Qantas Holidays award our agent Andrew Bearden for his hard work this year!

Andrew Bearden - a great Australian Specialist and one of Colchester Travel's agents has just been given an achievement award from Qantas Holidays for the outstanding number of bookings he has done this year.

Qantas Holidays came to Colchester Travel today in one of their Britz Camper Van's decorated in Aboriginal colours ready to award Andrew. Many photo's were taken of Andrew and the Qantas team with his award and a few of the other Colchester Travel team dressed in true Aussie style!

The Colchester Travel team enjoyed having a look around the Britz Camper Van to see for themselves what their customers would experience with hiring this type of van to travel round Australia or New Zealand!

If your thinking of taking a break to Australia why not come to Colchester Travel to speak to our Australian Specialists who will be happy to sort out your travel arangements for that once in a life time trip!

Is there more to Malia than meets the eye?

Malia has often shocked the nation with it's image of drunken under-age teens and inappropriate behaviour of the ill-mannered tourists visiting there but little is known that this town on the North coast of Crete has a completely different side to it.

Cheap hotels is what springs to mind when thinking of visiting Malia, but the hotel 'Cretan Malia Park' is a world away from these. This is a five star luxury hotel offering 204 guestrooms and bungalows with a variety of garden, pool and sea views to acquire to different tastes.

On top of this it is surrounded by exotic trees and flowers with beautiful gardens for families to enjoy a relaxing holiday. This hardly sounds possible when the teen tourists go out to party at night but this hotel has placed itself in a quiet location where the hustle and bustle of the “Malia Strip” and the "wild night life", cannot be heard.

Typically, the last place a family would think to book their summer holiday would be a hotel in Malia, but strangely there are family friendly resorts where night-life entertainment is not just for adults or teenagers wanting to party. The hotel 'Kyknos Beach Hotel and Bungalows' offers 4 star accommodation in a child-friendly environment with entertainment such a magic shows going on at night time. There are also tennis courts here for families to enjoy and 'The animation team' who run lively shows make family fun really happen.

The town of Malia does have two sides but it is also a place where families can enjoy a fun filled holiday in one of the well-cared for hotels and perhaps not even get a glimpse of the party night life.

It seems that perhaps Malia has been wrongly judged as only one side of it has really been let out to the public, such as it being portrayed as a town where the tourists are ruining any culture that it once had and the party life there being the only big attraction to sway people to visit.

Now after looking at what else Malia has to offer, perhaps others will eventually start to see that this little town is not all about the partying and not just for young adults or teenagers, but that families can visit and have a relaxing or a fun holiday to their desire.

Wines of the World Evening

Our Mayflower Travel office in Billericay are hosting a Wines of the World evening on Wednesday 6th October at the Village Bar and Grill in conjunction with the Wine Maestro from Billericay.

The evening will consist of a structured Wine Tasting event with eight selected wines from around the world.  The Wine Maestro will talk you though how to taste the wine (though I am sure most of you will have had much practice) and Lorna will do a small talk on possible wine tours, or just holidays in the regions from where the wine comes from.

Colchester Travel Coffee morning success.

Our low key coffee morning for our valued customers was a successful and despite the poor weather we raised just over £75 for Macmillan Cancer.  Thanks to everyone who attended and donated to a worthy cause.

Peak Experience

Just had a visit from an AiTO Ski operator call Peak Experience, and I'm very impressed with their luxury hotel based ski programme to the Italian Dolomites.
They have selected 6 of the best hotels in the region, each of which has outstanding features and qualities, 5 of which have ski in/out facilites.  The Rosa Alpina is the only one that does not, and they offer a private car dropoff and collection to the slopes.  Just telephone and they come and collect you !

Private jets and helicopter transfers are available, along with scheduled BA flights and car transfers.

This is not for everyone, but if it sounds like something that you would like to know more about, please get in contact with us.

Nordic Experience is open for business

Colchester Travel's new tour operation "Nordic Experience" is open for business.  Our brochure has been signed off and is now in the hands of the printers, and should be hot off the press on 1st October.


If you can't wait that long, we will have a PDF for download (6mb) later this week.  Check back to the blog for details.


The brochure covers Arctic Adventures in Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland with a few surprises such as the new Treehouse in Sweden, and old favourites such as the ICEHOTEL.  Winter White Weddings are also covered in Iceland and Finland. 

Colchester Travel Wedding Fair - East Mersea Vineyard

Hello to all those future brides and grooms that attended the Mersea Island Wedding Fair at the weekend. 

We hope that you enjoyed our "goody bag" - We certainly enjoyed our chats with you and look forward to seeing you when you want to arrange your honeymoon or faraway wedding.