Greek Orthodox Easter at the start of May. Olympic Holidays has a few deals, including seven nights in Corfu departing 3 May for £313pp including return flights from Manchester and half-board at the Gemini Hotel in Messonghi.
• 0844 576 2386, olympicholidays.com

Kings Place festival

Michael Palin is known for his cheery travel documentaries and books; less well-known are his works of fiction. Listen to him discuss his latest novel, The Truth, at the inaugural Kings Place Travel Writing Festival on 22-23 June. Palin is one of a diverse line-up of speakers who include Sara Wheeler discussing her Antarctic adventures, chef Atul Kochhar on the curries of the world, and Damien Brown, describing his sometimes harrowing, sometimes uplifting experiences as a Médecins sans Frontières doctor. In addition Guardian Travel writers Kevin Rushby and Benji Lanyado will be leading mini masterclasses on the arts of travel writing and blogging (respectively). All in all, an inspiring and entertaining weekend. To book tickets visit kingsplace.co.uk/whats-on.