This category covers places to stay, things to do, ways to get there, excursions, tours, getaways, along with shopping and eating while on holiday.

Hotel deLuxe Lobby - Portland, Oregon

The Cheapest, Chicest Hotels In Portland

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With its surfeit of chic hotels for every taste, Portland is the perfect stylish and affordable getaway—especially now.

Hotel deLuxe Lobby - Portland, OregonTRAVEL ADVISORY | Forget Seattle, Vancou- verites. For a getaway where the food is the hottest (just Google “Portland Food Scene” and you’ll see), the hotels are the coolest and the shopping is sales tax free, spend an extended weekend in Portland, Oregon, especially this time of year.

Why now? Because Portland hoteliers are heading into what they call the low season, when their already reasonable rates drop even more dramatically—and the chicest hotels are seriously budget priced. (These rates are even more attractive with the Canadian dollar currently at par.)

The 3 Cheapest Chicest Hotels In Portland Right Now Read more
Ross Bonetti Velib Biking in Paris

See Paris For Pennies (Yes, Really—It’s True)

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How cool is this: cruising around City Of Light on a bicycle you can rent for a song.

Ross Bonetti Velib Biking in ParisTRAVEL ADVISORY | The next time I visit Paris (in my dreams!), I’m going to ride a bicycle just like the one Ross Bonetti is sitting on in this picture. Ross, who owns LivingSpace Interiors in Vancouver and travels to Paris twice a year to attend the Maison et Objet trade show, has always crisscrossed the city by taxi or metro—until a year ago September when he started renting bicycles. Now he can’t imagine getting around the city on anything but a two-wheeler. Read more

Bagging Fashion Trophies in Portland, Oregon

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Bagging some serious fashion trophies at a Portland, Oregon, thrift shop.

Tod's loafers C. PhaisalakaniSAVE ON CHIC | Stuff like this never happens to me, so when it finally did I was gobsmacked—though I shouldn’t have been, because my former sister-in-law Ruth, a Portland attorney with a sharp mind and a gimlet eye for bargains, had been telling me for years that Portland’s Goodwill thrift stores were awesome places to find top brand apparel. Read more

Pueblo Ingles

How To Stay Free At Resorts In Rural Spain

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Wanted: English speakers to stay for free at resorts in the Spanish countryside.

Pueblo Ingles TRAVEL ADVISORY | Are you friendly, flexible and fluent in English? Then for the price of a plane ticket to Madrid, you can spend eight days but zero money at a four-star resort in rural Spain. Pueblo Ingles, meaning English Village, is an organization in Spain that allows Spanish speakers to interact with English speakers. Instead of cash, you exchange your life experience, stories and patience with learners for luxurious accommodation, exquisite meals and a lounge chair by a pool. The Spanish speakers get to practise speaking real or “raw” English, as the program likes to call it, in a totally English environment; not even a “hola” allowed. Read more

Are You Sleeping With Airbnb Tonight?

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The Ebay of space, Airbnb offers travel accommodations to suit every taste and budget. And you’ll make friends too.

STAY HERE | Whether it’s on a futon in a friend’s living room or on a king-size bed in a luxury villa, what you need when you travel is a place to lay your head at the end of the day. Finding one to suit myriad travel tastes and budgets has become easier with the online service Airbnb.com.

The website was started in 2008 as Airbed and Breakfast by three San Francisco guys who rented out inflatable beds during a hotel room shortage. Now Airbnb connects travellers with people who have space to rent in over 4,300 cities worldwide. You can search by city or country, plus by price, room type and date, and read reviews by previous guests. You then contact a host through the website and book online using a credit card or PayPal account. Read more

The Cheapest Chicest Hotels in Palm Springs

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If you can take some heat, this California city is a great place to get a room right now.

 

 

Colony Palms Hotel, Palm Springs

STAY HERE There are two schools of thought on travel accom-modation. There is the group who say: a bed is a bed and all I need is somewhere clean to lay my head because I don’t plan to spend time in my room anyway; and there is the other group who feel that where they stay should be memorable in the way it looks or contributes to the place’s overall experience.

I understand both these points of view and have fallen into one or the other of these groups depending on the occasion. But I do love design—and the idea of regionality where hotels are concerned—so I’m always on the lookout for accommodation with what I call original spin, hotels that “have a look” and feel local. Oh yes, and I want them to give great service AND be reasonably priced. Read more

Allegiant-Air

I Pledge Allegiant

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How to save a bundle by flying out of Bellingham on the little airline that could.

Allegiant Air planeCHEAP FLIGHTS | “I’m not going to fly on any airline that sounds like it’s been named after a communi- cable disease,” I told my husband when he suggested we jet to Oakland, California, from Bellingham, Washington, on Allegiant Air. We had accepted a last minute offer to join friends in Palo Alto for a football game at Stanford University and needed a cheap flight to the Bay Area ASAP. Everything out of Vancouver was really pricey, but we could catch Allegiant Air’s nonstop from Bellingham to Oakland: two round trip tickets totalled $521.44 including luggage.

I’m a “label airline” person because I hate to fly, but with a single ticket from Vancouver to San Fran costing upwards of $500, I decided to revisit my initial hesitation with Allegiant by doing a safety record check. I looked for serious complaints online (there was grousing about delays and surly staff) and sought the opinion of two Air Canada employees I know who had flown Allegiant before: they said they would do so again. Read more