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More Americans visit the Dominican Republic than any other Caribbean island — millions per year, most of them landing at Punta Cana International Airport, getting on a shuttle, and spending their entire trip inside a Barceló or Hard Rock all-inclusiv...
If you have spent any time traveling outside the United States, you have probably noticed something interesting. People will tell you — sometimes to your face, always politely, occasionally with a beer in hand — that they love Americans but canno...
This might surprise you: there are Americans in Iran right now. Not many, and they're not there casually but they exist, and their stories paint a more nuanced picture of US-Iran relations than the headlines suggest. Who Are the Americans in Iran?...
We're not going to sugarcoat this. The US State Department rates Iran as Level 4: Do Not Travel — its highest warning level, the same as active war zones like Syria, Somalia, and Yemen. That sounds terrifying. But the reasons for Iran's Level 4 ratin...
For most of its post-war history, North Korea continues to operate tightly controlled tourism for foreign visitors. Western tourists travel through specialist agencies, most famously, the Beijing-based Young Pioneer Tours, on strictly supervised grou...
American Samoa is an unincorporated territory of the United States in the South Pacific Ocean, approximately 2,600 miles southwest of Hawaii. Its approximately 55,000 residents are US nationals (not citizens by birth, in a legal distinction that co...
Americans who make it to Serbia almost universally say the same thing afterward: they wish they had gone sooner, and they wish they had stayed longer. This is a country that operates almost entirely outside the standard Western European tourist circu...
For Americans, the tour operator isn't just a convenience — it's a legal requirement. Iran mandates that citizens of the US, UK, and Canada travel with a government-licensed guide throughout their stay. Your tour operator is simultaneously your visa ...
You land in Tehran. You walk out of the airport into a country that your government tells you not to visit, that your media portrays as hostile, and whose leaders regularly chant "Death to America" on television. You're nervous. And within 30 minutes...
Many people associate Algeria with the civil conflict of the 1990s called the "Black Decade" or Algerian Civil War but that era is over. But, modern Algeria, while not without challenges, is safer than its reputation would suggest. Current US Sta...
Unlike much of North Africa, Algeria does not offer visa-free or visa-on-arrival entry for American citizens. You must obtain a visa from an Algerian embassy or consulate before you travel to explore or en route to another destination. The process re...
The short answer: yes, people absolutely still travel to Iran — and the numbers might surprise you. Before COVID-19, Iran was receiving over 8 million international visitors per year. While the pandemic and geopolitical tensions reduced those numbers...
If you're considering travel to Iran as an American, you need to understand the political landscape because sanctions, diplomatic relations, and political tensions directly affect your ability to travel, spend money, and stay safe. Travel Advisory...
When people ask why Chinese nationals travel to Lesotho, the assumed answer is usually tourism — and then the follow-up question is an incredulous "but why Lesotho?" A tiny, landlocked mountain kingdom completely surrounded by South Africa, with a po...
Germany is a nation of travelers. With a strong passport, generous vacation entitlements, and one of Europe's highest standards of living, Germans collectively take hundreds of millions of trips per year — and the destinations they choose, the amount...
Cuba is unlike anywhere else in the Caribbean. A country where 1950s American cars roll past colonial palaces, and where salsa dancing, or Casino spills out of open doorways. If you're planning a Cuba trip, this guide covers things you need to know t...
Denver has no shortage of great restaurants, but none of them come close to matching the history of the Buckhorn Exchange. Open since 1893, it's the oldest restaurant in Denver, Colorado, and one of the most unusual dining experiences.
Algeria isn't considered a shopping destination but that might work to your advantage. Unlike the heavily commercialized souks of Marrakech, shopping in Algeria is about discovering authentic, handcrafted goods. And, the tourist price markup is minim...
Let me be honest with you right upfront: Chile has earthquakes. A lot of them. The country averages over 8,000 seismic events per year, and roughly one significant quake (magnitude 7+) every decade. If that scares you — stick around, because by t...
Hamburg is Germany's second largest city and, by historical wealth, arguably its most important. It is a city-state — one of three in Germany (alongside Berlin and Bremen) — meaning that Hamburg city and Hamburg state are the same political entity.
Grenada — a three-island nation (Grenada, Carriacou, and Petite Martinique) in the southeastern Caribbean — is consistently cited as one of the safest destinations in the region for tourists. The nuanced answer is: safer than most, not without risk, ...
In the center of Salt Lake City, Utah, stands one of the most recognizable religious landmarks in the Western Hemisphere: Temple Square, a 35-acre complex that serves as the global headquarters and most sacred site of the Church of Jesus Christ of La...
Iceland is a country literally being built by fire — it straddles the Mid-Atlantic Ridge where the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates are pulling apart. Eruptions here are not rare historical events; they are a regular part of the landscape'...
Everyone knows Los Angeles as a car city. Five-lane freeways, parking minimums, the 405 at rush hour, the assumption that no one walks anywhere. But this wasn't always the case — and the story of how Los Angeles transformed from one of the world's be...
Before anything else, the scale. Mongolia is the 18th-largest country in the world. It has roughly 3.3 million people. That gives it the lowest population density of any country on earth that isn't principally Antarctica. Large portions of it have no...
Puerto Rico rewards visitors who arrive prepared. Most first-time visitors make the same set of avoidable mistakes — staying only in San Juan, not renting a car, eating only at tourist restaurants, or being surprised by the heat and the language. The...
Puerto Rico's nightlife is the best in the Caribbean. It is not even a close competition. The island that gave the world reggaeton, that has been producing internationally famous DJs for decades, that operates on a schedule where nothing starts unti...
Puerto Rico sits in a unique position among Caribbean destinations: it offers the richness of Latin Caribbean culture — the food, the music, the Spanish architecture, the warmth of the people — wrapped in the practical ease of a US territory. No pass...
You can visit Cuba without knowing its history — but you'd be missing the point. Every crumbling mansion, every vintage car, every slogan painted on a wall tells a story that stretches back five centuries. Cuba's history is dramatic, painful, triumph...
Getting from A to B in Cuba is either a charming adventure or a logistical headache — often both at the same time. The island doesn't have Uber (outside limited Havana service), GPS navigation is unreliable, and public transport runs on Cuban time. B...