Travel experienced a boom in 2023, with visitor numbers in many hotspot destinations returning to pre-pandemic levels.
09.02.2024 - 15:53 / forbes.com
Tech is invaluable for travel directions, reviews and reservations, but it can also help us better navigate and connect with the spaces we move through in niche ways. That might mean finding the quietest cities, small titbits of interesting local history, or songs and books that were written about the areas we're passing through—all of which help to enrich our travel experience.
Anyone who has ever wondered why something is the way it is when they're exploring a place, and then turned to their phone to look it up, might love NearbyWiki. You can either search for a place or geolocalize, and you'll access all the Wikipedia entries that are listed for that location—offering a more historically in-depth way of moving through the streets you explore.
For travelers looking for food-related information, pantryandlarder do various maps of food costs and spots across the planet. Take the map of the cost of a Big Mac across the U.S.—a Big Mac is cheapest in Stigler, Oklahoma ($3.49) and most expensive in Lee, Massachusetts ($8.09). Better yet, travelers could do worse than checking out the interactive food hygiene map showing failing food establishments across the U.K. or the map of pint inflation across the country.
There is practical advice to be had on noise pollution by earth.fm who have curated this guide to the ‘noisiest’ cities across the U.S., U.K., and mainland Europe, including the places within them to escape the hustle and bustle of city life.
If you're in the U.S. and you want to pair your journey with stories of the places you're traveling through, try the Autio listening app which has over 11,000 stories paired to local neighborhoods and people. If reading books are more your thing, Destination Reads or TripFiction will help you find novels set in the places you're going, as will this tool, Books Around America, developed by Crossword Solver using Goodreads data, helping pair traveling book lovers with U.S. geography.
We associate lots of places we travel to by the music we hear and sometimes it's the songs we have in our heads that inspire us to visit. The Beatles put Penny Lane on the map and Camila Cabello's Havana and Duran Duran's Rio, help cement these places into our brains as we sing the chorus on loop.
Most people are familiar with Spotify Wrapped, which sends users their most played songs at the end of every year, but there is also a global list of Spotify Wrapped that analysed all Spotify users in 2023, meaning that you can click on anywhere in the globe that you're traveling through and see what the most listened to song was last year in that place—it's another way of engaging with the local culture. In France, for instance, the most streamed song was Bolide Allemand by SDM, in
Travel experienced a boom in 2023, with visitor numbers in many hotspot destinations returning to pre-pandemic levels.
Though her work on Saturday Night Live keeps her tethered to New York City, comedian Chloe Fineman can most often be found criss-crossing the country to film in Los Angeles or back to the Bay Area, where she grew up. Recently, for her campaign with Nütrl Vodka Seltzer, she got to see a new place: Mexico City. “First of all, my brain still can’t understand how it’s a three-hour flight from LA [and five hours from New York], so I could meet all my friends in the middle,” she says. “And it was the most beautiful city. We saw luchadores wrestling, and the food was unbelievable. Some of the best meals in my life were in Mexico City!”
Holland America Line is charting a course for adventure with its 2026 Grand World Voyage—one of its most ambitious ever, promising an unparalleled travel experience for adventurers eager to explore the entire globe. The company’s president, Gus Antorcha, announced the details of this epic voyage to guests sailing the current 2024 Grand World Voyage aboard Zuiderdam, which is presently positioned between Okinawa and Tokyo.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jaclyn Sienna India, the founder of the luxury travel concierge Sienna Charles . The following has been edited for length and clarity.
Strikes are a regular occurrence in Europe, as employees withhold their labour to fight for better pay and conditions.
Last year, my parents took their first-ever group tour to France, Belgium, and the Netherlands. You know, those tours where you share a coach bus with 30 strangers for a week, stop at popular tourist draws, stay in pre-arranged hotels, and go on guided city walks with bright orange audio boxes that might as well be “look at me, I’m a tourist” placards. I tried to dissuade them, offering to plan their entire Eurotrip myself, but they ultimately opted for the tour’s convenience and relative all-inclusiveness. Now they’re absolutely hooked, with two more tours under their belt this year.
Geneva sits on the southern shores of Lac Léman in French-speaking Switzerland. The city is cradled by the Alps and Jura ranges with the tip of Mont Blanc is visible on a clear day. Not just the domain of bankers and diplomats, Geneva’s whimsical Vieille Ville is a hilly tangle of medieval plazas and monuments. The International Museum of the Red Cross is a sobering look into the latest humanitarian efforts. Directly on the lakeside, the Bains des Pâquis offer seasonal bathing (and winter saunas). These magnifique Airbnbs in Geneva, Switzerland, put you close to the lake and Place du Bourg-de-Four.
Holland America is going big with its latest around-the-world cruise.
For travelers with a love of history, there’s something truly special about staying in historic neighborhoods and preserved town centers surrounded by iconic monuments and story-filled city streets. A hotel redolent with the whispers of centuries past can be the ideal addition to an immersive journey, offering not just a place to rest, but a living testament to the captivating historic narratives of the region. From restored convents and department stores, to festival hot spots and hideaways for the elite, check out 6 incredible heritage hotels from around the world that are ideal for a March break getaway.
Before the pandemic, I was living in the United States, drifting through an endless stream of first dates. Either I'd ghost them, or they'd ghost me, and even if neither of us ended up ghosting, I still never felt excited enough to go on a second date.
Altree Developments, a Toronto-based, multi-generational, full-service development company is set to redefine luxury living in St. Maarten and today announces they have launched sales at their newest development, Vie L’Ven (life to life), a luxury resort and residences with 280 units, that is slated for completion in 2028. “Vie L’Ven seamlessly coalesces the influences of both French and Dutch cultures which are truly represented in this incomparable development through exceptional living, dining and wellness experiences,” says Zev Mandelbaum, founder of Altree. “Serving as a love letter to St. Maarten, Vie L’Ven encourages homeowners and guests to embrace living life to the fullest, while soaking in the island’s natural beauty and tranquility, where European culture blends effortlessly with Caribbean aptitude.”
The pastel-painted villages and cliffs terraced with lemon groves of Italy’s Amalfi Coast attract some five million tourists a year.