Travel
Discover facts about travel. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Travel
Oaxaca has a market corridor devoted to smoke and meat
At the Pasillo de Humo in Oaxaca's Mercado 20 de Noviembre, shoppers choose meat such as tasajo or chorizo and have it grilled over charcoal nearby. The smoke…
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Chile's Atacama can briefly trade desert for flowers
Unusually favorable rainfall can trigger the desierto florido, when seeds and bulbs respond with mass blooms. The display is episodic rather than a guaranteed…
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Shetland builds a Viking-style galley to set it on fire
At Lerwick's Up Helly Aa, a torchlit procession ends with participants throwing torches into a specially built galley. Months of preparation produce a…
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In this Mexican town, weaving is the local economy
In Teotitlán del Valle, families have passed down Zapotec weaving techniques for generations, using hand-spun wool and natural dyes made from crushed…
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Spend the night in a tea plucker’s home above Darjeeling
Guests stay in tea pluckers’ homes, share family meals and learn to pick the precise “two leaves and a bud.” They can also wake to views of the Himalayas.
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George Town in Penang features welded iron caricatures and interactive mural installations
Its UNESCO-listed streets double as an open-air gallery: wrought-iron caricatures recount local history, while Ernest Zacharevic’s murals let visitors pose…
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The Matterhorn resort that keeps private cars out
Zermatt restricts ordinary private cars, so visitors generally leave them in Täsch and continue by train. Electric vehicles handle much of the traffic inside…
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The freighter that brings supplies—and tourists—to the Marquesas
The Aranui 5 carries cement, sugar, and pickup trucks to the remote Marquesas while taking passengers ashore to see volcanic peaks and ancient tiki statues.
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The Croatian resort where war-ravaged hotels meet the sea
The hotels were once a resort for Yugoslav military elites, including Josip Broz Tito, before the 1991 Croatian War of Independence left them in ruins. Today,…
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The train ride where the sun never sets
The Nordland Railway crosses the Arctic Circle in summer, where the midnight sun keeps daylight going through the night. The journey takes about 10 hours.
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A railway tunnel traded trains for glowworms
The old Helensburgh station in Australia closed in 1915 when the railway was duplicated and rerouted. Its abandoned Metropolitan Tunnel later became known for…
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Traversing swaying suspended rope bridges above the massive Danum Valley rainforest canopy
The walkway hangs about 130 feet above the ground and is bolted to towering dipterocarp trees in a 130-million-year-old primary rainforest. Hikers may spot…
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Japan's sleeper train offers a bed without a bedroom
The Sunrise Seto and Izumo include nobi nobi spaces where passengers lie on raised, carpeted platforms with partial dividers. They trade a private compartment…
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This hotel's winter rooms return to the river
At Sweden's Icehotel, artists build a new seasonal hotel from ice and snow, then spring melts it away. Guests sleep inside rooms whose architecture has an…
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The floating islands that need constant repairs
The Uros build their floating islands from totora reeds, but the reeds rot from below in the cold Andean water. Residents keep the islands afloat by layering…
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The post office at the end of the world
Near Ushuaia, a small waterfront post office on the Beagle Channel offers a tangible souvenir of reaching the far south: a postmark. A card sent from here…
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The desert beauty contest judged by Wodaabe women
Men paint their faces, roll their eyes, and dance for hours while women judge the performances.
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Pilgrims carry stones across Spain just to leave them at a cross
At Cruz de Ferro on the Camino Francés, travelers add a stone to the mound beneath an iron cross. Many bring it from home to represent a burden they want to…
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You can eat haggis on the train to the Scottish Highlands
The overnight train from London’s Euston station serves traditional haggis and peaty Laphroaig in its club car as it heads toward the Scottish Highlands.
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Chinguetti's manuscript libraries face the desert
Families in the Mauritanian caravan town preserve handwritten works on religion, poetry, mathematics, and other subjects. The collections reflect a place…
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You can dive through the streets of a Roman resort
At Baia, near Naples, parts of the ancient settlement sank as the volcanic landscape shifted. Walls, floors, and mosaics now lie underwater instead of beneath…
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The German town built from asteroid-made diamonds
The town of Nördlingen was built from local stone shocked into millions of microscopic diamonds by an asteroid impact about 15 million years ago.
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Tskaltubo's grand spa buildings became shelters after war
The Georgian resort drew Soviet visitors to its bathhouses and sanatoriums. After conflict in Abkhazia displaced families in the 1990s, thousands found…
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The volcanic island where saunas use underground heat
On Japan's Aogashima island, a smaller volcanic cone sits inside a larger crater. Residents use the ground's geothermal heat for a sauna and steam-cooking…
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