Love to travel to the most posh places? A new analysis from travel experts at the blog OptimosTravel ranks Aspen—a mountain town in Colorado—the most expensive U.S. vacation destination.
11.04.2024 - 10:11 / forbes.com
Astro-tourism is one of 2024's biggest travel trends, but with so many of the best stargazing places in the U.S. in the nation's west, a road trip is the easiest way to visit them.
Timing is everything. One of the most important factors to remember when planning your stargazing trip is the moon's phase. Do not arrive at a dark place in the week before the full moon, and expect to see any stars. The night skies are by far the darkest in the week before a new moon and for about four evenings after, giving you a two-week window for a fabulously dark vacation. You can check the moon phase here.
Camping World recently analyzed online search activity around over 50 stargazing locations in the U.S. to identify the top 15 most popular. It's a good list, but it could be a better list. In fact, for almost all of them, there's a darker alternative nearby that will help you see more stars—mainly because there will be fewer people—and where it will likely be more accessible to book a campground. You could easily argue that famous places are the ones to stay away from, for wherever there are people, there is light.
So here's the top five—and an alternative suggestion.
Google searches per month: 368,000
Official website/Dark Sky Park
Suggested alternative: Lost Trail National Wildlife Refuge (Dark Sky Park)
Google searches per month: 246,000
Official website
Suggested alternative: Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument (Dark Sky Sanctuary)
Google searches per month: 201,000
Official website / Dark Sky Park
Suggested alternative: Big Bend Ranch State Park (Dark Sky Sanctuary)
Google searches per month: 201,000
Official website
Suggested alternative: Curecanti National Recreation Area (Dark Sky Park)
Google searches per month: 165,500
Official website/Dark Sky Park
Suggested alternative: Dead Horse Point State Park (Dark Sky Park)
The best way to go stargazing in any U.S. national park is to go camping or RVing—but book as soon as you can because campgrounds get booked up months in advance. Some of them have hotels and lodges, but by their very nature, they're light-polluting and almost always away from the darkest skies.
Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.
Love to travel to the most posh places? A new analysis from travel experts at the blog OptimosTravel ranks Aspen—a mountain town in Colorado—the most expensive U.S. vacation destination.
As a travel writer, one of my greatest loves is experiencing a new country, region, or city with my son. But one place has always been our favorite: London.
Celebrating Mom this Mother’s Day is an opportunity to show how much people love and appreciate her. Gift ideas abound from flowers and chocolate to jewelry and clothes. But, what if you could give the gift of memories with her? Even if time is limited, there are lots of creative hotel packages for entertaining weekend getaways to celebrate with her or for her to enjoy on her own or with friends. These are some of the limited-time deals available for Mother’s Day this season.
From Maine to Florida, the East Coast is home to some beautiful stretches of coastline, amazing views, and of course, remarkable beach towns. Whether you're looking for a summer hotspot full of excitement and entertainment and brimming with crowds, or want to escape to a quieter small town this season, the shores on the East Coast have a little something for everyone. From charming, historic New England towns to tropical Southern getaways, there is so much to explore this summer.
The stone arches looped solemnly over their shadows, some teetering above the grass, some sinking into it. It was a dazzling January morning, and I was standing in the Park of the Aqueducts, about 20 minutes by metro from central Rome. Here, the ruined arcades of six of the 11 aqueducts that once supplied the Eternal City with an astonishing volume of water — by some counts double the per capita water allotment of a typical 21st-century American city — have been preserved.
It’s inevitable: Every spring when we pull together the Hot List, our annual collection of the world’s best new hotels, restaurants, and cruise ships, a staffer remarks that this latest iteration has got to be the best one ever. After a year’s worth of traveling the globe—to stay the night at a converted farmhouse in the middle of an olive grove outside Marrakech, or sail aboard a beloved cruise line’s inaugural Antarctic voyage—it’s easy to see why we get attached. But this year’s Hot List, our 28th edition, might really be the best one ever. It’s certainly our most diverse, featuring not only a hotel suite that was once Winston Churchill’s office, but also the world’s largest cruise ship and restaurants from Cape Town to Bali. We were surprised and inspired by this year’s honorees, and we know you will be too. These are the Hot List hotel winners for 2024.
In a landscape sparsely populated with people but covered in spruce forests, taiga, tundra and lakes, a singular physical force reigns supreme – the 20,310ft imposing elevation of Denali, the mountain that dominates its eponymous national park in Alaska.
Although many people think of Oregon as one big forest — or equate the Pacific Northwest with Portland, its unabashedly weirdest and biggest city — this massive state offers so much more.
There are as few as 3900 tigers left in the wild. Here’s where and how to spot one of them.
The shimmering beauty of Lake Tahoe makes travelers stop and stare.
With spring in the air and summer to follow, New York offers one of the world’s most interesting restaurant sites: rooftop dining.
For big adventures this year, consider expedition cruising to discover engaging and enlivening destinations across the globe. Wilderness Travel has a curated line-up for 2024—2025, which includes tours to the world’s last frontier—Antarctica; journeys to the far north in the Arctic; exclusive once-a-year odyssey cruises to multiple locales around the planet like the coast of West Africa, northern Europe, and Asia; and dynamic river cruises on the planet’s most well-loved rivers—the Danube, Mekong, Amazon, Magdalena, and Rhine. Keep reading to plan out your next voyage.