http://www.insideluxurytravel.com/newsletters/ilt_newsletter_03_2011.html

have cold - in bed - MISERABLE!

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The new series of Inside Luxury Travel is now in full production!

The team is just back from a rather wonderful filming trip in Malaysia. We started off in the capital city, Kuala Lumpur, for just one night - staying at The Villa Samadhi. This is a new and quite comfortable boutique property in a rather affluent part of the city with great views of the Petronas Towers.


From KL, we flew to Tioman Island in the beautiful state of Pahang. We stayed & filmed three nights at JapaMala. This property - which faces the South China Sea - is surrounded by fabulous rainforest, teaming with plants and animals. The highlight of my stay was watching as James (camera assistant/field producer) was chased along a walkway by a small troupe of angry-looking monkeys. How I laughed...


From Pahang, we ventured north to Terrenganu state and YTL's Tanjong Jara. This is undoubtedly a world class luxury resort with quite impressive facilities and service. A highlight for me here was - uncharacteristically - thumping my first shot on a Par-3 onto the green and holing the putt for a birdie on the Bukit Besi Golf Course. It was my first round of the year...

Malaysia is fast becoming a favourite for a new breed of luxury traveller and is a very affordable alternative to Thailand and Bali.

On my way home, I popped into Hong Kong... one of my personal favourite travel destinations on Earth. I stayed at the magnificent Peninsula hotel but also popped into the Mandarin Oriental, Shangri-La, Upper House, Four Seasons and the Ritz-Carlton (which is set to open at the end of March). Honkers IS buzzing...

March is a quiet month - I will be doing a couple of Leica trips but we will carry on filming the show in earnest from April. Last month I featured Nashville and Chicago. You are able to see what I did and where I stayed by heading to the Leica blogsite http://blog.leica-camera.com/ or if you become a friend of Leica (or Inside Luxury Travel) on Facebook. It currently has 90,000+ friends on this site alone...and countless millions of fans around the world. Leica is THE camera brand. I am very lucky that Leica - last year - invited me to share my travels by writing a fortnightly blog accompanied with a dozen photographs (taken on a Leica). While I write a blog for Leica from every location I film, I will still be short this year of destinations! So if you want guaranteed coverage of your location on the Leica blog, Facebook, Twitter and our own Daily Diary, please contact me on varun@insideluxurytravel.com

Due to current political and climatic issues occurring around the world, our 2011 filming list may have to be amended but we are still hoping to film (not in any order): Seychelles, Antigua, Sydney, Napa Valley, Big Sur, Wales, Geneva, Sweden, Budapest, Botswana, Egypt, New Delhi and Mumbai. If you have any feature or hotel/resort ideas, please do not hesitate in contacting us here on: info@insideluxurytravel.com

For all our friends in India, Inside Luxury Travel now airs on ET Now - the premier business channel in the country - which is owned by The Economic Times. In New Zealand, the show now airs on Travel Channel on the SKY platform. Around the world, Inside Luxury Travel now airs in 167 countries, in 18 languages and to 500 million homes.

Karen Luard of KP Communications is looking after the public relations for Inside Luxury Travel. If you have any PR enquiries please do get in touch with her on: kp@kpcommunications.co.uk

I have now written over 850 entries on my daily diary insideluxurytravel.blogspot.com and it's going strong! Not a day missed in over two years!

We are always looking for interesting, exciting and fun luxury features for the show and if you have any ideas, please email Emma (producer) on: emma@insideluxurytravel.com.

Throughout this series we have worked with the likes of Robert Graham (apparel) and Leica to add that extra touch to the production. We like this, so any more brands out there that you think we should be working with, please also contact us!

With love, Varun