The "Therapy" room at Propeller Island City. Photo by Sterin.

By Sarah Silbert—

We were pleased when a copy of Bed in a Tree, published by Eyewitness Travel, came across our desk the other day. Flipping through, we couldn’t decide which magnificently unusual hotel we liked best.

The book, written by Bettina Kowalewski, surveys 27 of the world’s most unique accommodations, from giant wine barrel guestrooms in Germany’s Rhine Valley to elegant canopy beds atop an ancient tree in the South African wilderness. Each hotel description is complemented by pages of stunning photos and tips on what to do in the hotels’ locales.

Most of Kowalewski’s picks are located in lesser-known (and more interesting) destinations, and they all clearly demonstrate how hotels can be so much more than a place to sleep. While many of the hotels aren’t Cheapo-friendly (hello, $590 a night Ice Hotel in Norrbotten, Sweden!), Kowalewski thankfully includes a few budget-friendly spots.

Here are five unique sleeps featured in the book that are easy on the budget:

Capsule Hotel
Located on a canal in The Hague, though the exact location changes.
www.capsulehotel.info

The Capsule Hotel in The Hague, the Netherlands, caught our eye with its two James Bond-inspired oil rig pod rooms furnished with beds made of fisherman’s net and sheepskin rugs. (Rooms are even outfitted with karaoke machines!) It would be quite a ride to spend the night bobbing up and down on the water.
Nightly rates: €70-150

Propeller Island City
Albrecht Achilles Strasse 58
Berlin, Germany 10709
www.propeller-island.com

As long-time fans of Berlin’s many art hotels, we loved the book’s photos of the 27-room Propeller Island City, located in the German capital. Each room boasts a wildly different theme—you could sleep in a coffin (with air holes, of course), or bask in the light of the “Therapy” room’s multicolored fluorescent lamps. While we’re not sure we’re brave enough to stay in one of the hotel’s wonderfully outrageous rooms, we think it would be a blast to visit.
Nightly rates: €70-190

Pension Kamerichs
Ditzroder Weg 18
Bad Laasphe, Germany 57334
www.pension-kamerichs.de

Pension Kamerichs, located in Westphalia, Germany, is a B&B—minus the roof. The “room” consists of a white iron bed on a pretty green lawn, plus a nightstand and a chair. Sure, there’s not much privacy—though the lawn humorously boasts a door frame, but the prospect of sleeping out in the fresh air sounds pretty appealing. Marie-Luise Kamerichs, the enthusiastic proprietor, provides old-fashioned nightclothes for the guests (as demonstrated in several funny photos in the book), and breakfast is included.
Nightly rates: €35

Park Plane Hotel
Woodlyn Park
Waitomo, New Zealand
www.woodlynpark.co.nz

Waitomo, New Zealand’s Woodlyn Park Plane Hotel provides guestrooms on a 1940s Bristol B-170. The plane has plenty of history, having once carried military personnel into Thailand and Hong Kong. The rooms pictured look considerably more comfortable than economy class fold-back seats, and the cockpit unit, complete with the switches and knobs of the control panel, offers an especially unique stay. The hotel’s owner also runs a converted train wagon hotel, a Hobbit Motel, and a World War II patrol boat hotel.
Nightly rates: $85-95

A "roulotte" in La Serve. Photo by Wolf_H.

Les Roulottes de La Serve
69860 Ouroux
Rhône-Alpes, France
www.lesroulottes.com

Les Roulottes de La Serve, located in the beautiful Rhône-Alpes region of southwestern France, offers accommodation in the form of three converted roulettes, or “gypsy wagons.” Each of the three guestrooms boasts a different, dazzling décor, from Asian-inspired artwork in the Roulette des Étoiles to the rustic décor in the Roulette de Manège. The pastoral French location, combined with the novelty of sleeping in a caravan that has roamed the country, has us craving a night in any of these wagons.
Nightly rates: €50-60

About the book: “Bed in a Tree,” by Bettina Kowalewski, was published in September 2009 by Eyewitness Travel. The book also includes vouchers for a 10% discount at 15 of the 27 selected hotels. The book retails for $25.

Popularity: 10% [?]

A train in Görlitz, Germany on one of the routes featured in the book.

By Nicky Gardner and Susanne Kries in Berlin—

What train routes might make it into a list of Europe’s greatest train journeys?

The book that inspires us to ask this question is published next month by Time Out Guides Ltd. Great Train Journeys of the World is edited by Andrew Eames who pulled together a team of leading luminaries on rail travel to write the book. (Full disclosure: Andrew was good enough to ask us to contribute prose and images for a number of routes across Europe.)

The routes: Classic long-distance and branch lines

Europe makes a good showing in this global compendium of journeys worth making. Of course the book includes many classic itineraries such as the Trans-Siberian and the posh tourist train Orient Express. But the joy of the volume is the neat way in which unexpected tiddlers are pushed into the limelight. For example, the book includes a rural run through the Cévennes area of southern France, a branch line that crisscrosses the border between Germany and Poland, a rural route in Catalunya, and a line that cuts through the heart of the Bosnian countryside.

This is not just a book for train buffs. It is pitched at the general reader who is looking for hints about journeys that might be worth taking. Some cutting-edge European express trains are celebrated for their speed, such as the Eurostar link from London to Paris, Germany’s ICE services, the TGV in France and the AVE routes in Spain.

But the lure of Europe’s greatest rail journeys is not generally in their speed, but in the way that trains trundle through the countryside both by day and by night. The book has a little Hungarian rhapsody in an account of a 12-hour journey by day that takes in four European capitals, and a Highland fling with a super essay on the Caledonian Sleeper night train from London to the Scottish Highlands.

A firm favorite: the Caledonian Sleeper to Fort William

Editor Andrew Eames comments in the book that the night train from London to Fort William in Scotland (often dubbed “The Deerstalker”) was the service that every one of the two dozen authors really wanted to write about - no matter how many times they had taken the train before. In the end, Eames himself wrote about that particular journey.

Bargain berths, too

Rail travel on some of Europe’s classic rail routes need not be impossibly expensive. Some of the journeys in the book are brief and cost no more than a few euros. And bargain berths on that overnight train to the Scottish Highlands can still be booked for dates later in 2009 for as little as 39 pounds sterling - all inclusive in the comfort of a sleeping car with crisp linen sheets.

Susanne Kries and Nicky Gardner are based in Berlin and write regularly for EuroCheapo. They contributed to “Great Train Journeys of the World” with articles and pics on rail routes in central Europe and Scandinavia. Nicky and Susanne are editors of hidden europe magazine, about which you can find out more on www.hiddeneurope.co.uk.

Popularity: 7% [?]

A section of the East Side Gallery in Berlin. Photos by Campru.

Berlin—Critic and curator Emilie Trice writes, “Berlin is the graffiti mecca of the urban art world.” And a recent New York Times article confirms Trice’s assertion with the observation that “The city’s skyline might be defined by a Sputnik-era TV tower, bombed-out churches and the ghost of a certain wall that once split the German capital. But its streetscape is largely molded by graffiti.”

It is therefore unsurprising that the city’s art landscape includes a number of galleries exclusively showing street art. Overkill Shop, Circle Culture, and Intoxicated Demons are a few choice examples of galleries specializing in bringing street art inside. And recent super-successful shows by celebrated local street artists such as EVOL and Jaybo Aka Monk demonstrate the commercial viability of street art for international collectors.

A graffiti guide

Street art in Berlin.

But for everyone interested in just appreciating the work in its natural habitat, there is a new book by graphic designer Benjamin Wolbergs, “Urban Illustration Berlin: Street Art Cityguide.” The book makes the perfect guide for a walking tour through Berlin’s outdoor street art scene.

Written in both German and English, the book offers exclusive interviews with seventeen of the elusive artists. Wolbergs does not limit his focus to spray paint. Instead, he gives attention to the rich range of stencils, cutouts, markers and wheatpaste works across the city.

Wolbergs’ stunning street photography in “Urban Illustration Berlin: Street Art Cityguide,” along with the interviews’ insight into the artists’ working techniques, motives, and philosophies on street art, make the book a valuable purchase, regardless of whether one is planning a visit to Berlin.

A self-guided graffiti walking tour

However, the book’s real treasure is a tear-out city map detailing the locations of 500 iconic and admired instances of Berlin’s street art featured in the book. Tear it out and take yourself on a walking tour.

Street art is fragile. And a few of the works Wolbergs spotlighted no longer exist. But the neighborhoods remain active areas for street artists and well worth visiting for anyone interested in the origins of Berlin’s vibrant international art scene.

Popularity: 14% [?]

If you’ve been following the career of Arthur Frommer—guidebook pioneer, magazine founder, and budget travel personality—you’ve probably noted his daily travel musings on his blog, “Arthur Frommer Online.” Since launching it last year, Frommer has penned more than 1,000 posts that cover a vast array of subjects, from new travel sites to censorship in Dubai.

“Ask Arthur Frommer: And Travel Better, Cheaper, Smarter,” published in March by Wiley Publishing ($19.99), reworks the most helpful of these dispatches into a 512-page budget travel encyclopedia. Flipping through the book is a trip in itself, and reading the book from cover to cover is sure to be an education in the art of budget travel.

Art lessons

“Ask Arthur Frommer” offers up Art’s tips-of-the-trade in an easy-to-follow structure. Throughout, Frommer pushes the idea that technology has changed the way we travel, granting us new-found independence, flexibility, and opportunity to see the world.

Frommer clusters his advice by topic, in sections such as ”Airfare,” “Cheap hotels,” and “Transportation.” We were happy to note the attention he pays to less mainstream destinations (hello, Riga!) and his suggestion to open up to “alternative lodgings” like hostels. (Full disclosure: We were also quite happy to see references to both EuroCheapo and our sister site, EuropeanHostels.com on his blog and in this book.)

It’s well worth noting that while Frommer has been around the globe (his landmark book, “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day,” debuted in 1957), he’s no technophobe when it comes to his travel know-how. At 80, he’s still an active traveler, and frequently writes about emerging technologies, new travel trends, airfare comparison sites, and travel meta-search engine.

Our fave Art encounters?

We really enjoyed passages where Art goes “off the keyboard” and gets truly expressive, even controversial, about the mainstream travel media.  He isn’t afraid to berate publications that kowtow to the luxury travel trade, and he names names. He’s also had it with out-of-touch editors defining “budget travel” as $250-a-night boutique hotels and (even more expensive) resorts. Go Art! 

Throughout his career, Frommer has pushed his readers to do their own research, find real deals, and get closer to the cultures they visit. This book, compiling a half-century of real budget-travel advice, is a wonderful way to get started. 

Have you read this book? Have a comment? Post it below.

Popularity: 5% [?]

The other day, a copy of “Fodor’s Budget France ‘82″ landed in our office. The cute little book, measuring no larger than a pocket-sized Agatha Christie novel, has captivated and charmed us ever since.

For one thing, it’s so simple. The 178-page book is all text, providing three maps (France, Paris, and the Metro), ten chapters, and a phrase index in the back. The only photo to be had was an advertisement on page 174 for a Fodor’s language course, audio cassette-edition. The book retailed for $5.95 (about $13.00, adjusted for 2008).

Money and prices abroad in 1982

Obviously in 1982, France used the franc, which had an exchange rate of about $.17, or 5.89 francs to the US dollar. That is, if you exchanged your travelers checks at a bank. The book explains that travelers’ checks “are still the safest and simplest way to carry money.” Today, of course, travelers’ checks have mostly been replaced by credit cards and ATM machines, which can be found in airports and on every other street corner in Paris.

MasterCard? Visa? ”Credit cards are not widely accepted in France, and you’re very unlikely to find restaurants … that accept them.” We were in mid-snicker before we realized that there are still many small hotels and restaurants in Paris that don’t accept credit cards. Some things don’t change.

Sample costs in 1982

According to the book, you could expect to pay the following prices in Paris in 1982 for these “everyday expenses”:

• A ticket to the opera - 80-200 ff ($13-34 in 1982; $29-75 adjusted for 2008)
• A “tot of whisky or gin” - 15-25 ff ($2.50-$4.25 in 1982; $5.25-9.15 in 2008)
• A woman’s shampoo and set - 60-100 ff ($10-17 in 1982; $21.50-$36.50 in 2008)

In other words, prices haven’t really changed that much, even with the dollar tanking against the euro. Perhaps that shampoo and set would cost you more today, but you could still find plenty of “tots of gin” for less than €6.30 ($9.15).

Hotels in 1982

The Fodor’s guide recommends over 40 budget hotels in Paris, categorized as either “Inexpensive” or “Moderate,” and lists them all, with impressive brevity, on just two pages! Several of the hotels mentioned can still be found 26 years later in our Paris guide. (Don’t worry–we’re reasonably certain that they’ve purchased new sheets!)

For example, here’s what they have to say about de la Sorbonne, a charming little thing in the Latin Quarter: “6 rue Victor Cousin, a Latin Quarter special, atmospheric and genuine.” Did you notice what was missing, besides room descriptions? Prices! And phone numbers!

The book explains broadly: “Inexpensive hotels will charge about 80-140 francs ($13-24, 1982) for a double room, moderate ones will charge 150-220 ($25-37, 1982).” Those really were the days. Today, as we note in our “Expect to Spend in Paris” guide, you can easily find an acceptable budget hotel for €80-130, or $116-188 ($53-87 in 1982). So yes, hotel prices seem to have outpaced inflation. Hotels, however, have probably upgraded their standards.

As for reserving that special place, well…

“Remember too that many inexpensive hotels have guests on an almost permanent basis and aren’t interested in tourists wanting accommodations for a few nights; as many of them won’t take advance reservations and don’t answer letters, your best bet is to go from hotel to hotel until you get lucky.”

So much for the good old days!

Popularity: 5% [?]