Where to Next?
Forty cities, each with an honest answer to the questions travelers actually ask: when to go, how long to stay, where to base yourself and what is worth your time.
Western & Northern Europe
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is a small, flat city of canals, brick gables and great museums, best explored by bike or on foot, and best enjoyed unhurried.
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is calm, cycling-mad and quietly stylish, with canal-side cafés, a serious food culture and a compact center you can cross on a bike in minutes.
Dublin
Dublin is compact, literary and sociable, with Georgian squares, old pubs and a long coastline close by. The conversation is half the attraction.
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is built on volcanic crags, with a medieval Old Town, a Georgian New Town and a castle that dominates both. It is easy to love on foot.
London
London is a city of villages stitched together by the Tube. Free national museums, huge parks and pubs on every corner make it easier to enjoy than it looks.
Paris
Paris rewards slow walking more than ticking off sights. Pick two or three museums, then spend the rest of your days crossing the river on foot.
Reykjavik
Reykjavik is a small, colorful capital that works best as a base for geysers, waterfalls and lava fields, with a thriving café and music scene in between.
Zurich
Zurich is a tidy lakeside city with a medieval old town, excellent public transport and the Alps on the horizon. Calm, clean and rather expensive.
Southern Europe
Athens
Athens is dusty, loud and endlessly interesting. The Acropolis is the headline, but the neighborhoods, the food and rooftop evenings make the stay.
Barcelona
Barcelona mixes Gaudí's imagination, a Gothic old town and a city beach, all on a late schedule that suits long dinners and slow mornings.
Dubrovnik
Dubrovnik's limestone old town sits inside medieval walls on the Adriatic. It is beautiful and busy, so go early, stay late and take a boat.
Florence
Florence packs the Renaissance into a compact, walkable center. It is perfect for art lovers, and a good base for Tuscany's hills and hill towns.
Istanbul
Istanbul straddles two continents, with Byzantine and Ottoman landmarks, ferries across the Bosphorus and a food scene that rewards every wrong turn.
Lisbon
Lisbon spills down seven hills to the Tagus, with tiled facades, yellow trams and viewpoints at every turn. Bring good shoes and an appetite for custard tarts.
Madrid
Madrid runs on a late clock. Three of the world's great art museums, tapas on every block and long evenings that begin after dinner time elsewhere.
Rome
Rome stacks three thousand years of history on top of a lively modern city. Walk, eat late and expect to stumble on ruins between the espresso stops.
Santorini
Santorini is a crescent of volcanic cliffs around a flooded caldera. The famous views come with crowds, so plan your time and choose your village carefully.
Venice
Venice is a city of canals and no cars, built on a lagoon. Get lost on purpose in the back streets, and leave the crowds to the main squares.
Central Europe
Berlin
Berlin is raw, spacious and history-heavy, a city still reinventing itself. Come for the museums and memorials and stay for the neighborhoods and late nights.
Budapest
Budapest is two cities on either bank of the Danube, joined by grand bridges. Thermal baths, ruin bars and imperial architecture make it a generous short break.
Prague
Prague's Gothic and Baroque center survived the twentieth century almost intact. Cross the Vltava, climb to the castle and leave time for a long beer.
Vienna
Vienna is a city of palaces, concert halls and coffeehouses, orderly and elegant. Its pace suits long mornings with newspapers, then a night at the opera.
Asia
Bali
Bali is a Hindu island of terraced rice fields, sea temples and surf beaches. Where you stay shapes the trip, so choose your bases with care.
Bangkok
Bangkok is loud, hot and brilliant. Gilded temples, river ferries, markets and some of the best street food in the world fill every day.
Kyoto
Kyoto was Japan's capital for over a thousand years. Its temples, gardens and wooden streets reward early starts, slow walking and a plan to avoid the crowds.
Singapore
Singapore is a clean, efficient city-state where Chinese, Malay, Indian and colonial influences meet. Eat at the hawker centers, and keep an umbrella handy.
Tokyo
Tokyo is enormous, orderly and endlessly varied. Quiet shrines sit beside neon crossings, and the trains run so well that even a huge city feels manageable.
North America
Banff
Banff is a mountain town in the Canadian Rockies, with turquoise lakes, glaciers and wildlife on its doorstep. Plan around the season, and start early.
Charleston
Charleston is a walkable port city of pastel houses, church steeples and live oaks. It moves slowly, eats well and suits a long weekend.
Nashville
Nashville is Music City, with honky-tonks, songwriters' rooms and hot chicken. Skip the bachelorette crowds for a week of real music and Southern food.
New Orleans
New Orleans eats, drinks and plays music like nowhere else in America. Come hungry, stay out late and look beyond Bourbon Street.
New York City
New York is five boroughs of neighborhoods, each with its own food and rhythm. Walk a lot, ride the subway and leave space for the unplanned.
San Francisco
San Francisco is compact, hilly and fogbound in summer. Pair the Golden Gate and cable cars with neighborhood food, Bay views and day trips to wine country.
Savannah
Savannah's grid of leafy squares, moss-draped oaks and Gothic Revival houses invites aimless wandering. It is gentle, atmospheric and surprisingly easy to cover.
Latin America
Cartagena
Cartagena's walled colonial center, with its colored balconies and plazas, sits on the Caribbean. Explore early, retreat from the midday heat and linger in the evening.
Cusco
Cusco was the Inca capital and sits at about 3,400 meters. Acclimatize, enjoy the stone streets and use the city as your gateway to Machu Picchu.
Mexico City
Mexico City is vast, high and endlessly interesting, with Aztec ruins under colonial plazas, major museums and some of the best food in the Americas.
Oaxaca
Oaxaca is a compact colonial city in the mountains, with indigenous roots, markets, mezcal and a cuisine that many Mexicans consider the country's best.
Africa
Cape Town
Cape Town sits between Table Mountain and two oceans. Few cities pair a good food and wine scene with such dramatic scenery within a short drive.
Marrakech
Marrakech is a walled red city of souks, riads and palaces, with the Atlas Mountains on the horizon. Sensory overload is the point, and a quiet courtyard is never far.
Amsterdam, Athens, Bali, Banff, Bangkok, Barcelona, Berlin, Budapest, Cape Town, Cartagena, Charleston, Copenhagen, Cusco, Dublin, Dubrovnik, Edinburgh, Florence, Istanbul, Kyoto, Lisbon, London, Madrid, Marrakech, Mexico City, Nashville, New Orleans, New York City, Oaxaca, Paris, Prague, Reykjavik, Rome, San Francisco, Santorini, Savannah, Singapore, Tokyo, Venice, Vienna, Zurich
Not on the List? Plan It Anyway.
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