Hotel Check - Horizon Deluxe Apartments, Stanley, Tasmania

The north west of Tasmania has Australia’s cleanest air and least
crowded roads. It is also stunningly beautiful and as Justin Wastnage
writes, one new serviced apartment gem in the historic town of Stanley
makes the most of the natural assets

HORIZON DELUXE APARTMENTS

First impressions: 7/10
Horizon has an enviable position set in
lush farmland overlooking the town of
Stanley on Tasmania’s north west coast.
However, this area is also out of mobile
phone range for most networks,
rendering the manager’s voicemail with
entry codes irrelevant.

Accommodation 8/10
The two apartments (named Tatlow
and Godfrey) are mirror images of
each other in layout, but strikingly
different in décor, but both have a
wow factor. Tatlow is a modern white
interior with beige and brown details,
while Godfrey is a relaxed design of
blues and greens and frosted glass.
There is music playing in each,
reflecting the respective mood.

Service 7/10
Horizon is aimed at self-drivers who
let themselves in and leave the key
when they depart. The reception is
down at the sister property the
Seaview Inn, where the owner was
very honest about the relative
charms of his own, admittedly
excellent, Nut View Restaurant
compared to the local pub on a
quiet Tuesday night.

Facilities 9/10
A self catering apartment too often
lacks a good nearby shop. Horizon
provides a very complete breakfast kit
to save the early morning scavenge.
Similarly, a barbeque pack of assorted
meats is found in the freezer. Both
apartments have good, if complex,
home cinema equipment including a
small library of DVDs and satellite
television. The amazing rain shower in
the bathroom rivals the jacuzzi as the
best way to get clean in comfort.

Ambience 9/10
The centrepiece of each apartment is
the jacuzzi set in the middle of the
room, alongside the bed. The layout, of
both the apartment complex and the
bath, optimises the view. Stanley’s
main attraction is The Nut, a large
headland jutting out into Bass Strait.
The views at Horizon are unmatched.

Overall 80%
This property was built from scratch on
arguably the best plot of land in Stanley.
The views of the wild north west coast
are to die for and the attention to detail
in furnishings is commendable. Book
your funkier clients into Tatlow, the
more traditional into Godfrey. ■

Horizon Deluxe Apartments has a twonight
Tarkine & The Edge Of The
World package including a Tasmanian
produce picnic hamper, Stanley Nut
Chairlift passes, two nights à la carte
dinner at The Nut View Restaurant
and two nights’ accommodation for
$899 for two people.

The Rialto Reloaded

Hotel review originally appeared in Australian Traveller magazine, June 2009

Justin Wastnage inspects the long-awaited renovation of this Collins Street masterpiece that has artfully enclosed a classic Melbourne laneway, capturing it within a vast atrium of cool glass and warm steel.




Melbourne likes to think of itself as a bit cool. A bit European. And more than a bit above Sydney with its brash megabars and shiny temples to consumerism. So it was with some trepidation that I booked a room in the recently renovated Rialto hotel on Collins Street for a romantic weekend with my wife.

The publicity around the Joseph Pang-designed $60m overhaul, which saw the hotel close for 16 months as it swapped management from Le Méridien to InterContinental Hotels, talked of expanses of glass and steel; all very Sydney. Worryingly so. The charm of the Rialto lay in its quintessentially Melbourne laneway feel, chiefly because the communal spaces were situated in Collins Lane, which served as access way between the Melbourne Wool Stores and its office building. Yet it is the glass itself that absolutely makes the Rialto; the vast atrium that spans the laneway has been preserved largely intact as part of the renovations. The refurb has made better use of the openness and vertical space that a ten-storey glass ceiling affords. Natural light during the day is replaced by cool blue at night. Clean lines accentuate the long, narrow dimensions of the bar and restaurant area.

In truth, InterCon couldn’t have tampered with the atrium even if it wanted to. The two buildings that make up the present-day hotel were considered masterpieces even when the renowned St Kilda architect William Pitt finished them in 1891. The Federal Coffee Palace that completed Pitt’s Collins Street trio was the city’s tallest building and a showcase for the neo-gothic style that became known as Marvellous Melbourne.

As the city tore down some of Pitt’s other works (including the Coffee Palace to make way eventually for Melbourne’s new tallest building, the Rialto Tower), the National Trust slapped a preservation order on the hotel and its faux-Venetian façades.

The grandeur of the building adds to a sense of style as we arrive, fresh from one of Melbourne’s modern architectural triumphs, Southern Cross Station on Spencer Street. Yet once inside, you could almost be forgiven for thinking you were in a boutique hotel. The hotel lobby, such that it is, is tucked away inside the Winfield Building that was once the wool board’s office complex. Here ceilings are low, the concierge and check-in counters manned by effusive staff in smart uniforms.

Read the full review on the Australian Traveller website by clicking here.

The Call of the Wild

The article below originally appeared in the April-June 2009 issue of Vacations & Travel magazine.

Justin Wastnage heads to the northern reaches of Japan to explore the wideopen landscapes and natural beauty of Hokkaido.

Dmitry Medvedev had won the
lottery, Mayumi Yamamoto tells me
as she opens the door to the
Presidential Suite. In the subtle game
of diplomatic brinkmanship, the
Russian president had scored an early
coup: the best available room in the
imposing Windsor Hotel overlooking
Lake Toya on the northern Japanese
island of Hokkaido, where Yamamoto
is a manager.

Medvedev was in town for the G8
Summit meeting. Mayumi explains
that the guest list posed some
unique protocol problems. “We had
three presidents, four prime ministers
and a chancellor, so they couldn’t all
have the Presidential Suite,” she
recalls. Instead, they drew lots for
the best rooms.

As voyeurism goes, it doesn’t get
much better than trying to guess on
which side of the enormous bed
Medvedev slept. Even the bodyguards
would have had it pretty easy: the
suite comes with an adjoining family
room, where the burly minders could
have popped their earpieces on the
bedside cabinet after a day’s work.

Henchmen would not look out of
place here, for the hotel’s bold
design, by modernist architect
Hiroyasu Higuchi, is reminiscent of a
Bond film baddy’s retreat. A tower of
ever-smaller concrete slabs forms the
hotel and resort complex. Brutal and
angular, the building is in striking
contrast to the serene natural beauty
surrounding it. Sitting atop the 625-
metre peak of Mount Poromoi on the
Oshima Peninsula, it looks out over
both Lake Toya itself and Uchiura
Bay.

It is also at the end of a 20-
kilometre private road, perfect for
James Bond villains and G8 Summits.
Many hundreds make the journey
each year, not to stay in the hotel,
but to dine at the restaurants
contained within it.

French chef Michel Bras opened his second
restaurant at the Windsor in 2002,
only three years after receiving three
Michelin stars. The establishment has
been booked out pretty much every
night since.

Japan’s decision to host the G8
Summit in Hokkaido was part of a
wider renaissance taking place
around the northern island, best
known to Australians for its ski
resorts. There is much more to
Hokkaido than winter sports,
however. The island is Japan’s great
natural wilderness, frigid in winter
but bursting with life in summer.

Crystal-clear streams, lush green
mountains and deep, cold lakes are
reminiscent of Tasmania, but the
island’s ever-present volcanic activity
and hot springs lift it that notch
higher. In the far north of Hokkaido,
you can watch ice floes drift by in
February while in summer, gigantic
fields of lavender leave immense
purple bruises on the landscape of
the island’s centre.

Hokkaido has a distinct frontier
feel about it. The island is rugged
rather than dainty, wild rather than
cultivated. Even its architecture –
one area in which you’d expect to
find an orthodox approach – is
startlingly un-Japanese. The island’s
capital, Sapporo, is laid out in a grid
like a US downtown, brick
warehouses cheek-by-jowl with
sandstone office blocks, while the
countryside is punctuated with
Scandinavian-style chalets.

But the areas of urbanisation are
tiny; for the main part, Hokkaido
remains untouched by humans. What
draws most visitors to Hokkaido is
open space and water. The island is
still being formed, thanks to active
volcanoes dotted around, and
virtually all the tourism hot-spots in
the southwest are located near real
hot spots. While the onsen communal
bathing experience should be a
mandatory inclusion on any Japanese
itinerary, Hokkaido is where it
reaches its zenith: cold air on your
skin heightens the sensation of the
geothermal water on your body.

While the idea of bathing naked
with a loved one may put off only
the most prudish, bathing with
colleagues or strangers is a whole
different matter. Yet the onsen is a
strangely liberating experience.
Stripped down to your bare
essentials, there is no room for airs
or graces and everyone, rich or poor,
must scrub themselves down before
plopping into the steaming water.

Getting back to nature is a whole
lot more appealing in this part of
Hokkaido. Soaking up the hot water,
we are metres from Lake Toya, our
modesty preserved by a hedgerow.
Women, meanwhile, get far better
treatment on the fifth floor, their al
fresco bath commanding spectacular
views of the caldera lake, its islands
and the surrounding mountains.

Lake Toya has had a chequered
history. Created by volcanic activity,
its popularity among domestic
tourists has been equally dented, at
regular intervals, by volcanic
eruptions. Walking around the
Volcano Science Museum in Toyako,
it is easy to see why.
Mount Usu, one in a ring of
mountains that border the near-circular
lake, last erupted in 2000,
washing away two highways and a
rail track and burying countless
vehicles and buildings under its lava.
A text-book evacuation plan meant
no-one was killed. The town’s tourist
chiefs have clubbed together to stage
nightly fireworks displays on the lake
during summer ever since – best
viewed from one of the many cruise
ships that ply the lakefront.

Hokkaido is also loved by Asian
tourists, who flock here for the
island’s food. Considering its
northerly location, it is surprising
that Hokkaido’s produce is giantsized.
Red apples barely fit into an
adult palm; wild salmon leap
upstream in such great numbers that
only the extra-large ones get caught;
but the pièce de résistance has to be
the island’s red king crabs. Dozens of
restaurants dedicated to consuming
this hairy crustacean dot the
coastline near Lake Toya.

I sit, transfixed, as a crab the size
of an average dinner plate is wheeled
out, followed by another until
everyone sitting alongside me at the
steaming cauldron has received one.
I avoid making any sudden moves
until one of my companions
unceremoniously chops off a giant
claw and pops it into the broth. We
all follow, until the cauldron is awash
with vegetables, tofu and limbs. A
few minutes later, as we scoop out
the flesh from inside the cavities of
our crabs, it is clear to see why this
is a must for all Hokkaido-borne
travellers. The taste is incomparable.

This beauty had been swimming,
care-free, that morning, probably in the deep,
cold ocean surrounding Hokkaido, when it had
been yanked out by one of the hundreds of
Japanese and Russian fishermen who call the
picturesque port of Otaru home. Not that the
Russians have always been welcome in Hokkaido:
there is a lingering land dispute in the
northernmost islands. But this didn’t stop the
Japanese hosts plying Medvedev and fellow G8
summiteers with the giant crab during their stay.
With food like this, Medvedev would have
known for sure he had won the lottery.

To read the article as it appeared, click on the page images above.

Make your Marque in Sydney

Review originally appeared in TravelWeekly Australia September 5, 2008

Booking business hotels in Sydney is tricky if your clients cannot spend $300 or more per night. The Marque Hotel Sydney is a renovated business hotel in great style with a central location. Justin Wastnage recently stayed at the property and had change to spare

The Rendezvous group recently finished a four million dollar makeover of the former Country Comfort Inn's central Sydney hotel. The Marque Sydney is now pitched at the trendy four-star market.

First impressions 7/10
The reception space is nicely done, with retro lollipop-coloured chairs and shiny plastic surfaces throughout. The check-in staff are pleasant and helpful, though not entirely at ease with the hotel's systems. Getting into the car park (a tricky thing in this neighbourhood of one-way streets and no entry signs) could have been better explained. All these points, plus the shabby lift, are no doubt teething problems and have probably already been sorted out.

Ambience 6/10
The Marque claims to be a boutique hotel brand. It's not. But that said, it pulls off the modern chic look with ease. It's minimalist, with blacks and reds complemented by grey furniture. The property is not huge, but the design team has worked wonders with the space it has. The location, almost directly opposite Central Station, means that slightly unsavoury characters and low-rent storefronts will remind you that you are in the cheap end of town despite the slick appearance.

Accommodation 8/10
There are still some lingering reminders of the old Country Comfort Inn, chiefly in the tight layout of the corridors and internal structure of the rooms. But again, the décor more than makes up for it. The suite's bathroom had a very funky angled marble floor to drain the water away in the shower that left the rest of the room dry. Drawbacks of the location become apparent, however, during weekend nights when the street outside is noisy from either drunken revellers or unlicensed drag racers using the five-lane intersection as a starting grid.

Facilities 7/10
Unfortunately, when I stayed, the much-vaunted iPod clock radio did not work and neither did the television, which appeared not to pick up the ABC. But the suite had a fully stocked kitchen in addition to the mini bar - perfect for the longer business stay. The downstairs Script restaurant makes a good stab of being a trendy lounge bar and the food is good. Nearby options are plentiful if your clients know how to get to Chinatown. If not, they will find themselves at a loss for culinary alternatives in the wrong end of town.

Service 7/10
Friendly staff were still finding their way when I stayed, but it's still early days for the hotel and overall the service was fine.

Overall 70%
Four-star hotels in Sydney are often rough around the edges, but The Marque is one a brace of renovated properties that have a definite cool factor in the mid price bracket.

A business bed and breakfast package at The Marque Sydney is available from A$170 per room, per night. For more information visit www.marquehotels.com/sydney