| Mendocino Green Wine | In northern California you’re never far from wine country. And while name brand-name mainstays like Napa and Sonoma seem to steal most of the attention, we tend to favor smaller, more remote appellations that offer quality vintages, artisan pleasures and a nice, slow pace of life. One of our favorites lies [...]
| Bay Area Eco-Getaway | We’re overlooking a perfect crescent of sandy beach, watching the clam diggers harvest a chowder. In the protected harbor beyond, a vintage yacht with a rakish bowsprit gently bobs, while on the riprap break wall, anglers lazily cast crab snares and bait their hooks. Where are we, New England? Some [...]
Wish a happy fifth birthday to the Big Solar of U.S. hotels, covering five acres and producing 10 million+ kW of electricity…
| Comfort Amid Critters | The bobcat was the first indication that El Capitan Canyon isn’t just another green glamping “resort.” Just across California Highway 101 from historic El Capitan State Beach, fewer than 20 miles north of Santa Barbara, this eco-friendly “nature lodging” lures city slickers and locals alike to its luxury safari tents [...]
| Green Wine Country in SoCal | Take a lazy drive along Rancho California Road, lined with vineyards, olive trees, and cypress, and you might, for a moment, imagine yourself in Tuscany rather than SoCal’s Temecula, an easy hour-or-so trip from San Diego, Orange County and Palm Springs. While the Temecula Valley doesn’t have the [...]
| A New Era Dawns | Palm Springs, someone says. What comes to mind? All that Rat Pack and Old Hollywood history, of course … Jetsons-like interior design … an outdoor-indoor lifestyle that takes advantage of 330+ days of sunshine … and architecture spanning Spanish colonial to Fifties minimalist modern. There’s the Walk of Stars [...]
Healthier air travel and hotels lead the year’s travel trends spotted by Wellness Tourism Worldwise, an international organization focused on well-being and travel. The forecast is based on an analysis of
| Green And Inn-viting | Mendocino sets a mood. Perched on rocky headlands high above a swelling kelp-forest ocean, it’s like nowhere else on the California coast. A stage backdrop of a 19th-century seafaring village, with tidy New England ship captain’s homes and wooden sidewalks. A Pacific beacon for artists and dreamers and lovers of foggy [...]
| LEEDing in Central California | John Steinbeck made Monterey famous as the place sardines got canned, but today it’s equally renowned as the gateway to the world’s largest marine sanctuary and an amazing abundance of aquatic life. Some 21 endangered and threatened species of sea creatures spend their lives here. Seven species of whales [...]
| New Chef Shines | It’s a lovely evening, and the tourists are trolling the sidewalks of Sonoma around the city’s delightful, leafy square. They’re looking for a place to eat, and so are we. Not that Sonoma is short on dining options, not at all. It has plenty of those. But when you narrow [...]