Coronado’s beachfront hotel rates start easing the same week Labor Day weekend ends, and they keep sliding into fall. That’s one island in one county. Multiply that pattern up the length of California’s coastline, and locals get back a version of their towns that summer’s tourists never see. These are the California beach towns where…
Reserving a Tennessee cabin for October is the easy part. Getting your trip right is the harder part. A signed confirmation says nothing about the gravel driveway behind it, the kind more than one rental company requires four-wheel drive to reach. These are the Tennessee cabin booking mistakes that ruin an October trip. 1. Ignoring…
An Ohio orchard that normally pulls nine bushels of apples off one tree may get lucky to get one bushel this year, after an 11-degree freeze hit in March. That kind of loss changes what a simple family trip to pick apples looks like. These are the apple orchard mistakes Ohio families are making this…
A driver eases onto the Blue Ridge Parkway at Rockfish Gap, sets the cruise control, and expects the same conveniences as every other highway in Virginia. That expectation gets tested fast. This is what Virginians wish every tourist knew before merging onto the Blue Ridge Parkway. 1. The Parkway Isn’t a Shortcut More than 16…
Hurricane season hits its statistical peak on September 10, just days after Labor Day weekend wraps up this year. Many people mapping a drive to Asheville, Boone or Blowing Rock never glance at a tropical outlook before they load their car. But those mountains carry the scars of the storm that showed exactly how dangerous…
One of Virginia’s Chesapeake Bay ferries isn’t running at all this summer, and hardly anyone off the island has noticed. Its longtime captain is out on medical leave with no return date posted. Virginia’s other working ferries are still crossing on schedule, mostly for the people who live a short drive from the landing. These…
New York held the nation’s first state fair in 1841. That’s twenty years before Kansas became a state. Nevertheless, it still hasn’t figured out how to make parking simple. Upwards of 100,000 people a day pack into the fairgrounds outside Syracuse on its busiest days. The first-timers among them keep making the same handful of…
Tennessee has mountain roads worth driving with the windows down and nowhere else to be. But on a Saturday, many drivers end up spending more time staring at the bumper ahead of them than the view outside. These scenic routes in Tennessee are beautiful enough to draw a crowd and crowded enough to make locals…
New York received over 315 million visitors last year, and fall foliage is a big part of why people keep coming back. A lot of that traffic funnels onto the same handful of scenic roads every October. But many tourists miss some of the best parts of the state. These are the fall drives New…
Troopers cited more than 3,000 speeders in Virginia over last year’s Labor Day weekend. Virginia treats reckless driving as a criminal charge, not a routine ticket, no matter whose license plate is on the car. These are the Labor Day weekend mistakes tourists make in Virginia. Note: This is general information, not legal advice. Traffic,…
