Stories
Personal travel stories and narratives
StoriesA Week in Dubai: The Journal of Someone Who Expected to Hate It
I showed up ready to dismiss the whole place as a soulless shopping mall with a skyline. I was wrong in ways that surprised me.
StoriesWhat Luang Prabang Gets Wrong About Tourists (and Right About Everything Else): A Local's Perspective
Somphone has lived in Luang Prabang for 18 years. She runs a guesthouse on the Mekong, teaches at the morning market, and has opinions about your Instagram photos of the alms ceremony.
StoriesFour Nights in Granada: Tapas, Flamenco, and the Alhambra at Dawn
I ate dinner for €9 every night, watched flamenco in a cave, and stood inside the most beautiful building I've ever seen. Granada broke my budget expectations.
StoriesThe Day I Walked Dubrovnik's Walls and Understood Why They Call It the Pearl
I climbed 2 km of medieval walls in 35-degree heat, jumped into the Adriatic from a cliff bar with no sign, and ate octopus that changed my standards permanently.
StoriesSeven Days in Yogyakarta: A Travel Journal from Java's Cultural Heart
Borobudur at dawn, batik in the afternoon, gudeg for dinner, and a volcano looming over everything. A week in the city Indonesians call Jogja.
StoriesA Yakushima Forester on the Trees That Have Seen Everything
Haruki has worked in Yakushima's forests for 18 years. He guides visitors to trees older than civilization and has opinions about the tourists who treat them like selfie backdrops.
StoriesThe Walk to Machu Picchu Changed How I Think About Travel
I skipped the train, walked the railway tracks for 2.5 hours, slept in Aguas Calientes, and arrived at the citadel at dawn. The ruins were secondary to the journey.
StoriesWhat Locals at the End of the World Wish You Knew Before Visiting Ushuaia
The insider playbook for Ushuaia from the people who live at 54 south: where to eat king crab, which tours are worth it, and the mistakes almost every visitor makes.
StoriesAsk a Florentine: The Steak Rules, the Gelato Test & Why We Eat Tripe Sandwiches
Marco has lived in Florence for 40 years. He has strong opinions about how to order a bistecca, which gelato shops are fake, and why lampredotto is the real Florentine food.
StoriesWhat Adelaide Locals Know That Visitors Always Miss
Ask anyone who lives here and they'll tell you the free tram, the best egg-tart... er, meat pie, and the beach the tourists never find. Here's the local playbook for Adelaide.
StoriesFour Perfect Days in Thessaloniki: Your Day-by-Day Plan
A follow-it-start-to-finish four-day plan for Thessaloniki — waterfront and food, the Roman core, Byzantine Ano Poli, and Macedonian gold — with what to eat each day and how to pace it on Greek time.
StoriesMy Reef Diary: 5 Days on the Great Barrier Reef from Cairns to the Whitsundays
From a terrifying first breath underwater at 12 meters to Whitehaven Beach's impossible sand — a day-by-day account of the world's biggest living structure.