So you’re looking for someplace a little different for your vacation this year. Perhaps you'd opt for a destination off the beaten track – but with enough to see and do to keep you busy. Or maybe a place with 24/7 action. Or maybe one loaded with old world history. Yet another option – which few vacationers know about – is the place to go for some serious “liming” (more about this later).
The editors of Watchboom, a free monthly travel magazine for baby boomers, offer the following smorgasbord of getaways. At least one of these spots, they say, is bound to fit your bill.
Fly Me To The Moon
How about visiting a moon base – in Spain? In Valencia (yes, the city known for its namesake oranges and tasty paella rice dishes) there's a mile-long project looking much like a set for Star Wars. Among a half-dozen jaw-droppers in the “City of the Arts and Sciences” spread out in a dried up riverbed is an immense opera house shaped like a spaceship on a launch pad, a giant aquarium sporting 20 acres of pod-like viewports and underwater tunnels made of glass, and a five-story-high, eye-shaped theater as long as a football field.
Chances are you'll find all this pretty cool for a 2,000-year-old seaport on the Mediterranean.
Rx For Weary Bones
Time for ‘liming’ on St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
For a change of pace, picture yourself sharing the powdery sands of a chain of Caribbean islands with local folks who've perfected the fine art of doing as little as possible. It's called “liming,” and you find it on the 32 islands and cays of the southern Caribbean country of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. They've even got a Liming Appreciation Society, dedicated to “encouraging people to take a lot more relaxation time provided that the activity has no explicit purpose beyond itself.”
Bora Bora On St. Lucia
Waiting for you on the nearby island of St. Lucia is one of the Caribbean’s most opulent boutique getaways (and often voted THE most opulent). Nestled atop a mountain – as you might expect from its name – the Jade Mountain resort’s 29 suites offer eye-popping views of the island’s crown jewels: twin volcanic peaks soaring a half-mile in the air.
View of the Pitons from a typical suite at Jade Mountain.
The peaks are the Pitons, and like the Tetons towering over Wyoming's Jackson Hole, the Rocky Mountain peaks over Denver and the picture-postcard spires over Bora Bora, they're a feast of natural beauty. And even tastier when you’re looking at the Pitons over your in-room infinity pool.
Guns and Moses In Jerusalem
Do you get a kick out of people-watching? If so, find a table (if you can) at a restaurant the size of a postage stamp along Jerusalem’s jam-packed Via Dolorosa (the “Way of Sorrows”), nosh on a pita full of chicken shawarma and check out the mish-mash of people passing by. You’ll see some dressed in everyday western street clothes, pilgrims in native outfits from all over the globe, church, biblical and social groups wearing same-name sweatshirts and others in all kinds of religious garb from Jewish men in ultra-orthodox long black coats and black hats to Muslim women in full burqas.
Visitors jam the Via Dolorosa (the “Way of Sorrows” walked by Jesus on the way to his crucifixion).
Look close, and you’ll likely see a sprinkling of tourists sporting what appear to be Jerusalem’s two big sellers: plastic crowns of thorns and “Guns and Moses” tee-shirts. Still others can be seen tooting plastic shofars (Jewish ceremonial instruments) resembling rams’ horns like those used by Joshua to down the walls of Jericho.
A Treasure Of The Sierra Madres
Mexico’s colonial gem of Alamos is so far out in the boonies of the state of Sonora (just below Arizona) that the road ends there. True, it's hard to get to Alamos, but it's well worth the long drive – because the town is a jump back in time to an era when the silver mines of the nearby Sierras made it one of the richest places on the planet.
Door to a colonial mansion in Alamos.
Wandering around Alamos' cobbled lanes and porticoed walkways you half expect to see mining barons in silk shirts, velvet breeches and knee-high leather boots strutting off to count the day’s take. You can imagine ladies in hooped skirts and white petticoats heading to afternoon teas. Silver-plated carriages, it’s said, once lined Alamos’ lanes like Rolls-Royces along Beverly Hills’ Rodeo Drive.
So what's your pleasure? A Valencian fantasy? Moseying around the biblical lanes and wall-to-wall shops of Jerusalem? Snoozing on an idyllic Caribbean island? Walking in the footsteps of silver barons in Mexico? Whichever trip you pick, the WatchBoom editors say you'll come back with plenty of amazing memories.