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The Forgotten Island Chronicles of Minna Anthony Common
On sparsely populated Wellesley Island—part of the Thousand Islands archipelago, on the New York side of the St. Lawrence River—you can drive for miles without seeing a home or a business. If you’re like most visitors, you might point your car down the long, tree-lined path on the southeastern tip, into Wellesley Island State Park, stop at the Minna Anthony Common (MAC) Nature Center, check the trail map, and head out for a scenic hike. As you step onto River Trail, which winds along the water, you might give only a passing thought to the facility, which sounds like it could have been named for a wealthy benefactor. But the…
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Puffin Cruise to Eastern Egg Rock, Maine, with Hardy Boat
Following the Black Hole of travel writing that was 2020, I’ve been fortunate—and hugely relieved—to have a steady flow of assignments since the early spring. One of my favorites was a story on the new Empire State Trail for National Geographic, and the experience of working with them was such a joy that I immediately talked my editor into a story on birding ecotours and conservation that I’ve been wanting to write for over a year. (Look for that in September.) Wanting to add firsthand experience to the piece, I started researching an Atlantic puffin cruise off the coast of Maine. I got lucky: one tour company had an opening…
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Weekend Coastal Maine Road Trip
I’ve been wanting to write a story on birding ecotours and conservation for over a year. When I finally placed the story with National Geographic (look for it in September), I had a great excuse to go on a puffin cruise—something else I’ve been wanting to do for eons. But it was already late July, and puffin tours are usually booked in advance for the summer. In a huge stroke of luck, I found a tour with availability in five days. The problem: I didn’t have much time to plan my trip. Knowing that even a hastily planned coastal Maine weekend road trip was better than none at all, I…
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How Hotels Are Reimagining Outdoor Spaces into Novel Guest Experiences
In Washington, DC, a destination hardly known for its Alpine scene, guests cozy up at the Viceroy Washington DC’s plush, après-ski outdoor Winter Lodge, to sip lattes and warm themselves by the fire pit. Meanwhile, on the opposite coast, the venerable, all-luxury-all-the-time Beverly Wilshire in Hollywood has gone back to the land—sort of. Select—and deep-pocketed—travelers can now forgo the usual room or suite for an urban glamping experience in the hotel’s decked-out, Moroccan-inspired rooftop urban glamping tent. These are just two examples of how hotels are repurposing their outdoor spaces to create novel, socially distanced experiences for guests. While these new safe outdoor hotel experiences may look effortless, they’ve required…
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WITS Virtual Tour: New Brunswick, Canada
Every once in a while, I’m introduced to a coastal travel destination that wasn’t previously on my radar, and I promptly become obsessed with it. This is the case with New Brunswick, Canada. Since I went on Visit New Brunswick’s virtual tour at WITS, I’ve been researching, poring over photos of, and scheming ways to visit this unique water-woods-wander destination sandwiched between Maine and Nova Scotia. The tour kicked off at Hopewell Rocks, one of nine provincial parks in New Brunswick, with General Manager Erika Degrace guiding us into the park through a serene wooded area. She was joined by Kevin Snair, a park interpreter, who took us on a…
Writing the waves of coastal travel
