Who doesn't love a good list?

Photo by: Stephen Martin
Top 3 list of Top 10 lists


Virtual Tourist: World's Top 10 Ugliest Buildings

I would argue that the Pompidou Centre isn't that ugly, it's just that the rest of Paris is so pretty. Also, congrats to my hometown of Toronto for sneaking onto the top 10 with the ROM addition.

National Geographic: Big Photo Top 25 Photo Finalists

Stunning. My favourites are 3, 6, 13 and 16. It makes me want to have a National Geographic Big Photo room in my house with blown-up versions of all 25. Seems feasible.

Top Tenz: Top 10 Hippie Destinations
Vancouver makes it to #2. "Liberal marijuana policy" is cited.

About town in Beantown

My BFF moved down to Boston for school when we were both 17 and has never really looked back. I don’t blame her. I try to make an annual trip down there, using her as an excuse to see one of my favourite U.S. cities.

Most recently, I spent Hallowe’en weekend in this New England hub. The 31st was uncharacteristically warm which made walking anywhere and everywhere even more enjoyable in this pedestrian-friendly city. As a side note, it also made me think back to the many Hallowe’ens of my youth that were never that mild – remember wearing a massive and hideous unzipped coat over your princess/dog/unidentifiable costume while you paraded from house to house? I bet kids in Florida never had to deal with that crap.

Hallowe’en was definitely a highlight of the night, although I’d have to say the bar we ended up at – Tequila Rain – would not win the blue ribbon in the classy bar category. There are, despite Tequila Rain, a number of top-notch sights to see in Beantown. A few of my suggestions:

New England Aquarium
I’ve already unshamefully admitted it – I’m a massive aquarium buff. My excitement level rivals that of a 6-year-old when it comes to these things and that will likely never change. The New England Aquarium visit was one of my favourites because we topped it off with an IMAX viewing of Deep Sea 3-D. Other highlights include the four-storey ocean tank and the lobster hats in the gift shop.

Top of the Hub
This restaurant at the top of the Prudential Centre is definitely the destination for a fine dining experience in Beantown and the view of the city is worth having to ignore your budget. The menu offers the best in New England seafood and other local cuisine. We missed out the live jazz performance that happens every night in the lounge and I am vowing now, as I write this post, to make up for that on my next visit.

Mike's Pastry
Holy cannoli. This sweet shop in Boston's North End was overflowing with locals and tourists alike when we walked past mid-afternoon and the line had yet to diminish when we returned post-dinner at 7. Located in the heart of Boston's Italian area, Mike's has a reputation for its pastry creations that is fully deserved. The Florentine cannoli was oozing with ricotta, dripping with chocolate chips and topped off with chocolate drizzle. Un. Real.

Newbury Street
For me, this is the closest I've come to a shopping mecca in North America. From Marc Jacobs to Madewell to the two-storey designer re-sale shop Second Time Around, I have spent more money on this street than I would care to admit. The actual walk down Newbury is beautiful, especially in the fall. The cafés - Stephanie's on Newbury, in particular - are prime spots to sit and people watch or stalk whatever celebrity is in town filming.

Fig's Pizza
I fasted (read: skipped real meals and ate only Hallowe'en candy) all day in anticipation of chowing down here, a hotspot owned by famed chef Todd English. We made reservations, which turned out to be necessary as Fig's is simply a large shoebox on Beacon Hill. Hands down the best pizza was the signature Fig and Prosciutto (with gorganzola), which is one of those combos that sounds dubious on paper but is actually gastronomic heaven. Other favourites were the Portobello (portobello mushroom, wild mushroom purée, roasted red onion and fontina) and the Bronx Bomber (your standard pepperoni, Todd-English styles).

Frequent flyer fodder

Life has been hectic with going from working no job in the summer (when I decided to start this blog to give me a sense of purpose) to working two jobs and 60 hour+ weeks.

That's not to say I have beat the all-things-travel bug and although my writing has unfortunately taken the backseat, my reading has not. Here's a few of the best travel articles I've read recently:

The single-day business trip (Globe and Mail)
As a twenty-something with little responsibilties at home and a naive sense of what flying 3 days a week really means, I often dream of a job that would require me to travel at least some of the time. I am at a point where the question "would you travel for your job?" would be met with a definitive "yes." "Please." Some of the glamour, I will admit, is taken out from this article's look at same-day flights and hotel cuts.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/travel/the-single-day-business-trip/article1350027/

Destination: Berlin, GERMANY (Toronto Star)
Propeller Island City Lodge seems like the the end product of Tim Burton meets whacked hotelier over several bottles of wine. The rooms are creepy yet creative and makes the hotel a destination in and of itself.

http://www.thestar.com/travel/europe/article/713745--bedroom-bizarro

Destination: Thunder Bay, ONTARIO (re:porter)
My new favourite in-flight read, the re:porter, had some great travel stories that explored a few of its destination cities - an increasing roster despite a general shrinkage of the travel industry. The whole thing is worth perusing, and I was especially drawn to the article on Thunder Bay. I stayed at the same quaint B&B as the writer and missed him by a couple days...I've been waiting for this article to come out since June and its unique take on T-Bay's Finnish culture did not disappoint (p. 27)

http://www.flyporter.com/common/docs/reporter_07.pdf

I is for...Ibiza

Ibiza, SPAIN

My first exposure to the small Spanish island of Ibiza was probably when I was 12 years old and the creative genius that was the Vengaboys came out with the song “We’re Going to Ibiza.” I couldn’t remember exactly how it went so as I began to write this post, I youtubed it and was taken back to my youth. I was not, however, taken back to Ibiza because there is no way any semi-decent club there would actually play this terrible, cringeworthy song. It sounds like it should be background music for a television commercial for a blowout sale on Hawaiian print shirts.

In actuality, Ibiza is a stunning destination that lives up to its party-hardy reputation while providing a gorgeous seaside backdrop for the daytime spent necessarily resting up for another allnighter.

Many major European cities will offer cheap flights to Ibiza, especially during the offseason. It is a hot and crazy weekend destination for many vacationers and those two days are often enough.

There are two main areas you can stay in Ibiza as a young traveller – out by the nightclubs or closer to the beaches. My group opted for a hostel within walking distance of several beaches and we couldn’t have been happier. The area – called San Antonio – faced out towards the ocean. It was a stone’s throw from the infamous Café del Mar although we found ourselves returning to another live music haunt, Villa Mercedes, even killing time there before our departure flight at 2 a.m.

Our days were spent at various beaches and climbing over rocks and into coves to get to them. There is often nothing more gratifying than having a local recommend a destination to you that turns out to be a hidden heaven on earth. That was Cala Salada, a beach no more than 20 minutes from our hostel (girls took a cab, boys went on an "adventure walk" to get there). I know this is not a romantic way to say it, but the water was such a perfect shade of turquoise it honestly looked digitally enhanced. We soon learned it was pretty to look at, but swimming was another story as the annual infestation of jellyfish was underway. Super.

Our big night out was spent at Pacha nightclub, an insane venue that maxes out at 3,000 people and has enough strobe lights and smoke machines that it should carry the same warnings for people as getting a X-ray does.

The sign of a great night, and in this case a great weekend, I believe, is still being up with the sunrise. And you can’t really beat an Ibiza beach to witness something like that.

And now, I will leave you with my favourite verse of the song that introduced me to this lovely place.

I don’t wanna be a bus driver
All my life
Im gonna pack my bags and leave this town
Grab a flight
Fly away on venga airways*
Fly me high
Ibiza sky

*doesn’t exist

Get out your nautical-themed pashmina afghan

My recent perusals of various travel sections have taken me to the high-seas, where luxury can sometimes literally bathe in a sea of money. I caught my first glimpse of marine excess when I spent that summer in Nice. For anyone that’s travelled to Monaco as a commoner, it’s a must-do to walk around the marina and gawk at people who are sunbathing on outdoor beds next their infinity pool which is flowing gently to the deck below where another boat – flanked by two jet skis – sits for recreational fun. There is something fascinating about the world’s elite, who insist a red carpet be rolled out before they debark at the next port, if they even get off the boat.

The Globe and Mail recently featured a creature of a boat, the interior of which was designed by French fashion house Hermès. The project was a joint venture with Monaco-based yacht builder Wally Construct and it honestly looks like some sort of futuristic, non-Earthling that trolls around the ocean.




At 58-metres, this doozy of a watercraft measures 30,000 square feet of living space, a 25-metre pool and a “beach” (why don’t you just drive to an actual beach?) that stretches for nearly 40 metres across the back. Something about this boat makes me think that if it had a voice, it would sound like Darth Vader. But it’s stunning nonetheless and a friend to the environment, using solar energy and running on a diesel-electric engine.


Another noteworthy cruiser that’s now out there is that of Russian yacht-fanatic and billionaire, Roman Abramovich. Abramovich is so concerned with getting too much attention that he has equipped his subtle yacht, Eclipse, with a lasers that can destroy camera shots and possibly the lives of the photographers whose livelihood depended on getting the shot.


The lasers work by detecting CCDs (charge-coupled devices) which are found in most photoelectric sensors. The idea is that anytime one of Abramovich’s security guys (or gals) spot a possible camera, all they have to do is point and shoot the laser. Any photos on the camera in question will subsequently be destroyed. Seems a little extreme but I guess a 557-foot yacht is too.