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I will lead on a journey through slow food and rapid development, just right in Phoenix, Arizona. Phoenix is a city of uniqueness of the horizon and desert light. This optimistic attitude, accompanied with the arid climate and low cost of living has brought many people to the Valley of the Sun.

The Phoenix metropolitan area is one of the fastest- growing areas in the United States. It’s a pity because the car is king there – driving is only way to move around in 9, 200 square miles region. In this world it’s hard to state the foot and the bicycle as much as the car.

Phoenix is a lesson in freeway nomenclature. The endless pavement and strip malls remind of a distant Los Angles. But there’s a beautiful iridescent horizon and a new light – rail system will soon take place and run.

But behind all these statements comes the good. There’s a quality cuisine, a thriving art scene and unique modern architecture. The creative landscape has three museum institutions. They have the Phoenix Art Museum, a wonderful new second edition, and the other museum SMoCA, which was transformed from a five-plex AMC theater to 20,000 square feet of gallery space. And you have the Nelson Fine Art Center that combines the hispanic character with rich collections of Arizona State University.

The city is a totally electric mix. There is Temple’s musical heritage with the Gin Blossoms. The arts are there. There’s also a place called Red Modern Furniture, which is a little tapas. The city also got Passage, a wonderful boutique that is just blowing everybody away. It’s the coolest fashion spot with a spectacular environment and stylish items. It’s amazing and it’s affordable, accessible and cool.

If you happen to be there on the summer hiking the loop trail around Piestawa Peak or the trail up Camelback Mountain. It’s a great way to see the prespective of the city. As well as biking on the canal system is another perfect way to glimpse a diversity of neighborhoods and history of the city. And at the end for gourmets audience – whenever you’re going to eat in Phoenix or just have a snack, a cocktail, it’s a fantastic experience.

 The Ghana’ landscape is combination of beaches and reefs which make Ghana a wonderful place for surfers. Set on the Gulf of Guinea, Ghana has a tropical climate, with the combination of perfect waves, warm water and no crowds creates the ideal place for learning how to surf. 

Surf camp Ghana is lies on a 2 km beach in the fishing village of Busua. It is a traditional Ghanaian coastal village, 3-4 hour driving from Accra (the capital city).  This tourist destination is providing you with many entertainment options boast some of the nicest beaches in Ghana. Surfing is relatively new to Ghana, but the surf instructors will guide and help you improve your surfing skills.

Malawi is a landlocked country in southeast Africa, also emerged as Nyasaland. Behind the shores of lake Malawi known for boutique eco-resorts and rich international tourists is another Malawi with green hills, tea plantations, high mountains and game parks free of safari jeep traffic jams. The country covering about 400 miles in total and every traveler will find an extraordinary experience.

Despite of the fact the roads could sometimes be rough, in general the country provides an easy trip. The widly spoken language is English. The other language is Chichewa. The main point in Malawi is Blantyre. Blantyre is like Malawi’s New York. It’s a centre of finance and commerce and is the second largest city. During daytime in Blantyre you will bump into vendors hawk, avocados, bananas and cellphones card ending up to the window of your car; traffic police try to stop wild drivers.

As well as Blantyre boast several ”Out of Africa” restaurants, where you can sit on an open -air terrace and sip a late afternoon Malawi style gin and tonic.

Then from Blantyre, lies the Thyolo region about 25 miles southeast though winding road. Everywhere in Malawi is recommended to hire a car and driver (for about $30 a day). So Thyolo is a home to tea plantations, reminds very much of Sri Lanka. The roads there have winds and meanders up through rich green hills. Several of the plantations like Satemwa Tea Estate welcome overnight visitors offering them traditional planters’ bungalows.

But if you going north from Blantyre in a trip you will come across the biggest attraction of the country: the famous lake and Liwonde National Park. The park is very wild and animals have become almost conditioned to seeing tourists. If you are not on a paid safari tour, the best way to explore the park is to take a boat, provided by Mvuu Camp, the main lodge in the park, along the Shire River.

Just 80 miles north of Liwonde you will come to lake Malawi, which has the widest diversity of fish in the world and shore with its rocky outcroppings reminds of the Indian Ocean beach.

 Zurich is a city with no shortage of timekeepers. Zurich is also a city of landscape design, the Helvetica typeface and the Swiss Army Knife. Clocks are everywhere, over train and tram stations and from the facades of office buildings and church steeples. Time may rule this modern capital but also symbolizes the dynamic between the city’s history and modernity.

Zurich is the world’s most livable city, owing to its small size and population of fewer than 400, 000. It’s a place where bankers dance during summer evenings and where wealth attracts contemporary art.

Zurich is very exciting, attracting more young people and more foreigners. You have more galleries per person than any  other city in the world, after New York. Zurich offers spectacular museums, restaurants, boutiques and nature in every doorstep, which is very important. That’s why an Italian wants to compare his muscles, he does it with the German and the French.

On the west side of Zurich (also known as Kries 4), the industry is there and so its art. Everything is there. There are new apartments, lofts and cinemas in old factories. Schiffbau is a lovely theater with a good restaurant called LaSalle. It’s an aesthetic glass box.

Swiss people, in general plan the future too much, so they are not really alive. They know exactly what they will do at 60. and this is not sexy and attractive for me. There you can have the sexiness. They just want to do the best. You will see this in the benches or the design of bins- it’s too much. It’s too material.

Today Las Vegas has suffered from D-cup syndrome, no matter its plans and dreams. It’s a gaudy casino resort with greed, gluttony, simulacra that push the pleasure buttons of masses. Vegas is a real city and every day it’s getting more real. The city is always sunny and beautiful.

Las Vegas is developing into a future city with their own homegrown, groundbreaking architecture. Residents of Las Vegas have a lot of lost pets – from feral cats to farm animals and because the is in the desert – water is a huge issue. But clever architects have addressed those things in a very attractive design with solar panels and a ” living machine” to recycle graywater.

The city seems to be a sprawl of sand, bulldozers and acres upon acres of tile – roofed housing developments. And the question is ” Does the city have any real architectural history”? The answer is ”Yes” and the residents are trying to save it. The La Concha is a Paul Revere Williams structure, one of the last hotel landmarks on the Strip. There’s also the Old Mormon Fort, a historical landmark with a new addition by local architect Eric Strain. The structure is another example of how every great city needs to develop its own architecture.

When we talk about new architecture get in the elevator and go to Mix – it’s on top of the hotel at Maudalay Bay. Mix is the first restaurants and lounge, where the hotel spent a lot of money bringing in a major league restaurateur. The restaurant’s facade is made of 15, 000 Murano blown- glass baubles. It’s very beautiful.

They say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, but once you leave, you may have trouble banishing Sin City from your mind.

Rogner Bad Blumau is a hotel of discovery. Green roofs, round shapes and colorful facades make up a wonderful work of art in the middle of nature. The hotel is build like a city with various district. The architect is the Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser whose vision is that life is harmony and in harmony with nature. So the Rogner Bad Blauman is one of these places. The hotel is located in Bad Blumau municipality of the district of Furstenfield in Styria, Austria.

From his early days Friedensreich was a painter, who later also became an ecologist and building designer. He collected many ideas while traveling all around the world. Later he used these experiences when he started to design buildings.

Two curative springs supply Rogner Bad Blumau with power, heat and energy. Floating in the warm water, daydreaming alone or as a couple under canopies, on the glass-covered roof or when reading in a room of silence. The Melchoir spring is the soft and mild one at the hotel. When it comes from earth, the highly mineralized  thermal water has a temperature of 47.2 degrees Celsius. The other one – Vulkania spring is made up of a unique composition of depth groundwater. The mineral content in this naturally strong sole spring exceeds the required guide value for curative waters many times.

The Vulkania curative spring is of volcanic origin and the highest mineralized curative water in the Styrian spa region. Collected in the Vulkania curative lake, the water is genuine and powerful with warmest bathing temperature out in the open. Bathing in this water feels like silk.

One of the greatest service is relaxing in the Dead Sea Salt Gretto. Teh walls, the ceiling and floor consists of 100% salt from Dead Sea. During your session in the Dead Sea Salt Gretto you will inhale ionized air rich in micro – elements like iodine, potassium, sodium, magnesium, iron and selenium.

Since it was founded, Rogner Bad Bluman has been awarded numerous prizes again and again. Out of and about at Rogner Bad Blumau guests can also enjoy a lot of sport activities like cycling, fishing, tennis, running, inline skating, beach ball, skater track and street ball.

Cologne is a very modern city in Germany, where three sharp objects have a commanding influence on the skyline, from nearly every corner in the city. One of them is the ornate cathedral, which looms over low-rise buildings and fanning arteries. The ancient city of Cologne creates a vanish of brutal modernity, but while scratching Cologne’s surface reveals a vibrant center of art and design.

Cologne used to be, after New  York, the second most important art city in the world, but that was 15 years ago. Nowadays a lot of it has been taken over by London, Los Angeles and Berlin. Cologne is also described by its cathedral more or less. You can’t really not go there, but once you step into for a half an hour you will understand.It’s good to check out one of the Romanesque church, of which there are 12 in Cologne. From a historical point of view they are quite pure and more important from the cathedral.

But the most spectacular buildings at the moment are the Kolumba Diocesan Museum and Renzo Piano Peek & Cloppenburg department store (up in the picture), which is made of 6, 800 single glass slabs, all of different sizes. It’s a shopping area that is women part. Other interesting place for me is a shop called Sign of the Times specializes in’50s and ’60s furniture. The shop offers extremely fascinating items. There’s also a very special shop called o.k. Versand. There you can buy objects from China, India and Bulgaria.

In conclusion I would say that Cologne is very proud city with fantastic history of art and art collectors. But today many people are moving away, so Cologne must be very careful in the near future. Good luck..!

 Esch-sur-Sure is a small village set in the mountains, next to the Luxembourg. It is a medieval town which is surrounded by a meandering Sure River. The commune is famous with its open air opera and museums, Flower Parade and eco – tourism, offers 90km of walking paths.
The village is located around a castle built in 927, offer protection against marauding troops of Hungarians. The castle consists of two towers – the lower, built in the 10th century and the upper watchtower which was added in the 16th century. There is a charming view from the valley across the river. The castle is open year round and free admission. Old cloth and candle fabrics have been restored and are again producing typical products of the region. There is a permanent exhibition on the park with cloth-making museum and demonstrations.

A couple of miles from Esch-sur-Sûre are the country’s drinking water reservoir, where a barrage dam makes a fine lake, used for watersports of all sorts. Swimming, fishing, windsurfing, canoeing and sailing are very popular.

Houston, Texas is a place famous for its weird view of bigger is better. But today residents are starting to realize the environmental predicament that we need to change our actions in order to have a future in this world. Houston is a diverse city that attracts intellectuals from all over the world to industries such as energy and aerospace. Nowadays as I already mentioned the city offers a surprisingly large number of modern and international style architecture.

In this city of the biggest people, they are slowly learning the benefits of small. People are more aware of the environment and more concern about the future of our Planet Earth.

Houston is a place where people like to have their car: it’s a freedom, you know. Because it’s so hot and humid, you have the underground city where you can go from one building to another all through tunnels and without having to go the street level or outside. It’s all connected by walkways underground. There’s everything in the underground city: restaurants, business, laundry services and many more.

On ground level Houston itself  boasts with Discovery Green park. A spot with different activities like performances and concerts, great restaurants, pilates, yoga classes, a playground for kids, a manmade water pond for boats. It’s wonderful. It’s one of those things that make you think ”Houston is actually progressing”.

The food in Houston is fantastic. When it comes to food, it’s one of those places -discoverable. They have incredible seafood and barbecue traditions with a variety of flavors.But watch you eat – Houston’s the fattest city in the United States.

Pescara – a city in the Abruzzo region of Italy, situated at sea level on the Atlantic coast. The coast is low and sandy and the beach extends untouched for some distance to both the north and the south of the river. The city has Mediterranean climate typical of Atlantic Sea with dry hot summers, rainy winters and high humidity all year round. Pescara is also city of culture, art and relax.

In this article I’m very pleased and attracted by one of the fountain in Pescara’s Della Rinascita, created by Japanese architect Toyo Ito and integrated on 14 December last year, cracked by itself. The celebration of the inauguration of Plaza Della Rinascita was attended by 10, 000 people with great expectation and participation in which citizenship has been waiting for the completion led.

The day in the square is continued with all the events planned and rebirth of Plaza Lounge has closed the concert with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Pescara with its 55 elements entertained the audience playing known opera arias.

The fountain itself comprises 20 cubic meters of transparent acrylic material dubbed in the huge wine glass, five meter high on the two meter-square base. Passers- by heard creaking noises and the water in the tremendous bowl appeared to freeze. The monument which costs more than one million euros has been cordoned off by the police.

Brussels is a surreal linguistic city between the Dutch-speaking Flemish and the French-speaking Walloons, many transactions occur in neither language. But people just speak English. Its modest character made Brussels the perfect compromise for postwar rivals choosing a headquarters for the European Union and NATO, while all the diplomats and a swirl 
of immigrants from North and Central Africa give it 
an intense international, cosmopolitan flavor rare for such a small city. The picture displays the Atomiumis, built in 1956 for the World’s Fair, an homage to the future. It recently reopened after a complete renovation.

The Atomium’s interior, which includes these atomlike seating pods.

The Belgian Center for Comic Strip Art was designed by Art Nouveau master Victor Horta.

The Grand Place—Brussels’s major tourist destination—was burned down by the French in 1695, but was rebuilt within five years. Brussels has parks and forests, of course, but one place I especially like is both outside and inside. The Galeries Saint-Hubert were the first glass-covered shopping arcades in Europe. There are cafes in the galleries where you can sit outside and watch people go by, but you’re not in the rain. One modern and peaceful world …

The Montreal Expo 67 defined today Montreal as a design spot to watch. Though Montreal isn’t booming quite like Toronto or Calgary, the European stone streets of the Old City are still a favorite of tourists—and of the American under-21 set looking for a beer. Many famous architects have designed university buildings and museums all over Montreal like the Faculty of Music Building at McGill University and several boutiques.

The truth is, Montreal is a place to discover. The people there are very welcoming and if you talk to them they will help you see. There isn’t some organized system to discovering the city as the chambre de commerce presents. I suggest dear traveler going to smaller, lesser-known places, and that’s where you find wonderful food or nightlife. It’s all very organic there, but there’s no system to discovering it, or one place or neighborhood to go. One of the best, most established places  there is Café L’Express and they don’t even have a sign.

Montreal is also an initiative city, which makes a new center in Old Montreal. It’s lovely down there and the stone buildings are amazing, but it’s very touristy by the St. Lawrence. The western part of Old Montreal is developing in a really natural way, though. McGill Street is coming up. The way the west part of Old Montreal is going, it will help re-create the natural fabric of the city.

In the past, the east side of Montreal was Francophone and the west was Anglophone. It’s still that way to some extent, but you will enjoying a moment of harmony there. The new leadership has said that the referendum is on ice for some years in order to establish a healthier, more connected city. This is a wonderful city and it’s the only place I know where everyone really does speak two languages.

You see, Montreal is all about surprise. You come here expecting one thing and then you see a guy surfing in the river. It’s on YouTube.

Urban hostels in Europe have passed to an elegant transformation over the last decade, creating a viable alternative to the boutique hotel. The picture displays the Urbany in Barcelona. Rooms here have private baths, Wi-Fi and air-conditioning.

A particular room at the Urbany in Barcelona.

The rooftop terrace at Urbany, where the view includes the Agbar Tower, left.

A room in the modern London Central Youth Hostel. Located five minutes from Oxford Street and Regent’s Park, this hostel also has a 24-hour Internet cafe, group tours around the city, entertainment (D.J.’s, live music and karaoke nights) and kitchens where you can make your own meals.

The picture shows the Circus Hostel in Berlin’s lively Mitte neighborhood, located in the heart of the city.

One of the apartments at the Circus in Berlin. Every room has Wi-Fi.

The youth-oriented Yellow hostel in Rome only accepts guests in their late teens to age 40. Dorm rooms are all mixed gender and some have private baths. Foosball in the common room at Yellow, which is near the central railway station in Rome.

Côte d’Azur is also popular in English as the French Riviera – it is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeastern corner of France, extending from Menton near the Italian border on the east to either Hyères or Cassis in the west. The Côte d’Azur was once one of the first resort areas in the world. It began as a health resort for ailing British tourists at the end of the 18th century, after that in the mid-19th century, when the railroad arrived, it became the playground and vacation spot of British, Russian, and other aristocrats, such as Queen Victoria and King Edward VII, when he was Prince of Wales.

In the first half of the 20th century it was visited by artists and writers such as Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Edith Wharton and Somerset Maugham, as well as wealthy Americans and Europeans. After World War II it became a popular destination for mass tourism and conventions, as well as a summer home and meeting place for celebrities from Brigitte Bardot to Elton John.

Officially, the Côte d’Azur is home to 163 nationalities with 83,962 foreign residents, although unofficial and semi-official estimates of the number of non-French nationals living in the area are often much higher. The French Riviera also contains the seaside resorts of Cannes, Antibes, Juan-les-Pins, Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, Beaulieu, Cap d’Ail, Fréjus, Saint-Raphaël, and Saint-Tropez, and surrounds the principality of Monaco, with a total population of over 2m.

Monaco

The Marquesas Islands also emerged as ”The land of men” are a small group of volcanic islands in French Polynesia, a collectivization of France in the southern Pacific Ocean. The highest point in the region is the peak of Mount Oave, located on Ua Pu island at 1, 230m above sea level. Ua Pu is the third largest of the Marquesas Islands and the only major island that was unified under a single monarch prior to the arrival of European explorers.

The capital of the Marquesas Islands is the settlement of Taiohae on the island of Nuku Hiva.  The Marquesas Islands are the island group farthest from any continent in the world, lying between 900 and 1,200 km (550 and 725 miles) south of the equator and 1,371 km (852 miles) northeast of Tahiti.

Besides the lush tropical vegetation that goes culturally, the Marquesas are remarkably dry islands. They are the first major break in the prevailing easterly winds spawned from the extraordinarily dry Humboldt Current. The Marquesas Islands are thought to have formed by a center of upwelling magma called the Marquesas hotspot. The islands are divided in six communes. French and Tahitian are the only official languages of French Polynesia, and therefore of the Marquesas Islands as well, the Marquesan languages, in their various forms.

Accommodations are available in only a few hotels (Nuku Hiva and Hiva Oa) and small family homes on each island. The islands offer a wide range of activities, as Landrover excursions, horseback riding, hiking over mountain trails and to inland cascades, picnics on the beach or mountains, deep-sea fishing, sailing, motorboat rides, visits to archaeological sites, visits to artisansí workshops to buy wood carvings, tapa hangings and monoi perfumed oils.

To get there by boat try the mixed-freighter ARANUI takes up to 100 passenger in air-conditioned cabins for a 16 day cruise from Tahiti to the Marquesas through the Tuamotu archipelago and back. It includes  deluxe accommodation and meals as well as land excursions in the various islands.