Having traveled around Australia for 3 months, we feel comfortable designing our own ActiveTravels Dream Day Itineraries to Australia. Depending on time and budget, we can send you to Sydney, Melbourne, Cairns/Port Douglas, and add in some special treats like Ayer’s Rock, biking or hiking in Tasmania, or scuba diving off a Great Barrier Reef island, like Heron.
New Zealand, however, was meant for driving at a slow pace. That is, if you can handle driving on the left-hand side of the road. We’ve enjoyed working with a local outfitter, NZSidekick, that will rent you a car and then design an itinerary with suggested activities and stops at small inns they personally inspect and recommend. Pricing is affordable and it’s a fantastic way to see the country’s topography, from fjords to glaciers to massive lakes and long stretches of secluded coastline. Activities include cruising the majestic Milford Sound, dinner at a Marlborough sauvignon blanc vineyard, and strolling along a beach dotted with hundreds of massive elephant seals.
These are busy times for us at ActiveTravels as we listened to our growing membership and have started to design food, art, biking inn-to-inn, family adventure, and yoga trips exclusively for our clientele. We are partnering with some of our favorite people, including food and cocktail writers, restaurateurs, art historians, renowned adventure outfitters, and beloved yoga instructors to help lead these tours. Lisa and I hope to finalize the pricing and dates (starting in the fall of 2016) by the new year, when we also roll out our new website redesign. Yea! Thanks again for your continued support! What a long strange trip it’s been. As my dad used to say, “Enjoy the ride.”
When we last stepped foot on Virgin Gorda February 2018, the island was devastated in the wake of Hurricane Irma. We were sailing the BVIs and the locals were overjoyed to have any travelers to this region. But it was hard not to be saddened by the overwhelming state of destruction. Upon arrival in Tortola, boats were capsized in the harbor, roofs were ripped off houses, and locals were driving cars with broken windows. Classic resorts like Bitter End and Peter Island were in tatters, large tankers beached, homes destroyed wherever you looked. Thus the reason why we’re overjoyed to find out today that the 
Soft and cushiony, with a shade of pink to enhance the dramatic effect, the sand on the beaches of Bermuda is better than advertised. Hemmed in by jagged rock formations and backed by cliffs, the finest beaches are a mix of horseshoe-shaped coves filled with tanning bodies and small jewel-like pockets of sand with just enough space to contain a couple or two. This sublime stretch of coastline serves as the ideal welcome mat for the weary waves that have rolled some 600 miles from the coast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, the closest landmass to the west. May and early June are the ideal months to visit this 23-mile speck of land in the Atlantic. The surge of travelers, many venturing here aboard cruises in the height of summer, have yet to arrive, so you can see the island in its natural relaxed state. Stay at the newly revamped rooms and suites at the 
Sad to be leaving the 
Doug Mayer, founder of