Planning a 2026 trip? These are the 10 best where-to-stay guides — Tokyo, NYC, Kyoto, the Algarve, Berlin, Sydney, Amsterdam, Vienna, Lisbon, and London — with the best neighborhoods and honest hotel picks in each.
Venice is the rare city that lives up to the postcards — then exceeds them. But it rewards a plan: the big sights sell out, the access fee punishes spontaneous day trips, and the city’s geography means a wrong turn can cost you an hour. This 3-day Venice itinerary is built for first-timers — one … Read more
Berlin is one of those cities where the address on your booking confirmation genuinely changes the trip. Mitte puts the Reichstag, Museum Island, and the Brandenburg Gate on your doorstep. Base yourself in Kreuzberg and your evenings turn into street-art strolls and late-night bars. Pick the wrong corner and you’ll spend your days riding the … Read more
Sydney does the big-ticket sights brilliantly — the Opera House sails, the Harbour Bridge climb, the Bondi to Coogee walk. But ask a Sydneysider where they actually go on a free Saturday, and you’ll hear about somewhere else entirely: a secret garden tucked behind Luna Park, a tidal pool only reachable on foot, a laneway … Read more
Sydney is one of those cities where your neighborhood choice genuinely shapes the trip. Stay in The Rocks and you’ll wake up to harbour views and walk to the Opera House before the crowds. Base yourself in Bondi and your mornings start with salt air and a coastal walk instead of a train timetable. Pick … Read more
There is a specific smell that means Christmas in Europe: hot spiced wine, roasted almonds, pine needles, and chimney smoke, all swirling together in freezing air. I have wandered Christmas markets from the Baltic to the Rhine, and no two feel the same — Vienna does imperial grandeur, Strasbourg does half-timbered fairy tale, Tallinn does … Read more
New York City is one of those rare cities where your hotel choice shapes the whole trip. Stay near Times Square and you’re 20 minutes from Broadway, Central Park, and three airports’ worth of transit connections — but you’ll pay a premium and hear sirens at 3 a.m. Stay in a quiet West Village townhouse … Read more
There are road trips you drive to get somewhere, and there are road trips you drive because the road is the somewhere. Scotland’s North Coast 500 is firmly the second kind — a 516-mile loop that starts and ends at Inverness Castle, launched in 2015, and has become one of the great driving routes of … Read more
The Algarve is Portugal’s sunniest coastline — 200 kilometers of golden cliffs, hidden coves, and fishing villages turned resort towns along the country’s southern edge. But where you stay here matters more than in most beach destinations. The Algarve isn’t one place: Lagos buzzes with backpackers and boat tours, Albufeira parties until dawn, Tavira dozes … Read more
Kyoto doesn’t do casual visits. Every first-timer arrives with the same long list — Kiyomizu-dera’s wooden stage, the vermilion tunnels of Fushimi Inari, the Golden Pavilion, the bamboo grove, a glimpse of a geiko in Gion — and every first-timer discovers the same hard truth: Kyoto’s great sights are scattered across a wide basin, and … Read more