The newlyweds at Peiratikos have just returned from their honeymoon, and they’ve got me thinking about my favorite places.
They picked New Orleans as a destination, a city I love for many reasons. My first trip was in high school, taking the bus down with the marching band for a Mardi Gras parade. It was 90% awful, as one might expect, but those hours when we ditched our chaperone to scurry around the French Quarter definitely made an impression. I’ve been back a couple of times since, and I hope to go back many more times in the future. The food is incredible. I can honestly say we’ve never had a bad meal while there. The sense of equal-opportunity debauchery is wonderfully disorienting, and I love how it manages to be beautiful and historic and seedy at the same time. If you go, take the streetcar out to the Commander’s Palace for brunch. The prix fixe menu is an amazing way to sample incredible food cheaply, and the Bloody Mary’s are not to be believed. (They top them off with more vodka after you’ve had a couple of sips.) Warning: obituary cocktails have not been named whimsically.
While there’s something really artificial about the debauchery of Las Vegas, I’ve still had a great time there. The people-watching alone is worth the trip, and the gaudy horror of it all is really awe-inspiring. It also lends itself to weird and unexpected experiences (like taking part in a CBS market survey for three awful, now-dead programs… still, it was a nice break from the slots). I’m not crazy about getting around Las Vegas, as a rental car is kind of a necessity unless you want to trap yourself on the Strip. And if you do that, your dining is at the mercy of the casinos. You don’t want to put yourself in that position, as celebrity chefs have invaded without trying too hard, which means ridiculously high prices for mediocre food. My recommendation is to spend most of your food dollars in Chinatown, where meals are delicious and incredibly cheap. And if you have a thing for glorious hotel room bathrooms, Mandalay Bay is your residence of choice.
I’ve tagged along with my partner on a few work trips to Chicago, and it feeds my window shopping habit fairly nicely. Ahh, Marshall Field… how do I love thee? And seeing so many beautiful impressionist canvases at the Art Institute is something you really shouldn’t skip.
New York City has had mixed results. We’ve had great trips (like the most recent one) and terrible trips (do some serious research on your lodgings, or nothing else that happens will overcome the horror of where you’re staying). Still, the energy of the place is undeniably exciting, and the sheer variety of it all nicely purges any nasty West Virginia build-up for a while.
I really want to go back to London. I went there to visit family years ago, which kind of limited my freedom of movement. (I spent a lot of time dragging strollers up and down escalators when I’d rather have been doing a pub-by-pub comparison of gin and tonics or having shopgasms at Harrods.) We keep talking about a return trip, but we always seem to be lured back to…
…the Four Corners region. It’s so spectacularly beautiful, even when the landscapes are terrifying. There’s a household difference of opinion: the hubby loves the Grand Canyon, but I’m partial to Zion National Park. The Grand Canyon looks like it would happily kill you, which is an exciting feature, but I feel much more secure in Zion, where you stay at the bottom instead of on the edge. Still, either is an amazing experience. (If you’ve been to the Grand Canyon but have never stayed on the North Rim, I really recommend it. The view isn’t as spectacular, but the crowds are a lot thinner, and there are many wonderful hikes.) The cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde in Colorado are fascinating, too.
My favorite American city and one of our most frequent trips is Washington. It’s an easy and beautiful drive for us through western Maryland, and it’s one of the most walkable cities we’ve visited. I think it’s really underestimated as a cultural destination in terms of the range and quality of fine and modern art you can see. As food cities go, it holds its own nicely (though we always go to City Lights of China in Dupont Circle, no matter how much we vow to be more adventuresome). As gays living in W.Va., we love opportunities to be in the majority (or at least the larger minority), so Dupont Circle is almost always our base of operations. DC has probably my favorite public transportation system in the world; the Metro system is a real gem. The design of the city is a wonder, too. There’s just nothing I don’t like about it, and a visit always recharges my batteries.
Okay, enough travel babble.