Author: Barbara Redding

Big brands, boutiques spice up the New Orleans hotel scene

Food & Drink, History, Hotels, Lifestyle, Luxury, Travel
by Barbara Redding

Seafood gumbo, crawfish etouffee, and sugar-dusted beignets entice visitors to New Orleans. Along with Mardi Gras and the Jazz and Heritage Festival, of course.   But these days, the city’s hotel scene is also getting some special attention.   Luxury hotel brands Caesars and Fairmont are set to add new properties in the Crescent City. Plus, new boutique hotels are opening, and historic favorites are being renovated.   Plus, most of the new additions include restaurants that are offering the food that’s helped make New...

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Séc-he: New Palm Springs Wellness Center Offers Tribal Healing Treatments

Adventures, Lifestyle, Luxury, Travel, Wellness
by Barbara Redding

“Taking of the Waters” is a sacred healing experience practiced for centuries by the  Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians of Palm Springs, California.   Today, visitors can soak in the steaming water of the tribal hot springs at The Spa at Séc-he, the tribe’s new luxury spa in downtown Palm Springs.   The tribe began sharing Agua Caliente Hot Mineral Spring with settlers in the 1800s, making it Palm Springs’s first tourist attraction–and namesake. The first bathhouse was a rough-hewn wooden cabin.    Séc-he...

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Commodore Perry Estate: An Italianate mansion reimagined as a luxury resort deep in the heart of Austin, Texas

Food & Drink, History, Lifestyle, Luxury, Travel
by Barbara Redding

A stone wall wraps around the Commodore Perry Estate, obscuring views of an ornate Italianate mansion built by a wealthy cotton merchant and his socialite wife during the Roaring ‘20s in what was then the outskirts of Austin, Texas. But the estate is hardly a secret these days. Auberge Resorts Collection has reimagined the 10,800-square-foot mansion as the centerpiece of a 10-acre urban resort that is enticing luxury-minded visitors from around the world.   On a recent assignment for Travel Weekly, I explored the whimsically...

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Rendezvous in Wyoming’s Green River Valley

Family, Lifestyle, Travel
by Barbara Redding

Trout are plentiful but elusive in the fast-flowing Green River in western Wyoming. Anglers from big cities on the West and East Coasts arrive every summer by private jet to stay at rustic ranches in the shadow of the snow-capped Wind River Mountains. They rise early to cast fanciful, hand-tied flies into the clear emerald water in hopes of hooking an inquisitive cutthroat. Fishing was not what drew mountain men, Native American Indians and traders to the lush Green River Valley nearly 200 years ago....

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A Rolling History Ride in Durango

Adventures, Family
by Barbara Redding

When I bought a ticket to ride the narrow-gauge train from Durango to Silverton last summer, my only concern was nabbing a window seat for views of the San Juan Mountains. Unfortunately, riders on the historic train face more challenges this year. The “Baby Train,” as it is sometimes called, is running again — sort of. Shut down by the coronavirus pandemic in March, the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad (D&SNGRR) was ready to roll again in June when businesses in southwestern Colorado began...

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Tranquil Beauty of Tuscany

Luxury
by Barbara Redding

After spending two weeks hiking in Cinque Terre and hopping ferries on Lake Como, I was ready to relax with friends on a secluded agritourism farm in Tuscany. From the sleepy Sinalunga train station, I traveled in a sleek Italian sports car along narrow country roads that dipped and curved abruptly around tiny hamlets, walled estates, olive groves and vineyards. Porcelain-white Chianina cattle grazed contentedly along the road sides. Red poppies and mustard-colored rapeseed covered the rolling hills as far as I could see, interrupted...

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São Paulo Entices With Art And Energy

Adventures
by Barbara Redding

Sao Paulo – Brazil’s biggest city was not on my bucket list. Rio de Janeiro, yes; Manaus in the Amazon rainforest, definitely. But I was pleasantly surprised by the sprawling business capital of the largest country in South America during a visit in early October 2018. This city of some 20 million is packed with eclectic museums, edgy architecture, and vibrant graffiti art. Designer shops, award-winning restaurants, elegant accommodations, and high-energy night clubs abound throughout the city’s multi-ethnic neighborhoods. And the gregarious Paulistanos, as locals...

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A Wedding in India and Much More

Adventures
by Barbara Redding
The writer and her friends at a wedding

My trip to India began with a festive Hindu wedding in Kolkata. It ended after a mesmerizing sitar performance in a musician’s home in Varanasi, a visit with elephants rescued by a conservation center in Mathura and a walk through a Delhi slum with a young man who grew up there and now hopes to be an actor. Oh, I also saw the Taj Mahal in Agra, the Amer Fort in Jaipur and the Mahatma Gandhi museum in Delhi. The must-see sites of India are indeed captivating. But I...

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Cuba: An Island Lost in Time

Adventures
by Barbara Redding

A fast-moving Caribbean storm chased us off the idyllic, mostly empty Cuban beach. The wind almost whipped the towel out of my hand as I pushed the key card into the door of our third floor hotel room. Nothing happened. Tried again. Nothing. By the time my companion returned with a new card — and news of a power outage — rain was coming down in sheets. Though we escaped the tropical deluge, our neighbor’s room flooded in the all-inclusive, government-owned resort near Trinidad. When...

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