North America travel tips

76 guides across 3 countries — when to go, how to get around, which ATMs not to use, and what a fair price looks like.

wide angle photo of Brooklyn Bridge under cloudy sky

New YorkUnited StatesThe city that never sleeps

aerial photo of white buildings

CancunMexicoCaribbean turquoise meets Mayan history

bird’s eye view photography of coconut trees under blue sky

Los AngelesUnited StatesBeaches, canyons, and a city built for driving

aerial photo of buildings beside beach

MiamiUnited StatesArt deco, ocean heat, and a Latin American pulse

people walking on sidewalk near brown concrete building during daytime

Mexico CityMexicoAztec ruins, world-class museums, and the best street food anywhere

The Colorado river winding through the layered walls of the Grand Canyon

Grand CanyonUnited StatesA mile deep, and no photograph has ever conveyed it

Moraine Lake below the Valley of the Ten Peaks in the Canadian Rockies

Banff & the RockiesCanadaTurquoise lakes under peaks that go straight up

city with lights turned on during night time

Las VegasUnited StatesA city built to take your money, and extremely good at its job

Golden Gate Bridge during daytime

San FranciscoUnited StatesSeven square miles of hills, fog and other people’s ideas

The red Canal Street streetcars lined up at the end of the line

New OrleansUnited StatesThe least American city in America, and the best-fed

buildings and body of water

VancouverCanadaA glass city between the mountains and the sea, and it rains

The Toronto skyline with the CN Tower across Lake Ontario at golden hour

TorontoCanadaHalf the city was born somewhere else, and you can eat your way through the proof

landscape photography of skyscrapers

MontrealCanadaA French city with North American winters and a festival for everything

white and gray castle and buildings

Quebec CityCanadaThe only walled city north of Mexico, and it takes winter seriously

Anchorage along the shore of Knik Arm, under the snow-covered Chugach mountains

AnchorageUnited StatesA city with moose in the gardens and the whole of Alaska out the back door

a green bus driving over a bridge in the mountains

DenaliUnited StatesSix million acres, one road, and a mountain that makes its own weather

An aerial view of a city with a bridge

JuneauUnited StatesA state capital with no road out, a glacier at the edge of town, and rain

Waikiki and the Honolulu skyline along the shore, seen from Diamond Head on Oahu

OahuUnited StatesWaikiki on one coast, the North Shore on the other, and a volcanic ridge in between

The Chicago skyline across Lake Michigan on a clear day

ChicagoUnited StatesThe city that invented the skyscraper, on a lake with a horizon

The Boston skyline across the Charles River

BostonUnited StatesFour hundred years of American history in a city you can cross on foot

The Space Needle and the Seattle skyline with Mount Rainier behind them

SeattleUnited StatesWater on both sides, a volcano on the horizon, and the coffee that changed how the world drinks it

A hot spring ringed with orange bacterial mats in a Yellowstone geyser basin

YellowstoneUnited StatesThe first national park anywhere, sitting on top of a supervolcano

The neon signs of Broadway in Nashville at night

NashvilleUnited StatesLive music in every bar on the street, from ten in the morning

aerial photography of beach shore during daytime

TulumMexicoMaya ruins on a cliff above the Caribbean, cenotes in the jungle behind, and a beach road that got expensive

a large building with a dome and a courtyard with people walking around

OaxacaMexicoThe best food in Mexico, seven kinds of mole, mezcal from the village that made it, and the Day of the Dead

brown rock formation on sea under blue sky during daytime

Los CabosMexicoDesert running into the Pacific at the tip of Baja, with grey whales in the bay every winter

Loungers and a thatched parasol on the white sand at Playa del Carmen

Playa del CarmenMexicoA beach town that became a city: a pedestrian avenue of bars and dive shops, white sand either side of it, and the ferry to Cozumel from the middle

Boats and sunshades on the shallow turquoise water at Playa Norte, Isla Mujeres

Isla MujeresMexicoAn island eight kilometres long with the best beach in the Mexican Caribbean at one end, golf carts instead of cars, and Cancún twenty minutes across the water

The Cozumel shore from the air, houses along a line of white sand and reef

CozumelMexicoThe best wall diving in the western hemisphere, an island that empties the moment the cruise ships leave, and a wild eastern shore with nothing on it

Thatched wooden cabanas among the palms on Isla Holbox

Isla HolboxMexicoA sandbar island with no cars, no pavements and no bank: golf carts through the sand, flamingos on the lagoon, and whale sharks offshore in summer

The Bacalar lagoon from above, its blues running from turquoise to deep green

BacalarMexicoA freshwater lagoon of seven blues over a white limestone floor, with cenotes dropping out of the middle of it and a pirate fort on the shore

The white twin-towered church of San Servacio on the plaza in Valladolid

ValladolidMexicoA colonial town of painted houses with a cenote in the middle of it, an hour from Chichén Itzá and nothing like the coast

Dancers in white under the red arcades of a colonial building in Mérida

MéridaMexicoThe Yucatán’s white city: a colonial grid of courtyards, the best food on the peninsula, free concerts most nights and cenotes an hour in every direction

A street of painted colonial houses inside the walls of Campeche

CampecheMexicoA walled city painted in sherbet colours on the Gulf, with pirate forts at either end and almost nobody in it

The Maya palace at Palenque standing among the jungle trees

PalenqueMexicoA Maya city half-swallowed by jungle, with howler monkeys in the canopy above the temples and waterfalls an hour down the road

Tiled roofs of San Cristóbal with the highland mountains behind

San Cristóbal de las CasasMexicoA highland colonial town at 2,200 metres, cold at night and full of Tzotzil markets, with the strangest church in Mexico half an hour away

Palms above a rocky bay on the Pacific at Puerto Escondido

Puerto EscondidoMexicoA surf town on the Oaxacan coast with one of the heaviest beach breaks in the world at one end and a calm swimming bay at the other

One of the Huatulco bays, a curve of sand between headlands

HuatulcoMexicoNine bays and thirty-six beaches on a coast that was planned rather than grown, with a national park behind it and boats the only way to half of it

A street of coloured colonial facades with tables outside, Puebla

PueblaMexicoA city of tiled facades under two volcanoes, where mole poblano was invented and the biggest pyramid on earth sits under a church

The pink towers of Santa Prisca above the white houses of Taxco

TaxcoMexicoA silver town poured down a mountainside: white houses, red roofs, streets too steep for anything but a Volkswagen Beetle, and silversmiths in every doorway

Guanajuato packed into its ravine, the houses stacked up both sides

GuanajuatoMexicoA silver city crammed into a ravine, with its traffic running through tunnels under it, painted houses stacked up both sides and a student population that sings in the streets

A street of ochre and red buildings in San Miguel de Allende

San Miguel de AllendeMexicoA colonial town of pink stone and bougainvillea, kept perfectly by the people who moved here for it, with a neo-Gothic church that looks like a fairy tale

A cobbled street of colonial houses in the centre of Querétaro

QuerétaroMexicoA colonial centre of aqueducts and shaded plazas that most visitors drive past, with the country’s newest wine region an hour up the road

A wet alley of pink stone reflecting the sky in Morelia

MoreliaMexicoA city built entirely of pink stone, with an aqueduct running into the middle of it and the monarch butterflies wintering in the mountains two hours away

The lit cathedral towers over the plaza at dusk in Guadalajara

GuadalajaraMexicoThe city that invented mariachi, tequila and the charreada, with murals by Orozco under a dome and the best food in western Mexico

A field of blue agave with the mountains of Jalisco behind

TequilaMexicoThe town the drink is named for, in a valley of blue agave that is a World Heritage site, with distilleries you can walk into and a train that brings you

The beach and palms curving towards the town at Puerto Vallarta

Puerto VallartaMexicoA cobbled old town on a bay with jungle mountains behind it, the most welcoming gay scene in Latin America, and beaches reachable only by boat

Sayulita from the air, pools and roofs among the jungle above the bay

SayulitaMexicoA surf village of bunting and bare feet north of Vallarta, small enough to cross in ten minutes and busy enough to feel like a festival

The yellow towers of the cathedral against a blue sky in Mazatlán

MazatlánMexicoA working Pacific port with the longest seafront promenade in Latin America, a restored old town of opera and ironwork, and a carnival that fills February

A bare desert mountain rising straight out of the Sea of Cortez near La Paz

La Paz, Baja CaliforniaMexicoA quiet Baja capital on the Sea of Cortez, with whale sharks in the bay in winter and the emptiest turquoise beaches in Mexico up the road

Two figures in Day of the Dead costume on a street in Todos Santos

Todos SantosMexicoA desert oasis town of galleries and palm groves an hour from Cabo, with a wild Pacific beach that is not for swimming and whales going past it

White parasols along the sand at a Maui beach, the headland beyond

MauiUnited StatesA volcano you drive up for sunrise above the clouds, a coast road of waterfalls and one-lane bridges, and whales in the channel all winter

Lava running in bright orange channels over black rock on Hawaiʻi Island

Hawaiʻi Island (the Big Island)United StatesAn island with eleven of the world’s thirteen climate zones, a volcano that has erupted in most recent years, and the best stargazing on earth from the top of Mauna Kea

Kauaʻi from the air, buildings along a curve of green coast

KauaʻiUnited StatesThe oldest and greenest Hawaiian island: a canyon Mark Twain called the Grand Canyon of the Pacific, a coast with no road along it, and rain that made all of it

The dome of the United States Capitol against a clear sky

Washington, DCUnited StatesA capital of free museums on a two-mile lawn, cherry blossom for two weeks a year, and a metro that actually goes where you want

A palm-lined street of high-rises in downtown San Diego

San DiegoUnited StatesThe most comfortable weather in the United States, a park bigger than Central Park with fifteen museums in it, and the Mexican border twenty minutes south

The towers of downtown Austin from above

AustinUnited StatesLive music every night of the week, barbecue worth queueing three hours for, and a river full of swimmers in a city that hits 38°C

The Portland sign over Broadway in downtown Portland, Oregon

PortlandUnited StatesA city of bookshops, food carts and bridges under a volcano, with the Columbia gorge and the Pacific each an hour away

The Philadelphia skyline lit gold at sunset

PhiladelphiaUnited StatesWhere the country was declared, with the art museum steps Rocky ran up, a covered market since 1893, and the best cheesesteak argument in America

A horse carriage on a street under the live oaks in Savannah

SavannahUnited StatesTwenty-two garden squares under live oaks hung with Spanish moss, a river of cargo ships at the end of the street, and open containers allowed on it

The columns and steps of the old Custom House in Charleston

CharlestonUnited StatesPastel houses on a peninsula between two rivers, the best restaurant town in the American south, and the fort where the civil war started in the harbour

Turquoise window frames set into an adobe wall in Santa Fe

Santa FeUnited StatesThe oldest capital in the country, built of adobe at 2,100 metres, with the light that brought the painters and green chile on everything

A corner building of shops and awnings at dusk in Key West

Key WestUnited StatesThe end of the road: 160 kilometres of bridges to an island nearer Havana than Miami, where the sunset is a nightly performance and Hemingway’s cats still have six toes

A mid-century motel and palm trees under the mountains at Palm Springs

Palm SpringsUnited StatesMid-century modern houses under a 3,000-metre mountain, a tram to the snow at the top of it, and two hundred days of sun a year

The Yosemite valley at sunrise, El Capitan on the left and Half Dome behind

YosemiteUnited StatesA granite valley with waterfalls down both walls, the biggest cliff face in North America at one end, and sequoias older than most countries

The red walls of Zion canyon seen from the trail above it

ZionUnited StatesA canyon of red sandstone you walk up the middle of, in the river, with a cliff route so exposed it has chains bolted to it

The orange hoodoos of the Bryce amphitheatre under a blue sky

Bryce CanyonUnited StatesAn amphitheatre of orange rock spires at 2,500 metres, best at sunrise, and some of the darkest skies left in the country after it

Delicate Arch on its slickrock bowl at sunset, near Moab

MoabUnited StatesA desert town between two national parks, with two thousand stone arches on one side, a canyon labyrinth on the other, and the Colorado river through the middle

Red sandstone buttes under a blue sky at Sedona

SedonaUnited StatesRed sandstone buttes around a small town of galleries and trailheads, with the Grand Canyon two hours north and a vortex on every hill according to some

A Joshua tree in the desert scrub under a wide blue sky

Joshua TreeUnited StatesWhere two deserts meet: spiked trees out of a children’s book, granite piles climbers come from everywhere for, and a sky with the Milky Way in it

The folded badlands of Death Valley in low light

Death ValleyUnited StatesThe hottest and lowest place in North America: salt flats below sea level, dunes, a crater and a painted canyon, all within an hour of each other

A snow-streaked peak above a green valley in Glacier National Park

Glacier National ParkUnited StatesA road over the top of the Rockies past hanging valleys and waterfalls, with grizzly bears in the bottom of them and glaciers that will be gone within a generation

The Teton range rising straight out of the flat valley floor

Grand TetonUnited StatesMountains that rise four thousand metres straight out of a flat valley with no foothills, a river of moose and beavers under them, and Yellowstone an hour north

The Big Sur coast from above, a cove of turquoise water under the cliffs

Big SurUnited StatesNinety miles of cliff road between the mountains and the Pacific, with redwoods in the canyons and nowhere to stay that is not booked months ahead

Vineyard country under the hills of the Napa Valley

Napa ValleyUnited StatesThirty miles of vineyards between two ranges, four hundred wineries on them, and a train and a balloon to see it from

Lake Tahoe at sunrise, an island in the bay and the pines in silhouette

Lake TahoeUnited StatesA lake of startling blue at 1,900 metres with mountains all round it, a dozen ski resorts on them, and a casino strip where the state line crosses the shore