| who are we? |
| |
i-escape.com is the trading name of Ram Tinto Associates Ltd, a UK-registered company based in London. Our core team includes the two founders, Laila Ram (a former management consultant) and Nikki Tinto (a former investigator), Michael Cullen (an established travel author and consultant) and Aidan Forestier-Walker. All four have spent many years travelling extensively to some of the world's most far-flung locations. We also work very closely with a team of freelance photographers, journalists, creative writers and travel industry experts who travel the world visiting and reviewing new places for us.
Are you interested in joining our team? Click here for our latest job vacancies.
Laila Ram, Founder
Director, Strategy and Finance
Contact: 
 After years of advising people on how to run their businesses, Laila Ram decided to try it out for herself. Armed with 5 years of management consultancy experience, an MBA from New York's Columbia Business School and having been Strategic Development Director for several small companies, she decided to set up her own business in something she was really passionate about: travel.
Laila grew up living in Holland, Denmark, Switzerland, India, the UK and US, and has been travelling ever since. She teamed up with one of her best friends and travelling companion on many far-flung trips to create i-escape.com. Based initially on all the great places they had discovered during their travels, i-escape.com has now grown into a fantastic collection of places that Laila and Nikki dream of visiting when they get a chance to get out of the office!
Geographical expertise: Sri Lanka, India, Maldives, Iceland, Morocco
Nikki Tinto, Founder
Director, Research and Content
Contact: 
 Nikki developed her flair for uncovering secrets through 10 years working as a senior consultant to the world’s largest investigations firms. Here she located hidden assets of former foreign heads of state, investigated environmental and human rights issues and provided critical intelligence to some of the UK’s most significant corporate mergers and acquisitions.
With her love of travel and adventure, a degree in Geography from Exeter University, and a natural thirst for discovering the special and unusual, Nikki spent her time between investigations contracts seeking out some of the worlds most unspoilt locations. She has travelled in over 40 countries, including most of South America where she enjoyed two years painting surreal murals in mountain villages, sampling the local cactus juice and avoiding piranhas in the Amazon. After many years of friends using her as a source of new and interesting places to stay, the internet has finally provided the perfect channel through which she can share her discoveries.
Geographical expertise: Latin America, Spain (including Mallorca), Thailand, Bali
Michael Cullen
Editor
Contact: 
 Michael has always been a keen linguist, explorer, writer and photographer, so to carve out the ultimate niche in travel writing - and then see it take off as a business - is like paying a cat to sunbathe. After joining i-escape at its genesis in 2001, he reviewed many of the places on this site, and has edited most of the rest. His multinational background encompasses Greece (where he was born and brought up), France (where he did his baccalaureat and taught English), Africa (where he backpacked around Kenya and Zanzibar) and more recently, Spain, Italy and Austria (where he leads occasional trekking tours - as a break from all this strenuous hotel reviewing). He has also written guidebooks for Sawdays, Sunflower, Lonely Planet and Cicerone, and published articles in various UK travel magazines.
Geographical expertise: Greece, Italy, Spain, France, Turkey, Zanzibar, Morocco, South Africa, Thailand, Caribbean
Aidan Forestier-Walker
Director of Operations
Contact: aidan@i-escape.com
 Having been bitten as a teenager by the travel bug whilst tripping in South America, Aidan never quite escaped the draw of making the most of every holiday. With a degree in Commerce at Edinburgh University and a decade ensconced in the aerospace industry, a return flight to his passion of travel was realized when his wife Nikki Tinto asked for help in expanding i-escape. Having always wished to marry work with pleasure, what could be better. After all, even before joining the business, a good many i-escape hotels had already been savoured. With a growing team, and a deep desire to preserve the unique edge that i-escape has won, Aidan brings with him management experience from a hi-tech industry and inside knowledge to run and deliver its increasingly busy operation.
Geographical expertise: Brazil, Spain (including Mallorca), Bali, Iceland
Nadine Mellor
New Content Editor
Contact: nadine@i-escape.com
 Nadine believes that one should say yes to every invitation and possibility of adventure. This has taken her places far and wide from Australia to Zimbabwe via Thailand, Vietnam, Rajasthan, Morocco, Italy, Mexico, Turkey, Guatemala, the British Isles and now San Francisco. After a long career in film and TV in both the UK and Australia (award-winning news programmes, programme sales and marketing, and film and drama development and production) it was time for a change. Now the point person for new hotels going onto the site, setting up review trips and adding new content, she also assists with web marketing. And she still does cartwheels everywhere she goes.
Geographical expertise: UK, Ireland, Australia, Guatemala, Rajasthan, France, Italy, US, Mexico
Glenda May Richards
Bookings Consultant
Contact: 
 Glenda began her eclectic career in her native country of Canada, where she worked as a radio and television journalist in a range of jobs from news presenter to reporter to documentary producer to occasional weather girl! After a stint on the stage as an actress and a sojourn in the Caribbean writing and performing live shows for corporate retreats, Glenda made a permanent move to London where she parlayed her skills into the new media world – developing interactive television and editing/writing internet content for various websites. Glenda edits the i-escape newsletter, manages client bookings and help queries, writes and updates hotel reviews and tries to keep au courant with current trends in the the busy travel industry.
Geographical expertise: Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, United Kingdom, Morocco
Kate Parsons
Bookings Consultant
Contact: kate@i-escape.com
 Kate spent 5 years working in some of London’s top restaurants and felt that she would like to combine her love of travel with her appreciation of good food and where to find it across the world. Kate has had varied travel experiences from living in North Carolina and California, USA, to backpacking in India and the Greek Islands as well as many a short break exploring in Morocco, Spain, France and Italy and wherever else good food can be found. She brings with her enthusiasm and energy and will look forward to assisting with your booking enquiries, responding to feedback and advising you on where to go and what to eat.
Geographical expertise: Bali, Spain, France, Morocco, Australia, India, Greece
Liz Simpson
Assistant Editor
Contact: liz@i-escape.com
 Ever since interrailing around Europe aged 18, Liz has spent most of her free time and all of her money travelling: she's backpacked around 6 continents and dreams of going to Antarctica but hates the cold. Highlights were island-hopping around the Caribbean, camel-trekking in the Sahara and trying to pitch a tent on Bolivia's salt plains. After 5 years as a writer/sub-editor on various London magazines including Glamour, she began to dream of exploring in a far more stylish way. And where better than i-escape? She now helps write and edit our hotel reviews, keep our destination guides up to date - and occasionally gets to add to her travel-CV.
Geographical expertise: Europe (Iceland, Spain, Italy, Ibiza, Slovenia), Chile, Mexico, Morocco, Thailand, Australasia
Emma Taylor
UK hotels
Contact: emma@i-escape.com
 Emma has always had a penchant for nice hotels. So when the opportunity of a job with i-escape came up, she jumped at the chance! Like other members of the i-escape team, she’s had a varied career, and has a great love of travel that has taken her from the vineyards of South Africa to the deserts of Namibia, and the beaches of the Caribbean to the kitchens of Thailand. She now looks after i-escape's growing portfolio of hotels in the UK, as well as project-managing some exciting site developments in the pipeline. And occasionally she gets to review a few hotels herself, most recently in South Africa and Italy, two countries which she loves.
Geographical expertise: Sri Lanka, Kerala, Zanzibar, South Africa, Thailand, Italy, Maldives, UK
Charlotte Bonsey
Bookings Consultant
Contact: charlotte@i-escape.com
 After spending her teenage years in Prague, Charlotte spent two years living and working in Mexico and South Korea as an English teacher. She finally ended up at Bristol University and graduated in French and Spanish having spent a year of her degree in Bordeaux and Mendoza (Argentina) getting to grips with the languages and the local wines. She is now putting her language skills to use in the i-escape office assisting with booking enquiries and keeping the website up to date.
Geographical expertise: Czech Republic, France, Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Guatemala
Fiona Reece
PR officer
Contact: fiona@fionareece.com
 Fiona has spent the last 15 years combining her lust for travel with her job as a public relations consultant. Her journeys have taken her from Tasmania, where she was snowed in on a press trip, via Namibia, advising the Tourist Board on their promotion strategy, to the Caribbean to shadow a wedding planner with full BBC crew in tow. She feels equally at home in 5 star luxury as in a tent half way up Kilimanjaro or hiking the Inca Trail. She launched her own specialist travel PR consultancy, Fiona Reece PR, in June 2007 and makes sure that i-escape.com is always top of mind with the country’s media.
Shawn Richards
Webmaster
Contact: Visit Ink
 Shawn Richards is the CEO of Ink, a highly specialised new media company involved with the original development of i-escape.com. Ink has created advanced web applications for the property, aviation and travel industries. i-escape continually benefits from proven technology that it has developed for mission-critical search and booking engines.
Ink provides ongoing technical support and design expertise to the i-escape team helping to keep the site safe and performing well.
Jo Boissevain
Copy Editor
Contact: jo@i-escape.com
 Jo’s career has taken her from teaching 7-year-olds in Battersea to copywriting for Sawdays and i-escape. On the way she's written a guidebook to Cardiff, edited a listings magazines in Amsterdam, compiled the family pages for Bristol's Venue magazine, and taken time out to bring up two children and one small fluffy dog. As a child she was whisked off on train journeys to Finland, Scandinavia, Austria and France; later she lived with hippies in San Francisco and survived a heatwave in New York. Her favourite holidays are slow ones - a jaunt around Wicklow in a gypsy caravan, a week of gastropubbery in Suffolk. Perhaps i-escape will lead her to a few more sophisticated destinations, preferably reachable by train.
Geographical expertise: USA, India, France, Morocco, Italy, Australia and Bali.
Emilie Witham
Bookings Consultant (currently travelling through Americas)
Contact: emilie@i-escape.com
 Emilie has helped to build a playground in Chile as part of a Raleigh International project, backpacked around Bolivia and Argentina, learned Spanish in Barcelona, interrailed through western Europe and taught tourism in Weston College near Bristol. 2009 sees her travelling around Central and South America, partly to visit charity projects which interest her, and partly for the thrill of it! We hope that on her return she will resume handling i-escape enquiries in those regions, and meantime we wish her ¡Buen viaje!
|
Site Update Team |
As part of our commitment to keeping our reviews (and our prices) as up-to-date and as accurate as possible, we have a small team of hard-working, web-scouring, cross-checking data hounds. It is their mission to sniff out inconsistencies and chase our hotel- and villa-partners for answers, so that you can always trust i-escape to provide the most detailed information and the best available rates on the web. These merciless i-dotters and t-crossers are:
Jamie Pocock
Tim James
David Chu
Caroline Kennett
|
| |
| Contributors |
| |
Tom Bell
 As a small boy growing up in a grey country, Tom Bell spent most of his time daydreaming of far-flung exotic lands. After paying off his university overdraft, he headed for Australia with a deep conviction that he would find an Australian wife, thus ensuring himself a life of idle, sun-drenched pleasure. Unfortunately for him (but not perhaps, Australia) he was deported two years after he arrived. Although he is still searching for an Australian wife, he passes his time writing the Alastair Sawday British Hotel guide and has visited many places for i-escape in Spain, France, Portugal and most recently all over Indochina.
Guy Hunter-Watts
 Guy’s life changed when, after graduating in Spanish from Bristol, he discovered Crete and the Mediterranean. After a decade of drifting from good beach to good beach, he spent the next ten years leading tours in India, South America and Mongolia. Guy eventually put down roots in Andalucia where he combines work as a freelance walking guide and writer with running a small guesthouse. His first taste of travel writing was when he set off in a battered old van to visit nearly 300 B&Bs in France for the Sawday guide. Since then he has contributed to several travel guides and has written his own guide to the best walks in Andalucia. Guy knows the mountains of his part of the world as well as most shepherds and is currently charting a new coast to coast walk, linking the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. His reviews for i-escape took him to Andalucia, South Africa, SW France, Morocco, Tanzania and Namibia. His most valued possession: his walking boots.
Abigail Hole
 Abigail lived in Hong Kong for three years from 1997, writing and editing books for China and Vietnam. She travelled around the region frequently, from weekends in Shanghai to months in Thailand. After editing books in Lonely Planet’s London office, she worked on their India, Rajasthan, Delhi & Agra, Portugal, Wales, Tunisia, Best of Rome, Africa on a Shoestring, Britain and England guides, as well as contributing to Out to Eat – London, the Gap Year Book, Code Green and the Africa Book. Other travel journalism has appeared in the Guardian, Marie Claire, Wanderlust, the LA Times, the Denver Post, Toronto Sun, the San Francisco Chronicle, on BBC radio, and she writes for Alastair Sawday’s Special Places to Stay. Having once spent the night in a yard with chickens and goats in Mauretania, writing for i-escape has introduced her to a new, wonderfully comfortable realm of travel.
Christabelle Dilks
 i-escape's Miss Argentina, Christabelle fell in love with Argentina - and an Argentine man - at 16. But when the Falklands war started, she had to leave true love behind. She acted at the National Theatre, made short films, and worked at Channel 4 and the BBC, but walked out to return to Argentina for the first time in 20 years – and fell in love all over again. She travelled the entire country to write the Footprint guide, and even a series of unsuitable Argentine men, endless overnight buses, and an incident in La Boca did not dim her passion for the place. Making documentaries in remote northwest Argentina led her along a lesser known Inca trail up Mount Llullaillaco, where at 6,500m she nearly became the next human offering. Christabelle is writing TV drama and a feature film set in Argentina, while planning her eco-home in the Valles Calchaquiés. She has written for the Guardian, Wanderlust, Red magazine, and makes regular appearances on Radio 4’s Excess Baggage. For i-escape she has reviewed places in Argentina, Chile, Stockholm and Costa Rica.
Lesley Gillilan
 While growing up in Cornwall, Lesley didn’t see much of the world beyond Daymer Bay and Bodmin Moor (her parents’ idea of long-haul was a trip to Somerset); and she didn’t board a plane until she was nearly 30. She’s been making up for it ever since, and when she meandered into a career in journalism (from art school to editing, via a succession of dead-end jobs) she decided to go freelance so she could travel whenever the mood, or the money, took her. Writing for the national press (Guardian, Telegraph and FT, among others), her specialist subjects are property, interior design and
travel - a combination which perhaps explains her love of hotels. Aside from writing reviews for i-escape, she is currently researching a new guide book - to Cornwall. Geographical expertise: India, Turkey, southern Europe, America and the UK.
Rachael Oakes-Ash
 Rachael Oakes-Ash is a globe trotter with a writing addiction. Her work as a travel journalist is published in newspapers, glossy magazines, inflight literature and travel guides internationally. Her byline appears regularly in the Hong Kong South China Morning Post, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age in Melbourne, DestinAsian, Emirates Open Skies, Etihad inflight, Jetstar
inflight, Virgin Voyeur magazine and more. She's a corporate speaker, a media trainer, an author of two books and a contributor to three anthologies. Did we mention she is also a prolific ski journalist? There's not much in the world of travel writing she doesn't do... For i-escape she has visited hotels in Australia and Cambodia.
Caroline Sylger Jones
 Caroline Sylger Jones is the author of Body & Soul Escapes and Body & Soul Escapes: Britain & Ireland, inspiring travel resource books of places to retreat and replenish around the globe. She writes a wellbeing column for The National in the UAE, and reviews spas, retreats, yoga breaks, wellbeing holidays and luxurious boltholes for UK publications including Condé Nast Traveller, Red, Psychologies, Homes & Gardens, Sainsburys Magazine, The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian and the London Evening Standard. She has appeared on Radio 4 as a specialist on wellbeing holidays, is the expert on retreats for The School of Life and also sells her photographs through Alamy.
Viv Monahan
 Viv Monahan is a freelance investigator, travel consultant and writer. Her two published novels, ‘Dangerous Games’ and ‘Storm Fever’, which were written under her pen name, Vivien Leyland, feature exotic destinations as characters in their own right. With Masters Degrees in Philosophy and Spanish, Viv suffers from terminal itchy feet, a condition that, over the last decade, has been partially alleviated by frequent, long trips to Bali. After several years of being used as an informal travel consultant by various Internet Forums (and family members), Viv has sought out a collection of eclectic hideaways on small but beautifully formed islands and in Marrakech for i-escape. Thanks to two expensive language courses, she now speaks taxi-Indonesian almost fluently.
Joyce Copeland
 Joyce Copeland loves nothing better than bumping down an unpaved road to a unique hotel the rest of the world hasn’t yet discovered. She began her career as a writer and managing editor for Endless Vacation magazine, published by holiday exchange pioneer Resort Condominiums International. She veered off course during the 90s, writing marketing copy for Silicon Valley tech companies and authoring four career-related books. Today her travel articles appear in airline magazines, newspapers and travel industry trade publications. She's in the process of launching Beach Vacation Rental Scout, an online guide reviewing unique vacation homes on or near America's prime beaches. On review trips to Mexico, Argentina, Chile and Uruguay (and California and Istanbul) for i-escape, Joyce teams with her husband Gary, a former professional photographer whose fluent Spanish often saves the day.
Laura Dixon
 Laura began her career in travel with a dream about Iceland. Three months later, she found herself writing a book for Footprint about Reykjavik and the puffin hunters, geyser watchers and trend setters of the world's most northerly city. Since then, she's written and edited over 20 books for Footprint, from Northern Pakistan to Tallinn and Cardiff. She currently works as a freelance travel writer and part-time short story writer, contributing to the likes of Zest, Coast, the Express, ASOS, Closer and The London Paper. For i-escape, she's experienced colonial splendour and back-to-nature safari camps in Sri Lanka, as well boutique hideaways in the depths of Scotland and Madeira.
Rachel Howard
 Rachel is a freelance writer and editor who divides her time between London and Athens. A regular contributor to Conde Nast Traveller, National Geographic Traveler, High Life, How To Spend It, and Time Out guides, she has also written documentaries, screenplays, and comics. Her latest book, Secret London – An Unusual Guide, explores the hidden face of her home city.
Clare Hargreaves
 On her tenth birthday Clare made a day trip to Boulogne, ate a cheese omelette served by a gentleman with a beret and has been hooked on France and its food ever since. She went on to study French and Spanish at Cambridge, worked in Paris as a Reuters correspondent, and wrote two guidebooks - on French Villas (Sawdays) and Normandy (Cadogan) - as well as co-authoring Lonely Planet’s Career Break Book. She has also travelled widely in South America, Spain and Greece, and is currently deputy editor of BBC Countryfile Magazine, for whom she writes hotel reviews and edits the food and book sections. She also writes for BBC Good Food, BBC History and France Magazine, and for i-escape has reviewed hotels in France and Britain.
Cathy Teesdale
 An award-winning photographer specialising in travel, reportage, portraits and weddings, Cathy gained an early appreciation of beauty growing up with artist parents in a Gloucestershire mansion. While reading English at Exeter University her maverick spirit led to a near-fatal Devon cliff fall, but she survived to forge a career as a freelance feature writer, editor and photographer for a wide range of clients. Now blissfully Brighton-based, she has so far had adventures in Europe and America, Africa, the Caribbean and South East Asia and reviewed and photographed hidden oases in Goa, Sri Lanka and Venice for i-escape. To view her portfolio, visit www.cathyteesdale.com.
Jane Foster
 Originating from Wensleydale in North Yorkshire, Jane graduated in Architecture from Oxford Poly, then lived 6 years in Split, Croatia, before moving to Athens, Greece. She has travelled extensively through the Balkans and has written about Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia and Greece for various guidebooks including Footprint, Insight and Fodor’s. She also writes occasional articles for The Observer and The Telegraph. She loves hiking, sailing, camping and drinking red wine, and has a special penchant for almost-impossible-to-get-to beaches. She speaks English, Italian, Croatian and Greek. For i-escape, Jane has reviewed hotels in Croatia.
Joe Cawley
 Joe Cawley is a freelance travel writer and author based in the Canary Islands, published in The Sunday Times, Daily Express, New York Post and others. He's medically compelled to travel to alleviate sporadic bouts of island fever that leave him with a nasty rash and an uncontrollable urge to scream obscenities at the top of his voice. His first book 'More Ketchup than Salsa', about swapping life as a fishmonger in Bolton to be a British bar owner abroad, was voted 'Best Travel Narrative 2007' by the British Guild of Travel Writers. He likes the British Guild of Travel Writers. A lot. Joe is also the owner of local destination site My Tenerife Info.
Emma Whiteacre
 Since studying in Togo and France, Emma has always been a bit restless. She has worked at the European Parliament and World Bank in Brussels, for the UN in Kenya, and for a London charity, before settling down for five years of economic and political analysis of Latin America and Asia. But aside from the occasional work trip to Mexico, China and Hong Kong the longed-for jet-set lifestyle eluded her so, after marrying her like-minded travel buddy Duncan, she jacked it all in to bum around Latin America, Australasia and South East Asia. With the notable exceptions of a stomach bug on the Inca trail and floods in Australia, they have loved every minute.
Lara Dunston
 A perpetual globetrotter in some 60 countries, Australian travel writer Lara Dunston has lived out of her Samsonite since she and photographer-husband Terence Carter put their possessions in storage in Dubai (the closest thing to a home) in January 2006. Authors of over 40 guidebooks, the couple have traversed the planet on commissions for Dorling Kindersley, Lonely Planet, Rough Guides, Footprint, AA Guides, Fodor's, Insight and Thomas Cook. In between books, they write and shoot photos for all forms of media; their work has appeared in National Geographic Traveler, Wanderlust, The Independent, USA Today, BBC History, Sydney Morning Herald, Sunday Telegraph and scores more publications. They are destination experts for Triporati, NineMSN and Viator, and still find time to scribble their own travel blogs. For i-escape, they have reviewed properties in Thailand and Australia. Next up: Syria.
Mary-Anne Denison-Pender
 When Mary-Anne first travelled to India 19 years ago, she fell in love with it immediately. After many more trips to India and working for several prestigious UK travel companies as their India specialist, she set up her own business MAhout in April 2000. She has been lucky enough to have discovered a few of the country’s many hidden secrets – many of which lie in the wondrous hotels scattered around. MAhout now represents these places and endeavours to put some of India’s finest hotels ‘on the map’, by acting as their ‘ambassador’ in the UK. During the course of her 17 years in the travel trade Mary-Anne has built up a strong and recognised reputation and is considered one of the UK’s leading experts on India. She has reviewed many of i-escape‘s featured properties in Rajasthan.
Lisa Young
 Lisa is a London-based freelance photographer and travel writer and a founding member of www.i-escape.com. Lisa spent three years travelling the world photographing and gathering information for the launch of the site. Her work can be seen throughout www.i-escape.com. Today, Lisa produces photos and articles about her escapades which have taken her to over 50 countries. Her work has appeared in a variety of publications internationally, including The Times, Sunday Telegraph, Scotland on Sunday, Sunday Times Travel magazine and Harpers Bazaar. Clients have included Warner Brothers and the GSM Association. Articles include discovering the revolution trail in Cuba; skiing in the Arctic Circle; horse safaris in Kenya and riding a Harley-Davidson through Australia’s outback. Lisa also photographs portraits for private and corporate clients in the UK - for rates and details on Lisa's portfolio including film and TV work, visit her website.
Yasmin Boland
 Yasmin Boland has been a fulltime writer since she was 20 and is one of those Australians who lives by the maxim "have laptop, will travel". As such, she spends most of the year in Bondi, Sydney, and the other part in Paris - or en route between the two. She has contributed to publications, including She, B, Playboy, Elle, the Sydney Morning Herald and the London Evening Standard. Having stayed at some of the best hotels in Sri Lanka and Southern India on behalf of i-escape.com, she is also the author of two books: a fun, non-fiction work called Cosmic Love and a novel titled Carole King Is An Alien.
Liz Williams
 Liz attributes her inherent wanderlust to an enviable childhood spent in South East Asia, South America and the Caribbean. After a stint at the BBC she found her niche for a while as Promotions Editor for Conde Nast Traveller, which enabled her to investigate some of the finest hotels and destinations around the world. But it was a temptation which proved too great to resist and, having completed a round-the-world trip (from Patagonia to Mongolia), she now combines her passion for travel with her accumulated knowledge and experience, in freelance travel writing. For i-escape she checked out the very best that the Maldives and Chile have to offer, from island hideaways to magnificent haciendas.
Other contributing writers and photographers to our site include Charlotte Sinclair, Stuart Pearce, Britt Rohde, Gail Simmons, Michelle McDermott, Davina McKail, Lucia Appleby, Anita Naik, Justin Fox, Lisa Tsering, Carey Stevenson, Frances Bernon, Gemma Pitcher, Sue Carpenter, Lanie Goodman, James Alexander, Arabella Daniells, Gordon Baker and Philip Worman. |
|
