Blogger Spotlight: Claire, Luxury Travel Diary

Luxury Travel Diary was co-founded by Claire, once as a place to share her love for luxury travel and fashion related content. As well as running the blog, Claire also offers a Luxury Travel Auction which allows readers to bid on one-off stays at luxury hotels from only 99p. Covering luxurious accommodation, hidden beaches and breath-taking locations, such as The Maldives, Ecuador, Bali and Mumbai, the Luxury Travel Diary is the perfect place to find information on places you’ve never discovered before. In this spotlight, Claire chats to us about why she got into blogging, her favourite destinations, and why she focuses on luxury travel.

How did you get into blogging? I have always loved to travel and my career meant that, following 5 years of more backpacking style accommodation, I was able to afford to stay in luxury hotels. I have always enjoyed publications such as CNTraveller so I decided to write about my own travelling story but with a twist. You can actually bid and win a stay at many of the hotels I feature. Our website has grown in the last few years and we now employ a number of reporters who write for us and a tech team which runs our travel auction. I  like to think that we inspire our readers into trying new destinations, but also offer our readers the chance to win trips to these destinations in our auction.

What are your most favourite locations? For skiing I love the pretty alpine village of Lech and the Aman-style Aurelio is the place to stay here. Just amazing- it looks right out onto the slope and people ski right past your window.

For the summer I love the Belmond Cipriani in Venice where you can swim as boats pass you by! The Grand-Hotel du Cap-Ferrat a Four Seasons Hotel on Cote D’Azur is also an amazing hotel to spend the summer and drinks on the terrace as the sun sets are phenomenal. For a city break, you can’t beat Hotel Hermitage in Monte Carlo. You must book a room with a harbour view here, it’s one of the best views in the world.

For beach, Lanai in Hawaii has some of the best beaches in the world and the Four Seasons there is a great place to stay. The lagoon at the Monte Carlo Bay is an absolute favourite of my 6 year old son.

What places are still on your bucket list? There are none. I would ideally spend my year moving between the wonderful hotels outlined above.

What is your advice to people who want to experience a luxury holiday? Travel in low season, you can pay up to 60% less and get to enjoy the best hotels when they are not busy.

Where is your pick for the best luxury destination of 2017? South Of France – take your pick from a number of luxury hotels.
 
Why did you choose to focus on the “luxury” side of travel? Because it is the way I choose to travel.

What has been your most successful blog post/article to date and what was it about? Amazing remote retreats, we have had almost 100,000 views to date on this article.

What has travel taught you? Life experiences keep you young. There is no better way to experience life than to travel.

How do you like to work with PRs? And how can they improve their blogger outreach? We let PRs know our travel plans, if we can accommodate reviews about hotels they recommend, we are happy to, as long as they fit with our luxury brand and schedule. Because our readers spend in our travel auction we know that they are ideal for luxury hotels to target. I personally like putting unknown but amazing boutique hotels on the map via promotions to my readers.

What will be big in your blogosphere in the coming months? Social media continues to be massive and a great way to get accountable exposure. As an example, a good Instagram post on our feed will get around 15,000 views for a single image!