Columns

Many travelers tramp through Europe like they’re visiting the cultural zoo. “Ooh, that guy in lederhosen yodeled! Excuse me, could you do that again so I can take a picture?”

When I’m in Europe, I become the best German or Spaniard or Italian I can be. I consume wine in France, beer in Germany and small breakfasts in Italy. While I never drink tea at home, after a long day of sightseeing in England “a spot of tea” really does feel right. So on your...

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by Julie Skurdenis (Second of three parts)

The following describes the middle part of an odyssey that began in Sidi Bou Said, a suburb of Tunis, capital of Tunisia, and at the nearby archaeological site of Carthage.

During the first seven days of our 22-night private guided trip, my husband, Paul, and I visited seven archaeological sites (three of them UNESCO World Heritage Sites) plus the picture-postcard village of Sidi Bou Said, overlooking the Gulf of Tunis; the world-...

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Dear Globetrotter:

Welcome to the 413th issue of your monthly overseas travel magazine.

Wondering if continuing ash clouds from the volcano in Iceland will affect a flight of yours in Europe? Charts predicting the locations of ash clouds up to five days in advance can be found on the website of the UK’s National Weather Service, Met Office. On the maps of Europe shown, the projected ash cloud overlays are updated every six hours.

In fact, ash clouds from volcanoes...

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by Yvonne Michie Horn

San Miguel de Allende was just another sleepy, colonial backwater in Mexico until the 1950s, when it was discovered by creative and artistic souls. Slowly and then more quickly it became an expatriate darling until it stretched far beyond its quaint, cobbled streets and lovely old buildings.

Gated communities — largely American and Canadian inhabited — had gradually taken over six of the seven canyons surrounding the town’s historic center. In 1989, the...

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by Julie Skurdenis (First of three parts)

This was not my first trip to Tunisia. I had visited the country twice before years ago, but both trips had been brief additions to other trips. I had waited a long time for the opportunity to revisit this relatively small North African country wedged between two much larger neighbors, Algeria and Libya. I also wanted to share Tunisia with my husband, Paul, who had never visited before.

We carved out the time from our schedules,...

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Classic autos compete for attention with the Gran Teatro de la Habana on the Paseo del Prado. Photo: Keck

by Randy Keck (Part three of three parts on Cuba. Part one, in the May 2010 issue, thoroughly explored the legal considerations for Americans considering traveling to Cuba.)

On the morning of day seven of my January ’10 tour of Cuba, our ElderTreks group of 16 visited the Cienfuegos Botanical Gardens for a highly informative guided walking excursion that featured many varieties of exotic palms.

Colorful Trinidad entertains

We continued on to the colorful city of...

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Dear Globetrotter:

Welcome to the 412th issue of your monthly overseas travel magazine, the one you help write.

Not to discourage your traveling to any particular place but to better inform you so you can travel more safely, I am sharing here some of the more eye-catching items in the world of travel news.

Honduras, a country of 7.7 million, has one of the highest homicide rates in the world, with over 5,000 murders in 2009 and averaging more than 4,000 per year since...

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by Sandra Scott

Our cooking class in Prague in October ’09 had some interesting connections.

While staying at the Radisson Blu in Dubrovnik, Croatia, my husband, John, and I inquired about their cooking classes. The hotel in Dubrovnik was not offering classes during the time of our visit, but they said their hotel in Prague, Czech Republic, the Radisson Blu Alcron Hotel, offered cooking classes year-round. They arranged an informal cooking class for us.

Even though we...

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