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Thursday, September 6, 2007
Cyprus apartments are modern and often very luxurious with every conceivable home from home comfort plus a few more besides. Air conditioning for instance is a must at least in the bedrooms and most properties will have it installed as standard. I know you don't go on holiday to wash and cook but if you have kids it may be a necessity so most apartments have washing machines in their fully fitted kitchens. Cyprus apartments offer a real home from home holiday experience for families and couples alike without the hassle of set meal times. You will find an abundance of Cyprus apartments to rent all over the Island in the coastal resorts as well as the picturesque villages where you can sample some authentic Cypriot village life. The cyprus lifestyle is mainly an outdoor one due to the countries fantastic climate (over 320 days of sunshine) and that's why most Cyprus apartments are built with such large balconies or sun terraces. Most of the eating in Cyprus is done outdoors along with the cooking, which makes barbecues the ideal alfresco cuisine. Many Cyprus apartments do in fact have built in barbecues on the sun terrace and the great news is that the weather won't let you down either. Nearly all the modern property complexes are built around a pool area with plenty of room for sun bathing and chilling out. You can relax with a nice cool beer and still keep an eye on the kids enjoying themselves in the water. There is always a great community atmosphere around these complexes and you are sure to meet some real friendly folks who will have made Cyprus their permanent reretirement home. In fact many of the Cyprus apartments that are rented out belong to private individuals. They will have purchased these properties for themselves and rent them to help with the day to day costs of ownership or even as payment towards a mortgage. Please bear in mind that even though you may have rented through a large company the Cyprus apartments are often someone's home. There is no doubt that Cyprus apartments will give you a holiday to remember and have you coming back to this beautiful Island year after year (just like we do) to soak up that glorious Mediterranean climate. The people are friendly, the weather is perfect and they even drive on the left. With so many people buying their own properties to rent out there has never been a better time to consider Cyprus apartments for your holiday. Enjoy Cyprus! Kevin Moore owns and runs the Information Cyprus web site. Information Cyprus is the number one online resource for cyprus holidays, travel and Cyprus property purchase links. To find out more about the beautiful island of Cyprus, Cyprus holidays or buying property in Cyprus just visit the web site at InfoCyprus The Amazing 500 Year History of the Medieval Castle Medieval Castles were structures that changed dramatically over the centuries of the Middle Ages. These changes were brought about by many factors like changes in warfare and the influences of different cultures. Here is a brief history of how the Medieval Castle developed over the five hundred years of the Middle Ages. Around the tenth century the first castle-like structures were being built as defensive positions. These defensive structures were called Motte and Bailey and they were large mounds of dirt that were capped by wooden stockade fences and buildings. Hundreds of these structures were built during the century and they were very practical because they were made from local and easy to get materials. They didn’t require the massive resources that later stone castles would require. During the eleventh century many changes were sweeping through Europe and among these changes was an engineering revolution that enabled architectural building with stone. But this engineering growth alone was not enough for the building of large fortresses because that required a substantial commitment of time, resources and money. But there was also a social change sweeping through Europe. Lords and Kings were consolidating large kingdoms and gaining the wealth that made the building of large stone castles possible. In order to protect their lands or to gain a hold in adjoining lands lords and kings built stone fortresses. These stone fortresses were very similar to the Motte and Bailey structures of the previous century and they were often called “shell-keeps”. It was during the twelfth century that the massive stone keeps we normally consider to be medieval castles took shape. As crusaders returned to Europe they brought with them the engineering and design knowledge they learned from the Greek and the Turkish. Both of these cultures were very proficient with stonework and this new knowledge of architectural building enabled the building of large and elaborate stone fortresses throughout Europe. Castle building reached a feverish climax during the thirteenth century with over five hundred massive and very intricate castles being built throughout Europe. These castles were the masterpieces that we now think of as medieval castles and they had many design and engineering elaborations such as round towers. Up until this century the towers in castles were square but the square shape was vulnerable to battering rams and had blind zones. Round towers were stronger, less vulnerable, and had no blind spots. It was during the fourteenth century that the building of castles went into decline and then its eventual demise. Further developments in technology, and in particular the development of gunpowder and artillery brought about the demise by making it impractical and futile to spend ten years or more to build a castle that could be totally destroyed by a few days of artillery fire. But the castle didn’t disappear. It evolved into less of a security structure and more of a living quarters for royalty and wealthy families or what we now think of as a Palace. The medieval castle was an art and engineering form that evolved dramatically over a period of about five hundred years and reflected changes in warfare, culture, engineering and society. To learn more about Medieval castles visit the author’s website at: Medieval Castles To learn more about Medieval Knights visit his site : Knight-Medieval.com Hotels Guide - Part 1 of 4 This is a complete guide to worldwide hotels offers and facilities, split in 4 parts; this is part 1 of 4. Worldwide hotels offers Making a distinction regarding big geographical areas, the current situation of hotel offers and receptive structures it can be schematically distributed as follows. In countries with a tourism largely promoted by big tour-operator, like the Mediterranean coast and the islands of Spain, the largest Greek islands, the Tunisia and Morocco costs, the countries of the Center and South America, they have been developed, frequently in a disordered fashion, hotel offers and tourist centers characterized by the presence of large hotels, located in very attractive areas, endowed with numerous services, destined to be shown as beautiful as they appear in the catalogues of tour-operators in charge of filling them, but frequently poorly finished, with ordinary furniture and inadequate maintenance. There are hotel offers at particularly advantageous prices on behalf of big travel promoters which propose lodging places for trips to lower price; prices applied only to the occasional client, are on the other hand far greater. These same geographical areas have seen the surfacing of several hotels belonging to big chains, with hotel offers and diversified clientele (not just of tourists sent by tour operators) and with controlled standards of more comfort. The prevalence of large receptive complex regarding those of small dimensions is the most typical characteristic in these geographical areas, marked, by the hotel offers, for the logic of big travel promoters. They are few the pensions and hostels; the small receptive exercises are almost always administered as small residences or, they are simply arranged by houses in which rooms or apartments are rented. Diversified hotel offers In more industrialized countries which are those where the diffusion of tourism is older and consolidated, the receptive structure is very varied as well as the hotel offers. There's a consistent sector of receptivity called complementary called or extra-hotel next to the hotel structures, constituted by residences, camping sites, tourist villages, inns, holidays houses, private lodgings. Everywhere the appropriate equipment, comfort, cleaning in offers hotel reaches acceptable levels. Particularly, in Germany, Holland, Scandinavia, mainly if the urban areas are avoided, the lodgings, of any sort are pleasant and welcoming. Contrary to the countries included in the area marked with number 1), the richest European countries have hotel offers traditionally based on the small individual initiative. Today no receptive structure can live waiting for the client, customer or occasional. The client is looked for, cheered up with the hotel offers, the hotel reservation should be simplified, standards of service should be guaranteed admitting growing costs: most people request rooms with bathroom, telephone and television, with the whole comfort that doesn't make them miss their own houses. Thus have been developed the associations among hotel owners, for the qualification of services, the reservation in common, for the distribution of costs, the administration of hotel offers. Hotel chains have spread guaranteeing in all countries similar services that allow the quick reservation, through free telephone calls, the twenty-four hours. Born in the United States, country where the most famous hotel chains are found, today widely diffused in Europe as well, like the Hilton, the Marriot, the Ramada, the Holiday Inn, in a beginning chains brought together only the hotels of higher category, the most luxurious, and also most expensive from the viewpoint of hotel offers. Nowadays is no longer this way; next to the most important chains, endowed with expensive hotels, like the Hilton, the Sheraton, and the Holiday Inn, Americans like the CIGA and the Italian Jolly Hotel, like the French Sofitel, the Swiss Hotelplan, the British Forte, there are chains with more modest category hotels and more affordable prices, hence diversifying the hotel offers. Hotels offers and facilities France and Italy, countries of the oldest tourist tradition, present a fractional receptive structure, aimed at receiving individual tourism. Like Giorgio Castoldi writes in the "Manual of tourist technique", Hoepli, in Italy, on one hand is favored by the continuous appearance, in big cities, of offers of big hotels, of higher category, provided with the most modern services (congress rooms with its complementary equipment, fax, internal television circuits, etc.) easily reservables from any place in the world hosting mainly people who travel for business matters; and on the other hand when maintaining the offer of small hotels, most of the time with family administration, of lower category, those who prefer not to grow for not modifying their administration, based on the work of people motivated by the good operation of the company and willing to sacrifices that could not be requested to clerks in regular hotels. Their work is often not quantified: the entire family collaborates, from children to old men, frequently in partial way, or in very busy moments, without the need of some retribution. Therefore these hotels are able to apply affordable rates for the average tourist, for the family in vacations. They are usually able to obtain enough earnings for the entire family with hotels offers for only four or five months a year. Once the season is finished old men rest, children return to their school, the rest is in charge of maintenance, repairing, and the hotels offers to clients for the following season. These small formats hotels, with generally seasonal operation, represent most hotels in Italy and they are the backbone of a receptive structure that doesn't adapt to the demands of big tour operators that need hotels offers of large facilities, internally reservables. For this reason Italy is not goal of lodging for big tour operators in Northern Europe, contrary to countries like Greece, and Spain. The negative aspect of this approach, for Italy, lies on the fact that, by doing so, it�s given up to a wide range of potential clients who would assure the constant floow of tourists for differentiated hotels offers, besides the traditional periods of high season. The positive aspect rests on the fact that individual clients represent greater profits to the hotels, while the tour operator client represents sure arrivals for many months in the year, satisfying the offers, but paying little and with delay. It�s not just that, big tour operators seek offers of far more hotels that usually alter the landscape and atmosphere, transforming the coasts, like it has happened in a large part of Spain, Greece, and Tunisia, in urban centers dominated by the imposing profiles of big hotels. Changes in the hotels offers in Italy Substantial changes in hotels offers are being witnessed in Italy. Small pensions have decreased in number because the client-type of these hotels, fundamentally families in vacations, always uses the self-catering type structures (trailer houses, rooms for rent, etc.). Besides the growing in the offers of higher category hotels that satisfy a tourism different from the recreational one, the offers of three-star hotels that have, in Italy, an average of 39 rooms. Divorcing from the family administration, but keeping their opening for seasons. These hotels are fundamentally located in regions goal of recreational tourism: the region that more hotel offers present is the Trentino Alto Adige, the Emilia Romagna, and the Tuscan. Why? Probably because these hotels represent the Italian answer to the demand of tour operators. These hotels are in conditions of lodging groups, allows work in longer seasons in relation to small hotels therefore coping with higher costs than what their administration implies. Also with the demand of tour operators, these hotels are able to enlarge the traditional seasons of recreational tourism thanks to the hotels offers for congresses, manifestations, and agreements with extralaboral associations or entities of public attendance that fill facilities during low season. In a nutshell, the situation of hotels offers in Italy can be schematized as follows: Higher category hotels, of large facilities, mainly dedicated to business tourism, increase in number thanks to the growth of this sort of demand they satisfy with their hotels offers; Low category hotels, of small facilities, temporaries, of family administration, are still in some regions the center of hotel offers; they have the family in vacations as client-type; which decreases in number in relation to the modification of the families�demand, with strong tendency towards self-catering; Medium category hotels grow to satisfy mainly the demand of group tourism of tour operators, of congresses organizers, of assistance entities; they are often exercises of inferior category which, growing, transform their administration, they make it more professional and less family-like, to satisfy this new demand with their hotels offers. ------ This article is brought to you by OfferteHotel.com and EuropeLowCost.com. |
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