Swap browsing in California for Santa Cruz in Portugal
Sprawled on a towel, observing silhouetted surfers chasing the ocean-plunging carmine solar, I don’t must squint to think about I’m within the Golden State. However my sandy toes and salty hair are merchandise of the Atlantic, not the Pacific. And this Santa Cruz belongs to Portugal’s Costa de Prata, not California.
Mutual monikers should not the one parallels: this coast has 300 sunny days a 12 months, top-notch surf (after Malibu, close by Ericeira was the second place to be designated a World Browsing Reserve), and blond sands stretching in direction of wave-carved coastal bluffs and ocean arches.
On this former fishing village, simply an hour’s drive north-west of Lisbon, tranquillity flows just like the tides. A soul-healing clutch of low-slung, whitewashed streets waymarked by an out-of-place beachside crenellated turret – the only remnant of a palace plan thwarted by the 1929 Wall Road crash – it’s the form of delightfully textbook Portuguese place you come across serendipitously. And when you do, you received’t need to depart. Japanese poet Kazuo Dan visited in 1971 to have a “dialog between Heaven and Earth” – a chat he continued for 16 months.
Should you’re a surfer, you’ll immediately agree. If not, classes will depart you satisfied. Test-in at stylish Noah Surf House (room sleeping 4 from €320 B&B), full with an ocean-view infinity pool and skate park, and arranging all-age surf lessons is easy. Flawlessly renovated Villa Galega (doubles from €115 B&B) affords a extra homely escape.
Santa Cruz and surrounding Torres Vedras boasts 11 beaches certified as pollution-free – greater than some other Portuguese municipality. Tread the dune-crossing boardwalk to river-wrapped Praia Azul to flop on the best sweep.
Again on the town, beachside feasts don’t come higher than breezy Bronzear. Break up a steaming pot of arroz de peixe, a seafood-stacked rice stew, or take plump, signature crabs as your desk’s centrepiece throughout September’s Competition da Sapateira. California cravings? Noah’s grilled cheese and portobello burgers hit the spot. Pair with an area Touriga Nacional pink wine – a sturdy stand-in for a Cali Cab Sav – or slip away to the family-run vineyard Quinta da Almiara for a vine-hemmed, in situ tasting.
Evenings normally finish ringing the doorbell of Manel, the city’s oldest bar, for jazz-accompanied candlelit cocktails and Lisbon-brewed IPAs. Out entrance, an engraved stone shares Kazuo’s phrases considering chasing the setting solar to the top of the ocean – the haiku that Santa Cruz’s surfers now scrupulously honour.
Daniel James Clarke
Swap a cabin in New England for a mökki in Finland
Nearly two centuries after it was written, Walden; or, Life within the Woods, Henry David Thoreau’s e book in regards to the two years he spent residing in a self-built cabin on a lake in Massachusetts, nonetheless evokes generations of People to go looking for what he referred to as the “tonic of wildness”. It’s an American dream of simplicity and self-sufficiency that was additionally fantastically captured within the 1981 movie On Golden Pond, by which Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn fish, paddle and ponder life for one final summer time in Maine (although it was filmed in New Hampshire).
However North America doesn’t have a monopoly on this type of bucolic escape. The Nordic nations know all in regards to the enchantment of cabin life – and Finland, with 19 hours of daylight in midsummer and stylish wild landscapes, is an idyllic different.
Mökki, or Finnish summer time cottages, sit on lake shores or on rocks by the seashore and are sometimes handed down by means of households. With about 20% of Finns residing inside the Helsinki metropolitan space, these cabins are a sanctuary for spending time in nature: fishing and messing about on the water in summer time; snowboarding, ice-swimming and snowshoeing in winter. Many are off-grid, so a part of the ritual contains splitting wooden, gathering water, warming up within the wood-fired sauna … and letting your telephone battery die. You’re free to roam the coast or forage within the surrounding forest too – the Jokaisenoikeudet or “everyman’s rights” regulation offers everybody the liberty to wander and acquire wild meals.
You don’t must have mates or household with a mökki to remain in a single – there are an estimated 500,000 of them and solely a fifth of Finns personal one outright, so many can be found for these new to mökkielämä (Finnish cottage life). Lomarengas and Finland Cottage Rentals help you hire straight from house owners, whereas on Sviskär within the southern Åland archipelago you get a 28-hectare (69-acre) island all to your self – good for foraging, sea dipping and the “tonic of wildness”.
Sian Lewis
Swap the Appalachian Path for Europe’s even longer E1 path
In 1948, Earl Shaffer, a US second world warfare veteran, set off on an extended stroll. He had his ex-army rucksack and a few outdated boots, however no tent or cooker. His aim was to be the primary particular person to finish the two,200 miles of the Appalachian Path in a single steady yomp, a thru-hike because it got here to be recognized. When 67-year-old grandmother Emma Gatewood repeated the feat in 1955 (with even easier equipment), the Appalachian Path was on its strategy to changing into the world’s first long-distance movie star footpath.
Lately about 3,000 individuals try a thru-hike yearly (a couple of quarter of those succeed) however the expertise is now very completely different, with huts each six to eight miles, water stashes left by “path angels”, and well-established help logistics.
In Europe it may be more durable to seek out sustained remoteness, however the two,050-mile Scandinavian part of the E1 long-distance footpath is about as shut as you get.
This full 4,420-mile route had its origins in post-second-world-war rapprochement beliefs and was devised by a staff from the then European Ramblers Affiliation led by the British walker Arthur Howcroft (who died in 2023 aged 96). The trail begins at Norway’s North Cape and formally finishes in Palermo, however it’s in Scandinavia that it crosses the best quantity of wilderness.
The early levels are properly contained in the Arctic Circle and to not be underestimated, with navigation, river crossings and snowfields fixed challenges. Lengthy stretches are unmarked. There are some concessions to practicalities: each Norway and Sweden have wonderful programs of mountain huts.
When you attain Halmstad on the Swedish coast, you have got nearly one Appalachian Path’s value of strolling beneath your belt, however there is no such thing as a must cease: in E1 phrases you aren’t even midway. A ferry crosses to the Danish port of Grenaa, and the trail begins once more, persevering with throughout Germany and the Alps with a number of lengthy, robust days. Some nice levels then cross Tuscany and Umbria, however as soon as in southern Italy the trail, by all accounts, could be a bit sketchy and appears to fade away in Campania, although route-marking is enhancing.
After his failed try to finish the Appalachian Path, writer Bill Bryson described the advantages of long-distance trails succinctly: “For a short, proud interval I used to be slender and match. I gained a profound respect for wilderness and nature and the benign darkish energy of woods. I perceive now, in a manner I by no means did earlier than, the colossal scale of the world.”
Kevin Rushby
Swap New York for Berlin
Buzzy and culturally wealthy, with in depth museums and galleries, oodles of nightlife and live shows – from classical venues to techno golf equipment – lush inexperienced areas, family-friendly actions and hanging structure, New York and Berlin have loads in frequent. However as somebody who is aware of each cities properly, Berlin will get my vote.
Whereas NYC’s nightlife is various – and has bounced again since Rudy Giuliani’s ugly, harmful marketing campaign towards it within the Nineteen Nineties – it’s far more industrial than Berlin, whose underground digital scene, particularly techno, is edgier and extra experimental. From Berghain to Sisyphos, Berlin’s golf equipment additionally keep open longer (generally for days; it really is the town that by no means sleeps, at the very least on weekends). In addition they don’t are inclined to have costume codes – except you rely skimpy lingerie and kinky harnesses. VIP areas and even cell phone images are strictly verboten. Berliners can quaff beers brazenly on the streets, and bask in a little bit of public nookie at nightclubs – as distinct from official swinger or intercourse spots reminiscent of KitKat.
Berlin offers nice gastro, too, excelling at inexpensive, mid-range eating places that tick all of the pattern bins – small plates, pure wines, plant-based menus discovered at buzzy neighbourhood spots reminiscent of Kreuzberg’s vegan haven Happa, Neukölln’s La Côte and Sorrel, and Prenzlauer Berg’s Estelle. And whereas it doesn’t have a Chinatown or a Little Italy, you’ll find each nationwide delicacies on the planet (albeit with much less spice, to appease the delicate German palate).
NYC actually has improbable cultural big-hitters, from the Guggenheim and the Met to Moma and the American Museum of Pure Historical past, however Berlin has the Unesco-heritage Museum Island, Mies van der Rohe’s slickly modernist Neue Nationalgalerie and its personal pure historical past and German historical past museums. It additionally excels in uncommon venues that New York doesn’t have, such because the Hamburger Bahnhof, in a former railway station, the Boros Collection inside a second world warfare bunker, and Silent Green, an artwork and live performance area in a former crematorium.
As for inexperienced area, New York’s Central Park could also be one-and-a-half occasions the scale of the Tiergarten, however Berlin has vastly extra inexperienced leisure areas total, with about 2,500 inner-city parks and distinctive areas such because the sprawling Tempelhofer Feld, a former airport, and the huge Grunewald forest.
One last item: with a lot decrease inhabitants density and fewer vacationers (12.7 million individuals visited Berlin in 2024 versus the 64 million who went to New York), there’s extra room on the streets and fewer queues for the most important sights. Bis bald (see you quickly) … y’all.
Paul Sullivan
Swap the Grand Canyon for Montenegro’s Tara River Canyon
Let’s get one factor straight: dimension sensible, the Grand Canyon sprawls for 278 miles alongside the Colorado River, whereas the Tara River Canyon covers a mere 51. However what the Montenegrin canyon lacks in dimension it makes up for in depth: as Europe’s deepest gorge, it plunges 1,300 metres (4,300ft), solely 300 metres lower than the typical depth of the Grand Canyon (and simply over 500 metres lower than its deepest level).
As this Unesco world heritage website slices by means of northern Montenegro’s Durmitor nationwide park and ultimately slides throughout the border into Bosnia, it provides much more drama to this part of the Dinaric Alps’ forbidding mountains and glacial lakes.
For adventurers who like a problem, Tara means one factor: white-water rafting. The selection of excursions throughout the area is gigantic, however you may get a style of it in just a few hours by becoming a member of one of many journeys from the city of Žabljak, which in winter is one in all Montenegro’s ski centres. Ultimately, you’ll be rafting beneath the hovering concrete arches of the awe-inspiring Đurđevića Tara Bridge, whose magnificence is greatest admired from beneath.
There’s an entire mini trade arrange across the bridge, together with ziplining and stalls promoting souvenirs. As somebody on the reverse finish of the daredevilry scale – and because of rushing vehicles and a concrete path that’s barely a foot vast – I discovered it scary sufficient simply strolling on the bridge to absorb the admittedly extraordinary view.
However there are different methods of having fun with the great thing about Tara with out worrying about Montenegrin motorists. Not removed from Žabljak is the automobile park for the Ćurevac mountain peak and viewpoint, which is reached after a 40-minute hike and affords sweeping views of these magnificent gorges. It’s solely one in all scores of mountain climbing routes that wind above and alongside the river, a few of that are a part of the 1,200-mile Through Dinarica path that goes from Slovenia all the way in which to Albania.
Proper by the border with Bosnia and the confluence of the Tara and Piva rivers is one other assortment of rafting centres in addition to campsites providing mellower methods of exploring Tara. Boat journeys alongside gentler stretches of water provide the probability to swim in absurdly clear waters, lunch on natural food and drinks chilly beer brewed with spring water. And on this land of €3 pints, you’ll discover your euro going manner additional than your greenback ever would.
Keep at Green Top close to Žabljak, which has well-equipped one-bedroom self-catering wood chalets with gardens, barbecues and mountain views from £95 an evening.
Mary Novakovich
Swap the Mojave desert for Tabernas in Spain
When the Italian movie director Sergio Leone selected to shoot his westerns in Europe, there was just one place that would convincingly double for the American west – the Tabernas desert in south-east Spain. With its dry riverbeds snaking by means of arid mountains and sandstone canyons, it’s simple to think about your self in California’s Mojave desert.
Tabernas won’t have the Mojave’s well-known Joshua timber, however it’s dwelling to flora, fauna and a panorama harking back to the US desert. Prickly pears, large aloe and palm timber line the paths, whereas lizards scuttle amongst otherworldly rock formations and eagles soar within the huge sky.
Tourism remains to be low-key right here. For many years this barren a part of Andalucía was not on the radar of the Spanish vacationer board, and huge areas are monopolised by swathes of plastic greenhouses. However with a rising appreciation for Tabernas’ distinctive standing as Europe’s solely desert, in addition to the renaissance of Leone’s motion pictures, its charms are being re-evaluated. You’ll be able to take a guided horseback trip by means of the desert with the Malcaminos ranch and pitch your tent at Camping Fort Bravo (€45 an evening), one of many authentic film units nonetheless in use immediately. For somewhat extra consolation –and to stay out your California homesteading fantasy – you possibly can e book into one in all their western-styled log cabins (from €80).
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It’s a straightforward promote for me. Bewitched by cowboy lore as a teen, I rode throughout the American deserts looking for the legendary west (admittedly on a motorbike moderately than horseback), seduced by the romance of life on the path – billy cans boiling over campfires and a wide-open wilderness that promised a freedom unimaginable in fenced-off, old-world Europe.
Joshua Tree nationwide park within the Mojave desert grew to become my go-to vacation spot every time I discovered myself in California. However lately, I’ve been exploring Spain, scouting routes for the forthcoming Spaghetti Western Trail, and discovering the identical magic within the Desierto de Tabernas. The dimensions is after all smaller than the Mojave, however the silence, the stillness, the trace of sage on the nice and cozy air and the sense of exploration are as thrilling as my early US street journeys.
Leone was enthralled by American type and fable however all the time from a distance. “I can’t see the US some other manner than with a European’s eyes,” he stated. “It’s a rustic that fascinates me and terrifies me on the identical time.”
Should you really feel the identical manner proper now, however nonetheless yearn for a cowboy journey, you may do worse than comply with in his footsteps and head for Tabernas.
Lois Pryce
Swap Yellowstone for Carpathia in Romania
The jaw-dropping landscapes of the US’s 63 nationwide parks lure thousands and thousands of holiday makers to the good outdoor annually. Yellowstone, established in 1872, is the oldest of all of them – a sprawling 3,472 sq. miles of dazzling surroundings together with canyons and energetic geysers. Largely in Wyoming however stretching into Montana and Idaho, it’s dwelling to wildlife from grizzly bears and wolves to bison and antelope, and is crisscrossed by hundreds of miles of trails.
Though it might probably’t compete in dimension, the rugged, forested Făgăraș mountains in Romania provide an exhilarating style of the wild and thrilling wildlife-spotting alternatives nearer to dwelling. This space of Transylvania, on the southern fringe of the Carpathians, is among the many wildest locations in Europe, the place brown bear, wolves, lynx and – lately reintroduced – bison roam.
It’s the place the Foundation Conservation Carpathia is working to create the continent’s largest forest nationwide park, shopping for land for conservation and reforesting clear-cut areas on its mission to ascertain a 200,000-hectare wilderness reserve, which has been dubbed a “Yellowstone for Europe”.
As I hike by means of forests on steep zigzagging paths with my information Răzvan, the fun of the wild is actual – we see a viper and move contemporary bear prints. Gouge marks on a tree and overturned stones reveal the bear’s hunt for meals. I watch with bated breath as a bunch of bison wander on a hillside shut by – fortunately upwind of our scent.
We keep at Bunea cover, a wood shelter overlooking a lake, with bunks, a double bed room, a kitchen and large soundproofed home windows that take advantage of the views. As evening falls, I stare into the darkish as if glued to a film. One thing strikes within the half-light – and slowly a younger feminine brown bear wanders into view, sniffing the air, rubbing towards a tree. It’s not lengthy earlier than a big male seems, simply metres away from the cover. I’m mesmerised as I watch him pawing the bottom for meals earlier than sloping off into the woods.
In contrast to the huge lodges in Yellowstone, staying in these tiny cabins imply you’re near the motion, engulfed by the panorama. We hike increased to Comisu cover, at 1,600 metres, with sweeping views over the mountains as a storm rolls in. Owls name out within the moonlit evening as I drift off to sleep, dreaming about this vibrant wild world.
Jane Dunford
Go to Foundation Conservation Carpathia for extra data
Swap seafood in New England for Normandy and Brittany
For all our sniffiness about American delicacies, few individuals dispute the standard of the nation’s seafood. Though you possibly can not get a lobster roll at McDonald’s in New England, the fast-food joint is one in all the few locations within the area the place they’re not on the menu. Biking down the Atlantic coast final summer time as a part of analysis for a US travelogue, I rejoiced within the informal abundance on provide on the roadside – baskets of fried clams in Connecticut, oysters in Maine, crab benedict in Massachusetts … 3,000 miles and a world away from the grand silver fruits de mer platters of Europe.
You don’t should fly throughout an ocean to get your shellfish repair, nevertheless. Whereas you’re unlikely to seek out your self tempted by a lobster surf and turf burger in France, seafood can be surprisingly accessible for those who swerve Parisian bistros and go straight to the supply.
La Cale, in Blainville-sur-Mer on Normandy’s Cotentin peninsula, a straightforward drive (or a day’s cycle) from Cherbourg, is typiquement français for its satisfaction in native produce (oysters, whelks, clams and so forth, in addition to galettes and spit-roast meat), however moderately much less so in its informal feet-in-the-sand ethos and casual service. Remi, the proprietor, is described on-line as “eccentric” – his van is graffitied with the phrases “Rosbeefs welcome … frogs too”. Don’t move up the moules frites, or the teurgoule, a standard Normande spiced rice pudding.
Additional down the coast, in Brittany, I’ve earmarked Cancale, within the Bay of Mont Saint Michel, for a return go to, as a result of for those who ever wished proof that the French can let their hair down, look no additional than the individuals sitting on the ocean wall with paper platters of oysters and plastic cups of chilly sancerre. The oysters come from the seafront marché aux huîtres, which affords a bamboozling choice, all shucked to order, and the wine from an enterprising booze van parked close by. The shells, when you’ve completed, are thrown on to the seashore.
One step up, in that there’s desk service, however with no extra steps between sea and plate, is Maison Quintin, on the Atlantic coast close to Saint-Philibert, the place you possibly can feast on the household’s personal oysters beneath the pines because the solar units over the estuary, supplemented with skewers of plump prawns and langoustines, crab, grilled lobster, and their do-it-yourself seafood rillettes on toast. Reservations important – laid-back vibes assured.
Felicity Cloake
Peach Street to Lobster Lane: Coast to Coast in Search of Real American Cuisine by Felicity Cloake is published by Mudlark (£16.99)
Swap the Florida Everglades for Italy’s Marano Lagoon
It was on a sluggish journey by means of the in depth wetlands that border Italy’s Adriatic that I first stumbled on the little-known Laguna di Marano, a fastidiously preserved eco-paradise, barely touched by tourism. This gossamer internet of interlocking lagoons, canals and river deltas stretches from Venice all the way in which as much as Trieste. Native legend has it that Ernest Hemingway referred to as these wetlands and the adjoining sandy seashore resort of Lignano “piccola Florida”, as a result of it reminded him of the Everglades and the Florida Keys.
The US writer first got here to this a part of Italy as a volunteer on the finish of the primary world warfare. He returned within the Fifties to seek out inspiration for his e book Throughout the River and Into the Timber whereas duck searching and fishing on the Marano Lagoon – although for sea bream and mullet moderately than marlin, his favorite quarry within the waters round Florida.
On the bar of the country Trattoria Barcaneta within the bustling medieval port of Marano Lagunare, I order a glass of refosco dal peduncolo rosso, a rustic native pink wine favoured by the author. It is probably not as glamorous as sipping a Hemingway martini in a Key West cocktail bar, however it was the proper aperitivo earlier than tasting chef Claudio Moretti’s beautiful delicacies, a delicate carpaccio of sea bass and grilled eel from the close by Stella River delta, each freshly caught by the port’s many fishers.
Marano Lagunare is the proper base for exploring the encircling wetlands. The tourism office can organize actions from canoeing and kayaking to strolling and horse driving. Renting a small boat with a information is my selection, a retired pescatore (fisher) for the proper perception into native life on the water. Whereas the huge, open expanse of the lagoon is breathtaking, dotted alongside the sting of the water is one thing you’ll by no means see in Florida – conventional casoni thatched huts nonetheless used immediately by fishers.
The panorama adjustments dramatically as we enter the protected reserve of the Stella delta. Right here, the freshwater channels turn out to be narrower, bordered on each side by tall golden reeds – undoubtedly a really feel of the Everglades – as we catch glimpses of pink flamingos, purple herons, egrets, cormorants swooping down and a neat squadron of geese flying previous. It could be smaller than the Everglades (62 sq. miles versus 2,357), however the one factor really completely different from a Florida nature tour is that there is no such thing as a must look out for alligators.
John Brunton
Swap California’s Freeway 1 for Eire’s Wild Atlantic Method
My left foot shook on the clutch – not from tiredness, however from one thing resembling worry. Conor Cross had appeared like a good suggestion at breakfast. One in all Eire’s highest and narrowest mountain roads? Why not? The automobile appeared to drift because the street narrowed to a one-lane ledge between cliff and sky. No turning again now – only a sluggish crawl upwards with mist curling over the bonnet from the valley beneath.
Nonetheless, that is the surroundings the Wild Atlantic Method guarantees – and delivers. It’s a 1,600-mile coastal drive from Malin Head, the nation’s most northerly level, in County Donegal, to Kinsale in County Cork within the south-west – and Eire’s reply to California’s Freeway 1, the 656-mile Pacific Coast route that skirts sea bluffs, redwood groves and epic coastal views.
Large Sur’s iconic Bixby Bridge resembles the Mizen Head footbridge in West Cork. Freeway 1’s “million greenback view” is eclipsed by the Atlantic sweep from Slieve League, or the cliffs that tower above powder-white Keem seashore on Achill Island. Connemara’s Sky Road and the Burren’s Atlantic Drive echo Large Sur’s drama, winding between limestone and ocean. Nevertheless, my favorite stretch – the Dingle peninsula – is difficult to match. Its mountain-to-ocean setting is visible theatre dialled to max.
Inch beach, an extended curve of sand stretching three miles into Dingle Bay, is a mild introduction earlier than I turned north to hair-raising Conor Cross (non-compulsory and clearly marked) and descended into Dingle city.
The street then turns otherworldly alongside the Slea Head Drive with Ventry seashore’s three miles of bone-white sand good for barefoot strolling – considerably like Freeway 1’s well-known Moonstone seashore.
As I drove on I ended at each layby I may, as a result of there’s all the time one thing across the nook; a hidden cove or early Christian monument. At Coumeenoole beach, I stepped out on the headland and watched the surf pound the shore ferociously as if it was punishing it for some historical grievance.
After which got here Dunquin Pier – the lane zigzags down a steep slope like a spiral staircase that plunges into the ocean, which was sufficient of a purpose to ditch the automobile on the roadside and stroll down. That is the place the boats depart for the Blaskets, and it seems like the sting of the world.
Offshore, the Three Sisters – three jagged peaks rising from the ocean flooring – stay in focus, their silhouettes a reminder of the ocean stacks off Large Sur. About midway alongside the Slea Head Drive, the magnificent Blasket Centre delivers staggering island views.
Vic O’Sullivan
