Anastasia (Stasha) Healy

How did a 5,000-person rural Vermont town become a famous center for artisanal food and drink? Waterbury seemed to appear on the map in 1986 when two guys named Ben and Jerry expanded their ice cream factory from Burlington to Route 100 in Waterbury. The sweet-toothed pilgrims it attracts now fuel a local industry of gourmet goods. Over the years, a cider mill, barbecue restaurant, and tasting centers for locally made cheese, coffee, chocolate, and spirits have popped up in this Green Mountai...

In the Nutmeg State you can kick back in a lighthouse or treehouse, a water-facing suite steps from the East Coast’s answer to Rodeo Drive or a Relais and Châteaux inn with a world-class spa in the middle of nowhere (sorry, Washington, Connecticut – you’re pretty but not exactly hopping).

It might surprise you to know that Connecticut is home to world-class collections of American and British art and a showstopper museum of Native American culture. The state is king of house museums: You can see where Mark Twain wrote The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which is literally right next to Harriet Beecher Stowe 's home. Don't forget the Philip Johnsom Glass House and the Mecca for all things maritime, Mystic Seaport Museum.

As a traveler (not a tourist), you want to delve beyond a city’s most popular sights and attractions to get a deeper understanding of place. These surprising attractions take you out of the well-trod tourist areas to neighborhoods you wouldn’t see otherwise. Seek out these interesting spots for a dose of travel discovery.— Anastasia Mills Healy
Where: Nashville, Tennessee
How many people planning a Nashville trip say I think I’ll visit the Parthenon? There is, in fact, a to-scale replica of t...

Who Wouldn’t Want to Stay in Sting’s 16th-Century Tuscan Villa or a Scottish Castle on a Loch?
By Anastasia Mills Healy
How would you like to relax with friends around Sting’s pool in Tuscany or screen a film in George Lucas’ state-of-the-art movie theater in his Umbria home? Laura Blair of In Villas Veritas can arrange that and much more.
“A lot of people have snazzy websites but nothing to back them up. I’ve personally visited every property I recommend,” says Blair. She’s been matching dis...

By Anastasia Mills Healy
Dubai
To get a sense of Dubai, all you need to know is that it has the tallest building in the world and is constructing an even taller one; and it has the world’s biggest mall yet is building an even bigger one. A city with a superlatives complex, Dubai is always striving for the biggest, tallest, best, and most expensive of everything. No one’s done it before? Great! Dubai will hire the world’s best engineers and spare no expense in getting it done. This approach ca...

By Anastasia Mills Healy
The iconic image representing the Poconos has morphed from a couple sitting in a giant Champagne glass-shaped hot tub full of pink bubbles into kids careening down a water slide or snow tubing. The Pocono Mountains, about two hours from Fairfield County, are much more known now for family fun than kitschy honeymoons.
Resorts like Great Wolf Lodge, Camelback, and Kalahari are geniuses at creating excitement for kids. Enormous indoor and outdoor water parks can happily ...

Taxis are plentiful in Dubai and reasonably priced in relation to other goods and services. Distances can be great and temperatures often sweltering; plus, it seemed the walk to and from the rail stations to my destinations would be lengthy. That is how I came to take approximately 20 taxi rides during a week of sightseeing in Dubai in April to celebrate a milestone birthday.
By the time I had taken three cabs, I recognized a pattern: All my taxi drivers were Pakistani men, and all seemed to ...

The Gateway to New England, Greenwich is the first town in Connecticut when crossing the New York border. Founded in 1640, it has a long history of prosperity, attracting scions of industry who leveraged a busy port and business-friendly proximity to New York City. While Greenwich is known for mansions built on rolling lawns, high-end stores, and restaurants, the town has much history and culture, including a destination-worthy museum and rousing polo matches. The town’s website is www.greenw...

A sky high Four Seasons, Hamilton exhibition, free Pitbull concert, fabulous food hall, and stunning Museum of the American Revolution are new reasons to head south to Philadelphia

Two hours north of Fairfield County lie a Scottish castle and an Italianate palazzo, both pedigreed former Gilded Age “cottages” where royalty from any country would feel right at home.
Complete with turrets, gargoyles, suits of armor, and crackling fireplaces at every turn, the 1902 Blantyre entices winter guests with cross-country skiing and snowshoeing on its 100 acres, a library of 4,000 books and many overstuffed chairs in which to read them, gourmet dining, and a spa.
Blantyre doesn’t l...

Covered bridges, wooded trails, perfectly manicured town greens, and a slower pace draw Fairfield County residents north to Litchfield County. Many well-heeled New Yorkers have weekend homes here, and the area counts numerous prep schools, so there are sophisticated options for dining, shopping, and spas, as well as first-class inns. Helicopter in your cabin anyone?
Litchfield
Less than an hour-and-a-half from Greenwich, the town of Litchfield itself has a welcoming green lined on one side wi...

Kids under foot? Bookmark these suggestions for driving distance destinations the next time you need indoor activity inspiration. You’ll always have a response to “I’m bored!”

A half hour from Greenwich, the sprawling Ridge Hill Shopping Center (ridgehill.com) in Yonkers, NY can easily occupy kids for an entire day. There’s a multiplex with the hottest movies and a playground near the Cheesecake Factory; but what really makes the outing special are the rides and activities at the ...

Is this Lewis, Shetland, or Orkney? Nope: It’s the island of Videy, near Reykjavik. And these are not millennia-old monoliths but sculptures erected in 1990 by Richard Serra.
Called Afangar (“Standing Stones”), this is a site-specific installation of nine pairs of basalt columns ranging from nine to 13 feet tall.
Serra was asked to create a public work for Reykjavik but found inspiration in the wild and rugged terrain outside the city. Extracted from a nearby quarry, the stones are carefully ...

WESTCHESTER IN THE HUDSON VALLEY HAS IT ALL.
Whether you’re a triathlete in training or a casual weekend stroller, a dedicated ornithologist or a slow-paddling kayaker, Westchester County welcomes you to its miles and miles of outstanding trails and stunning coastline. Surround yourself in beauty at the terraced gardens of a Rockefeller mansion or in authentic Japanese and Chinese gardens. Play a round of golf or mini golf. Take in the jaw-dropping panoramic Hudson River views from an 800-foo...