Anne Kazel-Wilcox 
I’d been to Oslo before, but when I step foot on a floating sauna in the Oslo fjord, it’s a whole new thing. These pint-sized spas are the latest craze here, and I’m booked in a shared sauna, joining random strangers in a very hot experience. But they’re not strangers … Read more
Not too many years ago, I was in Serbia’s capital of Belgrade, where the city’s neglected waterfront was undergoing a revitalization. Hip restaurants and trendy hotels were beginning to pop up, though the waterfront retained a gritty, seductive aura that was attracting film crews—like the cast of Game of Thrones … Read more
I’m relaxing in a roomy Adirondack chair on the expansive lawn of Inn by the Sea in Cape Elizabeth on coastal Maine. A few feet away is a boardwalk to the sandy crescent beach that protects the inn from an oft-wild Atlantic. It’s early evening, and a family beside me … Read more
It’s called “Climb to the Clouds,” one of the oldest auto races in America. Cars race toward the 6,300-foot peak of New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington, the highest peak in the Northeastern U.S. Nowadays you can also be challenged by a “Ski to the Clouds”—a combo ski/snowshoe and fat bike 10K. … Read more
“It’s a cross between Hawaii and Prague.” So says a fellow American traveler that I meet, about the Azores, an archipelago of nine islands situated a thousand miles off the coast of Portugal, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Once considered the end of the known world, the islands … Read more
I’m standing on the “Blue Bridge” over the Spokane River, taking in the waterfalls cascading below and the soaring mountain peaks in the distance. I’m in Riverfront Park, a beautiful Spokane green space. It reminds me of New York’s Central Park with its winding footpaths, fountains and gorgeous vistas. It’s … Read more
I’m on a “dune tour” in Provincetown, Massachusetts, on the tip of Cape Cod—a geographic fishhook of land, surrounded on one side by the Atlantic, and on the other by Cape Cod Bay. This narrow strip of land allows me to take in the sinking sun over the ocean before … Read more
A vinyl copy of Eric Clapton’s Layla is playing on the turntable and Boz Scaggs is up next. Then I think I’ll broaden my musical horizons and spin Eydie Gormé’s Latin-pop hits. It’s all part of a relaxing evening in my hotel room at Yours Truly D.C., one of two … Read more
I’m in Lake Placid, in New York’s northern Adirondack Mountains, on opening day of the gleaming new Nordic Center. “This is the origin of winter sports in America,” says Kris Cheney-Seymour about the area, which first played host to the Winter Olympics in 1932 and then again in 1980. Kris … Read more
City of “Witch Trials” Hosts One of the World’s Biggest Halloween Celebrations The city of Salem, Massachusetts was settled in 1626, its name derived from the Hebrew word for peace, “Shalom.” Ironic that such a tranquil moniker would be chosen for a community that would go down in history as … Read more
On a historical walking tour of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, our guide points to a clock at the top of a bank building. As is always the case with town clocks, the time looks off. Then I look again and realize it’s a “tide clock,” which indicates the approaching high tide … Read more
It’s sunset and I’m standing beside the St. Lawrence River in the town of Clayton, one of the gateways to the 1000 Islands. Chatting with a young man who had recently moved to the region, I ask him what he likes about it. “Everything,” he tells me. And that pretty … Read more
I’m in the northernmost reaches of Italy, my sights transfixed upon the Dolomite mountains, which are part of the southern Alps. The sun is beginning to sink behind dramatic peaks, and it’s then that I witness the special phenomenon I was told about—enrosadira, or “turning pink” in Ladin, the ancient … Read more
I meander along the streets of Verona, Italy’s fourth most-visited city, in search of Juliet’s house. My GPS leads me down quiet streets (clearly not the location I’m looking for), and the famed balcony where a forlorn young teenaged girl welcomed her Romeo. I’m amused that the GPS takes me … Read more
I thought I had to go to France to see the best Impressionist paintings. And then I went to Connecticut. Little did I know that a corridor in the southwestern part of the state, stretching from the Greenwich area to Stamford, Wilton and beyond, played host to some of the … Read more