4 Top Reasons to Make a Vacation Rental Your Next Holiday - Plus Booking Tips

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Vacation rentals were the fastest growing type of holiday accommodation even before the pandemic. With types of rental homes ranging from urban apartments to beach villas, farmhouses to ski chalets or even castles, the trend towards non-hotel stays is likely to keep growing as travel picks up again.  Here are the top reasons why you might be thinking about a vacation rental soon.  And we share a couple of tips to help you get the best rental experience in a travel space with increasing choices of listed properties and a newly-professional approach to villa rentals.  Privacy and Space… All Together  It used to be romance was the big motivation for privacy, but in today’s world, being secluded has health benefits, too. Physical... more

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Kiss the 'Love Boat' Goodbye

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If you remember Saturday night TV dominated by a double-header of feel-good, travel-inspired shows, with the ‘Love Boat’ followed by ‘Fantasy Island’, this is the end of an era. The ‘Love Boat’ is sailing off into the sunset. Princess Cruises’ most famous ship, the Pacific Princess, has left the fleet. Princess Cruises tells us that, in its years at sea, the Pacific Princess sailed, “more than 1.6 million nautical miles, including 11 unforgettable World Cruise voyages and countless cruises to exotic locales.”But its real legacy is pure fiction.The Pacific Princess popularized modern cruising to millions of TV viewers through its star role as the ‘Love Boat’. In the romantic comedy/ light drama by feel-good TV producer Aaron Spelling, the zany antics of... more

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This State's 'For Lovers', and Even has a Seductive Local Cuisine - Recipe Included!

Story About Virginia Beach

The catchy saying is known around the world and has even been inducted into the Madison Avenue Advertising Walk of Fame. ‘Virginia is for Lovers’ debuted over 50 years ago, explaining to readers of ‘Modern Bride’ why they should honeymoon in Virginia. Over the next half-century, ‘Virginia is for Lovers’ has come to mean a lot of different things to different people. It’s not just newlyweds who love Virginia, nestled between Chesapeake Bay on the Atlantic Ocean and the Appalachian Mountains. Ways to Fall in Love in VirginiaVirginia is the cradle, the battlefield, and the bedroom of American history. Jamestown, founded in 1607, was the first permanent English colony in the New World. (Thomas Jefferson's plantation, Monticello/ J Looney)Right next... more

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3 Places For the Romantic, Overwater Escape of a Lifetime

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Ever since the first overwater bungalow resort was built half a century ago, they have come to define the ultimate romantic tropical getaway. Overwater villas are the next best thing to a private tropical island of your own – a luxury, rustic-chic bungalow suspended right over top of jewel-toned seas. It brings out the primal human in us all, and activates every romantic instinct. The originals in French Polynesia were inspired by the makeshift, thatched-roof overwater huts made by local fishermen to work on their catch and boats in the shade. A trio of American entrepreneurs hoping to develop a resort on a property on Ra'iātea that had a rocky waterfront - but no beach - got sudden inspiration and voila!... more

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3 Luxurious Ways to Experience the Travel Event of 2021 - the Antarctic Solar Eclipse

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A year from now, one of the travel events of our lifetime will be over.  Not only will 2021 see the return to travel we’ve all longed for; on December 4th, 2021, a total solar eclipse will take place. A total solar eclipse, where the moon passes between the Earth and the Sun, completely blocking out the sun for a short period of time, is as mystical and as primal an experience for us modern humans as it has been for all of our ancestors before us through time immemorial.Antarctic waters are the only place in the world with 100% visibility of this awe-inspiring astronomical event. The remote site also means no ‘light pollution’ from surrounding human population centers will interfere... more

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The Best Place In Britain to get Your 'Bridgerton' Fix

Story About Bath

The steamy, historic-fantasy Netflix series ‘Bridgerton’ couldn’t come at a better time to brighten our stay-at-home winter blahs. We aren't surprised it's shattered Netflix viewership records.Bridgerton is an early-19th century, light-hearted romp of an historic romance on steroids. Bridgerton follows the intrigues of the young Bridgerton family and their high society friends, enemies and potential mates, their scheming mamas, and the revelations of Lady Whistledown's scandal sheets.It's fantasy and eye candy of the highest order, with impossibly beautiful and sexy and famously diverse cast members, all outfitted in lovelier-than-life, Empire costumes that wouldn't look out of place on a runway, set against the sumptuous backdrop of British Regency-era elegant, lofty neoclassical architecture and sets with sweeping staircases, rooms where pastel... more

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Check Out These Pinup Pooches on the TSA's First Downloadable Calendar

Story About San Antonio

We love airports, don’t you? After a year without travel,  we can’t wait to see the bustle, feel that unique buzz of people excited to be off on a new adventure in a new place… Of all the sights and sounds of a busy airport, the one that’s guaranteed to make you smile is the earnest, adorable faces of hard-at-work security dogs.We may not be going to the airport and heading off to new destinations right now, but the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is taking a small detour from its serious mission of airport safety, and has found a way to share some of the endearing sensations of the airport with travel lovers at home. For the first time, the TSA... more

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Snuggle Up In the World's Largest Log Cabin

Story About Montebello

It’s made of an astonishing 10,000 western red cedar logs, and ‘logs in’ at a whopping 4-million cubic feet of volume.Fairmont Le Château Montebello lays claim to being the biggest log building on the planet. A massive lobby and rotunda anchor four wings extending out in a star formation that’s painted dramatic black on the outside, but retains its natural warm shade on the inside.Phenomenal, 70-foot log rafters support the atrium lobby, with a central, three-story stone fireplace, a mezzanine overlooking the stunning space, and a 3rd-floor balcony with a perspective over the wonders of its pristine, old-growth forest surroundings.This incredible building is topped by half a million hand-made cedar shakes, and boasts over a hundred miles of carved wooden... more

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6 Tips for Planning Your Post-COVID Wellness Vacation

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This January, two powerful forces for wellness travel converge: yearly New Year's resolutions to become or rediscover our best selves, and this year, the pandemic that's both kept us from traveling, and for many, fostered a lifestyle that may not have kept us at our peak.In the travel era BC (Before COVID), wellness travel was already one of the most popular, and growing, vacation styles.Since COVID, the idea of wellness travel has taken on a new dimension – now, ALL travel has a ‘wellness’ element as concerns about staying safe and healthy have already transformed how we travel. Wellness travel means many things to many people, from extreme diet or fitness programs, meditation, yoga or other mind and body practice retreats, even... more

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'Escape' on a Luxury Cruise This Season Without Leaving Home: Meryl Streep Stars in New Movie Filmed at Sea

Story About New York

We can’t travel on a luxury cruise ourselves right now– or do many of the other things we love to do around the holidays - but “Let Them All Talk” lets us take an armchair escape during the break, and imagine ourselves along for a ride on one of the most famous ships afloat.We couldn’t ask for better company for our silver screen journey. Starring three-time Academy Award® winner Meryl Streep, Academy Award® nominee and multiple Emmy® Award winner Candice Bergen and two-time Academy Award® winner Dianne Wiest with Oscar®-nominated Lucas Hedges (“Manchester By The Sea”) and Gemma Chan (“Crazy Rich Asians”), “Let Them All Talk” is directed by another famous Academy Award® alum, filmmaker Steven Soderbergh of “Ocean’s Eleven” series... more

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What's the Christmas Connection Between Salzburg and Stowe?

Story About Vermont

One’s in Austria, and the other in America. But they are bound together in the pop culture celebrations of the season.Have you figured it out yet? The hint is in film and music. Both Salzburg and Stowe are destinations tied to the Trapp Family legend. You likely know it as: The Sound of Music, a movie that’s become essential holiday family viewing – and singing - for every generation since the early 60’s.The film is the – very fictionalized – story of Maria von Trapp, who, while deciding whether to become a nun, became governess to the unruly children of Austrian nobleman and naval officer Captain von Trapp. As Nazi Germany threatens expansion into Austria and demands the services of the... more

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Celebrating the Holiday Spirit of Travel... at Home

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Here we are at the holidays at last. It’s been a year of challenges and disappointments, with canceled or postponed trips that normally give us the relaxation, escape from the everyday… and something to look forward to. But the holiday spirit of travel is still out there to lift our spirits this season and give us inspiration for travels to come.We’ve assembled some of the best seasonal experiences you can enjoy at home this year, and even share virtually with friends and loved ones. The NutcrackerLong before Toy Story, the ballet with Tchaikovsky’s memorable score and a magical story line in the Land of the Sweets that has toys and treats and mice coming to life in exquisite choreography was entrenched as... more

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Wish Away the Worst of 2020, Give Thanks, and Plant Hope - Tourism New Zealand's Forest Initiative

Story About New Zealand

When the sun rises on the New Year, New Zealand’s location on the globe makes it the first country in the world to welcome 2021. To get next year started on the right foot for the whole planet, Tourism New Zealand is launching a holiday initiative that generates hope, turns the disappointments of this year into something positive, and launches on Giving Tuesday, December 1st. For the month of December, Tourism New Zealand will be planting a ‘Forest of Hope’ for 2021. 2020 has been a tough year, with cancellations, postponements, missed travels and weddings, graduations, birthdays and celebrations.People from all over the world can submit their disappointments from the past year and New Zealand will transform them into hope, planting... more

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Italy Names Its First 'City of Wine'

Story About Barolo

Wine lovers have one more reason to get traveling again next year. In celebration of one of its oldest and most beloved products, Italy has declared its first-ever ‘City of Wine’. The Italian association of communities that collaborate to protect and promote their regional wine designations held a competition for the new honor.  Barolo - the town with the famous red wine of the same name – was crowned ‘City of Wine’ for the award’s inaugural year in 2021. Nestled between Genoa on Italy’s north-western coast, and the Alps to the north, the picturesque Langhe hills surrounding Barolo in Piedmont are nearly entirely covered by vineyards and have been declared a UNESCO World Heritage site.The nebbiolo grape grown there is made... more

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KLM has revealed the future of flight. Hint: You'll be sitting IN the wings.

Story About Netherlands

If you’re one of those travelers who always picks a seat over the wing, you’re in luck. In this new-concept aircraft, you – and every other passenger on board – will be flying IN the wings. They call it the Flying –V. And it’s a whole new vision of passenger flight. “Tube-and-wing” design has defined planes since the earliest days of passenger flight. Innovative approaches to aircraft design continued in military applications, where flying wing aircraft have established a presence. Now, they’re set to transform commercial passenger flight.In the Flying-V, the pilots remain in the nose. But behind them, the passenger cabin, cargo hold and fuel tanks are in the wings, resulting in a plane that’s a spectacular V shape. No more tube!The reason... more

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