Rock tips

“Trust the grip,” my canyoning guide, Filipe Ferreira from Madeira Adventure Kingdom, tells me, more than once. Still, I step slowly. Rushing freshwater sluices past my extra-grippy boots and over smooth boulders, before plunging over a 40ft drop, which I’m expected to rappel down. I look back up the canyon in the direction we came from, but there’s no turning back.

When a traveler experiences a truly captivating beach getaway at a hotel or resort, it often compels them to return.

Over the centuries, the Indigenous Shinto religion and Buddhism, imported from India by way of China, gained prominence in Japan at different times. From the beginning, beliefs intermingled, creating what’s now called shinbutsu shugo. Then, from the end of the 19th century through the first half of the 20th, government policy sought to split the two in an effort to elevate Shinto.

If we adopted a child’s-eye view of the world, how would we choose to have fun? It’s likely to be about more than the usual incentives, such as an ice cream, suggests research from Nature Communications. According to the journal, children as young as four seek experiences that deliver positive results, guide action, answer questions about the world — and are just plain fun. Whether it’s getting up-close with crustaceans on a rockpooling adventure, diving into a good book at a literature festival, learning to surf, taking to the stage or gazing at the stars, these 12 UK-based experiences deliver hands-on learning and creativity. 

Kingsbarns Distillery is the brainchild of Scottish golf caddie Douglas Clement. As a long-time caddie at Kingsbarns Links in the East Neuk of Fife in Scotland, Clement was constantly entertaining wealthy golfers who visited from all over the world to play Golf at St Andrews. His clients always wanted to go to a distillery for whisky tasting during their visit but there was nothing nearby, so he began to form a plan.

“More people seem to have discovered Hāna,” explained the staff member of Hāna-Maui Resort in this eastern Maui town. “They used to go to Lahaina but lately they’ve been coming here.” Since the wildfire that destroyed the historic town in West Maui, tourism has been filtering back to the island even to West Maui after it reopened on November 1st. But this town: serene, remote, one of the few remaining vestiges of old Hawaii surrounded by swaths of stunning nature uninterrupted by large developments has become even more of a draw.

The year may be coming to a close, but the night sky has at least one more major treat in store: the Geminid meteor shower, which will peak tonight into tomorrow.

Christmas pudding may be Britain’s best-known festive dessert, but in France, the bûche de Noël — or yule log — reigns supreme, with skilled pâtissiers and home bakers creating an array of different versions, from the classic to the outré.

From soft knits to plaid PJs, one of these cosy gifts is perfect for the traveler in your life. Our pick of winter-warming accessories are perfect for those traveling to cooler destinations, to use in-transit or in-flight. In fact, these presents will not only keep them warm, but will also keep you close to their hearts.

New Year, new national park to check off your must-visit list? Mark your calendars: The park system just announced a half dozen “free days” for 2024 that are spread throughout the year, beginning with Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Jan. 15, 2024.

The ripples are deep gold in the sunset light as we paddle across Coniston Water towards Wild Cat Island. Officially known as Peel Island, this is where the children camp in Arthur Ransome’s Swallows and Amazons. The canoe glides between rocks into the hidden harbour with its pebbly beach, and we climb, excited as kids, up through bronze-leaved oaks and tall pines to explore the clifftop clearings.

No country has it all, but the Swiss are justified in feeling pretty smug about their lot.

Rockefeller Center has launched a vertigo-inducing experience recreating the famous 1932 photograph of construction workers eating lunch perched high above the city while working on 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

In the vibrant heart of the St. James Quarter, W Edinburgh encapsulates Scotland’s Capital City.

“It looks like Canada,” said Nate Disser, our guide, indicating the lofty, snow-cloaked peaks around us. Later that day, when our group of 10 had skied to another high-alpine basin where craggy rock monoliths jutted up from ridgelines, Mr. Disser noted a resemblance to the Italian Dolomites. Yet we were in the San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado, a spectacular place in its own right.

A fresh Atlantic breeze blows up the estuary and rustles through a thicket of young lime trees by the Treaty Stone, the rock that witnessed the end of the Williamite war in the autumn of 1691. Just ahead, a seven-arch limestone bridge spans the Shannon River as far as the thick barrel towers of King John’s Castle. To the right, Limerick City’s quays and avenues bustle with new bars, hotels and restaurants. It’s a scene that contrasts starkly with the damp, smoky cityscape depicted in Frank McCourt’s book Angela’s Ashes.

When humans first soared in the air, it was not aboard an airplane. It was in a hot air balloon, in 1783 — 120 years before the Wright brothers’ maiden flight. Since then, biplanes have evolved into jumbo jets, but the basic technology behind ballooning has hardly changed: cloth, basket, burner, ballast and ground crew.

There are only two peaks in the Alps higher than Mount Erciyes — Mont Blanc and the Dufourspitze — but I hadn’t heard of this mighty Anatolian mountain until I was presented with the opportunity to ski its slopes. At 3,917 metres, it only ranks as Turkey’s fifth-highest mountain, but the dormant volcano lends its name to the country’s largest ski resort and it offers a very different experience to skiing in the Alps.

I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t this. Pictures barely do it justice. I was passing through West Texas, having already visited the nearby White Sands, Carlsbad Caverns, and Guadalupe Mountains National Parks, and figured this would be the easiest time to visit Big Bend National Park. I’d heard from a fellow traveler that it was his favorite park, and he’d been to all of them. With that in mind, I purposely limited how much I’d see of the park before I arrived. I wanted to be surprised, and boy was I.

Of the key Alpine ski destinations, Italy offers the best value for money. Here, an espresso can cost €1.50 (£1.30) a shot, and a piste-side plate of pasta €10-15 (£9-13), items that are often 70-100% dearer in the A-list ski areas of France. And a peak-week, February half-term holiday in a three-star hotel can come in less than €1,745 (£1,500) per person half board, including flights and transfers. And that’s not taking some back-of-beyond resort as a point of comparison, either: all these prices are available in or around Canazei in Val di Fassa, part of the vast Dolomiti Superski area. On its doorstep, more than 300 miles of perfectly groomed pistes spin off the central Sella Ronda circuit; explore the area’s outer limits and that total hits 745 miles.

The line for croissants forms early outside Lannan Bakery in the Edinburgh neighborhood of Stockbridge, where the self-taught baker Darcie Maher has been whipping up intricate pastries since the end of July. The name Lannan comes from a Gaelic word meaning “house,” and Maher’s choice of baked goods is intentionally nostalgic. Staples include an apple-and-custard-filled croissant and a custard slice with pink sour cherry icing. “Growing up, we made a chocolate sponge with little crunchy flaked almonds for birthdays,” Maher says. “We’d pour ganache over the top and I thought it was the most amazing thing to see it drip down the side.” (The chocolate cake at Lannan is now made with buttermilk and rye.) Maher, who grew up in the Scottish Borders with an artist mother and a scientist father, appreciates the way baking fuses creativity and precision. It takes three days to produce all the laminated dough pastries in preparation for the bakery’s Thursday through Sunday open hours. After the pain Suisse or crème brûlée Danishes disappear, inevitably by around 9 a.m., out come the cakes (from fig leaf sponge to quince Bundt), jambon beurres and finally a few sliced-up Roman pizzas and oatmeal raisin cookies.