[JOSE IGNACIO, URUGUAY] — It’s 3pm, the day after Christmas. It’s 82 degrees and sunny, with a light breeze gently flapping the white canvas awnings, fanning the cool shade underneath. The place is packed, everyone’s knee-to-knee. Cool pitchers of Clerico — the local Uruguayan version of a white sangria — are flowing past above the heads of the crowd, headed toward an antsy, thirsty table. There’s a DJ tucked in the back, but affecting moods in the front; like the breeze, causing everyone to gently sway along with him in a cool, mellow vibe. The smell of woodsmoke wafts out onto the beach. The best smell there is. Large wood cutting boards burdened with a grilled whole smiling fish swim by, browned at the edges, flaky
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Here’s a quiet little video summary I made of a fabulous two week trip in Morocco in April 2015. I tried to capture the sights, sounds and incomparable experiences of all of Morocco. Marrakesh, the High Atlas Mountains, the desert oasis of Skoura and camping in the Sahara. If you want more detailed information of all the sights in this video, check out the Morocco page on my website. Lots of great pictures, information, maps and links to other resources to help you plan your trip. Of course, if you have any questions, feel free to comment below.
[DALMATIAN COAST, CROATIA] — Highly recommend you try and swing a sailboat charter in Croatia. You can backpack or ferry between islands, but having your own steam allows you to duck in and out of the thousands of islands along the Dalmatian coast. Me and my best friends and their kids chartered a big Turkish gulet to sail these beautiful waters and these are the best places to sail to in Croatia — at least that we found. Twelve people on a boat! Honestly, I’d arranged this charter six months before and had been on travel sabbatical across Europe for four months, so didn’t do much planning at all for this trip, neither did the rest of us. It was actually so nice not to have
[SPLIT, CROATIA] — I knew she would be big. I had no idea she’d be THIS big. It was the pictures that got me first. Our awesome travel agent Ginny had been sending me pics of boats all over. “We want something cool” I’d said, these are my best friends. “Can you find a Turkish gulet in Croatia?” I’d seen gulets while on a regular sailboat in Greece, they’re so much better than a typical sailboat. I had space-envy. I made a note in my book: “Rent Turkish gulet one day.” I liked how they’re all built around a big broad dining table straddling across the back, not everyone scrunched in a tight sailing cockpit all the time. My travel agent could only find a
[TABERNASH, COLORADO] — If you’re looking for a Colorado ranch getaway, away from the slopes, but close enough, Devil’s Thumb Ranch is what you’re looking for. Outside the ski resort of Winter Park and just past the little town of Tabernash, Devil’s Thumb is setup to be its own self-contained year-round mountain resort. Focused in winter on the 100km of groomed cross-country ski trails, spa and other cold activities. There’s 100km of groomed cross-country ski trails like this at Devil’s Thumb Ranch, weaving in and around 6,000 glorious acres on a big ranch not far from the Continental Divide* in Colorado. At 8,500ft (2,600m) elevation you not only see your breath, but breathlessly feel it too, under the big bluebird sky. You can scoot and
[KEARNEY, NEBRASKA] — When you first get to the river, it’s 6am and pitch black. You feel your way down a path, heading toward The Noise. You want to get there before they see you coming. Slowly, the shrieks get louder and louder as the first light slowly begins to open its eyes. Suddenly, you start to make out shapes stepping out of the darkness. Big dark masses grow more detailed the lighter it gets. What you thought was an island or sandbar is actually a throbbing, humming mass of birddom. And they suddenly appear out of the darkness, like the invasion of Normandy on DDay. Hundreds of thousands of them, nearly covering the shallow river from shore to shore. We wait while the first pilot
[MAREMMA, TUSCANY] — Maremma is the southern edge of Tuscany and goes from the hilly and ferrous inland to the varyingly wild-horse-roaming, swampy and rocky coast. After four days in Bologna — two and half of them in bed with a violent flu — I was ready to come here and just sit in the sun by the pool at Il Pellicano and just eat my way back to health. But after a couple days of restoration, I couldn’t help but explore the famous area in and around Monte Argentario. I only had time for a daytrip inland to root around southern Maremma, these are the cools things I found to do in wild and woolly southern Maremma. A lot of English and American people only
[HANA, MAUI] — I was in Maui in 2015, the week before Thanksgiving scoping out a new project and got a chance to stay at the cool Travaasa experiential resort on the totally chill side of the island, at the receiving end of the Road to Hana. A lot of people take the white-knuckle drive, turn around and drive back the same day. But Hana is a world away from the Resort Crazy, white sock/white sneakers and muscle shirts (when did those come back in style? And why?) at the other end of the island. This is the way to do it. I love me some nice hotels and seek them out all over, but few can compare with the views of these bungalows, smack overlooking
[HANA, MAUI] — I was scoping out a project in Hawaii and stayed at Travaasa, a new experiential hotel brand with an amazing location in Austin and a second here, in Hana. I’m not a big fan of all the high-rise hotels in the crowded parts of Maui, but this place is much, much different. Travaasa is an “experiential resort” so they do cool stuff beyond having the best spa in Hawaii. Besides free yoga and a killer workout space overlooking the sea, there are lessons on Hawaiian throw net fishing, outrigger canoeing, culinary classes, horseback riding and a dozen other cool experiences. In addition to geeking out over pools and nice hotels, I’m completely OBSESSED with flying, so what got me was the glider experience, long