A novel exemplar from Lastminute.com – a secret sale.  Well, the sale itself isn’t secret, but the hotel you’ll be booking is, and you can get up to 50% off as a result.

Here’s how it works:

You choose a fix the date of and pick a place by means of using Lastminute.com’s search tool.  They give you the hotel’s location, star rating and description, but not its name.

Once you’ve booked, they’ll email you with the hotel name and details and you get to find out exactly where you’ll be laying your head that night.

Visit lastminute.com to find out more!

Ostia Antica, one of Italy’s most interesting and best-preserved antiquarian sites, is also one of the country’s best-kept secrets. Well, that’s certainly the impression one gets when arriving there, due to the distinctly unusual tranquility of the place, and the conspicuous lack of tour groups, roving guides, and buses.

Considering that Ostia Antica is only a 30-minute train ride from the center of Rome, it is truly worth a visit!

History

Highlights of the former port’s long and colorful history include its establishment by a fabulous Roman King sometime around the 7th century B.C (though no-one really knows for sure), frequent raids by arson-loving, river-hopping pirates, being overtaken by numerous Roman emperors who tarted the place up in concord with current architectural trends, being the place where Santa Monica–the patron saint of married women–died in a local pub, slowly evolving into a country retreat for idle Roman aristocrats, and eventually falling into dereliction and decay somewhere around the 9th century A.D. Read more…