Since I love going to the beach, I’m on the perpetual quest to find a great beach that’s close enough for a day trip from my home base of NYC. (Bay Head, NJ, my favorite nearby beach is tough for a day trip, although it can be done if you’re motivated enough.) For years, I’ve [...]

A few months ago, I wrote a post about five fantastic Jersey Shore towns that are nothing like Seaside Heights, the boozy boardwalk where MTV’s first season of Jersey Shore took place. While those five towns are good choices for a guido-free weekend at the beach, one of them is my clear favorite: Bay Head, [...]

(photos by Pete and Libby) In mid-May, Pete and Libby took a trip to the Basque region. First, they explored San Sebastian, Spain, which you can read all about here. Then they set out for Biarritz, France, which they liked even better. Here they explain what makes Biarritz, a chic resort town on the southern [...]

(photos by Pete and Libby) There's Spanish culture, there's French culture, and then there's Basque culture. Pete and Libby (whom you may remember from their photos of the Winter Olympics and Lindsey Vonn) decided to explore the Basque region in early May. They flew into Toulouse, France, and then drove to San Sebastian, Spain, where [...]

I took that photo of the beach at Siesta Key, FL, on Monday, May 31st. As you can see,the water is still clean, clear and gorgeous. (For the record, those are people's heads you see in the water — not tar balls or oil balls.) In fact, I wish I was still there right now… [...]

I planned my trip to Sarasota, FL, several weeks before the BP oil spill in the Gulf on Mexico. Every time I'd been to Sarasota, it was too cold to enjoy the beach but I figured that it should finally be warm enough on Memorial Day Weekend. Well, now I wasn't worried about the weather [...]

(photo of Bay Head by Lakewentworth/flickr) Memorial Day marks the unofficial start of summer, so I wanted to tell you about one of my favorite summer spots: Bay Head, NJ. This quaint Jersey Shore town, which bills itself as "a country village by the sea," is nothing like Seaside Heights, home to MTV's Jersey Shore. [...]

Today in Sarasota, FL, it was 65F and sunny. This is my third visit and this is the warmest weather I’ve ever experienced here. Normally, 65F is not the kind of weather you celebrate in Florida. But when the sun was beating down on my bare arms at Bradenton Beach (pictured above) this afternoon, I [...]

(Barton Creek Cave, photos by Amanda Lobell) I put Belize on my list of top 10 trips I wish I had taken in 2009, so I was very excited to hear all about Amanda Lobell and Neil Roach’s recent vacation there. They had a fantastic time dividing their week between the jungle and the beach, [...]

I haven't been in Grand Cayman for too long, and I've already found the beach and learned several things about the island. OK, finding the beach wasn't too hard as I'm staying right on Seven Mile Beach (pictured above), which is where many of the hotels are located. And the rest of what I've learned [...]