All Destinations

The pastel-pink colonial capital of the Bahamas on New Providence Island — the 102-step Queen’s Staircase carved by enslaved labour in the 1790s, the British colonial Government House, the Pirates of Nassau Museum tracing the city’s 18th-century pirate-republic era, and the massive Atlantis Resort across the bridge on Paradise Island. Cruise-ship central (over 4 million arrivals/year), with US Pre-Clearance at the airport meaning you skip US Customs on your return flight. Pair it with a day trip to Exuma’s swimming pigs to elevate the trip.

The most culturally distinct city in America — where Creole and Cajun cooking, jazz, second-line parades, and a French-Spanish colonial heart create something you genuinely can't find anywhere else. The French Quarter's wrought-iron balconies, Frenchmen Street's nightly brass bands, and beignets at 3am at Café du Monde.

New York City needs no introduction — it's the cultural and financial capital of the world. Five boroughs, each with dozens of distinct neighborhoods, offering everything from Michelin-starred restaurants to $1 pizza slices. The subway runs 24/7, the energy is relentless, and there's genuinely something new to discover on every visit.

Newport, Rhode Island, is a 25,000-person harbor city on Aquidneck Island that doubled as the Gilded Age summer capital for the Vanderbilts, Astors, and Belmonts in the late 1800s. The Preservation Society of Newport County runs guided tours of seven mansions including The Breakers (Cornelius Vanderbilt II's 70-room summer cottage), Marble House, Rosecliff, and The Elms. The 3.5-mile Cliff Walk threads the cliffside behind the mansions, the International Tennis Hall of Fame is set in the Newport Casino, and the Newport Folk and Jazz Festivals fill July and August. Bowen's Wharf and Thames Street hold the harbor restaurants and chowder bars.

Greenland's capital and largest city — population just over 20,000, more than a third of the territory — perches on a rocky peninsula at the mouth of one of the largest fjord systems on Earth, with Sermitsiaq mountain (1,210 m) rising directly across the bay. Founded by Hans Egede in 1728 as Godthåb ("Good Hope"), Nuuk holds the National Museum of Greenland, the country's best fjord boat tours, the Katuaq Cultural Centre, and a surprisingly Scandinavian-mild climate. Midnight sun late May to late July; long mild winters with regular aurora through April.

Mexico's culinary capital and a UNESCO World Heritage city. Famous for mole, mezcal, indigenous markets, Day of the Dead celebrations, and nearby Monte Albán ruins.

Orlando is the theme-park capital of the world — Walt Disney World's four parks (Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, Animal Kingdom) cover 25,000 acres southwest of the city, while Universal Orlando (three parks including the new Epic Universe opening 2025) sits closer in. Beyond the parks, downtown Orlando wraps around Lake Eola with its swan boats and weekly farmers' market, ICON Park's 400-foot wheel anchors International Drive, and the Kennedy Space Center is an hour east. The metro is enormous (2.7M), the airport is one of the busiest in the US, and theme-park strategy (FastPass, park-hopper, off-season vs holiday weeks) is its own discipline.

California's mid-century modern oasis — a 50,000-person resort city tucked against the 10,800 ft wall of San Jacinto Peak, 1.5 hours east of Los Angeles in the Coachella Valley. The town carries the highest concentration of preserved 1950s-60s desert modernism in the country (Modernism Week every February draws 162,000 attendees). The Palm Springs Aerial Tramway climbs 8,500 vertical ft to alpine wilderness in 10 minutes; Joshua Tree National Park is 30 minutes east. Pool culture is the local religion — over 100 hotels are designed around the courtyard pool. Coachella and Stagecoach drop into nearby Indio in April; summers spike to 45°C, but Oct-May is dry, mild, and built for cocktails.

A modern skyline rising above a historic old quarter (Casco Viejo), with the famous Panama Canal, tropical biodiversity, and a crossroads-of-the-Americas energy.

Utah's flagship ski town and the closest big-airport-to-resort drive in the US — 32 miles east of Salt Lake City via I-80, just 40 minutes from SLC International. Two world-class resorts share the basin: Park City Mountain (the largest ski resort in the US at 7,300 acres after the 2015 Canyons merger) and Deer Valley (skiers-only, perennially ranked the nation's top resort by SKI Magazine readers). Historic Main Street is a preserved 1890s silver-mining town with 64 buildings on the National Register, hosting Sundance Film Festival each January. At 7,000 ft base it's lower than Colorado giants — easier acclimation. Summer brings world-class mountain biking and the Utah Olympic Park.

America's first UNESCO World Heritage City — where both the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the Constitution (1787) were signed. Reading Terminal Market, Eastern State Penitentiary, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Liberty Bell are all within walking distance. The cheesesteak was invented here, and Philadelphians are passionate about all of it.

America's fifth-largest city and the heart of the Valley of the Sun — 1.6 million in the city proper, nearly 5 million across the metro, sprawling across the northern Sonoran Desert at 1,086 ft elevation. The signature trio is Camelback Mountain (a 1.3-mile rock-scramble up to a city-and-desert panorama), Old Town Scottsdale (boutique-and-margarita strip 20 minutes east), and the Desert Botanical Garden (50,000 plants on 140 acres). Brutal Jun-Sep heat regularly hits 45°C, but Nov-Apr is shirtsleeve perfection — the same window the Cactus League brings 15 MLB teams here for spring training. Phoenix is also the practical gateway: Sedona is 2 hours north, the Grand Canyon 4 hours.

The Steel City reborn as a tech and medicine capital — three rivers (Allegheny, Monongahela, Ohio) meeting at the tip of Point State Park, 446 bridges (more than any city in the world), and 712 sets of public city steps climbing the hillsides. Andrew Carnegie's flour-and-steel empire built world-class museums (the Carnegie, the Andy Warhol, the Frick), and the city's unique topography means the Mt. Washington overlook delivers one of America's great urban skylines. Stronger transit than peers expect (free downtown T light rail, two surviving 1870s funicular Inclines), the Strip District for food markets, Primanti Brothers sandwiches since 1933, and dramatically cheaper hotels than peer Eastern US cities.

The Riviera Maya's most walkable beach town, an hour south of Cancun airport on Highway 307. The pedestrianised Quinta Avenida runs four kilometres parallel to the sand, packed with restaurants, bars, gelato counters and silver-jewellery boutiques that do not close until 1 am. Mamita's Beach anchors the casual beach-club scene to the north; the all-inclusive resort cluster pushes south toward Tulum. Ferries depart every half hour for Cozumel (35 minutes) and there is a separate boat to Isla Mujeres, which makes Playa a useful base for a Caribbean island day trip without committing to staying offshore.

Portland is still weird, still rainy, and still one of the best small food + beer + coffee cities in America — though its downtown is in real transition since 2020. Powell's City of Books anchors the west side, food cart pods dot every neighborhood, Forest Park is a 5,200-acre wilderness in the city, and Mt. Hood plus the Columbia River Gorge are 45 minutes east.

A Pacific resort town on Banderas Bay where the Sierra Madre tumbles directly into the sea — 1.5 km of sculpture-lined Malecón, the cobblestoned Romantic Zone with its crown-towered Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, and 42 distinct beaches around the bay from family-friendly Los Muertos to roadless Yelapa to the offshore Marietas Islands' Hidden Beach. Hollywood put Puerto Vallarta on the map when John Huston filmed The Night of the Iguana here in 1963 with Burton and Taylor; it has since become Latin America's most LGBTQ+ friendly destination. Tourist infrastructure is excellent and English widely spoken; humpback whales calve in the bay December-March. The all-inclusive Hotel Zone is generic; the Romantic Zone is where Vallarta's charm actually lives.

The only fortified city north of Mexico — Old Quebec (UNESCO) is a living 17th-century French colonial town perched on the St. Lawrence clifftops. The Château Frontenac is the world's most photographed hotel. Carnaval de Québec is North America's largest winter festival. French is the heartbeat of this city, which feels more like Brittany than Toronto.

Raleigh is North Carolina's state capital and the southern point of the Research Triangle (Raleigh – Durham – Chapel Hill) — three universities (NC State, Duke, UNC) and the Research Triangle Park anchor one of the densest concentrations of PhDs in America. Downtown is built around the 1840 NC State Capitol, the free North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences (the largest natural-history museum in the Southeast), the NC Museum of Art's outdoor sculpture park, and Fayetteville Street's restaurants and bars. The college-town energy from NC State (37,000 students) means the food scene punches well above a city this size, and the surrounding Triangle area gives you Durham's renovated tobacco district and Chapel Hill's basketball.

The 1847 Mormon pioneer capital at the foot of the Wasatch Mountains — a perfect numbered grid radiating from Temple Square (the LDS Church world headquarters and the most-visited tourist site in Utah), 11 ski resorts within an hour's drive (more than any other US city), and the Great Salt Lake stretching to the horizon west of town. Unusually walkable for the western US (free downtown TRAX light rail, flat grid, generous sidewalks), with the famous "Greatest Snow on Earth" at Park City, Snowbird, Alta, and Deer Valley. The Sundance Film Festival (late January), Antelope Island bison herds, and the surreal Bonneville Salt Flats are all day-trip distance.

San Antonio is the seventh-largest US city (1.5M) and the most Mexican-feeling major city in the United States, anchored by the Alamo and a 3-mile pedestrian River Walk that runs 20 feet below street level through downtown. The five Spanish colonial missions (Mission San Jose plus the Alamo and three others) form a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the King William Historic District holds Victorian mansions, and the Pearl District has turned a 19th-century brewery into the city's best food and shopping zone. Tex-Mex was effectively invented here.

Southern California's laid-back beach-and-burrito capital — 70 miles of Pacific coast, 70°F year-round, and an arc from surfy Ocean Beach through La Jolla's sea-lion coves to Coronado's Hotel del Coronado and the Mexican border at Tijuana. Balboa Park packs 17 museums and the world-class San Diego Zoo into 1,200 acres. The Gaslamp Quarter anchors downtown nightlife; North Park and Liberty Station handle the craft-beer + food-hall crowds. The nation's largest naval base shapes the skyline with destroyer silhouettes.

San Francisco is one of America's most beautiful cities — the Golden Gate Bridge, cable cars climbing steep hills, and Victorian painted ladies are just the start. Fisherman's Wharf, Alcatraz, the Mission District's murals, and some of the country's best food (from sourdough to dim sum) make it endlessly explorable. Bring a jacket — the fog is real.

The oldest city under the US flag (founded 1521) wraps two massive 16th-century Spanish forts — Castillo San Felipe del Morro guarding the bay entrance and Castillo San Cristóbal protecting the landward approach — inside seven blocks of cobalt-cobblestone Old San Juan. UNESCO-listed, walkable in a day, and the only Spanish colonial capital you can reach with a US driver’s license. Add the El Yunque rainforest (the only US national rainforest), the bioluminescent bays of Vieques and Fajardo, and the salsa clubs of Santurce — it’s the most culturally distinctive US destination most US travellers haven’t visited.

A UNESCO World Heritage colonial town in central Mexico's Bajío highlands — the neo-Gothic pink-stone Parroquia de San Miguel Arcángel rises above the Jardín plaza like nothing else in Mexico, lit gold at sunset and pink at dawn. Cobblestone streets wind past 18th-century pastel houses, the Fábrica La Aurora art and design centre, the hot springs of Atotonilco, and a 10,000-strong North American expat community that has shaped the town since 1950. Day of the Dead and the Festival of San Miguel Arcángel (with the famous 4am Alborada fireworks) are the two most spectacular festivals in Mexico's calendar — both happen here.