The Long Way
The proposal, and the 42 trips we’ve built around it
42 trips built the way we would build them — two to four nights, for the two of you or for everyone you’d want there, and an ending chosen because it is the right place to stop rather than because it photographs well. Every place named is a real venue in a real town. Take one wholesale, or read one to see what a trip here looks like.
The West
Jesús Arzate
Cypress, fog, and the cove at the end of it
3 nightsCarmel-by-the-Sea, California
Carmel rewards people who slow down and punishes anyone on a schedule.
Apr · May · Jun · Sep · Oct · Nov·Two to four
Andrew Ruiz
Red rock by day, no light at all by night
3 nightsSedona, Arizona
Sedona is an International Dark Sky city, which is the part most people miss because they only look at the rocks.
Sep · Oct · Nov · Mar · Apr · May·Two to 6
Up at dawn in a basket, underground by lunch
3 nightsNapa Valley, California
The balloons go up at first light because that is when the valley air is still.
May · Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Veronica Lorine
The Tetons from the river side, before anyone is up
4 nightsJackson Hole, Wyoming
The Tetons rise straight out of the valley floor with no foothills in front of them, which is why every photograph of them looks slightly fake.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to 6
Rodrigo Soares
Two states, one lake, and a beach nobody can build on
3 nightsLake Tahoe, California & Nevada
The lake straddles a state line, and that matters more than it sounds: the two shores are governed by different agencies with different rules, and the paperwork for the same photograph is not the same on both sides.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to 8
Canyon rim in the morning, the river by afternoon
3 nightsMoab, Utah
Moab sits between two national parks and a river, and the mistake is trying to do all three in one day.
Apr · May · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Rimrock in the morning, the Deschutes the rest of the day
3 nightsBend, Oregon
Smith Rock is half an hour north of Bend and it does not look like Oregon at all — a wall of welded tuff standing over a river in a sagebrush canyon.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to 8
A headland, a tide table, and no schedule at all
3 nightsCannon Beach, Oregon
The whole town runs on the tide table, and once you accept that, the trip plans itself.
May · Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 6
The road to Hana, taken slowly, in both directions
4 nightsMaui, Hawaii
The Hana road is sixty-four miles and six hundred curves, and everyone who rushes it hates it.
Apr · May · Sep · Oct·Two to 6
The windward side, which is the other Oahu
3 nightsOahu, Hawaii
Almost everyone stays in Waikiki and almost nobody crosses the Koʻolau range, which takes twenty minutes.
Apr · May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 6
Two days in the city, and a garden nobody is looking for
2 nightsSan Francisco, California
San Francisco is small, vertical, and has different weather by neighbourhood, which is the single most useful thing to know before packing.
Apr · May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 6
A village on a headland, three hours from anywhere
3 nightsMendocino, California
Mendocino is three and a half hours north of San Francisco on a road that stops being a highway about halfway, and that drive is why it is still quiet.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 10
Adobe, galleries, and a slot canyon an hour south
3 nightsSanta Fe, New Mexico
Santa Fe is seven thousand feet up, so the light is hard, the nights are cold in every month, and the first day should not be the strenuous one.
Apr · May · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Two peaks, one lake, and a town that knows it
3 nightsAspen, Colorado
The Maroon Bells are the most photographed mountains in North America, and the road to them is closed to private cars for most of the day in season — which is the best thing about them.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to 6
Desert floor to alpine forest, and back down for dinner
3 nightsPalm Springs, California
Palm Springs is a winter town: the months everywhere else is cold are the months this works, and July here is genuinely dangerous.
Nov · Dec · Jan · Feb · Mar · Apr·Two to 8
Saguaro country, and a hill covered in petroglyphs
3 nightsTucson, Arizona
Tucson is a desert city with a mountain range on either side and a national park split into two halves around it.
Nov · Dec · Jan · Feb · Mar·Two to 6
A canyon, a river, and Yellowstone for the day
3 nightsBozeman, Montana
Bozeman is a base camp more than a destination, and the drive south into Yellowstone is close enough to do in a day without making the day about driving.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to four
The Midwest
A lakefront city, from the water and from a point at the end of it
3 nightsChicago, Illinois
Chicago is the best-looking American city from the water, and the architecture cruise is not a tourist compromise — it is the correct way to see it.
May · Jun · Jul · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Two wine peninsulas, and a dune that falls into Lake Michigan
3 nightsTraverse City, Michigan
Traverse City sits at the bottom of a bay with a wine peninsula on each side of it, both on the forty-fifth parallel, which the riesling people will tell you about.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to 8
A peninsula of cherry orchards, ending in undercut cliffs
3 nightsDoor County, Wisconsin
Door County is a peninsula with a bay on one side and open Lake Michigan on the other, and the two shores can have different weather on the same afternoon.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 10
An island with no cars, and a limestone arch above the strait
3 nightsMackinac Island, Michigan
Cars were banned on Mackinac in 1898 and never came back, so the island runs on bicycles, horses and the ferry.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep·Two to 8
The north shore of Lake Superior, and a lighthouse on a cliff
3 nightsDuluth, Minnesota
Superior holds a tenth of the world's fresh surface water and it makes its own weather; Duluth can be twenty degrees cooler than the rest of Minnesota on the same July afternoon.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
The South
Mick Kirchman
Reef in the morning, the old fort at the end of the day
3 nightsKey West, Florida
Key West is small enough to do entirely by bicycle, and doing it any other way is a mistake.
Nov · Dec · Jan · Feb · Mar · Apr·Two to 6
Miguel Ángel Sanz
Up the parkway, and something made with your hands
3 nightsAsheville, North Carolina
Asheville is a making town, and the best day here involves coming home with an object.
May · Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Philip Arambula
Twenty-two squares, and the one with the fountain
2 nightsSavannah, Georgia
Savannah's grid is built around squares, and the whole city is designed to be crossed on foot under live oaks.
Oct · Nov · Mar · Apr · May·Two to 8
Emmy Gaddy
The harbour, the battery, and dinner you booked in March
3 nightsCharleston, South Carolina
Charleston is a restaurant town first, and the good tables are booked further ahead than the flights.
Oct · Nov · Mar · Apr · May·Two to 8
Live oaks, a lake in the middle of the city, and one very old dining room
3 nightsNew Orleans, Louisiana
Most people never leave the Quarter, and the Quarter is the least interesting eight blocks in the city.
Oct · Nov · Mar · Apr·Two to 10
Cold springs, hill country, and a grotto whose roof fell in
3 nightsAustin, Texas
Austin is hot for most of the year and the city's answer to it is water: Barton Springs runs at sixty-eight degrees in every month and the city built a pool around it.
Apr · May · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
The oldest city in the country, and a fort built out of shell
2 nightsSt. Augustine, Florida
St.
Oct · Nov · Feb · Mar · Apr·Two to 8
A barrier island, wild horses at one end, a striped lighthouse at the other
4 nightsOuter Banks, North Carolina
The Outer Banks is a hundred and thirty miles of sandbar with one road down the middle, and where you sleep decides which trip you get.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 12
The highest ridge in the Smokies, and the road that reaches it
3 nightsGatlinburg, Tennessee
Gatlinburg is a strip of attractions at the door of the most visited national park in the country, and the trick is to treat the town as a bed and nothing more.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 10
Broad Creek by paddle, and the beach everyone already knows
3 nightsHilton Head Island, South Carolina
Hilton Head is a resort island built around a marsh, and the two halves of that don't always get equal time.
Oct · Nov · Mar · Apr · May·Two to four
The Northeast
Luca Bravo
A formal garden most New Yorkers have never been to
2 nightsNew York, New York
Central Park is 843 acres and almost everyone experiences the same forty of them.
Apr · May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Carriage roads, a land bridge, and a pond with two hills behind it
3 nightsBar Harbor, Maine
Acadia has forty-five miles of carriage roads built for horses and closed to cars, which makes it the best place in the northeast to spend a day on a bicycle without thinking about anything.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
A working harbour, an island ferry, and a headland with two lights
2 nightsPortland, Maine
Portland is a small city that eats like a large one, and the Old Port is walkable end to end in twenty minutes.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
Ocean Drive, the Cliff Walk, and houses built to be looked at
3 nightsNewport, Rhode Island
Newport is a sailing town with a row of Gilded Age houses along the cliff, and the two halves of it barely speak to each other.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 12
Two river towns, a museum in a box factory, and a lake on a ridge
3 nightsHudson Valley, New York
The valley is two hours up the Hudson from Manhattan on a train that runs beside the water the whole way, which is the correct way to arrive.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
A gorge with nineteen waterfalls, and the lake that makes the wine
3 nightsFinger Lakes, New York
Seneca is deep enough that it almost never freezes, which is why riesling grows on its slopes and why the wineries run down both shores.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 10
Two days of city, and a pond in Concord
2 nightsBoston, Massachusetts
Boston is the rare American city you can cross on foot, and the North End is the part worth eating your way through.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
The end of the island, out of season
3 nightsMontauk, New York
Montauk in July is a different town from Montauk in late September, and the second one is the reason to come.
May · Jun · Sep · Oct·Two to 8
The Mall on foot, and the water it curls around
2 nightsWashington, D.C.
Washington is a walking city pretending to be a driving one, and the Mall is longer than the map suggests — two miles end to end with nothing to break it up.
Oct · Nov · Apr · May·Two to 8
Up through the notch, to a pond on the ridge
3 nightsStowe, Vermont
The road through Smugglers' Notch is one lane between boulders the size of vans, and it closes for half the year — the drive is as much of the trip as the destination.
Jun · Jul · Aug · Sep · Oct·Two to 6
