All Destinations

Havana is a city frozen in time — 1950s American cars cruise past crumbling colonial palaces, salsa music drifts from open doorways, and the Malecon seafront promenade is the world's longest open-air living room. Habana Vieja's restored squares contrast with raw, ungentrified neighborhoods. Mojitos, cigars, and a sense of place unlike anywhere else.

A 12-mile crescent-shaped Lowcountry barrier island off the southern coast of South Carolina, master-planned in the 1950s by developer Charles Fraser around the principle that buildings should never overshadow the trees. The result is a quietly affluent island of 33-plus golf courses (host of the RBC Heritage PGA tournament every April at Harbour Town Links, played around the candy-striped 1969 lighthouse on the 18th hole), 60 miles of paved bike paths threading the maritime forest, and the 605-acre Sea Pines Forest Preserve. Charleston is two hours north on US-17; Savannah is 45 minutes south across the Talmadge Bridge.

Houston is the fourth-largest US city (2.3M in the city, 7.3M in the metro) and the most diverse — more than 145 languages spoken, world-class Vietnamese, Indian, and Tex-Mex food scenes side by side. NASA Johnson Space Center sits 25 miles south, the Museum District packs 19 institutions into 1.5 square miles (the Menil Collection alone justifies the trip), and Buffalo Bayou Park has reshaped downtown with 160 acres of trail along the water. The catch: Houston is sprawling, hot from June through September, and exposed to Atlantic hurricanes in late summer.

Greenland's third-largest town sits 300 km north of the Arctic Circle at the mouth of the UNESCO-listed Ilulissat Icefjord — where Sermeq Kujalleq glacier calves 35 km³ of icebergs per year (more than any glacier outside Antarctica). Home to 4,700 people and roughly 3,500 Greenlandic sled dogs. Midnight sun May–July, polar night November–January, and one of the planet's most reliable Northern Lights viewing windows September through April.

Indianapolis is the most under-rated big city in the Midwest — the Indianapolis Motor Speedway hosts the Indy 500 (350,000 spectators, the largest single-day sporting event in the world) every Memorial Day weekend, the NCAA is headquartered downtown, and Mass Ave (Massachusetts Avenue) has emerged as one of the Midwest's best food-and-drink corridors. The downtown is genuinely walkable thanks to the 8-mile Cultural Trail loop, and the city has more memorial monument acreage than any US city outside Washington DC — Soldiers' and Sailors' on Monument Circle is the unofficial symbol.

Jacksonville is the largest city by area in the continental United States (875 square miles, after a 1968 city-county consolidation) and the most populous in Florida at roughly 1 million residents. The St. Johns River cuts the downtown in half, the Cummer Museum and MOCA cover the city's serious art interests, and the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens is regularly ranked in the top 10 nationally. Three full Atlantic beach towns (Jacksonville Beach, Neptune Beach, Atlantic Beach) sit 18 miles east, and the St. Johns River Ferry at Mayport still carries cars across the river to Fort George Island. Amelia Island is 45 minutes north. The NFL Jaguars play at TIAA Bank Field downtown.

The northern anchor of the Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks UNESCO site. Maligne Lake's Spirit Island, the Columbia Icefield's Athabasca Glacier, the 230 km Icefields Parkway drive down to Banff, and the Jasper SkyTram up Whistlers Mountain (2,263m). World's 2nd-largest Dark Sky Preserve with an annual Dark Sky Festival. Wildlife: elk, bighorn sheep, bears, wolves. Honest note: the town suffered major damage in the 2024 wildfire; confirm operational status for specific lodges. Access from Edmonton (YEG) 4hr or Calgary (YYC) 5hr; VIA Rail stops in Jasper.

Joshua Tree spans 800,000 acres at the meeting point of the Mojave and Colorado deserts in southern California, two hours east of Los Angeles. The park is famous for the namesake yucca trees that cluster in the higher Mojave half, the surreal monzogranite boulder piles at Hidden Valley and Jumbo Rocks, and one of the best concentrations of single-pitch climbing and bouldering in the world (1,400+ routes). Skull Rock, the Cholla Cactus Garden, and Keys View over the Coachella Valley are the can't-miss roadside stops. Twentynine Palms and Yucca Valley are the gateway towns; the season runs October through May.

Kansas City is two cities (Missouri and Kansas) on opposite banks of the state line, but the Missouri side holds the heart: world-class barbecue (Joe's, Q39, Arthur Bryant's, Gates), the 18th & Vine jazz district where Charlie Parker and Count Basie made their names, the Country Club Plaza (the country's first car-oriented shopping district, 1923, modeled on Seville), and more public fountains than any city outside Rome. The food obsession runs deeper than just BBQ — Boulevard beer, KC strip steaks, and a pizza style of its own. The Chiefs' Super Bowl runs and the Royals' Kauffman Stadium round out one of the most underrated US cities.

The oldest of the main Hawaiian islands at 5.1 million years — long enough for erosion to carve the cathedral-green Na Pali Coast cliffs (1,200 m straight from the Pacific) and Waimea Canyon, the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific". Mount Waiʻaleʻale at the centre is among the wettest spots on Earth (~9,500 mm of rain a year), feeding seven rivers that pour out across taro-field valleys to Hanalei Bay’s 3-km golden crescent. The county forbids any building taller than a coconut palm, half the island remains undeveloped, and the only road around it dead-ends 27 km short of completing the loop — making the Na Pali Coast accessible only by foot, boat, or helicopter. The "Garden Isle" is the slowest-paced and most photogenic of the Hawaiian islands.

The southernmost point in the continental US — 90 miles to Cuba, an island that seceded from the United States in 1982 (the Conch Republic) and never quite came back. Hemingway lived here and wrote some of his best work; his six-toed cats still roam his Whitehead Street home. The 1.25-mile Duval Street is the “longest bar in America”, the nightly Mallory Square sunset celebration is a 50-year-old ritual, and Fort Zachary Taylor State Park is the best beach on the island. Pair Old Town’s Conch architecture with a Yankee Freedom day trip to the remote Dry Tortugas National Park.

Costa Rica's adventure capital sits at the foot of Arenal — a near-perfect 1,633m volcanic cone, dormant since 2010 but still feeding the area's many hot springs. La Fortuna Waterfall plunges 75m into a swimmable pool; Mistico's hanging bridges thread the rainforest canopy; Río Celeste's impossibly turquoise water sits a day-trip away. Zip-lining, rafting, sloth-spotting, and the famous Jeep-Boat-Jeep crossing to Monteverde all start here. Pura Vida personified.

Aldous Huxley called it "the most beautiful lake in the world." Three volcanoes ring a 1,562m caldera, and twelve Maya villages dot the shoreline — each Kaqchikel or Tz'utujil with its own character. Panajachel for transit, San Pedro for backpacker partying and Spanish school, San Marcos for yoga and cliff jumps, Santiago for traditional culture and the Maximón shrine, San Juan for textile co-ops and coffee. Lanchas (boats) shuttle between them.

North America's largest alpine lake — 22 miles long, 12 miles wide, 1,645 ft deep at center, sitting at 6,225 ft elevation in the Sierra Nevada and split between California and Nevada. Twelve ski areas ring the basin (Heavenly, Palisades Tahoe, Northstar, Kirkwood, Sugar Bowl, Mount Rose) — the densest concentration in North America. In summer the same shoreline becomes a beach-and-boat playground: Emerald Bay's granite-walled cove, Sand Harbor's clear turquoise water, and 72 miles of paved bike path on the West Shore. Reno (RNO) is 30 minutes from the North Shore; Sacramento (SMF) is 2 hours from the South. The state line splits casinos onto the Nevada side and most pine-forested cabins onto the California side.

The 4.2-mile Strip is a self-contained universe of themed megaresorts — the Bellagio fountains, the Venetian canals, the Eiffel Tower replica, the Sphere's LED exterior. 42 million visitors a year. Beyond the casinos: the Fremont Street Experience in Downtown's vintage heart, world-class residencies (Adele, U2 at Sphere), and a surprisingly strong food-and-cocktail scene built on celebrity-chef imports. Red Rock Canyon sits 30 minutes west, the Grand Canyon 4 hours east, Zion 3 hours northeast.

LA is a sprawling mosaic — Hollywood glamour, Pacific beaches, Getty art, Griffith Observatory views, and some of the country's best Mexican and Asian food. The city sprawls but rewards exploration: Venice's boardwalk, Downtown's renaissance, Beverly Hills' polish, and canyon drives to hidden overlooks.

Louisville (locally pronounced LOO-uh-vul) is the bourbon capital of the world and the home of the Kentucky Derby — the first Saturday in May at Churchill Downs has been running uninterrupted since 1875. The Urban Bourbon Trail links 40+ bars and distilleries within the city; the Louisville Slugger factory makes the bats every MLB player swings; and NuLu has rebuilt East Market Street into a tight strip of restaurants, distilleries, and galleries. Add the Muhammad Ali Center, a passable food scene, and Frankfort Avenue's Frankfort Avenue antique row, and the city punches well above its 630,000 population.

Madison is built on a narrow isthmus between Lake Mendota and Lake Monona, with the white-granite Wisconsin State Capitol (the only state capitol built on an isthmus, and a near-twin of the US Capitol's design) anchoring the dead centre. The University of Wisconsin–Madison wraps the western lakeshore, the Dane County Farmers' Market loops the Capitol Square every Saturday April–November (the largest producer-only farmers' market in the United States), and the Memorial Union Terrace's sunburst chairs are the unofficial summer living room. Beer, cheese, brats, and lake life — Wisconsin to its core.

Manuel Antonio packs Costa Rica's most photogenic combination into a tiny coastal sliver: a 1,983-hectare national park where white-sand crescents meet primary rainforest, and squirrel monkeys, sloths, and white-faced capuchins routinely cross the trail in front of you. The park sits at the foot of a steep ridge climbing up from Quepos, and the strip of road between has become Costa Rica's most concentrated tourism corridor — luxury jungle lodges, sea-view restaurants, and zip-line operators stacked along three switchbacked kilometres. Pura vida arrives with monkeys raiding your beach bag.

A 100-square-mile triangular island seven miles south of Cape Cod, reached by a 45-minute Steamship Authority car ferry from Woods Hole. Six distinct towns share the island, each with its own personality: white-clapboard Edgartown of sea-captain mansions, the working ferry port of Vineyard Haven, the gingerbread-cottage Methodist camp meeting at Oak Bluffs, the Wampanoag tribal lands and 150-foot striated clay cliffs at Aquinnah, plus rural Chilmark and West Tisbury inland. The Vineyard's Camelot legacy runs from JFK summers through the Obama family's recurring August stays at Blue Heron Farm.

Hawaii's second-largest island — the Road to Hana's 620 curves and 59 bridges past waterfalls and bamboo forests, sunrise above the clouds at Haleakalā's 10,023-ft summit crater, winter humpback whales in the Auʻau Channel, and the snorkel-famous Molokini crater. Lahaina's historic town was devastated by the August 2023 wildfire — visiting West Maui responsibly supports recovery. Kāʻanapali, Wailea, and Kīhei host the resort zones; Pāʻia and Upcountry Makawao are the laid-back alternatives.

Memphis is the soul-music capital of the American South — Beale Street neon, Sun Studio's tiny tile-floor room where Elvis cut his first record in 1954, the Stax studio where Otis Redding and Booker T. recorded, and Graceland 9 miles south where Elvis lived from 1957 until his death in 1977. The Mississippi River bluff downtown looks across to Arkansas; the National Civil Rights Museum is built into the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968. Add some of the best slow-cooked dry-rub barbecue in America (Rendezvous, Central BBQ, Payne's) and you have a city where music and history sit on every corner.

The colonial capital of Yucatán founded by Francisco de Montejo in 1542 on the site of the Maya city of T'hó — the conquistadors used dismantled Maya pyramid stones to build the cathedral, which you can still see in the walls. Mérida is consistently ranked among the safest cities in Mexico, the cultural capital of the Yucatec Maya (the only Mexican city where you regularly hear an indigenous language in everyday life), and the gateway to Chichén Itzá, Uxmal, and the Yucatán cenotes. The Paseo de Montejo is a French-influenced boulevard lined with henequen-boom mansions; the Mercado Lucas de Gálvez serves the best cochinita pibil in the country; the Sunday Bici-Ruta closes the city centre to cars. Heat April-May is brutal — visit November-February.

Mexico City is one of the world's great megacities — a sprawling, vibrant metropolis built on the ruins of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan. The food scene rivals any city on earth (from street tacos to world-ranked restaurants), the museums are extraordinary, and the neighborhoods are endlessly walkable. A cultural powerhouse at altitude.