Top 10 hot hotels
The best hotels in the world, according to the 2002 Travel and Leisure readers’ poll:
1. Boyer Les Crayeres, Reims, France
2. The Peninsula, Bangkok
3. Wickaninnish Inn, Tofino, British Columbia
4. MalaMala Game Reserve, South Africa
5. The Oriental, Bangkok
6. Four Seasons Resort Bali at Jimbaran Bay, Indonesia
7. Las Ventanas al Paraiso, Los Cabos, Mexico
8. Amandari, Bali, Indonesia
9. Sooke Harbour House, Sooke, British Columbia
10. The Peninsula, Hong Kong

Museum eats up history
Shelburne, Vt. From Henry VIII to George Washington, world leaders and their subjects had one thing in common: They all enjoyed a good repast.
Vermont visitors have until Oct. 27 to see what their European and early American forebears liked to eat and how it was presented. An exhibition of menus, table settings, customs and etiquette called “From Soup to Nuts: Preparing and Presenting Food, 1700-1830” is at the Shelburne Museum.
It’s all there, from an authentic recipe for a meat soup popular in 1700 Paris to a men’s-only, after-dinner drinking course served to privileged Bostonians in 1810.
The museum closes Oct. 27. Call (802) 985-3346;

Caribbean group seeks tourist admission fee
Port-of-Spain, Trinidad Caribbean islands should charge an “admission fee” to cruise ship tourists, to ensure a benefit from an industry that is profiting from the region “virtually for free,” says a leading business association.
“Foreign operators are utilizing our assets to considerable advantage, while we ourselves seem to be content to pick up the crumbs that fall from the table,” said Gary Voss, president of the Trinidad-based Caribbean Association of Industry and Commerce.
But his proposal appeared to target tourists, not the industry. Islands should consider charging “a standard (admission) fee of $20 per head per island,” Voss said.
This “would not be unreasonable given that airline visitors are long accustomed to paying this amount in airport taxes alone.”