Have you ever stayed in a convent?  Surprisingly, many of our fellow travel fanatics out there have shared with us that they have, indeed, spent some time staying in converted nunneries or convents.  Besides the inherently peaceful aura that seems to surround these modernized convents, many of them are located in absolutely gorgeous locations, and offer the traveller a different perspective.  I'd like to share our experience at El Convento, a gorgeous hotel in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico.  Read

I arrived in a quaint village in the French countryside and checked into a charming villa arranged by my travel agent.

Kobby Dagn


Way down South America way, one of the hemisphere’s most chichi beach resorts sits astride the Atlantic coast of one of South America’s lower-profile countries, Uruguay. On a narrow spit of land separating the Atlantic from the Rio de la Plata, Punta del Este is a 90-minute drive east of the national capital, Montevideo, and a 45-minute flight from Buenos Aires. Why do I mention the latter?

Because as popular as Punta is with many Uruguayans, it would be pretty much nowheresville wi

un

Yes, Bulgaria. This country has the fortune to lie on the beautiful Black Sea, and near the city of Burgas, a beach resort that began in the Communist 1950s as a getaway for the masses has found favor with a larger European public. Called Sunny Beach (Slanchev Bryag in Bulgarian), this country's largest resort boasts more than 300 days of sunshine per year and an average temperature of 28° Celsius during the summer months. It has a very small permanent population, but welcomes hundreds of thou

New Hampshire's Mount Washington Valley region is built on small business. Beyond outdoor tourism like skiing, mountain climbing, and whitewater rafting, more than 25 locally run inns and 70 restaurants, along with an array of local specialty food purveyors and farms, fuel a robust hospitality and culinary scene. This synergy is celebrated with longstanding festivals and special events. Two annual biggies held at the end of February are the Chilly Chili Cook-Off and the Mount Washington Valley

We established our base camp in Sestri Levante and settled into an eight-night vacation rental in the center of town.  On previous trips to this area we saw the white mountains surrounding the village of Carrara and made a note to someday add it to one of our itineraries… today was the day! 

Tunnels and Caves in the Hills of Carrara, Italy

The drive from Sestri was less than two hours, and when we arrived in Carrara, we were taken aback by the quiet mining village situated at the base of the crag

Ballota

Now that tourism to Croatia’s Dalmatian Coast is about to start heating up again for the summer, it’s a good time to cast a glance even beyond top dog Dubrovnik to other magical spots along these shores – and at the top of the list is a city with perhaps one of the world’s most unusual historic quarters: Split. It’s fair to say the mix of history, dining, beaches and more here is a mix unlike any on the planet.

Founded in the 6th century BC against a backdrop of high, rocky hills as the

by Suzanne Barbezat

Mexico's booming tourism industry got its start along a stretch of central Pacific coast that included then small towns like Acapulco and Mazatlan. But Puerto Vallarta, on Jalisco's beautiful Banderas Bay, struck a PR gold mine in Hollywood director John Huston, who upon visiting in the 1950s opined it was among the most beautiful places in the world and returned in 1963 to film Oscar-winning Night of the Iguana. Plenty of Tinseltown stars followed - Ava Gardner and Richa

I admit I am not much of a critic. I know what I like, and honestly I like just about everything, so don’t expect your standard, everyday review of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Twelfth Night.

I further admit that for me Shakespeare has too often just been words on a page – a cognitive exercise in appreciation of the work of one of the world’s great writers of the English language. In reading the words on a page I can appreciate both the talent it took to write them and the heart of the mat

When you visit Malpaís, on Costa Rica’s southern Nicoya Peninsula, be prepared to relax and unwind. This area of the country along the Pacific coast is so laid back that when you’re there it feels as if you’ve left the rest of the world off somewhere else, vaguely in the background. And that’s a good thing.

Besides being simply gorgeous – the beaches of Malpaís and Santa Teresa consistently are named the best beaches in Central America – Malpaís is a revered surf spot in Costa Rica. And the surf

Ready for spring, Disneyland Resort is ready to go with 5 weeks of food, drink and culinary special events. The magic will appear in California Adventure Park with chefs, culinary demonstrations and beverage and lifestyle seminars adding even more to the guests’ interactive experiences.

Celebrity chefs Guy Fieri and Graham Elliot are just a few of the well-known chefs who will be on stage 17 showing cooking techniques, sharing delicious tastings and handing out recipes. Guests will be more confid

There's little doubt that food is a major part of the tourism experience.  If tourism is about seeing new sights and having new and unique experiences, then the culinary world is a major part of the tourism experience.  Because eating is an essential part of living, food or culinary tourism has a broad base of appeal.  In fact, often when visitors return home, one of the first questions that people ask is ‘how is the food?” 

The interaction between tourism and food is often called culinary tour

A few months ago I found myself face to face with a school of piranhas, and lived to tell the tale. OK, the little buggers were in a tank at Parque Explora in Medellin, Colombia, whose unusual aquarium is devoted to Amazonian fauna. Common throughout the Amazon and its connected rivers – some of which are in Peru and Colombia but most of which of course fall within the borders of Brazil, the silvery shapes flitting by were mesmerizing but didn’t look particularly threatening  - but then I reme

It says something that an entire region is named after France's signature liquor. Only three hours away from Paris by train, the village of Cognac, world famous for its namesake eau-de-vie (water of life) is also the birthplace of King François I, narrow winding streets, the towers of St Jacques' gate, and many large 18th-century houses made of stone typically coated with "black velvet" or torula compniacensis, a microscopic fungus that also graces the walls of the region's cognac cellars.

Hist

Jarabacoa is the biggest town in the municipality of La Vega, located 700 meters above the Cordillera Central mountain range in the Dominican Republic. This region, known as the Dominican Alps, offers a magnificent landscape of pine trees and tropical forest, which will delight lovers of mountain sports, such as climbing, rafting, kayaking, canyoneering, horseback riding and hiking, in addition to being the starting point for expeditions to Pico Duarte, the highest point in the Caribbean.

Three r

The New South Wales onetime goldrush, no spa town of Daylesford (pop. 2,600) is a quaint area about 115 km (71 miles) north of Melbourne, and it accounts for more than 80 percent of Australia's mineral water springs. I love wine and I love relaxing, and Daylesford offers plenty of lovely opportunities to enjoy both.

Wine Tour

My own favorite thing here was the wine tour. The tour has three stops for tastings at local wineries, as well as some small snacks. The winemakers were all very hospitable

In case you’re wondering where is Montenegro, for starters it’s one of the world’s newest countries – a Slavic land once part of Yugoslavia, then Serbia, and now independent for just five years.  And though small (smaller than the U.S. state of Connecticut, in fact) it’s an up-and-comer indeed on the travel scene, with great history, nature, and above all a Dalmatian coast generally less well know than Croatia’s further north, but just as spectacular. And on said coast, you’ll find one of Euro

One of my very favorite things to do in Budapest when I spent some time there a few years ago was to spend a nice, soothing afternoon at a wonderful old fürdő (bath house). In the day and age of the elaborate luxury spa, old-fashioned bath houses seem practically extinct in North America except for a few ethnic examples (usually East European, occasionally Asian) in a handful of big cities.

Ancient Yet Popular Baths of Budapest

But here in the capital of Hungary, the oldies are still goodies

Shutterstock/Felipe_Frazao

by María José Cortés Llamas

Carved out of the Amazonian rain forest, Manaus (pop. 1.8 million) has been little known by the outside world, the capital of Amazonas state is filled with contrasts and intrigue, and previously lived through a golden age due to the rubber boom in the 19th century. The results can be seen in the architecture, which exude majesty and the inspiration of Belle-Époque Paris. The Amazon Theatre is the foremost example; inaugurated in 1896, it’s