Lonely Planets Guid to Hong Kong

Hong Kong in Cantonese, meaning fragrant harbor is a place with multiple personalities, as a result of being both Cantonese Chinese and under a more recent contemporary ex-British influence. Today, the former British colony is a major tourism destination for China's increasingly affluent mainland population. It is also an important hub in East Asia with global connections to many of the world's cities. It is a unique destination that has absorbed people and cultural influences from places as diverse as Vietnam and Vancouver and proudly proclaims itself to be Asia's World City.

The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) of the People's Republic of China is much more than a harbour city. The traveller weary of its crowded streets may be tempted to describe it as Hong Kongcrete. Yet, this territory with its cloudy mountains and rocky islands is mostly a rural landscape. Much of the countryside is classified as Country Park and, although 7 million people are never far away, it is possible to find pockets of wilderness that will reward the more intrepid tourist.

Hong Kong has a subtropical climate with at least one season to match your comfort zone. Boasting one of the world's best airports, it is the ideal stopover for those who wish to travel deeper into the Orient. 

The amazing views of Hong Kong

Nothing quite matches Hong Kong from above but, then, it’s difficult to get things wrong with mountains on one side, water on the other and skyscrapers in the middle to provide the platform. And it’s not just for thrill-seekers; fantastic views of the harbour form the backdrop of some excellent restaurants and a fair number of bars and clubs as well.

Remember, too, that it’s not just about Hong Kong from the top down. Some of the most dramatic sights in the territory are those of Hong Kong from the ground up. Just stand at the water’s edge on the promenade in Tsim Sha Tsui and you’ll understand. Views on the move are another good way to soak up Hong Kong’s uniquely energetic vistas, whether it means boarding a Star Ferry or watching an urban panorama scroll by aboard a clanking, ancient tram.

The rush of energy you get from taking in this futuristic megacity’s outline and the amazing natural topography on which it’s built is immense. You need distance and perspective to do this properly and getting as high as you can (we mean physically) is one good way to enjoy this simple thrill. Head for the Bank of China Tower designed by China-born American architect IM Pei in 1990. Take the express lift to the 43rd floor from where you’ll be rewarded with a panoramic view over Hong Kong.

From here you are about the same height as the Hongkong & Shanghai Bank to the northwest. It’s a pity that you aren’t allowed to go any higher, as it’s exciting swaying with the wind at the top. Even higher (though arguably not as dramatic) is the view from the windows of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority Information Centre on the 55th floor of the Two International Finance Centre.

The highest point of The Peak has been the place to live ever since the British came here in the 19th century. The taipans built summer houses here to escape the heat and humidity (it’s usually about 5°C cooler than down below). The Peak remains the most fashionable – and expensive – area to live in Hong Kong and is the territory’s foremost tourist destination. Not only is the view from the summit one of the most spectacular cityscapes in the world, it’s a good way to get Hong Kong into perspective. And the only way up, as far as we are concerned, is via the Peak Tram.

Rising above the Peak Tram terminus is the seven-storey Peak Tower, an anvil-shaped building containing shops, restaurants, tourist tat and a viewing terrace. Opposite is the Peak Galleria, a three-storey mall of shops and restaurants. Like the tower, it’s designed to withstand winds of up to 270km/h, theoretically more than the maximum velocity of a No 10 typhoon.

The view is equally enthralling from the bottom up. For the ultimate show-stopping view, stand at the harbour edge in Tsim Sha Tsui and take in Hong Kong Island’s skyscrapers’ gradient-defying march up steep jungle slopes.

Alternatively, and for a mere $2, you can board the upper deck of the Star Ferry and take in this breathtaking city while it’s bathed in a neon glow.  The ferry is part of a small fleet of diesel-electric boats first launched in 1888. With names like Morning Star, Celestial Star and Twinkling Star, the ferries are most romantic at night, festively strung with lights , as the city buildings beam onto the rippling water.

If possible, try to take the trip on a clear night from Kowloon side to Central; it’s not half as dramatic in the other direction. The trip takes about nine minutes (as long as it used to take to read the now defunct Hong Kong Star, a lowbrow tabloid newspaper, it was said), and departures are very frequent. Indeed, morning and evening, the Star Ferry is a genuinely useful and commonly used way for local people to hop from island to mainland and back again.

Get stuffed in Hong Kong

It is hard to have a conversation in Hong Kong without mentioning food, especially when many still greet each other by asking, ‘Have you eaten yet?’. The vast majority of Hong Kong’s 10,000-odd restaurants serve Chinese food, of course.

Cantonese is by far the most popular Chinese cuisine in Hong Kong, but Chiu Chow, Shanghainese, Sichuanese and Northern Chinese are also widely available.

Cantonese cuisine is famously fresh: there’s an emphasis on freshly slaughtered meat (mostly pork and chicken) and seafood. Simple techniques such as steaming and stir-frying allow the ingredients to retain their delicate and well-balanced flavours.

Chiu Chow cuisine makes liberal use of garlic, vinegar and sauces; it’s famous for goose and seafood dishes. Shanghainese cooking uses a lot of salted and preserved foods and relies on stewing, braising and frying. Sichuanese is the most fiery, making great use of chillies and pungent peppercorns. Northern Chinese food uses a lot of oils (eg sesame and chilli) coupled with ingredients such as vinegar, garlic, spring onions, bean paste and dark soy sauce.

Steamed bread, dumplings and noodles are preferred to rice, and lamb and mutton, seldom seen on other Chinese menus, are also popular.

The full range of international fare is on your doorstep, too: Italian, Japanese, British pub grub, French, Korean, Indian and Mediterranean food is all well represented across most price ranges. Central is the best pick for Western restaurants, especially Soho, though you’ll also find a fair few in Tsim Sha Tsui.

Hong Kong is home to Yum cha and if you haven’t experienced the phenomena, then don’t leave Hong Kong without stuffing yourself silly during this unique dining practice. Yum cha (literally ‘drink tea’) is the usual way to refer to dim sum, the uniquely Cantonese ‘meal’ eaten as breakfast, brunch or lunch between about 7am and 3pm. Eating dim sum is a social occasion, consisting of many separate dishes that are meant to be shared.

The bigger your group, the better. Dim sum delicacies are normally steamed in small bamboo baskets. The baskets are stacked up on trolleys and rolled around the dining room. You don’t need a menu (though these exist, too, but are almost always in Chinese); just stop the waiter and choose something from the trolley. It will be marked down on a bill left on the table.

The trick is not to order everything at once. Each trolley has a different selection, so take your time and order as they come. It’s said that there are about a thousand dim sum dishes, but you’d be doing well to sample 10 in one sitting. Dim sum restaurants are normally brightly lit and very large and noisy – it’s rather like eating in an aircraft hangar.

For street food, head for Woo Sung St in the Temple Street Night Market,  which runs parallel to the east, or to the section of Temple St north of the temple towards Man Ming Lane. You can get anything from a fried snack to go or a simple bowl of noodles to a full meal served at your very own kerbside table.

There are a few seafood and hotpot restaurants as well, or you might pop into Mido, Hong Kong’s best known cha chan tang (cafe with local dishes). You’ll also find a surfeit of fortune-tellers and herbalists and some free, open-air Cantonese opera performances here.

The Chinese are not traditionally known for their sweet tooth and you can head to the colourful wholesale fruit market (corner Shek Lung and Reclamation Sts), for a healthy dessert here. The market is always a hive of activity from midnight to dawn.

Alternatively, you can try a steamed cake that can be eaten occasionally as dim sum, often with strong tea. The more daring can slurp a sweet soup, a southern specialty made by boiling pulses, seeds and root vegetables, are consumed as a late-night snack, for their taste and their positive effects on health.

Traditional desserts do not contain dairy products, as many Chinese are lactose-intolerant. All this, however, has been changing as people adopt and increasingly Westernised way of life. These days, many Chinese teenagers call themselves “chocoholics”, and office workers talk about saving stomach space for cheesecake!

Shopping in Hong Kong

While any international brand worthy of its logo has at least one outlet here, Hong Kong’s reputation as a bargain hunter’s paradise is largely a thing of the past. So what’s worth shopping for? Clothing (off the peg or tailored), shoes, jewellery, luggage and, to a lesser degree nowadays, cameras and electronic goods are the city’s strong suits. Excellent art and antiques shops also abound.

Bargaining

Bargaining is a way of life at retail outlets throughout Hong Kong, with the exception of department stores and clothing chain shops, where the prices marked are the prices paid. Some visitors operate on the theory that you can get the goods for half the price originally quoted. Many Hong Kong residents believe that if you can bargain something down that low, then you shouldn’t be buying from that shop anyway. If the business is that crooked – and many are, particularly in the Tsim Sha Tsui tourist ghetto – it will probably find other ways to cheat you (such as selling you electronic goods with missing components or no international warranty).

Guarantee & warranty

Every guarantee should carry a complete description of the item (including the model and serial numbers), as well as the date of purchase, the name and address of the shop it was purchased from, and the shop’s official name chop (stamp). A common practice is to sell grey-market equipment (ie imported by somebody other than the official local agent). Such equipment may have no guarantee at all, or the guarantee may be valid only in the country of manufacture (which will probably be either China or Japan).

Antiques

Most of Hong Kong Island’s antique shops are bunched along Wyndham St and Hollywood Rd in Central and Sheung Wan. The shops at the western end of Hollywood Rd tend to be cheaper and carry more dubious ‘antiques’ – tread carefully through this minefield of reproductions, books, magazines, Chinese propaganda posters, badges from the Cultural Revolution and so on. For Chinese handicrafts and other goods (hand-carved wooden pieces, ceramics, paintings, cloisonné, silk garments), the main places to go are the large China-run emporiums scattered throughout the territory, such as Chinese Arts & Crafts and Yue Hwa Chinese Products Emporium.

Clothing

The best places to find designer fashion and top-end boutiques are in the big shopping centres and malls, especially Landmark in Central, Pacific Place in Admiralty and Festival Walk in Kowloon Tong. The best hunting grounds for warehouse sales and factory extras are generally in Tsim Sha Tsui at the eastern end of Granville Rd; check out Austin Ave and Chatham Rd South as well. On Hong Kong Island, Jardine’s Bazaar in Causeway Bay has low-cost garments and there are several sample shops and places to pick up cheap jeans in Lee Garden Rd. The street markets on Temple St in Yau Ma Tei and Tung Choi St in Mong Kok have the cheapest clothes. You may also try Li Yuen St East and Li Yuen St West, two narrow alleyways linking Des Voeux Rd Central with Queen’s Rd Central. They are a jumble of inexpensive clothing, handbags, backpacks and costume jewellery.

Computers

Hong Kong is a popular, competitively priced place to buy personal computers. Most people buy their computers in Kowloon, where there are loads of centres selling computers and related equipment. There’s a much greater choice and prices are lower, but ‘caveat emptor’ is the phrase to bear in mind as you browse. Hong Kong Island does have a couple of reasonable computer arcades, including the Wan Chai Computer Centre.

Gems & jewellery

The Chinese attribute various magical qualities to jade, including the power to prevent ageing and accidents. The circular disc with a central hole worn around many Hong Kong necks represents heaven in Chinese mythology. The Jade Market in Yau Ma Tei is diverting, but unless you’re knowledgeable about jade, limit yourself to modest purchases. Hong Kong carries a great range of pearls, and opals are said to be good value. Retail prices for other precious stones are only marginally lower than elsewhere. The more reputable jewellery-shop chains will issue a certificate that states exactly what you are buying and guarantees that the shop will buy it back at a fair market price.

Photographic equipment

Never buy a camera without a price tag. This will basically preclude most of the shops in Tsim Sha Tsui. One of the best spots in Hong Kong for buying photographic equipment is Stanley St in Central, where competition is keen. Everything carries price tags, though some low-level bargaining may be possible. Tsim Sha Tsui has a couple of shops on Kimberley Rd dealing in used cameras and there are plenty of photo shops on Sai Yeung Choi St in Mong Kok.

Watches


Shops selling watches are ubiquitous in Hong Kong and you can find everything from a Rolex to Russian army timepieces and diving watches. Avoid the shops without price tags. The big department stores and City Chain are fine, but compare prices.


Leather goods & luggage

Most of what gets sent to the Hong Kong market from China is export quality, but check carefully because there is still a lot of rubbish on sale. All the big brand names such as Louis Vuitton and Gucci are on display in Hong Kong department stores, and you’ll also find some local vendors in the luggage business. If you’re just looking for a casual bag or daypack, check out Li Yuen St East and Li Yuen St West in Central or Stanley Market.

A guide to the eateries of Hong Kong
How many kinds of restaurants are there in Hong Kong? How much time do you have? How big is your appetite? What is your gastronomic interest? Getting the idea? Hong Kong is entrepot to the world. And so it is restaurateur to the world.
 

Hotel Restaurants

Many of the best and oldest restaurants in Hong Kong are in the major hotels. And in our recommending them we are departing from our own gastronomic advice. We normally advise readers to avoid hotel restaurants. But for as long as Hong Kong has had hotels, fine eateries have been lodged within many of them. This is in part due to the fact that real estate is so expensive and always has been. Restaurants operate on profit margins so thin that even popular and successful establishments can go out of business overnight. But hotels, with their long-term leases, can weather the storms that often blow through the balance books. An advantage to hotel dining is that all the service is rendered in the western style, and in English. The table settings are familiar, the waiter asks if you’d like a cocktail, the menu is readable, and the crystal and silver are finely polished. It’s all just like home, except that the food is better. If you’ve never been to Asia before, this is a good way to ease yourself in. And it’s a fine way to get yourself pampered.
 

Concept Restaurants
There have always been western-style restaurants in Hong Kong, but they were always very traditional. Concept restaurants are, more than anything, reflections of the personalities of their owners. The concept may reflect where the owners come from, or it may reflect where they would like to have come from. It may be a place, a time or an era, an idea or a desire. They tend to be owned by North Americans, or people who have spent a lot of time in the US, Canada or Australia. Hence, English is the lingua franca. Some concept restaurants are simple and fun, some are dead chic, others are cosy and comforting.
 

Neon Restaurants

Identified by huge neon signs, neon restaurants are usually very spacious with high ceilings, and they are brightly lit and well ventilated. And it’s a joyous cacophony within. This is where Chinese people go most often when they go out to eat. The menus are very extensive, and most are Cantonese. Most neon restaurants have at least one English speaker on duty at any given time. Quite often it’s the head waiter, so you’ll generally get pretty good, though utilitarian, service. On the outlying islands their counterparts are the outdoor seafood restaurants. They are basically neon restaurants that have swapped their neon signs for terraces facing the water. And the grandest neon restaurants in all Hong Kong are the floating restaurants on the south side of Hong Kong Island.
 

Working-Class Restaurants
Dining in Hong Kong can get expensive. It can also be intimidating with such a wide variety of choice, and strange and unfamiliar venues and customs. And did we mention that it could get expensive? And so we patronise everyday low cost Chinese restaurants. This kind of restaurant is the soul of Chinese gastronomy: unpretentious, a bit earthy, a place of exuberance and life affirming noise. This is a restaurant in the truest meaning of the word. It comes from the Latin verb meaning ‘to restore’, and this is where people come to be restored, in body and in spirit. The food is wholesome and plentiful. And all the hubbub, bustle and kitchen clatter serves to restore the spirit, to make one feel part of this greater whole.
 

Noodle & Congee Shops

Hong Kong would grind to a screeching halt if it woke up one day and found no juk (congee; rice porridge) and no noodles. These eateries are found virtually everywhere that humans can be suffered to walk upon the ground. It’s Chinese fast food, comfort food and peasant fare all rolled into one. Noodle and congee shops are almost always on the ground level, close to where life is taking place. We are not aware of any noodle shop on the top floor of a major hotel. They are most common in Kowloon, but you’ll find them anywhere there is foot traffic.
 

Roasteries

Chinese restaurants specialising in roasted or barbecued meats are common in Hong Kong. You’ll know them when you see them; they have all their wares hanging in the window. However, unlike a western steakhouse these are not places in which to indulge in mountainous portions of animal flesh. Indeed a typical meal at a Chinese roastery would be a very balanced one. A common lunch here might be a simple noodle soup garnished with a few slices of roast duck. A dinner might be comprised of vegetables, rice, soup and an ample portion of roast pork. Of all the roasted meats available in Hong Kong the most popular is goose. The roast goose restaurants of Hong Kong are beloved by the people although, curiously, they are not as numerous as duck or pork roasteries.
 

Yum Cha Houses

In the long view of Chinese culinary history, dim sum is a newcomer. A mere 1000 years old. Still, in this brief time the Chinese have managed to develop around 2,000 varieties of these morning and lunchtime treats. The larger yum cha houses will offer up to 100 items on any given day. You’ll be able to have dim sum every day of your stay in Hong Kong and not eat the same thing twice. Eating in a yum cha house can be quite an experience. In a traditional yum cha house there is no menu. Instead, ladies (they are always ladies) carry trays or push little trolleys laden with all the goodies. There is no succession of courses. There is no ‘this only goes with that’. Your table will soon be piled high with steamer baskets and other containers, teapots, crumbs and spills. In our opinion the best time for dim sum is 10-11am. If you come earlier or later, the noise, the rush for vacant seats, the chatter and clatter of waitresses pushing their trolleys, and the overall bustle can make the whole thing look like the New York stock exchange. On the other hand, maybe that’s your cup of yum cha.
 

Dai Pai Dong

The dai pai dong is usually a mobile concern that can flee the cops when they try to shut it down for being unlicensed. And they are an institution fast going the way of high tea and fish & chips, becoming a culinary fossil, albeit one of great sentimental value. They were visible at all hours, but especially after dark. They congregated in such numbers down by the waterfronts that the festive scene of dining, socialising, hawking of wares, juggling, magic or fortune telling was known as a poor man’s nightclub.

The term dai pai dong literally means ‘big licence food stall’, and refers to the large sheet of paper on which their licence was printed. Sadly, in the 1980s the government stopped issuing these big licenses. Those licences still in existence are permitted to remain in business until the second generation. That is, the current licence holders can pass it on to their children, should they wish to make use of it. But when they expire, so does the big licence.
 

Speakeasies
There are numerous unlicensed restaurants in Hong Kong and not all are dai pai dong. Many are proper sit-down places and are among the best in town. Just ask the government officials who are dining there. They tend not to invest much in decor, after all, such finery could end up in a police auction. But the food is magic. They are owned and operated by people who are in the business for the love of it. Often times the restaurateur is by day a broker, or a manufacturer of garments, or even a police officer. But by night they are the Scarlet Pimpernels of Clandestine Cuisine, bringing you their illicit best.

You have to know somebody to get into a speakeasy. You have to know somebody just to find one. But all serious gastronomes know a few. When you are invited you will be told to rendezvous at a secret location at a certain point in time. Do not be early. Do not be late. One of the cardinal rules of both espionage and illegal provender is punctuality. At the appointed hour people will emerge as one from the shadows, from behind bushes, from around corners, and converge upon a suddenly opened door. Now rush in, quickly, for the door must close before the cops cruise by.

Soy Sauce Western

These eateries serve western-style food for the Chinese palate. Consider a meal of spaghetti with brown gravy, mashed potatoes eaten with chopsticks, breaded and fried pork chops, Swiss chicken cooked in soy sauce. Yum! One of the best examples of this is Tai Ping Koon restaurant (6 Pak Sha Rd, Causeway Bay). It was founded in 1860 by Mr Chui Lo Ko, who originally worked as a chef for a western trading company in Guangzhou, and his specialities were western dishes. Later Mr Chui opened his own restaurant in Tai Ping Sha, Guangzhou, and he named it after the place. It was the first restaurant in Guangzhou specialising in western cuisine. Three of his signature dishes, roast pigeon, smoked pomfret and Portuguese-style baked chicken, were celebrated among aficianados in south Guangdong Province and are standards on the menu even today, a century and a half later. Tai Ping Koon’s influence reaches far, and offers the curious Chinese diner a tentative exploration of western cuisine, but with select Chinese ingredients providing a comfort factor.
 

A Trip Through Peru

Exploring the wilds of the Amazon, the high-altitude waters of Titicaca, and the mysteries of Machu Picchu, Dreaming Traveller revels in the sheer, exuberant abundance of Peru.

South America has been around no longer than North America, and yet there seems to be more history in Peru: more pre-Columbian history and more colonial history and quite a lot of recent history. There are more birds in Peru, and they have more colors in their bright wings. More foods come originally from Peru—including both potatoes and tomatoes—than from any comparable square mileage anywhere else. There are more languages spoken in Peru, even if some are spoken by very few people. There are more climates there, packed in tight next to one another, most of the world’s ecosystems in narrow-wale stripes. When it rains, there is more rain; and when the sun is overhead, there is much, much more sun, and you need much more sunblock to survive it. The rivers are bigger and wider and faster, the earthquakes stronger. Peru has the Americas’ deepest canyon and the world’s driest desert. There is more luxury than you might have expected, even if there is also more privation than you might have hoped. There are definitely more holidays in Peru, because there is more faith in Peru, and from the darker wilds of the country on moonless nights, there seem to be more stars in the sky. It can get a little tiring, this maximalism; you wish from time to time that there were not so many waterfalls and inexplicable stone walls, but it cannot be denied that when you think of home from Peru, home seems pallid.

My partner and I began our trip with a week on the Amazon, which officially originates in northern Peru at the confluence of the Ucayali and Marañón rivers. The Amazon Basin has a dry and a rainy season, but it rains almost as much in one as in the other. It is more useful to think of them as the flooded and low-water seasons, for melting Andean snow and highland rains engorge the river between November and June, when it ignores its moderate winter banks and spills into the jungle that was previously its border, rising by as much as 40 feet. Geological time speeds up here. You can see riverine erosion and accretion as if you were watching a stop-motion film. We saw an entire grove of bamboo mudslide into the water, and, later, a snarl of the plants catch firmly on the opposite bank. The river’s water is brown with churned earth, and great messes of wood and broken things rush past you as if they were late for a party in Rio.

The canopy of the rain forest is more accessible when the river is flooded; indeed, you can float within reach of last month’s distant treetops. High-nesting birds are closer, though the soaked ground hampers walking. There are few large mammals, and the vegetation is so thick that one seldom sees them. Even our guides, jungle-born and -bred, had rarely spotted an ocelot, or a jaguar, or the world’s largest rodent, the two-foot-tall capybara. You visit the Amazon to see birds, monkeys, the pink river dolphins, and the much-maligned piranhas, and to bask in a seemingly limitless ecosystem. There are tiny villages and ranger stations here and there, and every so often a banana boat passes by on the main river, but essentially you are away from human habitat. There are no satisfactory maps of the Peruvian Amazon because it is in a state of permanent flux; it wriggles around like an insomniac, flinging itself this way and that way, rolling back to where it was in the first place, carving estuaries into yesterday’s land.

Our sleek, modern 130-foot boat, the Aqua, has set out to bring luxury to one of the earth’s most daunting wildernesses. When we caught sight of it from our excursionary skiffs, it looked as out of place against the torn shores of the tempestuous waterway as Fitzcarraldo’s boat pulled up a mountain. Sometimes, conversely, we would lie on beautiful pillows and gaze out huge plate-glass windows, and the torrid water and dense jungle seemed like multimedia projections because they were so incongruous with our urbane suite.
The Aqua was conceived of and built by Francesco Galli Zugaro, a dashing 36-year-old who rides on the boat for a few days each month. It is the love project of his fertile imagination, and his exuberant aura of discovery seems woven into its very fabric. He has had to contend with a turbulent debut: not long after our trip, the Aqua was twice attacked by armed bandits, who made off with guests’ valuables. No one was hurt, fortunately, and security has since been dramatically increased, provided by the Peruvian Navy and the national police.
The Aqua was designed and decorated by the noted Peruvian architect Jordi Puig with the spare, elegant coolness of Richard Meier: wall panels of soft white lighting, bathrooms with the latest eco-sensitive technology, Brazilian slate walls, floors of handsome local wood, California king–size beds, and those astonishing outer walls of glass. It’s as if 12 rooms from the W Hotel had decided to run away to sea together. The boat holds 26 passengers and 21 crew members, so the feeling is intimate. The menus were devised by Pedro Miguel Schiaffino of Malabar, one of Lima’s leading chefs, to meld jungle flavors and classic dishes: a soufflé made of fresh hearts of palm; broth of armored catfish with wild cilantro; a warm passion-fruit tart that sang in the mouth.

It is a truism of cruises that staff tend to be jolly, but it is in general a rather forced jolliness. On this trip, the staff seemed genuinely to be having a good time. They worked like the dickens: a team of trained naturalists who could whistle the call of any bird or primate, seducing them into view as surely as the Pied Piper, or spot a camouflaged toad at night as we careened by in the skiff; a bartender who could make a mean camu-camu-infused pisco sour. When we returned to the boat at the end of an occasional night tour, going in our dark skiffs around a bend in the dim river, the miracle of the Aqua struck us again: it looked like some river-bound constellation recently fallen from the night sky.

We explored the black water, the stiller areas, rich in tannins, which reflect everything as in a glass, darkly. On one particularly memorable day, we took the skiff for almost five hours until we found a lagoon so dense with floating water lettuce and water lilies that it covered the entire surface, and we motored slowly through what appeared to be a field, an impression made stronger by the long-legged jacana birds that skittered across the unmoored plants. The green parted for, then closed behind, us; earth was water, and water, earth. In a tree at the end of this green wonderland we found a three-toed sloth, perhaps nature’s weirdest creation, E.T. draped in a moth-eaten fur coat. The name “sloth” suggests laziness, but a sloth’s slowness is more like that of a smack addict. They hang from branches, turning their heads as if tomorrow might lie in any direction, occasionally munching on the hallucinogenic leaves of the cecropia tree. That night, we went to see nocturnal creatures, and I expressed regret that it was impossible to photograph the spectacled caiman, a carnivorous reptile closely related to the crocodile. Minutes later, while the captain held his legs, our valiant guide, Víctor Coelhos, cantilevered himself off the front of the skiff, plunged his arms into the muddy waters, and lifted a squirming juvenile into the air, holding it in such a way that we could photograph it and it could not remove his fingers.
If you go to the rain forest during the rainy season, chances are you will encounter rain. We did, but it was usually brief, sometimes giving way to clear skies and more frequently to clouds that softened the heat. On our penultimate day, we came through a dense patch of water hyacinths and found ourselves looking head-on at a rainbow, and as we drew in our breath, a flock of perhaps 40 green parrots skittered across our path. Pink is the navy blue of Amazonia: there were not only the pink river dolphins we loved, but also the pink-toed tarantulas and cascades of pink morning glories, more delicate than bougainvillea, a confetti dangled over the black water. In a week, we had traveled 500 miles, from Iquitos to the Pacaya River and back, and seen more than 80 species of birds, two dozen kinds of mammals, and an eccentric array of fish and reptiles. I had draped an anaconda around my neck, and then a boa constrictor; we had fished for piranhas with stick-poles. We had been received in one village by dancers and musicians, and in another by the old men who repaired the nets and broke the husks off rice. We had learned the names and cries of the prehistorically plumed hoatzins (pronounced “watseens”), the red howler monkeys, and the horned screamers with daft feather-like tufts on their foreheads. We had seen parrots and macaws, toucans of every shape and size, and, once, an anteater up in a tree. We had learned (but did not exercise this knowledge) that you can scoop up termites and rub them between your hands to make a natural mosquito repellent. We had seen dragonflies with red heads like matchsticks, and blue morpho butterflies, cerulean as the eyes of a fairy-tale princess. Everywhere we found water hyacinths in bloom; Monet’s lily pond had nothing on these streams. At night, in perfect isolation, we had gaped at a sky overcrowded with jostling stars and striped with the Milky Way.

If the miraculous universe of Amazonian Peru can be credited largely to the absence of human incursion, the thrilling destinations along the western slopes of the Andes owe as much to civilization as to nature. Monumental stone terraces climb like sinuous staircases toward the hilltops, giving testimony to the Inca genius for maximizing agricultural yield despite heavy runoff and poor soil. The colonial Spaniards who decimated the Inca empire robbed the natives’ precision-hewn stones for their own churches, whose hopeful spires punctuate the skyline in towns great and small. To enter this other world, you need guidance, not because it is dangerous, but because the muchness of it requires canny sorting. We ventured out under the aegis of Marisol Mosquera and Aracari Travel Consulting, which employs a network of extremely knowledgeable local guides. Mosquera brings not only elegance and panache to her work but also wisdom and a sense of history; she keeps you comfortable but helps you penetrate to the truest Peru, to experiences you might not otherwise have accrued until you’d visited the country 40 times. Her company restricts its purview to Peru, Bolivia, and Ecuador, including the Galápagos, and you are not put at a hotel or recommended a restaurant that she has not personally checked out. In 20 years of writing about travel, I have never enjoyed such impeccable personal attention.
Fresh from the Amazon and a night in Lima, we headed off to the Sacred Valley of the Urubamba River, where Inca ruins and terraces are scattered as densely as Starbucks in Manhattan. We started at Pisac, whose serpentine terraces echo the undulating slopes. The nearby town’s Sunday market is given over half to the touristic takeaways that hardly vary from place to place—the Indigenous Mall—and half to a bustling food emporium where sturdy women in serapes and bowler hats hawk every color and size of potato and corn kernels as big as the Hope Diamond. We lunched there, then headed for our siesta, and Susy Dyson. Dyson, a Peruvian of English descent, became Peru’s first supermodel 30 years ago in Paris, had a career as an actress and singer, and then quit the jet set to move home to Lima and have a family. Two years ago she bought a tract of land on an Inca terrace near Urubamba and transformed it into an inn, Ticllabamba. It has just three suites, set amid lush orchards and countless vistas; completely designed by Dyson, the place is simple and understated. Altitude is exhausting and we were tired, so Dyson arranged for the chef-owner of one of Peru’s top restaurants, Pio Vásquez de Velasco of nearby Restaurante El Huacatay, to come over and give us a cooking lesson, then make an indescribably delicious dinner that included a carpaccio of alpaca marinated with thyme and served with dried tomatoes and pecans. The feeling is more like visiting a marvelous friend in her charming compound than staying in a hotel.
One of the things there is more of in Peru is ruins, some of them hardly ruined. We had seen dozens of sites by the time we made our way to Machu Picchu with jaded eyes, taking the opulent Hiram Bingham train to arrive at the Machu Picchu Sanctuary Lodge. Then we walked to the site, and looked at the face of its splendid mystery. While not as extensive as Angkor Wat or as refined as the Taj Mahal, it has in common with those world monuments the quality of being utterly surprising, no matter how many images of it you have seen. It is partly that it is so ambitious and partly that it is so exquisitely situated, spilling along ridges and across hillocks and down vertiginous drops, taking in the surrounding peaks hundreds of feet above and the rushing river hundreds of feet below. Walking these streets, you feel that there was tremendous intention in this construction, though it is impossible to know just what was intended.
Cuzco is one of those cities, like Venice or Bruges or Suzhou, that is so exquisite that everything else about it seems irrelevant, and no glut of tourism can quite cancel its charm. The Plaza de Armas is one of the world’s great squares, with its two splendid colonial churches, including the cathedral, known for a painting of the Last Supper that shows Christ and the apostles dining on guinea pig. The Inca sites around the edges of town are spectacular, especially the intimidating stone ramparts of Sacsayhuaman. In mixing native and Spanish culture, Peru arrived at a style that seems like Europe viewed through a bright kaleidoscope. Cuzco has fine hotels, and we stayed at La Casona. Our room had carved doors, framed Incan textiles on the walls, antique furniture, dark-wood shutters that opened to a beautiful view of the square, and a colossal bathroom of striated marble. The 16th-century building consists of just 11 rooms around a cloister court. Down the road is the superhip, Italian-designed Casa Cartagena, also installed in a great historic house.

Driving the 240 miles of high country southeast from Cuzco to Puno, we went through a succession of villages defined by what they make: the village of fried pork skin (chicharrones); the village of roasted guinea pig (cuy); the village of bread; the village of textiles. Then we came at last to the Church of San Pedro Apóstol de Andahuaylillas, sometimes called the Sistine Chapel of the Americas, which the World Monuments Fund is helping to restore. It looks like a pleasant village church, but the doors open to reveal an interior that is relentlessly decorated, covered in frescoes, with a ceiling of a thousand medallions and an altar all silvered and gilded and mirrored, rather churrigueresque, and ingeniously harmonious. Fifty miles farther, we got to Raqchi, site of a 15th-century Inca town made mostly of mud bricks, yet of phenomenal size, the towering columns of its Wiracocha temple built to support what is believed to have been the biggest roof in pre-Columbian America. We drove on into the Altiplano, the high plains with elevations of more than 12,000 feet—great, flat stretches set in the jagged humps of the Andes, like the boundless footprints of a forgotten giant.
Puno is something of a dustheap, but from it you can explore the beauty of Titicaca, the world’s highest navigable lake. We went by boat first to the Uros Islands, floating man-made blocks of totora reeds, continually replenished with new layers on top as the bottom layers rot in the water, each island moored to an anchor. When the Uros leave their reed houses on their reed islands, they go in boats made of reeds, many with elaborate reed figureheads of pumas. Each island has a watchtower from which signals may be sent to neighboring islands in case of trouble, and that too is made of reeds, though it has wooden legs. The staple of the Uros diet is the starchy, white heart of the reeds. This universe of reeds is exquisite through monoculture; there is something meditative and transfixing about a place where the only points of difference are the water, the sky, and the brightly colored clothing of the people.
On Taquile Island, another 2 1/2 hours away, all the women weave, and all the men knit. The women weave long belts, and the men knit hats on needles as fine as pins. The handiwork is just extraordinary, and one only wishes one could commission something other than a woven belt or a knitted hat. Peru is rather rich in knitted hats, and there are only so many of them that anyone can incorporate into his daily life, and these particular woven belts are hard to carry off if you are not specifically trying to look like a traditionally dressed woman from Taquile.
In mid-afternoon we arrived at Suasi Lodge, set on the only private island in the lake, within view of Bolivia. The eco-lodge, now run by Casa Andina, was founded by Peruvian sociologist Martha Giraldo as a nature reserve. It is a place for the sort of calm reflection that befitted our last full day on such a full vacation. So much of Peru is a fiesta of stimulus. After a couple of weeks of that, Suasi is an oasis.
We left Peru by way of Lima, where we had dinner with Mosquera at Rafael Restaurant, which is one of Lima’s best. As befits the land of more, there are more than 3,000 kinds of potato grown in Peru, and in the course of our trip we had many that were unlike anything I ever had before, including wild jungle potatoes. There are over 2,000 kinds of fish in the waters of Peru because a deep Arctic current upwells off the coast, creating some of the most plankton-rich waters in the world. There are huge numbers of novel fruits and vegetables; we became obsessed with lucuma, a fruit that tastes like a cross between dates and butterscotch, at its best in a traditional Lima dessert called suspiro a la limeña.
Any good trip is orchestrated, and this one had been written by Mosquera in distinct movements. We had started low and made a gradual ascent, the better to avoid altitude sickness, but the trip was also modulated in its harmonic shifts from the wild exuberance of the Amazon to the mystery of the Sacred Valley to the stupefaction of Machu Picchu to the elegance of Cuzco to the breathtaking austerity of Lake Titicaca. This is a country where more is definitively more.

Puerto Morelos - Maxico

Puerto Morelos is a town in Quintana Roo on the Yucatan Peninsula, about 20km south of Cancun. It is both a fishing village and a resort and diving destination. It is located roughly halfway between Cancun and Playa del Carmen on the Caribbean coast of Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula. 

The pier in the center of town hosts snorkel and sport fishing boats while yachts dock in a man-made harbour just south of town. The village used to be the embarkation point for the car ferry to Cozumel, but that now leaves from Calica, a major port south of Playa del Carmen. 

About

If you’re looking to escape the crowds of the Riviera Maya, don’t miss Puerto Morelos, just 20 minutes south of Cancún.

It's the ideal location for those who want a quiet beach vacation away from the glitz, but with ample tourist amenities. The town has just two principal streets and you can walk from one end to the other in about 15 minutes.

You can get by with English, but Spanish is not superfluous. Most places accept US dollars but not credit cards. Almost all prices are quoted in Mexican pesos and it is generally cheaper to pay in pesos, than in US dollars.

The reef just off shore is part of the Great Mesoamerican Reef, the second largest reef system in the world and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. In 1998 the reef in front of Puerto Morelos became a protected National Marine Park, preserving its rich biodiversity and making this area one of the best preserved of the Great Mesoamerican Reef. Buildings in Puerto Morelos are limited to three stories by local bylaws, to preserve the village type of character.

There are two parts to Puerto Morelos, the former fishing village on the coast, now Hotels, Condominiums, Restaurants and Tourist shops, and the second part about 2 Km. inland and adjacent to Highway 307, on the western side, called La Colonia by locals. The inland portion is mainly single level dwellings for the local workers, as well as amenities such as small/local food stores, pharmacies, and several casual restaurants, serving simple fare such as tacos. 

 

 Beach at Puerto Morelos, in front of the Casita del Mar at the north end of town

Get there

By plane

The nearest major airport is in Cancún International Airport (IATA: CUN) (ICAO: MMUN). It is 20km away from Puerto Morelos and is Mexico's second busiest airport.

By car

Puerto Morelos is situated at the junction of Route 307 and a paved road to Leona Vicario in the interior of the Yucatan Peninsula. This recently paved road is the eastern terminus of La Ruta de los Cenotes, a network of minor roads that allows access to many cenotes in the interior. At Puerto Morelos, the beginning of this road network is marked by an archway. The waterfront is about 2km from Highway 307. Puerto Morelos is about 30km south of Cancun, 30km north of Playa del Carmen, and one hour north of Tulum.

By bus

Buses from Cancun and Playa del Carmen traverse Route 307, the coastal highway and the main highway into town:

• From Cancun airport take the Riviera/ADO bus to Playa del Carmen, hourly from 10:30. The bus departs from Terminal 2, east end (terminal faces north). Buy a ticket for Puerto Morelos just inside terminal or on bus. Ask the driver to stop at Puerto Morelos. Cost: 50 pesos as of 12/09

• From downtown Cancun (el centro) take the Riviera/ADO bus for Playa del Carmen from the bus terminal on Av. Tulum. Departs every 15 minutes. Buy your ticket at the station.

• From Playa del Carmen, take any ADO bus for Cancun from either bus station in Playa. Buy your ticket to Puerto Morelos at the station.

Cancún and Playa del Carmen buses arrive and depart from the highway, about 2km from town. Each side of the highway has its own small station and ticket office.

Frequent local buses travel between the highway/la colonia and the beach/el puerto for 4 pesos per person. Or take a taxi into town 22 - 25 pesos. If you decide to walk instead, ensure adequate insect repellent, as the road leads through a mosquito-infested mangrove swamp - and watch out for inquisitive crocodiles about half way, particularly on the northern side.

By private transfers

Private Transfers to Puerto Morelos start at $55 US each way for 2 people or $90 round trip.

• Airport Transfers from the Cancun International Airport Direct to your hotel.

Get around

There are many local taxis around, they gather at a taxi stand on the west side of the main square in Puerto Morelos. Bicycling is an excellent way to get around town, and they can be rented at a number of places in town. There is also a local car rental agency in the main town on the highway. Always make sure you find out the price of a taxi ride before you get in to avoid disagreements. At the car rental place you can bargain for a cheaper rate. 

 The Original Lighthouse at Puerto Morelos, Mexico in Feb. 2007. In 1967 the structure was tilted over in Hurricane Beulah. It has since survived Hurricanes Gilbert in 1987 and Wilma in 2005, but has not been knocked down. The new light house replacing this one is visible in the background.

 A quiet beach just north of the Puerto Morelos town square.

See

• Sit on the white sand beach in the shade of a thatched palapa

• Visit the Jardin Botanico just outside town and watch out for the spider monkeys.

• Birdwatching in the mangroves.

• Browse the various shops around the central square. 

Do

• Scuba Diving.PUERTO MORELOS offers a large variety of marine life on one of the most beautiful reefs in the world. The dives inside the reef can be from shallow up to dives where you can see large coral formations at greater depths. For more advanced divers there a few wrecks and the cenotes to explore. Also has easy access to various dive sites ranging from very easy to very challenging ones. For those who are looking for some relaxed diving there are some beautiful shallow reef formations in water of 40 feet/12 meters depth where you can dive among turtles, schools of colorful fish, eagle rays, and many species of crabs and lobsters only to name a few.For wreck lovers, there are two accesible wrecks near Puerto Moleros. The nearest is the C-56, a navy boat that has beautiful coral and which is home to very large pelagics at 60-90 feet/18-27 meters). For more experienced divers there's the Tulum which is at a depth of about 120 feet/36 meters.
• Swimming. Near the shore, water temperatures average about 27°C (80°F) year round. Freshwater swimming is available inland, at several cenotes. At cenotes that are not exposed to sunlight, temperatures are colder, and a partial wetsuit may be necessary for anything more than a brief dip.
• Reef Diving. The Mesoamerican Barrier Reef lies about 500 meters offshore. It is closer to the shore near Puerto Morelos than it is at most other points along the coast of Quintana Roo. Several dive shops and nearby resorts offering diving on the reef.
• Snorkeling. Guided trips by boat are offered to the reef. Snorkeling out to the reef from shore on your own is not permitted. To protect the reef against intentional and unintentional damage, you are only allowed onto the reef in the company of an accredited guide and wearing a life jacket. If you do go it alone, you risk being picked out of the water by park wardens who may just tell you off and take you back to the shore, but are within their rights to fine you. Note that these rules are not clearly signposted anywhere. A light wetsuit is welcome certain times of year.
• Cenotes. Cenotes are sinkholes in the native limestone that are filled with crystal-clear groundwater; some are large and deep, while others are small passages through a cave. Inland from Puerto Morelos, many cenotes are accessible along the road from P.M. to Central Vallarta, some with really good swimming in clear blue water; To take local transport to the cenotes take colectivo bus "jacinto kanek" from Puerto Morelos to the other side of the highway get off at pemex station (colonia zetina gasca) once there go to the main zocalo two blocks west of 7 eleven and take the bus heading to Leona Vicario, they leave Morelos at 7.00, 8.00, 9.00AM and return from Leona at 12.00,13.00,16.00,and 17.00PM you can get off at Boca del Puma, just past central vallarta at km16, which has nice trails through the forest and a cool snorkel through a cave passage, the owner Jesus will rent you a bicycle if you want to explore the nearby cenotes on your own. Snorkel in a cenote a few meters out in front of the Ojo de Agua hotel or the Puerto Morelos Reef, about 500-1000 meters from shore. You can rent equipment at the dive shops around town and swim there yourself, or book a boat trip outside the Casita del Mar (north end of town, on the beach) for USD22. Downtown operations offer trips for USD25.
• Walk on the boardwalk through the mangroves behind Ceiba del Mar resort (N end of town), and look at birds, fish and cool plants.
• Marina La Bonita (in Hotel Zoetry Paraiso de la Bonita, +52 9988728300 ext 8066, info@marinalabonita.com)- Offers high end catamaran sailing tours to Puerto Morelos, Punta Maroma, Cozumel, Cancun, Isla Mujeres and Isla Contoy. They also offer private deep sea fishing trips, snorkeling and scuba diving tours and PADI certified scuba diving training.
• Almost Heaven Adventures in Puerto Morelos, +52 9988710230 - Offer scuba diving, reef snorkeling, fishing trips and jungle tours. They also sell equipment. For those who want to try out scuba diving but are not certified, you can try a resort course and dive today. Night snorkeling trips and cenote diving are also popular.
• Jungle Spa, Calle de Las Reinas (Zona Urbana), ☎ 998 2089148 or Cell 044 998 1805424 (starseed@prodigy.net.mx). Make an appointment Tues, Wed, Thur, Fri and Sat. Reservations 10AM, 12PM, 2PM or 4PM. Limited time Sunday - 1.30PM and 3.30PM after Jungle Market. Closed Mondays. The spa is operated by non profit organization and directed by Sandra A. Dayton. The spa was created so that the Mayan women could benefit from the tourists coming to the area and provide for their families. They provide an authentic Mayan massage. 
• Aquanauts Dive Adventures (in Hotel Carmen Hacienda), Ave. Rafael E. Melgar (one block south of the town center), ☎ 998-206-9365. 8AM to 4PM. Offers scuba diving tours, PADI certification classes, snorkeling tours, and fishing. 
• The Little Mexican Cooking School (Cooking in Paradise), Avenida Rojo Gomez 768 (On the main avenue facing the beach), ☎ 52 998 2518060. 10AM-4PM. The cooking school offers a fun day of learning how to cook all your favourite Mexican foods and teaches you about the flavours and ingredients used in this fascinating cuisine. The school has classes during the week in CAsa CAribe (cat@puertomorelosliving.com) with an experienced local (English-speaking) chef, and students receive an apron and recipes to take home with their memories. USd90-130. 
• El Rey Polo Country Club (Horseback riding, polo and fourwheelers), Ruta de Cenotes 11.5km (On highway 308 turn right at Ruta de Cenotes, the club is 11.5 km down the road). An attraction in the middle of the jungle. A huge green polo field, club house with restaurant and bar surrounded by pristine tropical forest. Here you can take a trail ride on horse back take riding and polo lessons, hire a four wheeler to visit the cenotes or just relax at the bar. Regular polo matches are on the calendar and visitors are welcome to watch.  
• Diverspoint, Ave Javier Rojo Gomez #17 (Inside posada el Moro), ☎ +52 998 1893628 (info@diverspoint.com). 09.00 - 18.00. Offers diving, snorkeling and fishingtrips. Offers PADI certification training until Divemaster. Also rents bicycles and snorkeling gear.

Best Destinations for 2012

What places are calling your name for 2012? Whatever your mood, Traveler magazine has a recommendation for you—from the romantic hills of Croatia to the perfect beach in Thailand.

Iceland

Harmonic Convergence

Dusk falls on a primeval landscape on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula. A final relic from the world’s last ice age, this North Atlantic island nation is a world of knife-cut valleys, gargantuan fjords, monumental cliffs, black-sand beaches, thundering waterfalls, and silent white glaciers. Recent volcanic eruptions remind us that Iceland is still a country in the making, with changed landscapes that even Icelanders continue to discover.

Three years of financial recovery have made Iceland more affordable, with consumer prices now largely pegged to the euro. The country’s return to a humbler attitude stems from a thousand-year-old tradition of self-reliance—a tradition that has preserved one of the world’s oldest living languages and harnessed some of the cleanest energy on Earth.

Koh Lipe, Thailand

The Perfect Beach

Thailand's sun-drenched jewel in the South Andaman Sea, Koh Lipe has recently risen to the top of intrepid beach lovers’ A-list of island paradises. Considered an alternative to the overexploited Koh Phi Phi (which gained fame as the setting for the film The Beach), Koh Lipe is accessible only by boat, with departure ports that include Krabi and the nearby Malaysian island of Langkawi.

Crystal waters and pristine reefs surround the island. Up to 25 percent of the world’s tropical fish species swim in the protected waters around Koh Lipe (the island is in Tarutao National Marine Park). Pattaya Beach may be the island’s most developed tourist spot, but head to quieter Sunrise Beach, where a now settled community of “sea gypsies,” the Chao Lei, live and fish. Take in the view from Castaway Resort's "chill-out deck," above.

Dresden

The Comeback Kid

Dresden shone brightest in the 1700s, when the kings of Saxony spent their wealth to turn their capital into “Florence on the Elbe.” But in February 1945, two days of British and American bombing destroyed much of Dresden’s center and killed tens of thousands of civilians.

Nearly 70 years later, the city has been resurrected as one of Germany’s top tourist destinations. The landmark Frauenkirche (“church of our lady”), a baroque masterpiece designed by George Bähr, was rebuilt from rubble in 2005 (above). Today it towers above a carefully reconstructed historic center that is home to half a dozen world-class museums—from the Albertinum and the Old Masters Picture Gallery, with its Vermeers and Titians, to the oddly named but unforgettable German Hygiene Museum.

Istria, Croatia

On the Trail of Romance

Think Tuscany, but with a Habsburg past. The shady, rolling hills of Istria—Croatia’s northernmost peninsula—are becoming widely known for their truffles, Malvazija white wines, olive oil stancijas (estates), and crumbling hill towns. Cyclists can spin their spokes over some 2,000 miles of extensively maintained bike trails. Along the coast, sunny ocean views and impromptu opportunities for swimming and snorkeling abound.

The romantic town of Rovinj (above), a former Venetian vassal state, rises from the Adriatic like an estranged island of Venice. Pine-shaded Adriatic coves entice with a refreshing plunge. Evenings are capped off with Champagne cocktails at the Valentino Bar, a breezy boîte perched directly on the water and illuminated in vivid cerulean by underwater lights—not a bad spot to nurture your own inner Casanova.

North Colombia

Lost No Longer

Tayrona National Park's gorgeous beaches are a highlight of northern Colombia, home also to the famed Ciudad Perdida. The cleared mountaintop terraces of the "lost city" shine like a green grassy beacon declaring the country’s rebirth as a travel destination at the crossroads of the Caribbean and South America.

Virunga Volcanoes

Africa's Green and Fiery Heart

Perhaps nowhere on Earth is the dual creative and destructive nature of volcanoes more evident than in central Africa’s Virunga Volcanoes Massif. Straddling the borders between Rwanda, Uganda, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the eight-volcano chain is one of Earth’s most active volcanic regions and a veritable salad bowl for mountain gorillas, chimpanzees, elephants, and other wildlife. Landscapes in all three countries conjure visions of both Eden and hell.

In Congo, the swirling plume of the active Nyiragongo Volcano (above) beckons. Check on the security situation in the troubled country before going, but those who make the steep five-hour hike up Nyiragongo are rewarded with heady vistas of the world’s largest lava lake. Spend the night on the rim to fully experience the crater’s fiery light and sound spectacle.

Costa Brava

The Creative Coast of Spain

The boats painted in yellow, crimson, and white that bob in the water could belong to any scraggy Mediterranean coast. The polar bear that guards them, however, means only one thing: Salvador Dalí’s home in Costa Brava. Dalí, one of art’s greatest eccentrics, came from this part of Catalonia, in northeastern Spain. His giant eggs, swan fountains, and melting clocks drew inspiration from this sunshine-laced wilderness.

The medieval city of Girona also overflows with creativity during its annual spring flower festival, the Temps de Flors. Surprising floral creations spill down cathedral steps and bloom-inspired art installations fill city squares and stone-walled courtyards. The fishing village of Calella de Palafrugell (above) charms with seaside restaurants and homes.

Sonoma, California

American as Apple Pie

“I’ve been to Napa and Sonoma,” you hear people say, as if they were one and the same. Sure, Sonoma’s 300-plus wineries, like those of vine-centric Napa, offer peak wine tasting, from Ravenswood’s deep Zinfandels to Gloria Ferrer’s sophisticated sparklers. But if you’ve visited only the county’s wineries, come back to sample the astounding diversity that makes Sonoma one of America’s travel treasures.

Spend some time floating in an inner tube down the Russian River and walking amid ancient giants—one over 1,400 years old—at Armstrong Redwoods State Natural Reserve. Poke around the old Russian stockade at Fort Ross, which turns 200 in 2012, or the Spanish adobe mission, San Francisco Solano, in Sonoma town. Hunt for antiques along Petaluma’s downtown Victorian row, and dine on seasonal sake-steamed, aged abalone at Michelin-starred Cyrus in Healdsburg. And don’t miss a flaky, fruit-packed slice of Gravenstein pie from Mom’s Apple Pie, a roadside stop outside Sebastopol. It ranks up there with a Russian River Valley Pinot Noir as a real taste of Sonoma.

Muskoka, Ontario

Quintessential Cottage Country

Just two hours by car—but a world away—from powerhouse Toronto beats the heart of Ontario’s cottage country, Muskoka. Families have gathered here for generations to revel in true wilderness. The 2,500-square-mile area includes 8,699 miles of shoreline, 17 historic towns and villages, and innumerable waterfalls and lakes (like Kahshe Lake, above) framed by the peaks of Algonquin Provincial Park to the east and the isles of Georgian Bay Islands National Park to the west.

There’s plenty to do here but nothing you’d put on an agenda. Lounge with friends, barbecue everything, watch the night sky from the dock in the pitch black, play board games while listening to the rain. And run around barefoot all day.


Oman

Perfumed Oasis

While neighboring oil-rich countries on the Arabian Peninsula are building skyscrapers and convention centers, Oman is erecting an opera house and planting desert gardens amid capital city Muscat’s white stone buildings. Sultan Qaboos sparked the country’s modern renaissance with his rise to power in 1970—adding scores of new schools and hospitals and increasing the miles of paved road from six to over 3,700.

Many of Oman’s delights cater to the elite luxury traveler. The ritziest hotel in Muscat offers a helicopter landing pad out back. Pleasure yachts anchor off the coast; it can be easy to forget the sea is Arabian, not Mediterranean. Muscat's Park Inn, pictured here, has a roof terrace view to rival any.

London

Faster, Higher, Stronger

In Olympic-ready London, a new landmark (City Hall) meets old (Tower Bridge) along the Thames. The last time London hosted the Olympics, in 1948, locals subsisted on rations, there was no budget for new sports venues, and many competitors slept in military huts in Richmond Park. Britain may be entering another age of austerity, but nearly $15 billion has been spent on sprucing up the capital for the 2012 Olympics.

Many sporting events have already sold out, but there will be hundreds of free cultural events to enjoy throughout the summer. The London 2012 Festival will turn the whole country into a living stage, from a multilingual bonanza of Shakespeare productions at Stratford-upon-Avon to a soccer-inspired art installation deep in a Scottish forest. David Hockney, Leona Lewis, and Philip Glass are among the heavyweights headlining in London.


Sri Lanka

Jolly Good Times in Hill Country

The first thing that strikes you is the climate. Damp and bracingly cool, this place doesn’t fit your image of Sri Lanka, the lush island nation—formerly known as Ceylon—that hangs like a teardrop off the tip of southern India.

Nuwara Eliya (pronounced nyur-RAIL-ya) is a colonial-era resort town in Sri Lanka’s stunning hill country. This mountainous, mist-draped realm has long been popular with backpackers and other adventurers for its tea plantations (above) and rain forest preserves, known as the Central Highlands, which recently were added to UNESCO’s World Heritage list.

Greece

Ancient Beauty

Patrick Leigh Fermor, the dashing philhellene who died last June, knew that to get under Greece’s skin you must stray from the instant gratifications of its seaside resorts. Traveling on foot across the gorges of Roumeli and mountains of Mani, Leigh Fermor discovered a land of fierce beauty where traditions run deep. Eventually, he settled in Kardamíli, a sleepy hamlet in the southern Peloponnese, which he hoped was “too inaccessible, with too little to do, for it ever to be seriously endangered by tourism.”

Happily, he was right. While some islands have been scarred by unregulated development—and as the country grapples with the worst financial crisis in its modern history—Greece’s rugged mainland retains its unadulterated allure. Foraging for mushrooms in Epirus, watching pink pelicans take flight over Prespa Lake, listening to ethereal chanting in Meteora’s monasteries (such as the Roussanou Monastery, above)—there remain pockets of Greece where time stands still. You just have to know where to look.

New Zealand

Cyclists' Bliss

A violent struggle created this world, according to Maori mythology: Indigenous New Zealanders say Sky Father and Earth Mother were ripped from each other’s arms to make room for mountains, forests, and oceans. Around Rotorua, a Maori heartland and home of the mineral-rimmed Champagne Pool (above), it’s easy to believe the struggle continues, as the eerie landscape bubbles and churns like some primordial stew. Geysers erupt, mud boils, and steam seeps from cliffs and sidewalks, leaving a sulfurous scent in the air.

In a land where adrenaline lovers ride rockets suspended on wires and roll downhill inside giant plastic balls, biking seems one of the saner ways to plunge into a landscape that compels exploration: hot springs, glaciers, rain forests, and volcanoes, encircled by nearly 10,000 miles of coastline, packed into a country barely bigger than Colorado. New Zealand is made for journeys, physical and spiritual.

Panama

Eco-Wonderland

As a bridge between continents, Panama, 51 miles sea-to-sea at its midpoint, only looks slight. The Panama Canal, which capitalized on the Central American country’s slim waistline to become a literal nexus of global trade, will expand with two new sets of locks, one on the Pacific side of the canal and one on the Atlantic, designed for massive, 13,000-container cargo ships, due to be completed in 2014. World traders occupy gleaming new hotels that modernize the colonial capital.

In Panama, nature and indigenous culture are abundant. The canal-bordering tropical lowlands of Soberanía National Park ring with the cries of howler monkeys and the chatter of toucans. The cool, flower-filled highland town of Boquete sits in the shadow of the country’s tallest volcano. Embera women paint their bodies and create elaborate neckpieces (above). At the offshore Coiba National Park, where a maximum of only 40 overnight visitors are allowed, divers share the pristine waters with scientific researchers and whale sharks.

Mongolia

Untamed Hovsgol

If you yearn for a connection to the wild, you will find it here. Hovsgol is the northernmost of Mongolia’s 21 provinces, shadowing Russia’s border and sharing the great Siberian taiga (subarctic coniferous forest). Lichens in bright greens and oranges color 10,000-foot passes, while sacred rivers, rumored to never freeze, feed lakes framed by snow-tipped mountains.

Hovsgol is just now opening its arms to travelers who come to catch and release taimen, giant salmonid “river wolves” that stalk Hovsgol’s waterways. Others come to ride Mongolian ponies in search of the Tsaatan, small bands of nomadic reindeer herders (above) who live in encampments and follow shamanistic beliefs.