Matchbox: June 2009

Untangle the Web

• BEST FOR BOUTIQUE HOTELS AND SPECIAL PLACES

If you want to knock that average of 22 sites down to size in one quick hit; simply visit anyone of these six: i-escape.com, mrandmrssmith.com, chicretreats.com, perfectescapes.com, sawdays.co.uk and oneoffplaces.co.uk. Five minutes browsing the photos on any of these sites is enough to overload you with inspiration.

• BEST LUXURY TWEETERS

Have you succombed to Twitter yet? Or, more than that, have you realised its potential to aid travel? Sure, there are users out there who delight in telling the world that they "had a lovely sandwich for lunch", but there are also others sharing black-book secrets on exactly where to find the best lunches worldwide. And dinners. And hotels. And clubs. And bars. And just about anything you could imagine. Build up your list of followers, then save some of those time-consuming internet searches by simply throwing out a question, like "Anyone know a good hotel in San Fransisco?" Twitter is a direct line to all manner of worldwide experts, frequent travellersand clued-up locals. If you're heading somewhere in particular, then go to wefollow.com, type in the destination and a number of the big-hitting Tweeters for the region will appear before you. Follow them for insider updates and send them a line if you have a specific question. You can even do it on the hop from your phone: "I'm in Greenwich Village. Where can I get a good bagel?" Here are some luxury travel folk you should be following:

• luxury_travel "Blogging on anything and everything to do with luxury travel"
• mylitleswans "The premiere club for sophisticated family travel"
• luxtravel "Luxury travel consultant/expert on design hotels, exotic destinations and gay travel"
• kiwicollection "Guide to the best luxury hotels, resorts, spas and destination experiences in the world"
• smithhotels "The luxury travel and boutique hotel experts Mr & Mrs Smith"