Remote location The early use of real African locations in Hollywood movies mirrored that continent’s growing accessibility, via Europe, by scheduled airline services. Bigbudget productions began reaching cinema screens in 1950, first with King Solomon’s Mines, and such was the apparent hunger of cinema-goers for a life-like glimpse of Africa that the first ever full-length 3-D feature film, Bwana Devil, was partly filmed there, in 1952. The following year, John Ford’s Mogambo continued an exotic safari-suit-and-elephant-gun genre that would endure through to the late 1960s, but the most popular and best-remembered of Tinseltown’s forays into the so-called Dark Continent had already been made. Released in 1951, The African Queen, directed by John Huston and starring Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn, was – like King Solomon’s Mines and Bwana Devil – partly filmed in Uganda, where the titular riverboat, recently restored, is now available for hire. She was purchased three years ago by the owner of Wildwaters Lodge (wild-uganda.com) and anyone bold enough to make their way to central Uganda (via Entebbe International Airport, with either KLM or Qatar Airways from Hong Kong) can take a two-hour excursion aboard the African Queen on the River Nile. Less adventurous travellers can find another version of the vessel (two or three were used in the film) at the Holiday Inn Key Largo, in Florida, the United States (www.keylargoprincess.com/queen.htm).

Trading up Traders Yangon was one of the better hotels in town when it was opened by Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts in what was then the capital of Myanmar, back in 1996. Now, with international luxury brands taking advantage of the recent growth in tourism, the hotel has been upgraded and rebranded as the Sule Shangri-La, Yangon (above). Following a 2½-year renovation, the hotel now offers a mix of traditional and colonial, with plenty of local arts and crafts decorating public areas, and a transformation of the Gallery Bar into a curiously described “public drinking house from the past British era”. To mark the rebranding, the hotel is offering a Celebration Package priced from US$215 per night (for a minimum two-night stay) for Deluxe Room accommodation, a one-way airport transfer and a US$40 hotel credit for dining or “massage services”. For further details, visit www.shangri-la.com.

Package to India Oberoi Hotels & Resorts is offering a promotional package that might be of interest to families venturing to India this summer. As well as some quite substantial room discounts (daily rates start from US$310 per room night for a minimum of six nights), 10 Oberoi properties are also offering a free room for two children up to the age of 12, subject to availability. Also included are daily breakfast, airport or railway station transfers, yoga sessions and spa discounts. Hotels and resorts offering the Oberoi Exotic Vacations package include: The Oberoi Amarvilas, Agra; The Oberoi Rajvilas, Jaipur; The Oberoi Udaivilas, Udaipur (top); The Oberoi Vanyavilas, Ranthambhore; Wildflower Hall, Shimla in the Himalayas; The Oberoi, New Delhi; The Oberoi, Gurgaon; The Oberoi Grand, Kolkata; The Oberoi, Bangalore; and The Oberoi, Mumbai. See www.oberoihotels.com for more information and online reservations.

Deal of the week A Shanghai Business Class Special now on offer from Cathay Pacific Holidays includes round-trip, business-class tickets to Shanghai (Pudong) and two nights’ accommodation with daily breakfast from HK$4,060. The hotel offered at this price is the Renaissance Shanghai Putuo Hotel, which gets mostly “Excellent” reviews on TripAdvisor. Alternatives include the new Pullman Shanghai South (from HK$4,870), the Banyan Tree Shanghai on the Bund (from HK$5,690 and, in fact, about two kilometres from the actual Bund itself), and the Park Hyatt Shanghai (also from HK$5,690). The most expensive hotel on offer is The Peninsula, which is available from HK$6,540. Note that all these prices will be subject to a HK$619 fuel and tax surcharge. For a list of more hotels, further package details and online reservations, go to www.cxholidays.com.