The Sunday Travel Section
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Snowflakes tumbled lazily in the light of the train as it inched toward the Jasper rail station, where half a dozen elk foraged.
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Alan Bernholtz grew up in the San Fernando Valley and surfed off Malibu.
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At Lake Tahoe’s Squaw Valley Alpine Meadows, it’s not location, location, location, it’s terrain, terrain and more terrain: a combined 6,000 acres of some of the most dependably snowy, scare-yourself-silly inbound skiing and snowboarding among U.S. destination resorts.
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Whoever said “The more things change, the more they stay the same” was not a traveler, based on what you’ll see in 2018.
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The snow was so deep in Crested Butte, Colo., in January when I arrived for a multisport excursion that some of the town’s one-story houses were nearly buried.
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The first time I skied Aspen was in 1974, when I was a junior at the University of Colorado.
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I was killing time at LAX and wandered into the Qantas first-class lounge.
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Before I tell you about the Zhuilu Old Trail, I should confess that the day before I got there, I failed my first Taiwanese test of fortitude.
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With a loud crack, Coconut Joe deftly whacked a fresh green coconut with his machete, slipped a straw in the opening and handed it to me.
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Britain’s Big Ben fell silent in August for extensive repairs and won’t regularly bong again until 2021.
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To quote the band Chicago, “Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody really care?”
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Members of Plymouth’s First Congregational Church don’t bother looking at the clock just below the church steeple to see whether they’re on time for Sunday services.
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San Jose, long the Bay Area’s wayward child, has been transformed by the tech boom into a full-fledged, ultra-cool destination.
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Remember the old Palm Springs?
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A vacation requiring long treks leading to lots of people was not what we had planned.
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When we sisters-in-law (one in California, the other in Nevada) agreed to a midway Western weekend for the brothers, we should have known better.
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On Hawaii Island, you can have a first-class trip at coach prices.
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If you’re traveling to Maui, you may worry that your pockets need to be as deep as the water surrounding this popular island.
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Hawaii has certain allures, but low prices aren’t necessarily among them.
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We silenced our phones as we stood among remnants of an ancient Native American village, trying to imagine the daily activity 1,000 years ago on this remote mesa.
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“Turn right at the suit of armor and your chamber is at the top of the stairs,” the check-in clerk said.
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“You, sir, get down now.”
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We’ve all probably done it.
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In the Eastern Sierra near Bishop is a mountain route unofficially known as the highest motorable road in California.
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Wine lovers appreciate Saratoga’s laid-back sipping experience.
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On the morning of Aug. 12, my wife, Laurel, and I were in New York City’s Penn Station awaiting Amtrak’s Northeast Regional No. 141 to take us to Washington, D.C.
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It was a sun-dappled weekday morning and I was trundling east from Vancouver, Canada, on the SkyTrain transit line’s shiny new Evergreen Extension.
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Tens of thousands of cowboys descend on Pendleton, Ore., each September during Round-Up, the huge rodeo for which this town is best known.
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I love the West, its granite peaks, endless grasslands and twisting canyons, which sounds like the ultimate car trip.
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Tom and Renata Dorn transformed a dilapidated 1930s resort on the Mendocino coast into an enchanting B&B — but with a twist.
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When the moon blots out the sun during Monday’s total solar eclipse, 12 states in its path of totality, from Oregon to South Carolina, will be plunged into darkness for a few minutes.
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Carlsbad struck it rich with, of all things, water.
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I can still see it, a dirty snowdrift with cigarette butts and a mitten frozen into it.
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Angelenos tend to be evangelists for street food.
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Most cruise ship dining is done indoors, but you’ll find some wonderful opportunities for dining outdoors.
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This city is home to an astonishing array of food trucks and carts, indie coffee shops, brewpubs and world-class chefs.
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I’d heard whispers about Murphys, a speck of a village in the oak-studded Sierra foothills, a six-hour drive from Los Angeles.
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Canada’s Algoma region, a vast near-wilderness in Ontario, is so scenic that a heralded group of landscape painters visited repeatedly a century ago.
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The train had pulled out of London’s Victoria Station 20 minutes before, and Mitch, our cheery cockney waiter, was pouring a second glass of Champagne for my wife and me when a dignified gent in a tailcoat entered the dining car.
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Pinecrest offers an escape into the central Sierra Nevada, but with some modern-day comforts.
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Tea time on a drizzly London afternoon in March.
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The Black Canyon of the Gunnison was considered deep, dark and impenetrable not only by white settlers but also by Utes native to western Colorado.
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Who doesn’t love the grandeur of Sequoia’s redwood trees?
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I am sitting on the deck of a once-derelict building that is now the city’s trendiest microbrewery, watching the sun set over old smokestacks, the arches of early 20th century bridges and a river that once burned, and I am thinking that something intriguing is happening in Cleveland.
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When I called Olympia, Wash., home in the 1990s, I used to tell people I lived at the bottom of Puget Sound.
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When you’re in Paris, you’re visiting one of the most exciting and popular destinations in the world.
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Have some pie, spend time with wolves and hike in the wilderness near Julian. Did I mention the pie?
My housebound spouse was getting cranky; he clearly craved a breath of fresh mountain or desert air.
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Ready to go camping? Don’t start packing the car just yet.
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“You must see Quarai,” said the friend we were visiting in Albuquerque. “It’s a mystical place.”
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As my older daughter prepared last summer to take off for college, there was just one thing left to do: Kidnap her and take her someplace where there is little Wi-Fi, no boyfriend and no threat of exams.
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It was time to paint the second giraffe. “What color do you want him?”
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“Here. What do you think this is?”
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Less than an hour after stepping off the airplane in Livingstone, I had already witnessed elephants drinking from the mighty Zambezi River, watched baboons monkeying around on an ivory beach and stared down a bloat of hippos soaking on a sandbar.
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My husband and I have been visiting downtown Encinitas, Calif., for years, drawn by its laid-back vibe and mix of beach bohemian and new-age spirituality.
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Besalú may be the most interesting Spanish village you’ve never heard of.
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More than 20 years ago, I made my first visit to the Oregon coast as a quick side trip from a writers conference I was attending in Portland.
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Think “Catalina,” and you picture blue sea, beaches and rugged backcountry.
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Michael Vukadinovich traveled to Morocco with his wife, Christin, for 2½ weeks in May.
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Shopping for a deal on a cruise is a lot like shopping for a deal on a hotel room: You know there are great bargains out there, but you’re not sure how to find them.
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We can thank Velma Johnston, better known as “Wild Horse Annie,” for the thousands of mustangs that roam the high desert of northern Nevada.
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Easy ingredients for a frothy, frilly, lavender-infused weekend: Round up three girlfriends, a few purple shopping bags, a love of all things floral and head north to Washington state for the hugely popular Lavender Weekend in sunny Sequim, pronounced “Skwim.”
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“Little,” as locals call the Caribbean’s Little Cayman, is a diminutive chunk of porous limestone 110 miles south of Cuba with a human population of about 150.
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South-central Arizona is rugged and wild, with a rich history that includes soaring Sky Island mountain ranges and Spanish missions.
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Canadians are often stereotyped as unarmed Americans with universal healthcare who dress in heavy winter clothing.
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I lucked into a monster adventure off Canada’s Pacific Coast.
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Lenox, my first healer at Sunrise Springs Spa Resort in New Mexico, occasionally drooled and gnawed on my hand.
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Santa Maria is one of those cities I always drive past on my way up north.
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The 17-square-mile volcanic island of Ischia, a 90-minute ferry ride from Naples on Italy’s west coast, was a different world 60 years ago for Elena, the narrator of Elena Ferrante’s popular four-book series detailing the lifelong friendship of two women.
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I paced around Elvis Presley’s pink Cadillac, imagining him behind the wheel.
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“A day trip to the Salton Sea?” my family sputtered during our golf holiday in the desert.
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We are fascinated by fire.
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Graceful 80-foot-tall pine trees line the streets of tiny Lanai (Lah-na-ee) City.
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“We bend our knees to humble oneself,” my kumu, or hula teacher, said as the eight women swayed their hips.
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A bike trip requires planning, conditioning and organization, said Lisa McKinney, a spokeswoman for Missoula, Mont.
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In June, Mark Werksman and his wife, Leslie, bicycled with their adult children throughout Italy’s Tuscany for a week and loved the experience so much they signed up for a Canadian trip three months later.
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Those slacks you’re wearing? You can thank the bicycle for that: a timeline of milestones in cycling
Perhaps not since the invention of the wheel has another innovation — the pairing of two wheels — had such an impact on personal transportation, recreation and fun.
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You have a bike? Everyone has a bike. It might be dusty. Perhaps encrusted with spiderwebs.
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Some years ago, my father and I celebrated milestone birthdays with a wonderful six days of golf in Scotland.
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Not long ago I began looking for a place where I could spend a few months relaxing while spending very little money.
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Several weeks before I found myself uncomfortably close to the world’s largest shark, I told a few folks I would be going to Holbox.
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A foodie road trip to Tijuana?
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Inside a bar that sparkled like a delicate jewel box, New York mixologist Rael Petit whisked together a charcoal-colored cocktail that practically glowed against the backdrop of the 4,000 obsidian tiles that cover the walls.
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What a winter. What a wedding cake.
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Chris Moore watched in awe this winter as the snow piled up on his multiple trips to Bear Valley Mountain Resort in the central Sierra.
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At last, we can stop pretending.
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Spring flowers have had a tough go of it in the past few years.
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“It is the most spectacular thing you will ever see.
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A mighty darkness is about to descend upon the land, and sky watchers couldn’t be more thrilled.
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I’ve been a fan of the Liverpool Football Club fan since college, so I didn’t expect to be excited as I walked through the players’ tunnel at Old Trafford, holy ground for fans of rival Manchester United.
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Intrastate rivalries are everywhere: San Francisco versus Los Angeles, Dallas versus Houston, Portland versus any other city in Oregon.
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When Bruce Brown was shooting his iconic surfing film “The Endless Summer” in 1963, he hopped around the globe.
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Think you know Santa Barbara?
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Of course you come to Asheville to see the 8,000-acre Biltmore Estate, America’s version of Downton Abbey.
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Holi color festivals in the U.S. happen year-round, unlike those in India that tie the traditional Hindu celebration to the day after the full moon in March.
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There’s something oddly alluring about having strangers in a remote part of India walk up to you and smear your face ever so delicately with powdered paint.
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My wife and I love the desert.
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If you ask recent visitors to New Orleans to assess their dining experiences, the responses will undoubtedly fall in the range of “great” to “How much time do you have?”
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There may come a time when World War II ceases to be a source of fascination for millions of Americans, but for now, the subject matter continues to inspire historians, novelists, screenwriters — and everyone who is glued to the American Heroes Channel.
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The Chicago Cubs’ dramatic come-from-behind win to clinch the 2016 World Series electrified baseball fans, and the energy it generated promises to carry over to spring training for those who come to watch the Dodgers and Angels in Arizona’s Cactus League.
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Petaluma, Calif., once known as the “Egg Basket of the World,” has since softened its image as a hard-boiled agricultural town.
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No need to wait for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ and George Lucas’ movie museums to open in Los Angeles: Major cities in Australia, Europe and North America have their own such institutions, most offering a diverse selection of screenings and permanent and temporary exhibits.
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The occasion called for afternoon tea.
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As Southern California cedes to the Central Coast at the Gaviota Tunnel, most travelers stick to the 101.
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Perhaps that overwater bungalow is a bit out of reach.
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They say no man is an island, but I’ve found an exception to that rule: Just spend a few nights in the fantasy world known as an overwater bungalow and you’ll feel as though you’re adrift on your own private slice of paradise.
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Did Al Capone sleep here? Never mind: You can rest easy at Two Bunch Palms, a peaceful desert escape
In the Golden Age of Hollywood, Palm Springs was the desert playground for glamorous types who wished to see and be seen.
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My first trip to China 15 years ago came at a pivotal moment.
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I carved an S-curve of downhill graffiti on deep, virgin alpine powder, floating down amid spectacular snow-covered mountain ranges beneath a bluebird sky.
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We drove to Phoenix for a family wedding in early November and had most of two days free between evening events.
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Though sailings today are not the events they were in the heyday of transatlantic liners — bon voyage parties, streamers and waving crowds on the wharf — I try never to miss a cruise ship’s undocking as it heads out on a voyage.
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Looking for deals, new ships, indulgent experiences and some first-time-at-sea activities?
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The aroma of coffee drifted into my cabin along with the distant squawking of seagulls, but it was a gentle swaying that reminded me I was waking on a boat.
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No one would call the Aranui 5 a thing of beauty.
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On the 50-minute drive from Iceland’s Keflavik International Airport to downtown Reykjavik, the landscape switched from long, flat stretches of dirt to patches of grass studded with rocks.
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It all started with a movie supposedly shot in California — and culminated in a museum a continent away.
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If you’re a light sleeper, avail yourself of the earplugs on your bedside table at Los Poblanos Historic Inn & Organic Farm [4803 Rio Grande Blvd.
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In the shade of my thatch cabana classroom, I beamed as my children, ages 6 and 9, serenaded me.
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All the recent talk about the U.S. infrastructure got me thinking about the last time the federal government decided to rebuild America.
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While driving to Mammoth Lakes on U.S. 395 over the years, my family and I have visited the sobering Manzanar National Historic Site, clambered over the smoothish stones at (mostly dry) Fossil Falls, called out film locations in the Alabama Hills ( “ ‘Star Trek’!”
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Some people say the British drama “Downton Abbey” put tea on the front burner; others say it was Queen Elizabeth’s 90th birthday celebration.
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Winter’s chill quickly fades once visitors step inside the Pioneer Saloon in tiny Goodsprings, Nev.
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2017 is practically begging you to take a trip.
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Maybe this is the year you finally head north to Canada, which will be celebrating its 150th birthday all year.
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Port Townsend, Wash., was a bawdy seaport in the late 19th century, its saloons and bordellos packed with rowdy sailors whose ships docked here to clear customs before sailing into Puget Sound.
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If there is anything that deserves to be called awesome, it’s spectacular displays of holiday lights.
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Yes, it’s a tourist trap. Yes, I had to queue up in a long, steamy line to reach the bar.
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My brother-in-law bought a new fishing boat.
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At the top of the Sugar Bowl Ski Resort on Donner Pass, Alpine Skills International guide Jacob Swartz checked the avalanche beacons of his five clients.
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For several days during the 2002 Winter Olympics, Snowbasin Resort had its encounter with fame when it hosted the world’s fastest ski racers in the downhill, combined and Super G events.
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Visitors to this port city might be inclined to turn their attention to the sea and not to the mountains that surround it.
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Back in the day Northstar, a ski resort in the North Lake Tahoe area, was a country cousin to more hardcore Squaw Valley and Alpine Meadows.
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A winter wonderland has a lot of moving parts.
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When it snows, those who enjoy sliding on the white stuff race for them thar hills.
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Sometimes, sorrow and reverence only whisper.
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New hotels, hot restaurants, a singing superstar — Vegas proves again it just never sits still
New Year’s Eve may be a little less than a month away, but the Champagne corks are already popping in Las Vegas, ringing in new hotels, restaurants and attractions.
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Driving into the red rock mountains of Sedona, Ariz., always puts life into perspective for me.
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My daughter and I recently noshed our way through the Willamette Valley, a 150-mile-long, massively productive agricultural area in Oregon.
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Walt Disney Co. has planted its biggest flag with the opening of a third resort destination in Asia.
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As I rolled into Palm Springs on a recent visit, I had a fantasy about being part of its glory days as a playground for Old Hollywood royalty.
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When I heard there was an off-the-beaten path winemaking region in northern Baja California that travelers were comparing to early Napa Valley, I was skeptical.
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Hear the words “San Antonio” and you might flash on an image of the Alamo, the city’s best known building.
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Men’s history is easy to get at.
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San Juan Bautista has deep connections to its past that give it a settled feeling.
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WASHINGTON, D.C. — You’re worried about the next president. I’m here to change the subject.
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I saw many new, renewed and soon-to-open hotels in Washington, D.C., in September.
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Is the nation’s capital a great food city? Washington Post food critic Tom Sietsema thinks so.
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Summer has shifted to fall, and that means a road trip to the University of Oregon, dodging high-season crowds and high gas prices, partaking of the best weather of the year, getting in some golf and often a football game, bike riding and definitely quaffing local brews.
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I had just experienced nearly five weeks of serenity in Auroville, a homegrown spiritual community in India.
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Get your motor runnin’ / head out on the (Hops) Highway / lookin’ for the perfect beer / and whatever comes our way Apologies to Steppenwolf (millennials, ask the nearest baby boomer), but it’s hard not to get excited about taking to the road to sample San Diego County’s award-winning breweries.
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I’d never taken a tour on which the guide addressed the group as “my tribe,” but it felt perfectly natural aboard the Magic Bus, which calls itself a “trip” into San Francisco’s 1960s-era hippie counterculture.
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Pink rays from sunrise covered the rocky ruins of Okic castle on a peak outside Samobor and tinted the low-lying fog that snaked through valleys where cows grazed and grapes grew.
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There’s a first time for everything, I thought as I rolled into a Gas & Grass south of Colorado’s state capital, pulling up next to a pump.
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The clamor of trains and blaring whistles no longer disturb folks in Ely.
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Here’s how not to start a road trip.
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In national parks throughout the West, rangers and traffic engineers work long hours to nudge travelers out of their cars and onto trails — or at least onto shuttle buses and other less polluting alternatives.
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I cherish memories of my student days at UC Berkeley, an era when campus life flowed down Telegraph Avenue and into its colorful indie coffee houses.
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Call it nostalgia, or call it making do.
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There’s plenty to see and do in Los Angeles, but it comes at a cost--about $200 a night, according to the Statista website.
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Booking a flight to your vacation destination can be stressful, especially if you’ve never heard of some of the carriers you’re seeing.
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It’s a challenge: He likes to golf; I like to kayak.
