Conde Nast Traveler March 2022

Before I met my wife, not quite 17 years ago, I’d taken my share of great trips, but I hadn’t yet come to see travel as an avocation. She, by contrast, had just come back from a week tooling around Rio by herself. From the moment we were a couple, our relationship was bound up in talk of where we would go next. She encouraged me—and she empowered me—to start thinking that dream trips didn’t have to stay dreams. Our first vacation was to Amelia Island, and I still vividly remember the fragrant night air on the drive back from a day trip to Savannah, cracking up over the indolent alligators, swinging on the porch of our B&B as we learned about each other. A few weeks later we went to…

Almost 22 million visitors—a staggering 27.5 times Amsterdam’s population—descended on the city’s cobblestone streets in 2019. After the onset of the pandemic, its local council took steps to limit these crowds, like voting to move its infamous red-light district to a new purpose-built neighborhood outside the city center (the location is still TBD); outlawing nonresidents from lighting up spliffs; and launching splashy campaigns to nudge visitors to other areas. One of these is Amsterdam-Noord, a curious corner locals have known about for years, just four miles north of downtown. It takes only a free five-minute ferry hop from Central Station, the city’s main transport hub, to access this district, which has built up its creative cred since the early 2010s. Its defunct factories, which once cranked out cargo ships and…

It used to be a rarity to find Japanese whisky at your local bar, but these days it’s as commonplace as Grey Goose. Now countries from Indonesia to Vietnam are trying their hands at spirits associated with faraway lands. On Bali, Sababay Winery is cranking out the typically Italian tipple grappa, using fresh-pressed juice from endemic Muscat Saint Vallier grapes; the digestif, called Saba, is now served at boîtes like the Viceroy Bali’s swanky bar. And the barkeeps at Anan Saigon (on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants List) and the Reverie Saigon have helped popularize the gin from Sông Cái Distillery, Vietnam’s first. It’s a love letter to the country’s lush northern highlands, with a recipe developed with input from farmers and foragers hailing from local minority communities, blending wild herbs,…

Louis Vuitton’s men’s spring-summer 2022 collection, helmed by the late, inimitable Virgil Abloh, honors Black American culture while mixing in the maison’s signature touches—such as the incorporation of the design motif Hybridtooth, which adds elements like the outline of Africa to Vuitton’s iconic houndstooth. The season’s bags are a highlight, including the travel-trunk-inspired crossbody (above), and the entire collection is defined by a final Abloh-ism: “maintainamorphosis,” an appreciation of history alongside a call for radical change. A fitting farewell from one of the fashion world’s great disruptors. PHOTOGRAPHS: ANAN SAIGON, SÔNG CÁI, SILVERSEA CRUISES, LOUIS VUITTON…

LA MANZANILLA, MEXICO Four Seasons Resort Tamarindo, México No, the other Tamarindo. This under-the-radar Mexican beach shares a name with the popular Costa Rican surfing destination, but the similarities end there. As the crow flies, it’s about 1,300 miles closer to the United States, yet it attracts only a fraction of the visitors. Much of the land surrounding the property is protected under a mix of private and government-owned biosphere reserves, and the hotel is committed to rewilding its own lush forests so that any endemic flora and fauna affected during construction will bounce back and continue to thrive. It’s one of only a handful of resorts south of Puerto Vallarta (unlike bustling Punta Mita to the northwest), meaning you’ll likely have this slice of beach mostly to yourself. The resort was…

Adecade ago, Moscow’s dining scene was defined by lengthy menus, fusion European and Asian cuisines, and dishes with pricey imported ingredients that diners ordered mainly to flaunt their wealth. But global politics intervened. “An embargo imposed in 2014 deprived us of foreign products, but that prompted production of local ingredients,” says Arkady Novikov, a renowned restaurateur who has propelled the growth of Moscow’s dining scene with dozens of high-end restaurants around town. Now the city’s rediscovery of homegrown ingredients and traditions has turned it into one of the world’s most interesting places to eat. Last September, Michelin announced its first Moscow guide, for 2022, and this July, the city will host the 2022 World’s 50 Best Restaurants awards, joining notable foodie cities like Melbourne and New York. The trailblazer of the…