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Located on the first floor of the bustling central market, Nerbone’s food stall has been serving up steaming plates of warming nourishment to hungry market workers since 1872 and is a great place to find local color and rock-bottom prices. The specialty is lampredotto (cow’s intestines) served in a bun with bright green salsa verde, but if you can’t stomach that (sorry….), there is also pasta and roast meats. The locals stand at the bar counter to eat, but there are a few tables too.

Nakameguro is a hip and trendy area with many restaurants and shops, especially under the train tracks in a complex called Kokashita. The Meguro River that runs through the residential area is lined with cherry trees for sakura-viewing in the spring. Small boutiques featuring local designers as well as imported clothes are concentrated in the Aobadai area between Nakameguro and Daikanyama. Nakameguro is also home to two of the city’s best pizza shops, Seirinkan and da ISA, and yakitori restaurants Iguchi and Toriyoshi. Popular coffee shops in the area include Onibus, Streamer, and Artless Craft Tea & Coffee.

A UNESCO World Heritage site in a mountain valley about 40 miles west of Da Nang, My Son is a vestige of the Champa kingdom, a culture that was heavily shaped by Hindu beliefs and practices. Built between the 4th and 14th centuries, the temples pay homage to the god Shiva, though the deity is often referred to here by different names. While some of the shrines are partially restored, and others overgrown with greenery or showing their age (many were destroyed by American bombing during the Vietnam War), the sheer scope of the ruins are proof of the reach of Hinduism and the lofty ambitions of the Cham kings.

Become a Paniolo (Hawaiian Cowboy) for a day and do an actual cattle drive while on the Big Island of Hawaii. Even though it was a rainy, moody day, it was the perfect unique experience to have in Hawaii. Hawaii is much more than beaches! More information about my experience at Dahana Ranch: http://www.ottsworld.com/blogs/cattle-herding-in-hawaii/ Dahana Ranch P.O. Box 1293 • Kamuela, HI 96743 • toll free: (888) 399-0057 • p (808) 885-0057 • f (808) 885-7833 • [email protected]

“This family-run restaurant on the fishing island of Pellestrina is quite far out—probably 45 minutes by boat. But in the summer months, it’s a lovely ride, breezy and fresh. Once you’re at the restaurant, you sit on a pontoon and see nothing but the spread of la laguna and the occasional boat speeding past. They do wonderful fish here. It’s incredibly fresh and they’ll bring you an array of mixed antipasti to start. The oven-baked turbot on potatoes with baby artichokes and baby tomatoes is fantastic. So, so good.”

Read about more of McAlpine’s Venice favorites.

Aunty Doris is always behind the small counter dressed neatly in her red-and-white palaka shirt, with her hair fixed just so. She knows everybody and your madahs and fadahs and all da keeds too around here. Stop in for a taste of her old-fashioned crack seeds all lined up neatly on the shelf. Carry the jar over to the counter and talk story with Aunty as she spoons out your selection of sour cherry, football, olive seed, pickled ginger, li-hing mui, prune mui, dried lemon or wet seed. Chances are while you wait you’ll experience a “taste” of local color too. Eh no eat all da sweet sour cherry. I gotta get my fix!

Start your dive into Maputo’s interesting historic downtown area, the Baixa, at the Maputo Central Market—a covered market built in 1901 inside a Portuguese colonial building. It can get hot and crowded inside, but it’s well worth a little bit of sweat to witness the near-constant buzz of activity from early morning to afternoon as vendors hawk everything from tropical fruits and vegetables to seafood, nuts (don’t miss the cashews), handmade batiks, wood carvings and other souvenirs. Afterward, it’s a five-minute walk from the market to Baixa’s popular Café Continental for a tasty pastel de nata pastry and a cup of strong coffee.

Markets offer great insights into a country’s culture, and in Taiwan the night markets are a mandatory stop for observing local life. Sometimes spanning entire city blocks, the markets are an amusement park of sorts—complete with a midway of mahjong and basketball games—where friends and families gather at colorful communal tables to feast on gastronomic discoveries from a clutter of stalls. Whether you’re at one of the nine markets in Taipei (such as the famous Shilin market or the more intimate Ningxia market) or visiting the big Da Dong market in Tainan, you won’t go hungry! From savory pork on a stick and crispy chicken chop (chicken that is fried and then grilled) to sweet, custard-filled wheel cake and sugar cane lemonade, market fare surprises and delights. Distinctively Taiwanese grab-and-go snacks include stinky tofu (which tastes exactly as it sounds) and the surprisingly appealing pig’s blood cake—a hearty dessert-on-a-stick consisting of rice and pig’s blood dipped in a pork soy broth and coated with peanut flour. A cultural immersion at its finest, the markets and the surrounding scooter-filled chaos will create a memory of Taiwan that will stay with you forever. AFAR Ambassador Natalie Taylor traveled to Taiwan as a guest of the Taiwan Tourism Bureau.

Sure, it’s a bit rustic and the pebbled beach is small, but this beach club has reached legendary status with Amalfi Coast travelers for its charm. And its food. Everything served is fresh and local, and made in a tiny kitchen built into the rocks at a precipitous height. One suggesion for a long and leisurely lunch: Start with grilled mozzarella served on lemon leaves before moving on to the zuppe de cozze, a giant bowl of mussels drenched in a garlicky, tomatoey stew. If friggitelli (sweet Italian chili peppers) are on the menu, by all means order them. A pitcher of cold white wine with peaches is also recommended. Call ahead to reserve a chair on the beach and a table for lunch, and at the ferry jetty in Positano, your ride to the beach club is the boat with the red fish on its mast.

Through the end of June, the Museo di Sant’Agostino hosts a fascinating exhibit on the Machines of Leonardo DaVinci - including his bicycle, the air screw, and a massive interpretation of one of his earliest gliders. Housing in a converted monastery, the building itself is also a lovely space to visit the 16th and 17th century paintings and sculptures on permanent display.

A Carioca version of the São Paulo classic, the Rio Astor has two straightaway advantages: It sits on a magical city corner, at the start of Ipanema, just across from the beach, and it has a wide, airy terrace. From there, visitors delight in its drink menu (one of the city’s most complete) as waiters scurry hither and yon at cocktail hour, serving draft beers, which are called chopps and which somehow taste creamier here. The Astor also features a wide-ranging menu that updates Brazilian classics with unusual ingredients and more ambitious presentations of standards like arroz com feijão. The entire mix translates to one of Rio’s winningest combo of bar-rail and white tablecloth venue.

This five-kilometer-wide, forest-covered, extinct volcanic cauldron hugs the green (Lagoa Verde) and blue (Lagoa Azul) lagoons and is visible from the Vista do Rei (King’s View) lookout. If the crater seems familiar, that’s because it’s the landscape depicted in countless postcard photos of the Azores. According to an ancient legend, the different colors of the lagoons are the result of one being formed from the tears of a shepherd and the other those of a princess with whom he shared a forbidden love. It’s a much more romantic story than the scientific explanation: the different colored algae found in each.

Located in Santa Teresa, Aprazível is foodie heaven in a welcoming atmosphere. The name says it all—aprazível is Portuguese for pleasant or pleasurable—a meaning that becomes clear as soon as you take in its intensely orange, intensely Rio sunset views. The kitchen calls the food roots cuisine: moqueca (fish stew), hearts of palm, Amazon fishes, coconut rice, plus excellent steaks and chops. Naturally there are typically Rio desserts, as well as tropical drinks and artisanal beers. The Brazilians love it, and out-of-towners do too; if you add it all up, you’ve got the quintessential Carioca experience.

Iconic chef Roy Yamaguchi helped popularize Hawaiian-fusion food a generation ago, but at Eating House 1849 he takes a delicious detour with dishes inspired by Portuguese, Spanish, and Filipino flavors. This “plantation cuisine” evokes the immigrant dishes served in the mid-1800s, when the state’s first restaurant—a Honolulu establishment called Eating House—opened (according to legend). Yamaguchi brings some serious chops to the table: He trained at the Culinary Institute of America before serving as executive chef in Los Angeles‘s La Serene and winning a James Beard Award. The menu shifts seasonally, according to what farmers, foragers, ranchers, and fishermen produce. Expect delicacies like a beef-and-wild-boar burger and pork lumpia with green papaya. Cap it all off with cinnamon-dusted malasadas (Portuguese doughnuts) with Koloa Rum sauce!

Comuna was born as an alternative cultural space and has now become a landmark in newly hot “BotaSoho,” what they call the hipster scene in Botafogo, an old-style but rapidly gentrifying neighborhood. Open till sunup, this stone mansion has gained renown for its homemade burgers—go for the ones that feature wasabi mayonnaise—and for the casual vibe, common enough in Rio, but which here more resembles that of a São Paulo bar. The pleasant patio is great for stand-up drinking and movie-watching, while the upper level is given over to food events, theater performances, parties, and more.