I discovered Tucson and a cool new area of Florida. I had the dreamiest boat ride of my life in Kauai. I even met the son of one of the fabled Marx Brothers at a golf course surrounded by a trailer park in suburban Palm Springs. It was quite the year for travel to the U.S. for this cowboy, with trips to Florida, Hawaii, California, Vegas, Arizona, New York and more. Here are some highlights for my 2016 U.S.A. Jimmy Awards. BEST CITY DISCOVERY: I had never spent any time in downtown Tucson until November. I fell in love with Read more
U.S.A.
NEW YORK CITY – A sleek downtown hotel with great rooms and a wonderful bar. And a nearby place to sleep with an awesome restaurant and a cool rooftop patio. I was lucky enough to spend a few days in booming lower Manhattan in August. It was truly amazing to see the kind of re-construction being done around the site of the former World Trade Centers that were destroyed in the terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2001; nearly 15 years ago today. And there’s perhaps no better place to see it from than the W Hotel Downtown. W Hotels have Read more
The new NHL team heading to Las Vegas is changing more than the city’s sports scene. As part of the re-design of the area around the new T-Mobile Arena, where the newest pro hockey team will start play in the fall of 2017, Vegas officials have created an entirely new neighbourhood that’s both pedestrian and environmentally friendly. The new development, called The Park, runs from Las Vegas Blvd. to the new arena between the New York, New York casino and the old Monte Carlo, which is being replaced by a NoMad Las Vegas and the new Park MGM hotel. The Read more
Glorious deserts and towering redwoods. Quiet canyons and daredevil climbers ascending ridiculous pillars of stone. Fierce grizzlies and adorable prairie dogs. The United States is blessed with perhaps the most diverse geographical variety on the planet. Luckily for them, and for us, they also had the foresight 100 years ago to create a national parks service to preserve these natural wonders forever. Canadians and folks from around the world can visit fantastic parks from Hawaii to California to Maine and beyond. And now, thanks to a new film, Canadians will get a chance this summer to see a remarkable, immersive Read more
One of the great things about New York City is that the tourism folks don’t rest on their laurels. They come to Toronto regularly, for example, to talk about what’s new and what folks should see. They stage events all over the world to try to lure tourists to their city. They don’t just assume (as does Italy) that everyone will want to come there, so they WORK for their business. And it’s paying off. Last year, NYC welcomed a record 58.3 million visitors, their sixth straight record-breaking year. Some 12.3 million of those folks were international visitors, including a Read more
