One fine way to see the autumn leaves turn is from the saddle of a bicycle. Rolling for 469 miles through the Appalachian mountains of North Carolina and Virginia the Blue Ridge Parkway would make for a great fall road riding route. Visit www.blueridgeparkway.org for maps and info.
Stock markets fall, companies fail – perhaps what you need is luxury rather than solitude?
How about kicking back at http://www.thecarnerosinn.com/thecarnerosinn/ for some serious R&R if you need to escape from the economic meltdown and you call California home.
Chill out, and if San Jose is still open for business when you return home all the better!
A great little site for those who don’t necessarily want to wander too far is www.trazzler.com.
Conceived by a couple of the minds behind Twitter and Blogger this is a site for the Web 2.0 generation.
Visit, play, and be matched with the ideal trips for you – near and far.
This is what trundlin.com could have been if I had any coding skills ! Great site.
As a resident of a damp island (the UK), I have a special affinity with islands, and gravitate to temperate locations, rather than tropical – much to the consternation of my Caribbean loving family!
So, Seattle and its environs, such as Vancouver, Vashon and Whidbey Islands makes it onto my list of great places to live if you like Trundlin.
Skiing? Snoqualmie is around an hour’s drive away.
Boho island life? Vashon or Bainbridge islands may fit (even if you’re only bohemian at the weekend, and are a buttoned down tech sort of gal/guy Mon-Fri 😉 )
Cycling? Washington, Oregon and Vancouver all provide a lifetime’s worth of roads and trails.
Running? Perfect! Visit the Seattle Running Company (www.seattlerunningcompany.com) for local guides or event details.
Sounds idyllic? Well, like much of the “civilised” world, Seattle is in the midst of a credit crisis, so if you’re not lucky enough to live near Puget Sound already there could be a bargain awaiting you. Once there, why would you ever want to leave!
Click on www.visitseattle.org for a further glimpse on what the region has to offer, and get trundlin……..
www.tripadvisor.com have just launched a new search tool, “tankofgas” aimed at finding you accommodation local to you – within a gas tank’s drive.
Its aimed at newly resource conscious consumers, but is just as much aligned to the trundlin concept – you don’t have to travel far to have a vacation. Often the easy option is the most relaxing.
Have a play and let the trundlin readers know what you think in the comments section.
The surest start to a relaxing break is making the transition from urban to rural as quickly as possible.
My favourite cities tend to be bordered by water. Think San Francisco or Seattle, rather than Paris or Berlin.
There can be no way more majestic to leave a city than to walk, ride or drive across the Golden Gate bridge.
Once across there is a resort with the most fantastic vista. No, not Sausalito. About a mile before, there is the newly opened Cavallo Point (www.cavallopoint.com), a lodge that has all you need to relax. Being located in Marin County means all you need for an active or relaxing break are to hand.
I haven’t stayed there myself, but fully intend to, next time I’m in SF, if only to check out the wildly varying reviews on www.tripadvisor.com.
Whichever country you may live in, or visit, any island is slightly detached, slightly eccentric to the mainland however close to shore it may be.
Whether you need to catch a ferry to get there (e.g. Catalina Island in California, www.catalina.com) or you can approach over a short bridge (e.g. Ile de Re in France, www.holidays-iledere.co.uk, or Hayling Island – www.hayling.co.uk in the UK) you will often find that the pace of life slows down a notch or two and the rythmn of life is slightly more eccentric than back on the mainland.
If you are looking for detachment and solitude then there are more remote Island options that I will no doubt visit in my blog in the future, but for a gentle break, not too far from the madding crowd, try Island life not too far from home.
What the island loses in physical distance will be more than made up for in mental detachment once there.
Catalina Island, CA, USA.
Trundlin 