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When you live in Miami, you crave more than the glittery neon of South Beach. In Wynwood, the areas most up-and-coming hub for art and nightlife, Gramps appears like a grungy truck stop on the orange dive exterior. Inside, the bar includes live music, stand-up comedy and games. The bar serves creative speciality cocktails with flavorful, fresh ingredients. Outside, there’s an expansive patio with graffiti, art, picnic tables and live sports broadcasts projected on the buildings exterior. The vibe here is totally relaxed and vibrant. The crowd consists of hipsters, artists and fashionable hippies.

As the stomping grounds for ladies who lunch, bridal luncheons, and baby showers, the Swan Coach House has been a Buckhead staple since 1965. A group of ladies opened the restaurant, gift shop, and art gallery to raise money for the arts while serving their family recipes on their own plates and silverware. Since then, the restaurant has become well known for Southern staples like their chicken salad, frozen fruit salad, cheese straws, and champagne punch. Be sure to visit the lavish Swan House at the Atlanta History Center while you’re there.

IndexG B&B was an art gallery before the owners renovated the second floor into a four-bedroom bed and breakfast. Housed on a sleepier stretch of Gladstone Avenue but close to the action of both the West Queen West and Parkdale neighborhoods, this family-run B&B offers affordable rooms and minimal amenities. Art is displayed throughout the hotel, and it is all available for purchase. With much to do in the area, this is a well-located hub from which to discover the best of Toronto.

Jalavihar is a water park with activities for the entire family. The space features multiple pools, a wave pool, a lazy river ride, water slides, and a toddler area. If you wish to stay dry, there are also bumper cars, miniature trains, bungy trampolines, mini-golf, and an arcade. Be sure to check out the Party Zone, which features sprays of water keeping you cool on the dance floor.

All aboard Grand Banks, a seasonal oyster bar on the historic Sherman Zwicker, the last of a large fleet of schooners that fished the Grand Banks of the North Atlantic and traded goods in South America. It’s docked at Hudson River Park’s Pier 25 and serves sustainably-sourced oysters, small plates, and a long list of refreshing cocktails, wines, and beer.

One of Munich‘s loveliest beer gardens, the Waldwirtschaft, “WaWi” for short, is located in southern Munich on the banks of the Isar River. Many people cycle or walk to it, stop for a drink, then return along the Isar. It’s also famous for its jazz concerts. Check the website to see a list of events.

Strolling down the Limmatquai is an obvious choice for most visitors to Zurich. But just across the Limmat, on its left bank, lies an even more charming path lined with cobblestones and a covered passageway with arches that overlook the river. Artisan workshops and quaint stores can be found, including Lederladen for beautiful, hand-cut and sewn leather bags and Susanna Rüttimann Kiepenheuer for whimsical sculptures.

A typical restaurant at a typical neighborhood: cheap, good, homemade food and a local environment. The students gather here when they want to join for a class dinner. The name Tollan comes from an English container ship that sank in the river. This was back in the 1980s, and it stayed there for almost four years, with the hull upwards.

The Blue Star Bike Co rents pedal bikes as well as electric bikes for those who want a power boost. The shop designs and builds custom electric bikes so they know of what they rent. The location makes it easy to get your new wheels spinning thanks to its spot on the River Walk’s 7-mile loop.

Across the Cumberland River from downtown, residential East Nashville got its first taste of hipster cool in 2016 when this Instagram-friendly bed-and-breakfast opened in a renovated Queen Anne mansion. Like its sister property in Brooklyn, Urban Cowboy’s eight suites and freestanding cabin are each uniquely named—Midnight Rider, the Lion’s Den—and decorated with geometric inlaid woodwork, Southwestern-inspired designs, and handcrafted furniture, plus custom wallpaper and copper and claw-foot tubs. The communal music parlor encourages interaction among guests with a collection of gently worn instruments, as does the all-weather fire pit, where blankets and good cheer are plentiful, especially after enjoying craft cocktails and wood-fired meals at Public House, the property’s on-site restaurant and bar.

One of the iconic activities when visiting Jamaica is to raft along one of its rivers—particularly the long Rio Grande—and take in the island’s interior landscape. You can enjoy the Rio Grande’s range of flora and fauna during the relaxing, slow ride down its length. You’ll spot horses drinking along the riverbanks and plenty of tropical flowers and greenery, as well as locals cooling off near shore. Arrange your excursion with your hotel or an outfitter because you’ll need not only a raft but also a ride to the launch site at the mouth of the river, called Rafter’s Rest.

This riverfront Main St. strip is scattered with historic buildings from the 1850s and while a bit sleepy has points of interest like the movie theater and the beginning of the Stone Arch Bridge. Start your crossing from here to get the full effect of walking from the quaint past into the modernized Minneapolis skyline.

Even with Segway tours rolling through and street performers loudly competing for audiences, the 15th-century Piazza Navona somehow retains a shred of grace and elegance in modern Rome. Calm Renaissance palazzi face the piazza’s centerpiece, the famous and complicated Bernini work, Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi (“Are these colossal male depictions of the four great rivers of the world writhing on top of a boulder not fancy enough? Let’s top it with an obelisk for a little visual interest.”). The piazza itself was created when a 1st-century arena was paved over to create a market square—you can still sense the oval track of the arena in the shape of the opening. Come for a gelato and some excellent people-watching, especially in the evening.

Why we love it: A reimagined motel with quirky design, mineral pools, and a spa straight out of a Wes Anderson movie

The Highlights:
- Three different mineral pools for soaking in the sun
- A laidback spa with a twist on Calistoga’s classic mud baths
- Fun amenities like bikes, lawn games, and Polaroid cameras

The Review:
Inspired by classic roadside motels, Calistoga Motor Lodge sits at the end of the Silverado Trail, offering guests a casual, quirky stay in Napa’s northernmost town. The boutique property features a design by New York-based firm AvroKo, with lots of midcentury-modern furniture, bright pops of color, and retro details to transport visitors back in time. Simple yet cozy, rooms feature bold carpets, vintage-inspired fabrics, and cheeky art (think needlepoint signs reading “No selfies in the bathroom” and fabric animal heads mounted on the walls), plus tiled bathrooms with rainfall showers and signature bath products from on-site MoonAcre Spa. In addition to custom-designed hoodie bathrobes and freshly ground pour-over coffee, guests can look forward to unconventional extras like hula hoops, Mad Lib books, and Etch A Sketches for passing time between activities. If you bring along your pet, the hotel will even provide a dog bed, water and food bowls, and treats to make your four-legged friend feel at home.

Committed to local culture, Motor Lodge often hosts community events like group hikes, outdoor movie nights, and festivals. On Maker Mondays, local artisans even pop up at the hotel to host lessons in print making and more. When it comes time to relax, guests can repair to the three on-site mineral pools, all fed by natural geothermal hot springs and surrounded by loungers and cabana beds, or the whimsical spa, which offers everything from massages and body scrubs to less-traditional mud baths and salt soaks in clawfoot tubs. Afterward, soak up the sun in the spa garden, play a round of cornhole on the lawn, gather around the firepit, or grab a complimentary bike and make the short ride into town. Just be sure to borrow a Polaroid camera from the lobby so you can document your adventures at the surrounding wineries, boutiques, and galleries.

Frenchmen Street is, more or less, the local-music version of Bourbon Street. It also has its share of tourists trundling about with go-cups in hand, but they’re drawn more by the music than the drink. Plan to spend an evening (things start to pick up around 8 p.m., earlier on weekends) along a three-block stretch of small, informal clubs where there’s often no cover (give generously and give often when the bucket comes around), or at most $5 or $10. Notable clubs include the Spotted Cat, the Maison, Blue Nile, D.B.A., the Apple Barrel, and Snug Harbor. Earlier in the evenings, there’s often an impromptu brass band at the corner of Chartres and Frenchmen. Between sets, take a moment to browse the night art markets, the largest of which is next to the Spotted Cat.