Flexibility in France

CORK company Hello France specialises in flexible holidays which the company says have been tested by experienced staff — holidays can start and finish on any day of the week, allowing clients to match their dates with mid-week flight and ferry savings.

The company owns a large number of cottage-style mobile homes with decking and barbecues on four-star holiday parks in France.

To find out more about their products, email [e-mail], call 021 4322158 or visit www.hellofrance.ie.

- ON another positive note, the newly-launched summer issue of Holiday Magazine, Ireland’s consumer travel guide since 1983, sets an optimistic note for the travel year ahead. Whatever else we will have to give up in the year of the IMF, the magazine suggests it won’t be the family holiday.

And to whet an appetite for escape to exciting cities and sunnier places near and far, Holiday Magazine has travelled the world in search of the best deals in travel by air, land and sea, DIY and package holidays.

Turkey is the hot tip for sunshine holidays. Argentina and Iceland (with new direct flights from Dublin) are the places to check out how bust may turn to boom again. The magazine also discovers the ‘real’ Spain, Portugal and France.

A complete guide to the theme parks of Florida and Europe will come in handy for everyone trying to balance the family holiday budgets this overtaxed year. And the magazine also makes the case for a return to the no longer trendy, but so handily close, Isle of Man. The magazine is on sale at €2.

- THE Cruise Centre has announced details of the Monster Cruise Holiday Show, on February 19 and 20 in the Clarion Hotel, Cork, from 12 noon to 6pm.

On hand will be the Cruise Centre representatives as well as staff from some of the world’s leading cruise companies, including Royal Caribbean International, MSC Cruises, Fred Olsen, Silverseas, Princess Cruises, Cruise & Maritime, Crystal Cruises, Windstar Cruises, Paul Gauguin Cruises and Orion Expedition Cruises.

Some of the offers include seven-night Mediterranean cruises from €595, “no fly” cruises direct from Dublin, including a 10-night Spain, Portugal and& Morocco cruise from €899.

For more details contact the Cruise Centre on 021 4277094 or visit www.thecruisecentre.ie.

- CONGRATULATIONS are in order to two of Cork’s top travel companies on foot of winning recent national awards. Declan O’Connell’s Lee Travel won the best travel agent of the year gong and Discover Travel, allied to East Cork Travel and headed by Brendan Barry, took the best tour operator award at the recent Holiday World in Dublin.