Travel

Southern California is only a few short hours away from Las Vegas, and at the end of the drive is a plethora of renowned celebrations unique to the state. The combination of wineries, live music and beautiful beaches creates a thriving environment, and as new events pop up each year, festivals can be found nearly every weekend of the year.

In many parts of the country, abandoned train tracks have been repurposed into multi-use exercise trails. The best of them — a little more than two dozen routes in all — are in the Rail-to-Trails Conservancy Hall of Fame, and several of those are located in the Northwest region of the United States, in Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington.

There’s no doubt this capital city has truly earned its nickname as The City Different. Its skyline is not made of skyscrapers, but rather a collection of flat-topped adobe buildings that has taken more than four centuries to evolve. There are plenty of private and state-run museums that can provide history lessons, but simply wandering the streets, talking to locals and breathing in Santa Fe’s mountain air can all be done for free.

Soccer fans coming to Rio de Janeiro for the World Cup can still find some reasonably-priced accommodations, as long as a love motel, slum or campsite is where they’re looking.