Blogs

To countless monikers like " Rip City" , "Stumptown," and "Beervana,"  I have added Bridge City to Portland, Oregon's list. The Willamette River runs right through the center of the city, with a total of 9 bridges (not counting rail) connecting downtown to Eastside neighborhood districts like Buckman, Sunnyside, and Ladd's Addition. Some bridges are only doable by car, but others like the Burnside Bridge are pedestrian/ bike-friendly leading directly to streets flanked with former warehouses, fa

I wasn’t familiar with the Denbighshire area at all, so when I had business there, I really didn’t know what to expect. But, as I drove over the Welsh border, I’d hardly taken on board that the road signs were now bilingual, than I passed a brown sign saying I was entering an "Area of Natural Beauty".

This is countryside as it used to be … fields, trees and hedgerows, not the prairie-like expanses of elsewhere. We are now in the Vale of Clwyd, flanked by the gentle, flowing Clwydian Hills.

We were

Tuscany in the fall. You just can’t beat it. Long gone are the hordes of summer tourists from around the world, who travel in the height of season. It does get dark early and the weather is not balmy, however, in the fall you can live life as it was meant to be, meeting locals when the pace is slower.

I came to view the burnt orange colors of sunsets, drive through the rolling hills, eat in gastronomic heaven in small restaurants off the beaten path, and visit medieval villages. Tuscany speaks t

In a very compelling article somewhere on Lonely Planet's blog, Vivek Wagle, head of content and marketing at Airbnb, makes the compelling argument for "collaborative consumption," the basic business and ethical underpinning of his widly successful "places to stay" service and website.

Basically, he points, we are living in a world of "social accommodation services," where "being able to benefit from the good  (a tangible or intangible good) is better than actually possessing that good."

Or a