Travel

Budapest is a popular docking point for luxury riverboats, and it’s no wonder given that the mighty Danube runs right through the city, Hungary’s capital. From our luxury Viking riverboat we could see Buda and Pest as we faced the Chain Bridge—the earliest bridge to join the two cities. Viking boats were in the majority, […]

I was in Sudbury, Ontario, for an event recently when a huge storm struck. Later I found out that it was probably part of the tornado that left a trail of destruction across some Ottawa areas on Sept. 28. The wind was so strong that tree branches were crashing to the ground and the rain […]

A passenger who was refused entry onto a flight because he was wearing shorts had to resort to an unorthodox solution. Jordan Bishop was traveling from Indonesia to Turkey on Oct 3. But when he got to front of the line at the gate at the airport in Jakarta, he was pulled aside by an […]

When hurricanes like Florence make landfall, the first things they hit often are barrier islands—thin ribbons of sand that line the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It’s hard to imagine how these narrow strips can withstand such forces, but in fact, many of them have buffered our shores for centuries. Barrier islands protect about 10 […]

KILIMANJARO, Tanzania—From a distance, Kilimanjaro looked like a Bundt cake with white icing drizzled haphazardly over the top, as if I could reach out and sneak a taste; after all, I’d come to devour it. The day we were to start our seven-day trek, we drove over two hours from our Arusha hotel to the […]

Hundreds of proud Bavarians wore their finest traditional clothes on Sept 23 for the annual Oktoberfest costume parade in Munich. Always held on the second day of the world’s largest beer festival, the parade is a chance for the locals to show off their best Bavarian costumes, or what’s known in German as tracht. As is the custom, […]

With an air of anticipation and excitement we landed in Moscow, the departure city for our “Waterways of the Tsars” Viking River Cruise. The warm spring temperatures, brilliant blue skies, and extended daylight hours of mid-June—referred to as White Nights—enhanced our first visit to the Russian capital. While most theorists agree that the name Moscow […]

According to a Booking.com survey, 57 percent of people pay attention to their appearance every day, but 39 percent care more about their physical appearance while on vacation than when at home. Travel also inspires bolder style choices; 35 percent of travelers say the outfits they wear on vacation are brighter and more colorful than […]

The city of Irvine was designed with conservation in mind. Some 16,000 acres of preserved natural habitats and wildlands offer wide open spaces, hiking trails, and bikeways for visitors to enjoy, while public parks and green spaces dot business complexes and residential areas. This year, the Trust of Public Land ranked Irvine’s open space and […]

Commentary During Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings, Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee repeatedly called for an FBI investigation of events surrounding Christine Blasey Ford’s claim that she was sexually assaulted by Judge Kavanaugh when they were both in high school. Kavanaugh has already been through six FBI background investigations, including one for his nomination […]

I had the good fortune to partake in one of those “trip-of-a-lifetime” expeditions right here in Canada. I flew to Churchill, Manitoba, and participated in a Tundra Buggy Adventure Tour with Frontiers North tour company. Churchill is located on the south shore of Hudson Bay and it’s here, in what’s known as the “Polar Bear […]

Germany's Cannstatter Volkfest is the second largest beer festival in the world after Oktoberfest, with 4 million annual visitors.

My wife and I live in Hong Kong, but usually take two short breaks each year in Taiwan. The main purpose of these are to see performances by Shen Yun Performing Arts Company. We go in February or March, is to see the Shen Yun impressive stage show and then again in September is to […]

I decided it was time to go to Rwanda. What roused me was the splashy “Visit Rwanda” ad campaign that Britain’s Arsenal Football Club players have been displaying on their uniform sleeves, and the uplifting Kwita Izina baby mountain gorilla-naming ceremony held annually in September. “May I offer you a drink?” the hotel manager asked, […]

Visitors to Jamaica may not be aware that this island just south of Cuba is the third-most populous anglophone country in the Americas, after the United States and Canada. The high volume of tourists to Jamaica is of course great for the island’s economy, but anyone staying more than a day should look beyond the […]

More than 12 miles of pavement on sections of 20 roads in unincorporated Marin County will be repaired with a protective sealant starting at the end of September. The $1.3 million project by the county’s Department of Public Works will repair pavement that shows signs of cracking and weathering in the Bel Marin Keys, Ignacio, […]

The final port of call on our Viking river cruise “The Waterways of the Tsars” was St. Petersburg, a truly fitting ending in the city that Tsar Peter I (Peter the Great) designed as his imperial capital. Peter wanted to make a statement that Russia was leaving its isolation and taking its place on the […]

Travel blogger Shelley Tonkin captured extraordinary drone video of Western Australia’s Hutt Lagoon in August, showcasing the vivid, bubblegum-pink waters of the salt lake. Located near Port Gregory, the lagoon is popular for tourists travelling along the Western Australian coast between July and September to see beautiful wildflowers in full bloom. The lake gets its […]

ABOARD THE VICTORY CHIMES, Maine—The crew refused to eat lobster. It wasn’t so much mutiny as a surfeit of a good thing. No matter that the lobsters had been freshly caught that morning, steamed in seawater to a bright scarlet, and were now dripping with butter and juices, served with corn on the cob on the side. […]

Some three weeks before Oktoberfest kicks off in Munich, organizers presented this year’s official mug on Aug. 30, saying the price for one liter (33 fluid ounces) will go up. A lederhosen-clad brass band accompanied the official presentation on the sidelines of the Wiesn festival grounds where workers were busy putting up tents for the […]