What is it about wish lists? Don't you love them? And no more so than when they're travel wish lists. Inspired by Decorno's What's Next for Travel blog which asked "What's on your list? Where does everyone want to go?", Franki Durban at LifeInAVentiCup wrote on Wanderlust: "I found myself unable to complete a list. I simply have too many places I hope to experience, and I won't stop until I've seen them all. Seriously, if it's on the list, I'm going, and I don't intend to leave this marble until I've completed my journey." I'm with Franki. And I enjoyed creating my own: Yemen, Iran, Libya, the Ukraine, Guatemala, Zanzibar, Madagascar, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Nepal, Bhutan, Mongolia, Malta, Serbia, and Montenegro. I could go on. Why is that? Why do we enjoy list-making so much? Lonely Planet do well from their Blue List book and its companion website where you create your own 'bluelist' to recommend a travel experience. The glossy travel magazines publish lists all the time: top ten destinations, world's best beaches, top 100 hotels, etc. National Geographic Traveler has just released its 'Places of a Lifetime' list and guides to those cities - you can read our Dubai guide there soon! What we're really doing when we create our travel wish list is defining our dream destinations and travel aspirations. Our lists - and those of others - inspire us to move.
I'm not sure if Sally Potter and her beautiful film The Tango Lesson were responsible or whether it's more indicative of a larger tendency in travel - to travel to learn - but the trend of foreigners travelling to Buenos Aires to take tango lessons is so extraordinary it constitutes a phenomenon. The dance has also enjoyed a revival among locals. Walk down any of San Telmo's streets in the early evening and glance through a door and you're guaranteed to see a traveller, young or old, in jeans and t-shirts, taking lessons from a dapper old gentleman in jacket and tie or a distinguished woman, her black hair pulled back into a ballerina's bun. There are tango schools all over the city and private lessons posted on notice boards at hostels and supermarkets. Hotels such as the wonderful Mansion Dandi Royal offer tango packages including lessons in their own tango salon. The most popular place to learn is in the splendid Confiteria Ideal, a faded old café with an atmospheric dance hall upstairs which operates classes day and night, followed by a milonga, or social dance, where you get to practice with the locals. You can read more about experiencing tango in our new book Buenos Aires Encounter, but what most fascinates me is the flourishing trend of experiential travel. Travellers want to educate their minds and stimulate their senses. Cooking courses in Tuscany. Arabic lessons in Damascus. Elephant trekking in Thailand. Wine-making in Napa. Travel choices increasingly seem to be as much about what to do as where to go. As the slogan of adventure and experiential tour operator iExplore says, people want to "come back different", while i-to-i, a site that offers volunteering experiences, teaching opportunities and community projects abroad, is all about "meaningful travel". I'm not so sure you need to do an organized activity or tour to fully experience a place. You can sign up for a course in something when you arrive. The important thing is to just go. Figure out what to do when you get there.
I've probably reminisced enough about San Telmo. I've told you about the lively weekend Feria de San Telmo that takes over Plaza Dorrego and floods Defensa street with a sea of people, and the marvelous Mercado de San Telmo where you must go and eat. But I want to tell you two more things. Apart from the delicious fresh food and colourful eateries, the mercado is home to compelling stalls crammed with bric-a-brac and tango memorabilia and cluttered shops trading in antiques and collectibles, vintage clothes and accessories, and all sorts of other fascinating curios. A 1940s Argentine movie poster, an original Carlos Gardel record, or a cobalt blue seltzer bottle, perhaps? As engaging as the shopping is - and you can while away hours here - you mustn't forget to look up at the skylights and admire the wrought-iron detail. The wonderful building, dating back to 1897, was designed by Juan Antonio Buschiazzo, an Italian-born architect who also created the ornate Recoletta Cemetery. What is it about that combination of atmospheric shopping and old architecture that is so appealing when we we travel?
The Abbey House Gardens in Wiltshire, England is giving new meaning to being one with nature.
According to a BBC article, "A couple who garden in the buff are holding more open days when the public can walk around their garden naked." (Source).
During these 'clothing optional' days, visitors can tour the couples' garden in the nude for a variety of benefits (according to the Abbey House Gardens website):
- escape the pressures of daily living
- get back in touch with your inner self
- be inspired
- find time to unwind in fresh air
- enjoy some gentle exercise in beautiful surroundings
- meet up with friends & relatives in an easily accessible place
If you love gardens and being outdoors without clothes - the ways humans have for thousands of years - then this is a place worth exploring.
The BBC has done an absolutely fabulous job of covering this clothes-free garden story through a series of articles and a video over the last few years. Take a look at some of what the BBC has documented:
- Gardening in the buff takes off
- Naked Gardeners' Exhibition - The Abbey House Gardens in Malmesbury is a must for garden buffs, art buffs and those in the buff…
- Video: Naturism big in Wiltshire (2 minutes)
- Gardens opening for naked walks (appears to be the first BBC article on the gardens)
- Wiltshire's Naked Gardeners at Chelsea Flower Show (mostly about the couples' commitment to gardening)
I'd love to see something like this at a nudist resort closer to home (United States).
Maybe this exists already, but wouldn't it be groovy if a North America AANR-affiliated clothing-optional club with a large property and lots of woods allocated a few acres for members/visitors to use as a community gardening space?
As all good travellers know, there's nothing like a local fresh food market for picnic supplies, indigenous specialties, edible souvenirs (Dulce de Leche, anyone?), or simply a hearty meal. Wherever we travel, the local market is always one of our first stops; it's a window into the society, a microcosm of that city or country. The mercado de San Telmo is no exception and it's one of my favorite markets. Locals exchange gossip and laughter with the vendors as they select their purchases from the freshest of fruit, vegetables, cheeses, and meats, much better quality here than in the supermarket. Throughout the day porteños enjoy tasty Argentine favorites such as bife de lomo (tenderloin steak) or chinchulines (intestines!) from the colorful stalls inside or the simple parrillas (meat grill eateries) outside, while late at night they share beers and empanadas al fresco at the pavement tables with their friends. Experiences don't come more local than this.
San Telmo is a gritty suburb of skinny cobblestone streets with a mishmash of colonial and belle epoque architecture. It often gets a bad wrap, accused of being 'touristy'. But San Telmo is actually one of Buenos Aires' most bohemian barrios, with a working class population, uni students sinking cheap beers each night in its myriad bars, and emerging young artists and designers hanging their stuff in the cooperative fashion and art spaces. Weekends are when the 'tourists' literally flood San Telmo's streets for the lively street market, coming from all over Buenos Aires and beyond for the antiques, bric-a-brac and hippy handicrafts. Orchestras and bands perform on the pavements. Merchants sell hot nuts, corn on the cob and empanadas. The tango is danced on the street and after the markets are packed away locals fill the square of Plaza Dorrego for a milonga, or social dance. While we like the barrio of a weeknight when the streets can be eerily empty and quiet, and most people wandering them are locals, weekends are when we like San Telmo best, when the barrio really buzzes, and everybody enjoys being a tourist. Even if it's just for a day.
Remembering my days of journal writing at cafés and bars such as El Hipopotamo started a string of reveries about the bewitching Buenos Aires barrio of San Telmo. We rented an apartment in Buenos Aires for a few months earlier this year, using it as a base to research the city for a book. San Telmo was our home for the first two months. We lived like locals, getting our groceries at the little almacen, or general store, downstairs. We trod the same streets every day on our way back and forth to the Microcentro, Retiro, Monserrat, Congreso and other areas we needed to explore for our book. Every night we frequented our neighbourhood restaurants, cafés and bars, eating late like Porteños, as Buenos Aires' residents are called. And when we had to stay in to write we'd buy a bottle of Malbec downstairs and piping hot empanadas from the nearby empanaderia, watching football on television with the locals while we waited for our order. Faces became familiar and hanging out in the 'hood was something to look forward to. Why is it that we fly half way around the world to try and live as we would at 'home'? And why is it that living as much like a local as we can is so much more enjoyable than experiencing the place as a tourist?
