Search results for

Plus: An evening of art in Vienna and personal, customized excursions

Plus: New Alaskan cruise-tours and scuba diving with giant tortoises

Grab one of these easy reads before your holiday travel.

Photographer João Canziani shares scenes from the otherwordly boat journey that brought his family closer together.

The Best Watch for Your Next Vacation

Mallorca: Spanish Style Beyond the Beach

Tourism is down, prices are up, social services are disappearing, and the government is bankrupt. Which means it’s a good time to get to know Seychelles.

Overview

Established primarily to help preserve the ecosystem and habitable zone of the desert tortoise, an endangered species, the Red Cliffs National Conservation area covers nearly 45,000 rugged acres just north of the city of St. George in the southwest corner of Utah. Beyond being interesting for the tortoise, the area’s geology is unique because it encompasses a large swath of the transition zone between three major geographical zones, the Mojave Desert, the Great Basin, and the Colorado Plateau. There are lots of hiking and mountain-biking trails (Church Rock Loop, a 9.5-mile round-trip hike, leads to dinosaur tracks!) but special caution must be taken depending on where you go and camp. Seeing a desert tortoise is rare, but they should be left alone.

There’s nothing better than a lazy Sunday afternoon—so long as you’re able to spend it under the shade of a big tree, on a bed of soft leaves, and with a few of your favorite Galapagos tortoise neighbors nearby. Our naturalist told us not to get too excited about our visit to Urbina Bay on Isabela island—our chances for spotting tortoise were low, he said—yet a few moments after landing on the beach we spotted this fellow relaxing under the foliage. Seeing these guys in the wild is one of the most thrilling experiences I’ve ever had.

To see a Florida east coast beach as it’s been since the start of time, plan a visit to Cape Canaveral National Seashore, part of a barrier island east of Orlando on the Atlantic Coast that was originally protected as a buffer for NASA’s nearby space center. The park stretches across the border of Volusia and Brevard counties and is home to the largest natural (read: undeveloped) beach on the entire east coast of Florida. Boardwalks take you across preserved dunes onto pristine sands where sea turtles lay their eggs. Trails inland in the park lead to Native American shell mounds. And there are backcountry camping sites, too. Be aware that the beach at Playalinda, within the park, is a popular spot for nudists.

Changuu Island, also known as Prison Island, is about a 30-minute boat ride from Stone Town. The water around the island is crystal-clear and cerulean blue, which makes snorkeling here hard to resist, but a visit also lets you gain an understanding of a grim period of Zanzibar history. In 1860, the small island was used as a prison for disobedient slaves. By 1893, construction of an actual prison complex was completed, but instead of housing prisoners, it was used to quarantine yellow fever cases. Nowadays, the island is home to some endangered Aldabra giant tortoises, given to the island in 1919 by the British governor of the Seychelles. Some of those original tortoises are supposedly still alive here to this day!

I don’t know what these two have against each other, but they couldn’t work it out while I was on the island. Puerto Egas on Santiago Island is one of the top wildlife viewing areas of the Galapagos, home to a stunning array of endemic species including crabs, turtles, tortoises, hawks, birds, sharks, rays, and more.

September 16, 1835. Charles Darwin lands at Cerro Tijeretas and is immediately awed at the abundance of wildlife he encounters. Darwin spends a great deal of time exploring Cristóbal, visiting frigatebird nesting sites and studying tortoises, sharks, rays, and more. Darwin also visits Laguna El Junco, the largest freshwater lake in the Galapagos. Cristóbal remains a popular tourist destination, and despite destruction brought by humans and many non-native animal species, much of the island’s wildlife endures.

The Chihkan (meaning red-haired, not chicken) Tower is now partly a museum celebrating the Qing Dynasty’s victory over the Dutch. As a teacher, though, I was more intrigued by the Wenchang Pavilion, dedicated to Kuixing (god of literature). Here, notes petitioning students’ success overflow from two large bulletin boards. After writing my own notes on behalf of some of my students, I walked to the balcony, which offers a great view of the other pavilion, as well as of some tortoise tablets and shady trees.