Destinations

What It’s Like: In French Polynesia, Try a Post-Cruise Stay on Marlon Brando’s Private Island

As soon as I catch a glimpse of Tetiaroa, I understand why Marlon Brando fell head over heels for this South Pacific paradise more than 60 years ago. From the window of a twin-engine airplane, I gaze down at the colorful atoll and see 12 lush, tree-covered islets encircling a shimmering turquoise lagoon. The scene

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Discover Panama’s Colorful and Remote San Blas Islands

Travel south from the rattling maracas and sultry samba of Cuba across the Caribbean Sea, east of the jungles and cloud forests of Costa Rica, west of the regionally divided and conflicting cultures of Colombia, and floating in the sparkling waters off the coast of Panama are the San Blas Islands – a world wholly

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What It’s Like: Our Year-Round Mediterranean Cruise on Star Legend

When Windstar announced last fall that it would be extending its Mediterranean season to year-round (from spring/summer/autumn), the first thing I wondered was this: How would a cruise in November–early March be different from one during the traditional April–October time frame? How would the new timings materially change the experience?

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Choose Your Adventure: In Santorini, the Wonderful Indulgence of Sailing the Caldera

Volcanoes are not something I am normally drawn to as I am to, say, a Caribbean beach or a Parisian café. And swimming in the crater of one wasn’t exactly on my bucket list. But I am drawn to adventure and to stories. As we were looking over the various excursions offered aboard Windstar’s “Treasures of the Greek Isles” cruise, “Sailing the Caldera” appealed to me.  The description — plunging into the green sulfur waters and a Greek lunch served on board — was alluring. The Atlantis mystery made me think that other stories like it would bubble up from the bottom of the caldera’s sea floor.

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If You Love Culture and Art, the Mediterranean is Perfect Year-Round

Are you game for experiencing some of the Mediterranean’s most popular cities in the low season? Here’s the good news: Winter in the Mediterranean can be milder than other places,. Sure, weather can be chilly but it’s also changeable weather, so don’t let that stop you.

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Dispatch from Iceland: Volcano Travel

Today, active volcanoes are carefully monitored and eruptions can be predicted well in advance, allowing people in places like Iceland and Italy to live, for the most part, without fear. Travelers can also, as I did, enjoy both an inner journey, as they contemplate these lands and their histories, and the actual journey, as they visit and see them for themselves.

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This May Surprise You: Winter Can Be the Most Magical Time to Cruise in the Mediterranean

Visiting Italy, France and Spain onboard Star Legend earlier this year was unexpectedly magnificent. I say unexpectedly because I learned then that this part of the Riviera has, for centuries, been a winter haven for northern Europeans. I get it now. The late winter week was pleasantly cool, I loved the calmer-than-summer ambience, there was

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We Ask You Answer: Where Do You Want to Return?

What are your “unfinished” cruise destinations? Where are the ports or countries you crave more of, even as you dream of new places? I think it’s common to have at least one place we’ve traveled to that calls us to return. Sometimes it’s simply because there were things we didn’t have time to see.  For me, it’s often more about the experiences I had in a destination, not the things I missed out on.

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