Notes
Plain-English notes on travel, prices, and how we build this site. Signed, dated, no fluff.
10 September 2026 · travel
England's uncapped visitor levy, and who really pays it
English mayors are to get an uncapped tourist tax, charged on the room whoever is in it. What that means for anyone selling rooms — and for guests who are not.
9 September 2026 · engineering
When the sky went quiet: the NATS outage, seen from a rooftop
What one home receiver logged during the 8 September 2026 air traffic control failure, and why a hotel site watches the sky.
5 September 2026 · engineering
Which Newcastle? The hardest easy question a hotel site answers
One word, ten places, four defensible rules and three wrong answers. What I learned about place names, and what a traveller can do about it.
3 September 2026 · engineering
A hotel price without dates is not a price
Planning a real trip to Sri Lanka and India broke my own wishlist — so searches, hotels and bookings now live together in trips, with the dates kept.
2 September 2026 · industry
The town R&R built: a US carrier is back in Pattaya — and there are still rooms
U.S. Navy photo by Seaman Gage Thomas
Pattaya exists as a resort because US servicemen came ashore for R&R in 1959. This week the USS Abraham Lincoln brought about 5,000 more — and there are rooms.
1 September 2026 · engineering
The crawlers that cost me money and pay me nothing
Last month my tiny database bill more than doubled. The culprits weren't visitors — they were SEO companies reading my site to sell what they read.