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Advantages: A five-star stay? Disadvantages: ?with just three-star facilities
simplicity often trumps ritzy ostentation. Attentive service matters, but nothing is nastier than the kind of smarmy obsequiousness that always seems to mask a sneer. And so on. Maybe it's simply down to that indefinable essence known as character or personality.
These inconsequential musings are prompted by my trying to pinpoint what it was about the Casa San Blas at Cusco that I liked so much. The hotel is certainly not without its limitations and even its failings, but it's a nevertheless a charming and delightful place to stay. Let's try to summarise what it has to offer.
* Location *
The Casa San Blas is situated just a few minutes' walk from Cusco's Plaza de Armas (central square), and is therefore convenient for all the main sights of the ancient Inca capital, such as the Qorikancha (Sun Temple), the Cathedral ...
Advantages: One of the best examples of Catalan Modernism Disadvantages: Very expensive
My husband has a job, which more often than not requires him to work on Christmas day and through most of the Christmas period. Whilst this is the perfect reason to turn down all invitations to spend Christmas with family, it's not the greatest way to celebrate the big day with a 14 hour shift. So last Christmas I decided that we'd have our very own Christmas but just a few days before the rest of the world. And so I booked a long weekend in Barcelona.
Our hotel - The Gallery (review already posted many moons ago) was just off the Passeig de Gracia, one of Barcelona's key boulevards where you can find my favourite of the buildings designed by Antonio Gaudi - the almost impossible to pronounce, Casa Batllo. Earlier in the year I had attended a big industry conference in Barcelona and we'd had the conference 'gala' dinner in the Casa ...
Advantages: The best submarine drama to date Disadvantages: Very long
It was only after watching my newly acquired copy of U-571 the other day that prompted me to dust-off my DVD of Das Boot (Director’s Cut) and give it another look.
In the past, this movie has been seen in several formats. Serialised on BBC2 and in standard movie length being two of them.
The DVD version runs for 200 minutes – and that’s just the movie! I suspect that this is closer in length to the TV mini-series in content than the normal movie.
The advantage of the DVD format, is that you can hear the soundtrack dubbed into English, or for the purist, in German with or without English* subtitles, which is, of course, much closer to the original. Tip – If you speak any German, see if you can spot the points where the somewhat primmer English subtitles deviate from the more lavatorial German dialogue ...
BNibbles 07.02.2001 (08.04.2001)
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Das Boot (DVD)
