Three Perfect Days

  • Nov 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Whistler, B.C.

    WHEN PEOPLE SAY WHISTLER IS big, they’re not just talking about the Canadian mountain resort’s size. It’s true that this once-obscure British Columbia fishing, logging, and ski town is now the largest ski and snowboard resort in North America. (At 8,171 skiable acres, it dwarfs even Vail.) It’s also true that its twin peaks, Whistler and Blackcomb, rise higher from base to summit than any other chairlift-equipped mountains on the continent, rambling from cedar rain forests to glacier-capped peaks and delivering a vertical mile of skiing. But what’s biggest about Whistler is its personality. Alternately thrilling and serene, urbane and untamed, Whistler is a winter destination best-suited to those who like to play hard. Whistler’s weather can be capricious, but—with glacier skiing and sprawling mountainscapes, a thriving gourmet scene and dance clubs, great activities for kids and a bustling, international vibe—the town’s fun factor never wavers. Located 75 miles north of Vancouver in a lake-dotted valley at the easy-to-handle elevation of 2,000 feet, Whistler spent its first 50 years as a summer fishing hamlet called Alta Lake. In the early 1960s, a group of Canadian businessmen pinpointed one local peak as a potential site for the 1968 Winter Olympic Games. That first Olympic bid failed, but in February 1966 Whistler Mountain opened for business. And the games are finally coming to town in 2010. Today both ski mountains are owned by Intrawest Corp., a resort and real estate conglomerate known for some of the continent’s best ski areas. So prepare to play and get pampered—no matter your ability level on skis or snowboard. Get ready, in other words, for three perfectly hedonistic, action-packed days.


  • Oct 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    TRAVELERS HAVE PRAISED the spectacular setting of Rio de Janeiro as far back as the 16th century. British poet Richard Flecknoe in 1655 called it “the most seductive scenery in the world.” In the early 18th century, explorer Louis Antoine de Bougainville described his experience in Rio as “the springtime of poets.” Since then, the city has grown into a metropolis of 6 million people, but visitors still feel a similar thrill at their first glimpse of Rio, magnificently set between dramatic mountains and an island-dotted bay. The natural landscape—beaches, rocky hills, and forests—weaves into the urban environment. Rather than dislodge nature, Rio incorporated it. Strangely, it took a long time for cariocas (as Rio dwellers are called) to acknowledge this privileged setting. For decades they strove to be European, preferably Parisian. Beaches were ignored, and in architecture, landscaping, and fashion, Europe was the mode. Only around 1923, when the Copacabana Palace was built on semideserted Copacabana Beach to receive foreign dignitaries, did cariocas suddenly embrace the wonder and beauty of their unique home. The admiration of visitors did much to turn beaches into something not just respectable, but also chic. And they became part of Rio’s style: easygoing, joyous, and intensely alive. The city retains traces of its imperial past as the capital and home to Brazil’s emperors, but, in general, the tone is thoroughly modern. Rio’s mix of architectural styles and evidence of unplanned growth in response to the needs of the moment only enhance its vibrant character. For lovers of year-round sun, there are two perfect seasons in Rio: hot and very hot. Summers—November through March—are when Rio is most truly itself. The beaches are packed, the bars are full, and music plays everywhere. It’s also when the city’s top celebrations take place: New Year’s Eve, with thousands dressed in white on the beach watching elaborate fireworks displays, and, of course, the world-famous Carneval (February 17–20, 2007). So dress your lightest and prepare for three perfect days in Rio.


  • Sep 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Paris, France

    ERNEST HEMINGWAY WROTE, “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.” Indeed, no matter which arrondissement you find yourself in, you’re bound to discover a delightful and delicious repast. Paris is a city that abounds with beauty. It surrounds visitors with grand architecture and regal monuments of the past, while boasting some of the most revolutionary innovations of the present. The computerized Minitel network existed long before many of us ever heard of the Internet, and the 100-year-old métro speeds passengers underground with an efficiency that’s still the envy of most cities today. Paris has grown quite a bit from its beginning as a small island in the Seine, the Île de la Cité. But it retains the feel of a large village, a mélange of small neighborhoods dotted with lively cafés with no shortage of Gallic characters. As you crisscross the city, from the bookish Latin Quarter to the bustling Place de la Madeleine, you’ll discover a place rich in culture and history. You’ll find Parisians fascinated, some say obsessed, with appearances. While you don’t need to don a beret and puff Gauloises to blend in, manners and appreciation go a long way. Parisians are justifiably proud of their city and are pleased when visitors demonstrate a similar appreciation. What’s not to like? So come along on a moveable feast through Paris, and for three perfect days, you’ll find an abundance of memorable experiences, perhaps enough to enrich the rest of your life.


  • Aug 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Jackson Hole, WY

    IF YOU’RE A SKIER, YOU’VE undoubtedly heard of Jackson Hole. The area’s ski superlatives—most challenging, most vertical, most expert-rated ski runs—are the stuff of legend. It’s no surprise, then, that people who move to this northwestern Wyoming valley do so mainly for the skiing. The surprise is that, for many of those who stay, winter is no longer their favorite season. “I came for winter and stayed for summer,” is the locals’ mantra from the bagel shop to the bank. When the snow melts, a completely different Jackson Hole emerges. (To clarify, Jackson Hole is the entire valley, and Jackson is the largest of the valley’s six towns.) Ski runs morph into trails surrounded by wildflowers that are perfect for hiking, biking, and running. Rivers rise to white-water level. Animals come out of hiding, and the ranches that give the area its Wild West attitude come back to life. The roads through nearby Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks reopen. And faster than you can say, “My muscles can’t take any more,” you can find a symphony or country-music concert, a festival, a rodeo, an art show, a winetasting, great shops and restaurants, or a spa where you can rest your body. Three days is the perfect amount of time to sample Jackson Hole’s cowboy-cosmopolitan style and enthusiasm for outdoor adventure.


  • Jul 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Sydney, Australia

    THERE IS MORE TO SYDNEY THAN the standout icons that grace its postcards. Though the glowing white sails of the Opera House and the dazzling architecture of the Harbour Bridge are its most recognizable symbols, this breezy, blue-eyed blonde of a city has a dark, edgy past that continues to resonate. Begun as an open-air British penal colony in 1788, Sydney has transformed itself over the past two centuries into the sunny, exuberant, cosmopolitan metropolis that greets visitors today. The city’s 4 million or so residents are rightly proud of their world-class restaurants, museums, and galleries; they revel in the hedonistic outdoor lifestyle afforded by a temperate climate along with ample beaches and bushland. But beneath the gloss, there are hidden depths. In the cobblestone lane-ways of the historic Rocks district, in the prisoner-hewn sandstone structures that dot the streets, and even in the larrikin spirit that suffuses modern Sydney culture, the city’s colourful convict past still echoes.


  • Jun 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Chicago, IL

    JUNE IS A GRAND MONTH TO VISIT Chicago. Everything is back in its proper place now that the showers of spring have washed away all traces of winter. In the miles and miles of parks along the lakefront (the reason Chicago’s nickname was once “Paris on the Prairie”), trees are dressed in their full-leaf finery and colorful, elegant beds of flowers are everywhere. All along the lakefront, towering masts of sailboats spike the clouds. Bicyclists and joggers (many with dogs in tow) appear in miniature against the majestic skyline of the city. The towering buildings washed by the bright summer sun look freshly scrubbed. In 1885, Chicago sported the world’s first skyscraper. Granted, it was only nine stories tall, but this city has set the standard for tall buildings ever since. Chicago is beautiful and fun. In 1997, the city council actually absolved Mrs. O’Leary’s cow of all blame for the great fire of 1871. Chicago is festive, too; it doesn’t simply flirt with food and music but carries on a deep and passionate love affair so intense it would make the moon blush. All summer long, Grant Park and Millennium Park serve up a tasty stew of music that feeds both the soul and the mind. The spirited Gospel Music Festival (June 2–4) and nothing-quite-like-it Blues Festival (June 8–11) will whet your appetite for more. And your appetite truly will be sparked—and sated, too—when you take in the great picnic in the park, Taste of Chicago, which starts June 30. June is a portal month in Chicago, a perfect doorway to a great season in one of the world’s greatest cities. It’s a cultural grand vista that goes on and on until millions of Italian lights are strung on the trees of Michigan Avenue just in time for Christmas.


  • May 2006

    Three Perfect Days, in Munich, Germany

    “MUNCHEN LEUCHTET” — Munich glows—wrote German author and Nobel laureate Thomas Mann in celebrating the city he called home. Munich is a magical place. A mild climate and laid-back style make it one of Europe’s most charming cities. The past 20 years have seen Munich become one of Germany’s most prosperous, as well. Major corporate headquarters in the automotive, banking, entertainment, insurance, and high-tech industries fuel a trendy social whirl of mercurial, self-made entrepreneurs and entertainers sometimes mocked as the “bussi-bussi” society for the airy kisses they often bestow. And then there are the genuine, salt-of-the-earth Bavarians, dressed in lederhosen, white shirts, and Gamsbart hats. Regional pride starts with a love of their language —a gravelly dialect hardly understandable even to fellow Germans—and ends with a devotion to beer. This proud capital of Bavaria is the world’s unofficial beer capital, with a vast array of beers on tap, from the famous wheat-based Weissbier to powerful dark bocks. All are brewed strictly according to the world’s oldest law regulating food—the 1519 Reinheitsgebot, which allows only water, hops, and barley to be used. Bavaria and its capital seize any opportunity to set themselves apart from the rest of Germany—just as Texas might in the U.S., Scotland in the United Kingdom, or Alsace in France. That independence harks back to one of Germany’s oldest noble families, the Wittelsbacher, who turned Bavaria into a separate kingdom in 1806. The city is celebrating the 200th anniversary of that “free state” status with exhibits and festivals throughout the year. This is the perfect time to see how magical three days in Munich can be.


  • Apr 2006

    Three Perfect Days, San Francisco, CA

    ON THE EVENING OF April 17, 1906, Enrico Caruso sang to a capacity crowd of ladies in white gloves and gentlemen in top hats at the opulent San Francisco Opera House. San Francisco reveled in its post–Gold Rush heyday. The next morning, “The Champagne Days” were over. At 5:14 a.m., San Francisco was jolted by a massive earthquake. “The Big One” ignited fires across the city that burned for three days, destroying 500 city blocks and 25,000 buildings and leaving more than a quarter-million people homeless. In short order, the city was rebuilt and the glory days returned. But 100 years later, a bittersweet nostalgia over San Francisco’s most defining moment lives on. With events planned for the centennial of the earthquake of 1906, there’s no better time to explore the City by the Bay. A metropolis of icons that include the fog-shrouded Golden Gate Bridge, clanking cable cars, and roller-coaster streets, San Francisco is the birthplace of blue jeans, Chinese fortune cookies, mountain bikes, and California cuisine. Sparked by its inimitable blend of youthful exuberance and Old World sophistication, the city boasts dazzling new museums and world-class restaurants, packing a cultural and culinary punch that’s tough to match. Factor in the myriad after-dinner diversions, including local theaters, an opera, a ballet company, and a vibrant music scene, and there are more reasons than ever to leave your heart in San Francisco.


  • Mar 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Nagoya, Japan

    FOR QUITE SOME TIME Nagoya was the brunt of jokes in Japan because of its inaka, or rural, status. But those days are no more. Today Nagoya is one of the fastest-growing economic centers in Japan and a focal point for modern as well as traditional culture. The Nagoya area is the ancestral home of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the founder of the Tokugawa shogunate, who established Nagoya as a castle town in 1612. From the start, the city was a vibrant hub of commerce because of its location along the Tokaido, the main road connecting Tokyo to Kyoto. Adding to the scene, in the 1700s, local overlord Tokugawa Muneharu took a special interest in the arts and crafts of the land. This encouraged many master artisans of the time to move to Nagoya, where, to this day, some of their descendants still live and hone their crafts. Bolstered by last year’s World Exposition, the opening of the Chubu International Airport, and the relocation here of Toyota Motors’ headquarters, Nagoya radiates an energy unequaled in Japan, an energy felt just walking down the colorful main streets, an energy encouraged by both the traditional culture and the industrial prowess of this modern-day metropolis. Over the next three days, you’ll see what all the excitement is about.


  • Feb 2006

    Three Perfect Days, Turin, Italy

    TURIN IS A HOUDINI CITY THAT has transformed itself many times over the centuries, from Roman army camp to medieval trading village to the baroque first capital of unified Italy, and then to the capital of Italian industry when Fiat was born here. In the 1980s, Fiat started downsizing, so the industrious torinesi began reinventing their city once again, converting hubcap factories and royal castles into art galleries, concert halls, architects’ studios, and posh hotels. Turin became a European capital of contemporary art, music, design, and high-tech. The Slow Food movement, born nearby, has added luster to the age-old culinary traditions of Turin and the surrounding Piedmont region, a heartland of Italian cuisine. When Turin was selected to host the 2006 Winter Olympics, massive new investments helped it put the finishing touches on its sweeping remake. Turin is now in its finest form in a century. Turin doesn’t feel like any other Italian city, or, at times, like an Italian city at all. Its broad, tree-lined boulevards and baroque palaces recall an Austro-Hungarian capital such as Prague or Vienna, while certain quiet, manicured squares could be in London. Most of all, Turin resembles Paris, in its mansard roofs and airy art nouveau façades, its cafés, and its taste for pastries, chocolates, and aperitifs. Yet despite its cosmopolitan charms, natives speak of their town with a most un-Italian self-deprecation. Forgetting the visionary gambles of their past, they claim to be hopelessly provincial, as unadventurous and square as their city’s right-angle street grid. They say they are reserved, even unfriendly with visitors (though they smile as they do so, and will soon be treating you to coffee at a favorite café). And no doubt because of their abiding inferiority complex with Milan, their larger, glitzier neighbor to the southeast, they seem convinced that their town has nothing to interest a visitor. Most tourists seem to have believed them, and travelers here have an opportunity for exploration and discovery that is rare indeed in Italy. Perhaps this sense of freedom is what appealed to the notoriously hard-to-please Friedrich Nietzsche, who said Turin was the one city he loved: “Tranquil, almost solemn. A classic landscape for the eyes and the feet … I’d never have believed that a city, thanks to its light, could become so beautiful!”


  • Jan 2006

    Three Perfect Days, St. Maarten

    IF THERE’S ONE THING ST. Maarteners are proud of, it’s the endearing adage that our Caribbean homeland is “The Friendly Island.” We plaster it all over our number-plates, and it’s true. The 60,000-plus inhabitants come from no less than 103 different countries; all contribute to the emerging identity of this 37-square-mile landmass. Christopher Columbus sighted the island on November 11, 1493, and named it after St. Martin, Bishop of Tours. Initially regarded as unpromising, St. Maarten changed hands among the Dutch, the French, and the Spanish. The French and Dutch split the island in 1648—the French side is called Saint Martin, the Dutch side Sint Maarten. Gone are the days of battle for Queen and country. Now part of the semi-autonomous Dutch Caribbean territory of the Netherlands Antilles, St. Maarten is focused on fast-paced, duty-free tourism with a multinational friendliness that’s attractive to tourists and investors alike. On your three-day holiday, you’ll see why many a first-time visitor becomes a regular.


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