You heard it here first. The best person to take away on holiday with you is not the husband, nor the kids, nor the nanny. Grandparents are the latest travel accessory.
I've written before about taking my mum away with the kids, including in a motorhome around New Zealand even though she's in her 70s. Now, it's officially cool to be encumbered with the older generation. The lavish and refreshingly old-fashioned Luton Hoo hotel, in Bedfordshire, England is one of many upmarket hotels beginning to offer families free places for grandparents (www.elitehotels.co.uk).
And the larger the age range, the better. Von Essen hotels promises a complimentary champagne reception and private dining room for any family with a minimum of three generations, as long as there are 10 of you (www.vonessenhotels.com). Even if a hotel doesn't mention any special promotion, it's worth asking if granny can fit in the family suite for free, just as kids once did.
Classic Cottages (www.classic.co.uk) has made a list of properties it thinks will appeal, such as the Oak Leaf cottage in Devon.
Taking granny is the trend. This kind of break is now marketed as a "cross-generational holiday", which sounds more like something you catch while away than the sort of thing you'd want to go on. But in fact, we do want to indulge in this newly branded activity, as holidays are a rare chance for many different generations to have a good old natter.
You can even take your granny to the Alps for free, as Ski Famille (www.skifamille.co.uk) is offering a bed in the alpine chalet for a grandparent with every ski party of two adults and at least one child.
"Cross-generational holidays" are always awash with nostalgia, giving grandparents the chance to tell stories to their grandchildren about what it was like when they were young, times were hard, but life was good. And life is never quite so good as when you're on vacation.
But sharing time together is only one model of this new sort of extended family holiday. Classic also recommends properties where three generations can stay together but not necessarily play together. At the Grade II-listed Georgian Poole House in the pretty Somerset village of Nether Stowey, kids can make believe in the Wendy House while their parents throw darts in the Games Room and Grandma and Grandpa relax in the Book Room, where Wordsworth and Coleridge once worked.
Do you have family travel tips that you'd like to share? E-mail Dea at dbirkett@thenational.ae
yallacompare profile
Date of launch: 2014
Founder: Jon Richards, founder and chief executive; Samer Chebab, co-founder and chief operating officer, and Jonathan Rawlings, co-founder and chief financial officer
Based: Media City, Dubai
Sector: Financial services
Size: 120 employees
Investors: 2014: $500,000 in a seed round led by Mulverhill Associates; 2015: $3m in Series A funding led by STC Ventures (managed by Iris Capital), Wamda and Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority; 2019: $8m in Series B funding with the same investors as Series A along with Precinct Partners, Saned and Argo Ventures (the VC arm of multinational insurer Argo Group)
Our legal advisor
Ahmad El Sayed is Senior Associate at Charles Russell Speechlys, a law firm headquartered in London with offices in the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Hong Kong.
Experience: Commercial litigator who has assisted clients with overseas judgments before UAE courts. His specialties are cases related to banking, real estate, shareholder disputes, company liquidations and criminal matters as well as employment related litigation.
Education: Sagesse University, Beirut, Lebanon, in 2005.
Credits
Produced by: Colour Yellow Productions and Eros Now
Director: Mudassar Aziz
Cast: Sonakshi Sinha, Jimmy Sheirgill, Jassi Gill, Piyush Mishra, Diana Penty, Aparshakti Khurrana
Star rating: 2.5/5
How to protect yourself when air quality drops
Install an air filter in your home.
Close your windows and turn on the AC.
Shower or bath after being outside.
Wear a face mask.
Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.
If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.
The specs
Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel
Power: 579hp
Torque: 859Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh825,900
On sale: Now
Electric scooters: some rules to remember
- Riders must be 14-years-old or over
- Wear a protective helmet
- Park the electric scooter in designated parking lots (if any)
- Do not leave electric scooter in locations that obstruct traffic or pedestrians
- Solo riders only, no passengers allowed
- Do not drive outside designated lanes
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The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Six tips to secure your smart home
Most smart home devices are controlled via the owner's smartphone. Therefore, if you are using public wi-fi on your phone, always use a VPN (virtual private network) that offers strong security features and anonymises your internet connection.
Keep your smart home devices’ software up-to-date. Device makers often send regular updates - follow them without fail as they could provide protection from a new security risk.
Use two-factor authentication so that in addition to a password, your identity is authenticated by a second sign-in step like a code sent to your mobile number.
Set up a separate guest network for acquaintances and visitors to ensure the privacy of your IoT devices’ network.
Change the default privacy and security settings of your IoT devices to take extra steps to secure yourself and your home.
Always give your router a unique name, replacing the one generated by the manufacturer, to ensure a hacker cannot ascertain its make or model number.