The Royal China Club, Baker Street, central London

For a Chinese restaurant, the Royal China Club has an unusually luxurious interior. It has very comfortable fabric chairs, starched white table cloths, bamboo panelling and leather padding on the walls. On the way in, you pass crowded fish tanks, packed with lobsters, eels, crabs and other sealife eking out their last few hours. The menus are long and comprehensive. From the dim sum selection, the sesame rolls filled with prawn and mango, which melt in the mouth, are a good choice, as are the succulent steamed dumplings - fillings include scallops and prawns with garlic. However, the minced lamb buns are a bit pedestrian - the flavour might remind you of a lame steak and kidney pie.  Among the larger dishes, the crispy duck with plum sauce, accompanied by wafer thin pancakes and crudite, is very moreish, but you don't get a great deal of food for £13.50 a pop. Similarly, the rice with chicken and seafood is a modest portion for a tenner. It is served in a huge leaf, making it good to look at, but hard to handle.  In general, the Royal China Club's food is a bit pricey, as are the drinks (330ml of Tiger beer for £4.50), while the bottled water is extortionate at £4.50 a time. You are served by a platoon of black-shirted, dour staff who keep topping up your glass. At busy times, you might have to wait a while for the various elements of your meal to arrive. The Royal China Club is comfortable and you can book a table, but you'll find a lot better value in Chinatown. 6/10

Locale, East Dulwich Road, south London

One of a small chain of Italian restaurants, Locale East Dulwich does a hearty and competitively-priced three course Christmas dinner for £25 a head plus wine and service. There are about five options per course. Among the starters, the butternut squash soup is a bit bland and you'll need to go heavy on the seasoning. Still, the accompanying bread is very fresh and tasty. For the main course, the lamb shank is a huge piece of well-cooked meat sitting on a big bed of mash potato - it is quite good, but there is too much, and it needs some vegetables and some garlic. After the lamb, the large slice of  tiramsu is pretty intimidating. It tastes good, but looks suspiciously neat and tidy - like it may have been made elsewhere. While the service is attentive, it feels like the staff have one eye on the bill - they top up wine glasses regularly.  Still, the waitresses also make sure you are well stocked with iced water and the East Dulwich branch is a spacious and comfortable place to party. In essence, Locale serves mediocre food in generous portions at reasonable prices. 7/10

The Elephant & Castle, Holland Street, central London

A throw-back to yesteryear, the Elephant & Castle is an old school pub that seems to draw an old school crowd on a Sunday lunchtime - elderly chaps with upper crust accents prop up the bar. It is a world away from the hustle and bustle of nearby Kensington High Street.  The dark wooden panelling, leather benches, Victorian lamps and gold-framed mirrors reinforce the feeling that you have stepped back in time. Only a neon fruit machine spoils the effect. The food menu plays it pretty safe, but is very competitively-priced for 2011. The beef burger (about £8) contains good quality meat, topped with bacon and salad, but the accompanying chips are a little oily. On tap, there is Amstel, Heineken, 1664, Guinness, Strongbow and other big brands, along with a decent selection of real ales, including Doom Bar, London Pride and one or two beers from the Moor brewery in Somerset. Owned by the Nicholson group, the Elephant & Castle might appeal to anyone who wants to rewind the clock back to the days before All Bar One and Pitcher & Piano. 7/10

Best Western Galleria Inn, Redondo Beach, Los Angeles

In a non-descript suburb of south LA close to the international airport and a few miles from the ocean, the Best West Galleria Inn, Redondo Beach, is a workmanlike and depressing place to stay. At weekends, this motel seems to be popular with noisy night owls and you'll get to hear plenty of chatter in the early hours as party animals slowly make their way along the balconies that lead to the guest rooms. Still, the beds are comfortable and the Wi-Fi is fast and free. Although the decor is dull and unimaginative, the biggish rooms are equipped with just about everything you'll need, except a safe. You can help yourself to the basic buffet breakfast in the very compact lobby. The lame coffee comes from a machine and you have to toast your own bread. There are also cereals, milk, yoghurts and hard boiled eggs in the fridge. This Best Western is a reasonably convenient and cheap stopover after a long flight, but there must be better options. 5/10

The Crooked Well, Grove Lane, south London

A new gastro pub in Camberwell, the Crooked Well is housed in a stately early nineteenth-century building with high ceilings, big windows and clean, stripped-back decor. Even on a Tuesday evening, it can be tough to get a table in the restaurant area, so you may be pointed to the bar. But beware, some of the bar tables are really too low to eat at. The food is traditional British fare, often enlivened with a modern twist. Among the starters, the pork belly, served with tuna creme fraiche, capers and gremolata  (£5.90), is a small and surprisingly-delicate dish. The presentation is superb and the swirls of pork crackling delicious, but the meat itself can be overpowered by the other flavours, especially the capers. For the main course, the hearty and hot fish pie (£26.50 for two) is a good choice on an autumnal evening. Beneath the mash potato topping, which is decorated with two king prawns, there is plenty of well-seasoned salmon. You'll also need a side order of vegetables, which are a further £3, but are nicely-steamed.  There is a lengthy wine list and some beers, such as Amstel, Doom Bar and Kronenbourg on tap. Although the Crooked Well is often packed, the service is polished and professional. 7/10

Southern stretch of The Strand, Los Angeles, California

A 22-mile bicycle trail hugging the beaches along Los Angeles' South Bay, the Strand is a blessed relief from the car-clogged roads elsewhere in the city. Beginning at Hermosa Beach, the most southerly stretch often hugs wide tracts of sand running down to the Pacific Ocean. The beach here is patchwork of volleyball pitches and every few hundred yars, a sky blue, wooden lifeguard's hut surveys the shoreline. With a white-dotted line down the middle and an eight-mile-an-hour speed limit, The Strand itself runs as straight as an arrow for a mile or so to Redondo Beach.  Here, you have to veer off on to the coast road for a short stretch before working your way through a car park and a short 'no cycling' section at the head of Redondo Beach pier. Then you rejoin the sea front for a couple of miles until The Strand comes to an abrupt end.  But it is worth pushing your bike up the steep slope to the bike lane on the residential road that climbs into the plush Palos Verdes hills. You can work your way around the picturesque coastline on the sometimes busy, but wide, Paseo Del Mar, which offers some fine vistas over the ocean. You can rent a bike at reasonable rates from several shops near Hermosa Beach. The Hermosa Cyclery, for example, offers a standard hybrid bike for $36 a day or $125 for a week. 8/10 

The Millennium Broadway Hotel, West 44th Street, New York

Housed in a skyscraper a stone's throw from Times Square, the Millennium Broadway is a mid-market hotel on an industrial scale. It has 625 rooms across scores of floors, reachable via swift lifts from the plush marble lobby. For such a central location in such a crowded city, the standard rooms are surprisingly spacious and well-equipped with a large desk, comfortable bed and armchair. They also have ironing boards, irons, safes and WiFi (costing about $13 a day). The predominantly brown decor is contemporary and in good condition, but a little dull. Still, there are big windows with dizzying views of the neighbouring skyscrapers.  The en-suite bathrooms are also modern and well-maintained, but the dappled tiled floor and fussy marble sink tops won't be to everyone's tastes. The standard rooms can be booked at pretty keen rates and, if you want to keep the cost of extras down, there are plenty of nearby cafes and coffee shops serving breakfast and offering free WiFi. A good base from which to see Manhattan. 7/10

Shampers, Kingly Street, central London

Although it sounds like it might be a tacky night club, Shampers is a fairly-tasteful French bistro and wine bar. Its decor is pretty dated, but the walls are covered in an eyecatching array of modern art, such as a very striking yellow and blue painting of a lido. The a la carte menu is supplemented by a good selection of specials. While you are waiting for your food, you can tuck into the warm bread. Starters (priced at about six pounds) might include butternut squash soup, Serrano ham or herrings. The latter is served with a very tangy salsa, which overwhelms the fish.  For red meat lovers, there is an appealing choice of mains (priced from about £11), such as lamb kidneys, chorizo cassoulet or venison steak. Served with a big dollop of creamy mash and spinach, the venison (about £15) arrives in juicy pellets. As you would expect, the very long wine list, organised by country, leans towards France, but there are also plenty of New World and Spanish options, starting at about £16 a bottle. If you don't want to spend a lot, the Malbec Coleccion Torino (£18 a bottle) from Argentina, which has a hint of prunes, is very drinkable and goes well with the meaty main courses. Beware, the kitchen closes around 11, after which there will be a very limited choice of deserts. Service (12.5% charge) by the young, somewhat melancholic, waitresses, can be a little sluggish. 7/10