[OBIDOS, PORTUGAL] — About an hour south of Porto is the small castle town of Obidos. If you’re a Game of Thrones fan, which I’ve never really seen, you may recognize this place. But if you’re just a normal castle-loving gypsy, you can stay in the nice pousada inside and get an extra use out of your traveling Glastonbury/Burning Man/Coachella flower bonnet and feel like a queen. They charge extra for swords, I hear, but available. Ravens on advance request. A good friend of mine recently stayed in the Pousada Obidos and absolutely loved it. And all the tourists empty out at night and they had the whole town to themselves. Some great restaurants, too. Obidos is known for their chocolate, so there are oodles of chocolate
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[SANTA CRUZ, PORTUGAL] — When looking for a cool design hotel outside Lisbon during my second first tour of Portugal, I saw an article on Areias do Seixo, full of pictures of crazy looking, organic rooms with stained stone, wooden log furniture, swings, and just amazing details. Every room was a revelation. That’s when I had to go to Areias do Seixo, one of the first and coolest design hotels in Portugal. _________________________________ After pulling into a sparse car park, no sign of life. You walk up to the huge, heavy wood doors — all big and Asian-y and intimidating, makes you feel like a bible salesman at Larry Ellison’s house — and they’re locked. Oh no, are they closed? Did I get the date
[LAGOS, PORTUGAL] — When everyone, including me, first goes to Portugal, the first thing they want to do is head toward the famed Algarve, the bottom half of the country, lined by picturesque rocky formations poking out from the water. But the Algarve to me is like Fort Lauderdale or Punta del Este, beautiful beaches ruined by hi-rises and massive retirement developments, centered around the “capital of Algarve”, Faro, all up to the border with Spain. But I really liked the quieter western end of the Algarve, from Portimao, west and on up the western coast. Here are my finds of the best beaches of the Western Algarve. The best beaches in Portugal and the best surfing beaches. _______________________________ The winding two lane highway runs
[TOURRETTES-SUR-LOUP, FRANCE] — I was on my way back from nine blissful days in Greece and heading toward the southwest of France. Having already done most of the coast, I wanted to find a new place to explore. I opened a new travel website I kept hearing about i-escape.com and started scouring pictures for something that grabbed my eye. And then BOOM. I saw a the picture above. That was all it took. This is in France? Looks more like Italy, or maybe Corsica. An ancient village perched high above the Côte d’Azur in the mountainy Alpes-Maritime region of France. I’ve always heard about this region, but had never been. So that’s where I pointed my car as I hopped off the plane in Nice.
[FOLEGANDROS, GREECE] — 20 hours, three planes, long layovers and a zippy ferry straight from Santorini, I arrived in the port of Folegandros after 9pm, in the pitchdark. The owner of my hotel, Dimitris was waiting for me at the port and drove me the short 3kms up to the town of Chora in his Jeep Cherokee. In minutes we were zig-zagging through the crooked streets of Chora, headed for my home for the next couple of days — the Anemomilos Boutique Hotel. A slow cool breeze, a couple of Mythos and music from the local tavernas conked me out for twelve straight hours. Set the phone for 6am to catch the sunrise, didn’t work… woke up at 10. ___________________________ About Folegandros — An Under the Radar
[FOLEGANDROS, GREECE] — On the quiet island of Folegandros, there are no cruise ships. There’s no airport. No big hotels. No hoards of tourists. They only got electricity a about 30 years ago. It wasn’t until the last 20 years that the island’s one road was paved — all 18 kilometers of it — and the first gas station arrived. There’s only one bus driver. Only a single taxi driver. And only 785 people live on the island. It that doesn’t sound like heaven, I don’t know what does. On the quiet island of Folegandros, there are no cruise ships. There’s no airport. No big hotels. No hoards of tourists. They only got electricity a about 30 years ago. You can only get here by ferry,
[FOLEGANDROS, GREECE] — A video and music overview of the best beaches, hotels and restaurants of the under-the-radar island of Folegandros. For more details, visit the Folegandros page on my website.
[GORGES DU VERDON, FRANCE] — I wasn’t planning on this hike. It was all innocent, really. I just stumbled on the signs and kept going. I had no water, no backpack, no raingear, no flashlight, no map, no guidebook. But the Scope-colored water and steep canyon kept pulling me “just a little farther.” The path descends to follow along the water, then climbing up ladders, dodging between stone arches then, disappearing into cool dark tunnels, emerging on the other side. When I say tunnels, I mean pitch black tunnels. Signs warn you should have a headlamp. Not having one, I mumbled to myself “Hahaha, we don’t need no stinking torchiers” as I entered that last… and longest tunnel.” Well, they were serious. Unbeknownst to me,
[SARTÈNE, CORSICA] — I was having dinner by myself the first night in Corsica at Domaine du Murtoli — one of the most exclusive resorts in France — and sitting back and grinning at all the natural wonder before me in this candle-lit treehouse of a restaurant hidden under the maquis trees. Barefoot waitresses in linen frocks darted under the leaves, bringing drinks, appetizers and cute smiles. Around the corner came a vision, the most perfectly tanned specimen on this planet. Valérie, the proprietress of this magical haven (and a former model and mother to four beautiful children). She floated on a cloud up to my table and I gulped. “Bon soir, my name is Valérie. How was your dinner? Did you see your little friend?”
[CORSICA, FRANCE] — You know when you’re in a rental car in a foreign land and you’re on a steep impossible skinny one lane road with dropoffs of hundreds of feet and wondering “what the hell am going to do if another car comes the other way???” I was in exactly in that situation, on a steep rocky road, barely wider than my car, pointing downdowndown on my way to the a sleepy fishing village I was told was a gem. The crazy road was a bunch of zig-zags all the way down to the sea, each turn more precarious than the last. My clutch skills failing on the steep hill, killing the car as I rounded the tightest bends. When you’re traveling with someone else, you kinda
[CORSICA, FRANCE] — “Emmm, Monsieur Dan, please be careful. The water is deep enough, but there ees a big rock down there. So you must jump out from the cliff to not hit it, but not too far. Or you will hit the beeg rock.“ That was my super-cute young French guide, shouting above the roar. I was canyoning in Corsica for the first time. We were standing on top of a huge stack of elephant rocks, a swift stream was zooming under our feet, funneled into a torrent off the edge of this cliff, crashing twenty feet five below. We were high, high up in the raspy mean mountains of inner Corsica, a lush island in the middle of the Mediterranean, that thrusts out of the
[CORSICA, FRANCE] — Smack in the middle of the deep blue Mediterranean Sea are two big islands, Sardinia and Corsica. Almost like twins, ripped apart, both jut out of the sea like breaching whales, with huge mountains in the middle and some of the best beaches in all of Europe ringing their rocking shores. Corsica, known as Corse in French, is a magical adventure land, with an infinite amount of sporty things to do. Hiking. Climbing. Canyoning. Snorkeling. Sailing. Boating. Or just sit on the beach. The middle is spiked with enormous shark-toothed mountains, some as high as the Alps, often dotted with snow year-round. Corsica is only 200km long, but with a wild spread of geography that would rival entire countries 100x its size.
[GÈDRE, FRANCE] — I always wanted to go on some great hikes in the French Pyrénées, but I could never figure out where. As I finally figured out after all these years, the Pyrénées aren’t just a single group of mountains, but a bunch of groups of Pyrénées spread all along the French/Spanish border. So when you think, as I stupidly did, “Oh I’ll just go hike in the Pyrénées” you’re instantly in over your head when you finally try to Google it and figure out where to go. There’s the Pyrénées-Orientales in French Catalonia (which I wrote briefly about in another earlier post), the Pyrénées-Atlantiques in Basque country near San Sebastian, the Midi-Pyrénées in Languedoc-Roussillion, the Haute-Pyrénées and several other sub-parts. And then there’s the complementary Spanish Pyrénées on the very other
[PRAGUE] — This is going to be a pretty easy post for you, more of a postcard travelogue. I think I am the last guy to visit Prague, but I slapped it on to an over-Christmas trip to Brussels just to see what it’s like and have some beer. Pretty city. Too many tourists for me. Granted, it was a holiday, but I feel sorry that it was so overrun. But it definitely is a beautiful city. These are the best things I’ve found to do over a winter weekend in Prague. Especially during a Christmas holiday weekend in Prague. Click to open the slideshow and follow along. There are other, better, already-done guides to Prague, a million of them. Just think of this post
[BRUSSELS] — Trying to do a Mileage Run at the end of the year to top off the tanks, I found a cheap flight to Brussels, perfectly timed between Christmas and New Years, back by the end of the year. Just a couple of days before flying on to Prague. These are the best things I found over a Christmas weekend in Brussels. It was Christmas in 2015. The sad massive terrorist attacks in Paris had just occurred the month before and I wanted to show my support but not letting those acts change our world. Plus, my hunch was right that the airfares and upgrades would be cheap with a lot of cancellations. I left on Christmas Day, went to Brussels, a day trip
[ANTWERPEN, BELGIUM] — So I was posting live pics of Brussels on my Instagram and someone who follows me shot back “You should go to Antwerp.” Hmmmm, never thought about going there. And this whole trip was a last-minute. “It’s a quick train ride and cooler, smaller and more artsy. Not boring like Brussels.” Really? “You should go to Antwerp.” my Instagram friend said. “It’s a quick train ride and cooler, smaller and more artsy. Not boring like Brussels.” I’d never even communicated with her before, but her IG name was intriguing enough, she’d been to amazing restaurants and hotels all over. “Yes, you should definitely go to Antwerp!” commented another person I’d never communicated with… a very stylish hotel owner in France (who just
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
[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