Chicago, USA

This is Chicago, a huge city with several district articles containing sightseeing, restaurant, nightlife and accommodation listings — consider printing them all.

Chicago is the home of the blues and the truth of jazz, the heart of comedy and the idea of the skyscraper. if you are the jazz or blues lovers this is the best place to travel. Here, the age of railroads found its center, and airplanes followed suit. Butcher of hogs and believer in progress, it is one of the world's great cities, and yet the metropolitan luxuries of theater, dining, and shopping have barely put a dent in real Midwestern friendliness. It's a city with a swagger, but without the surliness or even the fake smiles found in other cities of its size.

As the hub of the Midwest, Chicago is easy to find — its picturesque skyline calls across the waters of Lake Michigan, a first impression that soon reveals world-class museums of art and science, miles of sandy beaches, huge parks and public art, and perhaps the finest downtown collection of modern architecture in the world.

With a wealth of iconic sights and neighborhoods to explore, there's enough to fill a visit of days, weeks, or even months without ever seeing the end. Dress warm in the winter, and prepare to cover a lot of ground: the meaning of Chicago is only found in movement, through subways and archaic elevated tracks, in the pride of tired feet and eyes raised once more to the sky.

Christchurch, New Zealand

Capital of the Canterbury region and the largest city on the South Island, CHRISTCHURCH (population just over 300,000) exudes a palpable air of gentility and a connectedness with the mother country. After all, it was perceived as an outpost of Anglicanism by its first settlers, was named after an Oxford college, and has some of the feel of a traditional English university town, with its neo-Gothic architecture and gently winding river. To some degree it pursues an archetype – the boys at Christ's College still wear striped blazers, and punts course along the Avon – but the Englishness is largely skin deep. Modern Christchurch is also a lively melting pot of cultures, with a continental café scene and a distinct, ever-changing Kiwi identity of its own. Indeed, those who regard Christchurch as a quiet place in which to sleep off jet lag or take a break from the long journey across the South Island will be pleasantly surprised by the city's contemporary face. In recent years its traditional conservatism has gained a more youthful, bohemian edge, with an explosion of lively bars and restaurants (the city boasts per capita a greater number than Auckland), the emergence of underground nightlife, and a burgeoning of the visual arts, theatre, music and street entertainment. Such urban pursuits are nicely balanced by the Pacific Ocean suburbs of New Brighton and Sumner, both of which boast excellent beaches.

Straddling the main road and rail routes running down the east coast, Christchurch is used by many tourists as a base from which to explore the South Island, with the steep, angular terrain of Banks Peninsula and the vineyards of the Canterbury Plains proving the most popular out-of-town destinations. Many of the outdoor activities for which New Zealand is famous are accessible from here, with a plethora of city-based companies offering trips involving rafting, paragliding, ballooning and mountain biking in the surrounding countryside (see "Listings"). The city is also within a two-hour drive of several good skifields to the west, making it possible to combine a day on the pistes with an evening in Christchurch's numerous watering holes. Indeed the place's only real drawback is its cost: compared with the rest of the South Island, Christchurch is an expensive place to spend any length of time.

Information by Rough Guides

Nassau, Bahamas

Originally a harbour base named Charles Town, NASSAU is the modern-day face of the Bahamas, visited by most everyone who comes down this way, not least for its service as a transport hub. Though dingy in parts, enough historical flavour has been preserved to make such a stop here worthwhile. Much of this atmosphere comes from its development during the so-called Loyalist period from 1787 to 1834, when many of the city's finest colonial buildings were built. Before this build-up, Nassau had largely been a haven for pirates, privateers and wreckers, situated as it was on key shipping routes between Europe and the West Indies.

But it was really the development of the tourist industry here that put Nassau firmly on the map. After alternating periods of decline and prosperity in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the spike in trade and construction that followed World War II led directly to Nassau's emergence as a global centre for tourism and finance. By the mid-1950s, with the dredging of the harbour and the construction of the international airport, Nassau began to host more than a million visitors a year, and a decade later, after the construction of the Paradise Island Bridge and the development of Cable Beach, the city was receiving twice as many more.

Information by Rough Guides

Cape Town, South Africa

CAPE TOWN is southern Africa's most beautiful, most romantic and most visited city. Indeed, few urban centers anywhere can match its setting along the mountainous Cape Peninsula spine, which slides into the Atlantic Ocean. By far the most striking – and famous – of its sights is Table Mountain, frequently shrouded by clouds, and rearing up from the middle of the city.

More than a scenic backdrop, Table Mountain is the solid core of Cape Town, dividing the city into distinct zones with public gardens, wilderness, forests, hiking routes, vineyards and desirable residential areas trailing down its lower slopes. Standing on the tabletop, you can look north for a giddy view of the city center, its docks lined with matchbox ships. Looking west, beyond the mountainous Twelve Apostles, the drop is sheer and your eye will sweep across Africa's priciest real estate, clinging to the slopes along the chilly but spectacularly beautiful Atlantic seaboard. Turning south, the mountainsides are forested and several historic vineyards and the marvelous Botanical Gardens creep up the lower slopes. Beyond the oak-lined suburbs of Newlands and Constantia lies the warmer False Bay seaboard, which curves around towards Cape Point. Finally, relegated to the grim industrial east, are the colored townships and black ghettos, spluttering in winter under the smoky pall of coal fires – your stark introduction to Cape Town when driving in.

To appreciate Cape Town you need to spend time outdoors, as Capetonians do, hiking, picnicking or sunbathing, or often choosing mountain bikes in preference to cars and turning adventure activities into an obsession. Sail boarders from around the world head for Table Bay for some of the world's best windsurfing, and the brave (or unhinged) jump off Lion's Head and paraglide down close to the Clifton beach front. But the city offers sedate pleasures as well, along its hundreds of paths and 150km of beaches.

Cape Town's rich urban texture is immediately apparent in its diverse architecture: an indigenous Cape Dutch style, rooted in the Netherlands, finds its apotheosis in the Constantia wine estates, which were themselves brought to new heights by French refugees in the seventeenth century; Muslim slaves, freed in the nineteenth century, added their minarets to the skyline; and the English, who invaded and freed these slaves, introduced Georgian and Victorian buildings. In the tightly packed terraces of twentieth-century Bo-Kaap and the tenements of District Six, colored descendants of slaves evolved a unique brand of jazz, which is still played in the Cape Flats and some city-center clubs.

Sadly, when most travelers expound the unarguable delights of the city, they are referring only to genteel Cape Town – the former whites-only areas. The harsh reality for most Capetonians is one of crowded shantytowns, sky-high murder rates, taxi wars, racketeering and gangland terror. In the late 1990s this violence has been characterized by a complex and bloody war between colored gangs and Pagad (People Against Gangsterism and Drugs), a Cape Flats organization that started with the ostensible aim of stamping out crime. Fortunately, this conflict has remained largely restricted to the Cape Flats and isn't something tourists need be unduly concerned about. Having said that, petty crime is nonetheless a problem in central Cape Town, but it's a risk you can minimize by taking a few simple precautions.

Information by Rough Guides

Arequipa, Peru

An active city, some 2400m above sea level, and with a relatively wealthy population of over three-quarters of a million, AREQUIPA maintains a rather aloof attitude toward the rest of Peru. Most Arequipans feel themselves distinct, if not culturally superior, and resent the idea of the nation revolving around Lima, and with El Misti, the 5821-metre dormant volcano poised above, the place does have a rather legendary sort of appearance. But besides its widespread image as the country’s second biggest and arguably, after Cusco, most attractive city, Arequipa has some very specific historical connotations for Peruvians. Developing late as a provincial capital, and until 1870 connected only by mule track with the rest of Peru, it has acquired a reputation as the centre of right-wing political power: while populist movements have tended to emerge around Trujillo in the north, Arequipa has traditionally represented the solid interests of the oligarchy. Sanchez Cerro and Odria both began their coups here, in 1930 and 1948 respectively, and Belaunde, one of the most important presidents in pre- and post-military coup years, sprung into politics from one of the wealthy Arequipa families. In recent years, despite the tastefully ostentatious architecture and generally well-heeled appearance of most townsfolk, there has been a huge increase in the number of street beggars and Arequipa typifies the social extremes of Peru more than any other of its major cities.

On of the best times to visit is around August 15, when there’s a festival celebrating the city’s foundation with processions, music and poetry. There’s also a folklore festival in the first week of July.

Information by Rough Guides

Hanoi, Vietnam

The Vietnamese nation was born among the lagoons and marshes of the Red River Delta around 4000 years ago and for most of its independent existence has been ruled from Hanoi, Vietnam's small, elegant capital lying in the heart of the northern delta. Given the political and historical importance of Hanoi and its burgeoning population of three million, it's still a surprisingly low-key city, with the character of a provincial town – though with a dramatic rise in motorbike ownership, increased traffic and Western-style retail outlets, it's catching up fast with the brash, young Ho Chi Minh City. For the time being, however, it remains relatively laid-back. It still retains buildings from the eleventh-century court of its founding father King Ly Thai To, most notably the Temple of Literature, and some of the streets in the Old Quarter still trade in the same speciality goods they dealt in 500 years ago. In 1887, the French turned Hanoi into the centre of government for the entire Union of Indochina, replacing ancient monuments with grand colonial residences, many of which survive today. Hanoi finally became the capital of independent Vietnam in 1954, with Ho Chi Minh its first president: Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum is now the city's biggest crowd-puller. The city sustained serious damage in the American War, particularly the infamous Christmas Bombing campaign of 1972, much of it lucidly chronicled in the Army Museum. Until recently, political isolation together with lack of resources preserved what was essentially the city of the 1950s. However, since the advent of tourism in 1993, the city has seen an explosion in travellers' cafés, mini-hotels and cybercafés. Indeed, Hang Bac, one of the Old Quarter's main drags which is home to a large number of traveller hangouts, is starting to resemble a little piece of Bangkok's Khao San Road in Hanoi. The big question now is how much of central Hanoi will survive the onslaught of modernization.

Information by Rough Guides

Edinburgh, United Kingdom

Venerable, dramatic EDINBURGH, the showcase capital of Scotland, is a historic, cosmopolitan and cultured city. The setting is wonderfully striking; the city is perched on a series of extinct volcanoes and rocky crags which rise from the generally flat landscape of the Lothians, with the sheltered shoreline of the Firth of Forth to the north. "My own Romantic town", Sir Walter Scott called it, although it was another native author, Robert Louis Stevenson, who perhaps best captured the feel of his "precipitous city", declaring that "No situation could be more commanding for the head of a kingdom; none better chosen for noble prospects."

The centre has two distinct parts, divided by Princes Street Gardens, which run roughly east–west under the shadow of Castle Rock. To the north, the dignified, Grecian-style New Town was immaculately laid out during the Age of Reason, after the announcement of a plan to improve conditions in the city. The Old Town, on the other hand, with its tortuous alleys and tightly packed closes, is unrelentingly medieval, associated in popular imagination with the underworld lore of schizophrenic Deacon Brodie, inspiration for Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and the bodysnatchers Burke and Hare. Edinburgh earned its nickname of "Auld Reekie" for the smog and smell generated by the Old Town, which for centuries swam in sewage tipped out of the windows of cramped tenements.

Set on the crag which sweeps down from the towering fairytale castle to the royal Palace of Holyroodhouse, the Old Town preserves all the key reminders of its role as a capital, plus a brand new parliament building rising up opposite the palace. A few hundred yards away a tantalizing glimpse of the wild beauty of Scotland's scenery can be had immediately beyond the palace in Holyrood Park, an extensive area of open countryside dominated by Arthur's Seat, the largest and most impressive of the volcanoes.

In August and early September, around a million visitors flock to the city for the Edinburgh Festival, in fact a series of separate festivals that make up the largest arts extravaganza in the world. Among the many museums, the exciting new National Museum of Scotland houses ten thousand of Scotland's most precious artefacts, while the National Gallery of Scotland and its offshoot, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, have two of Britain's finest collections of paintings.

On a less elevated theme, the city's distinctive howffs (pubs), allied to its brewing and distilling traditions, make Edinburgh a great drinking city. The presence of three universities, plus several colleges, means that there is a youthful presence for most of the year – a welcome corrective to the stuffiness which is often regarded as Edinburgh's Achilles heel.

Beyond the city centre, the most lively area is Leith, the city's medieval port, whose seedy edge is softened by a series of great bars and upmarket seafood restaurants, along with the presence of the former royal yacht Britannia, now open to visitors.

Information by Rough Guides

Gothenburg, Sweden

One of the best ways to see Gothenburg is from the window of a tram. The trams run all over town and move slowly enough for you to get a proper look at the city. Another alternative is to walk, of course. Gothenburg is a fairly small city, so the distances involved are perfectly manageable. Brunnsparken, in the town centre, is a good place to start out on your walk. All trams stop here, so it is easily accessible. The shopping center Nordstan and the shopping streets Kungsgatan and Fredsgatan are located nearby.

If you walk up Östra Hamngatan, you will notice that the street name changes after a while, to Kungsportsavenyn, or just Avenyn for short (that's how the locals refer to it as well). At the end of the street, you will find yourself at Götaplatsen, a major source of local pride for many Gothenburg residents. In the centre of the square, there is a statue of Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea, and Götaplatsen is also home to Stadsteatern (Gothenburg's largest theatre), The Concert Hall and the magnificent Museum of Art which also houses the Hasselblad center, a museum for photography . Close to the intersection of Götaplatsen and Avenyn, you will also find The Municipal Library and Lorensbergsteatern. Liseberg, the local amusement park, is also located in the immediate vicinity and they offer all of the customary attractions for both adults and children.

If you choose to walk up Kungsgatan rather than Östra Hamngatan from Brunnsparken, you will soon find yourself by Järntorget. The neighborhoods which border on this square, Haga and Linnestaden, are very nice. Haga used to be the main residential area for the working class. It was until recently a bit on the shabby side, but it has since been renovated. The old-fashioned style still remains, however, and is evident in the low wooden houses and the narrow cobble-stoned alleys. There are a lot of nice small cafes and shops in Haga. The architecture of the buildings in Linnestaden is quite different from Haga. In Linnestaden, the buildings are primarily built of stone and they are much taller. This district is home to some of the most popular restaurants in town. Another area which is quite similar to Linnestaden is Vasastaden, close to Avenyn.

At the end of Linnegatan, the main street in Linnestaden, you will find yourself at Linneplatsen. This is the place to head towards if you want to see Gothenburg's largest public park, Slottskogen. The park is the perfect place for sun-bathing, having a picnic or just taking some time out for a little rest and relaxation. Slottsskogen is also home to the 70-yearold Observatory and The Museum of Natural History. Towering up above Slottskogen, on the hill Masthuggsberget, you will see the district known as Masthugget.

On cool summer evenings, the setting is perfect for a nice quiet stroll down by the harbour. Have a look at the ships, like Barken Viking or the naval ships, or admire the impressive new opera house. The harbour really brings home the realization that Gothenburg is located by the ocean. There are many maritime places of interest and getting to them is easy. Just take the tram to Saltholmen and then perhaps a ferry to one of the islands in the southern archipelago.

On the other side of the river Göta älv, you can see the district called Hisingen. This is actually a very large island. It is quite heavily populated, and many industries have their factories and administrative facilities here. At Eriksberg, by the Hisingen harbour, Ostindiefararen Götheborg is docked. This is an exact replica of an 18th century ship, a popular and interesting attraction for both locals and tourists.

There are also a lot of interesting destinations outside of the city limits. The biodynamic gardens known as Lärjeåns trädgård are located in the suburb of Angered. This is an excellent place to buy organically grown vegetables, and why not enjoy a cup of coffee at the cafe while you're at it? If palaces and castles are your thing, a visit to Gunnebo slott makes a nice day trip. This 18th century palace is located in Mölndal, just outside of Gothenburg. Or you might enjoy Nääs slott in Tollered.

There is a lot on offer both in the city of Gothenburg itself and in the surrounding communities. Whether you are mainly interested in nature, history, culture, architecture, entertainment, good food or shopping, you will find it all right here on the beautiful west coast of Sweden.
source:yahoo travel

Yogyakarta-the cultural city

YOGYAKARTA (pronounced "Jogjakarta" and often just shortened to "Jogja") ranks as one of the best-preserved and most attractive cities in Java, and is a major centre for the classical Javanese arts of batik, ballet, drama, music, poetry and puppet shows. At its heart is Yogya's first family, the Hamengkubuwonos, whose elegant palace lies at the centre of Yogya's quaint old city, the Kraton, itself concealed behind high castellated walls. Tourists flock here, attracted not only by the city's courtly splendour but also by the nearby temples of Prambanan and Borobudur, so there are more hotels in Yogya than anywhere else in Java and, unfortunately, a correspondingly high number of touts, pickpockets and con artists.

Yogyakarta grew out of the dying embers of the once-great Mataram dynasty. In 1752, the Mataram Empire, then based in nearby Solo, was in the throes of the Third Javanese War of Succession. The reigning susuhunan, Pakubuwono II, had been steadily losing power in the face of a rebellion by his brothers, Singasari and Mangkubumi, and the sultan's nephew, Mas Said. To try to turn the tide, Pakubuwono persuaded Mangkubumi to swap sides and defend the court, offering him control over three thousand households within the city in return. Mangkubumi agreed, but the sultan later reneged on the deal. In fury, Mangkubumi headed off to establish his own court. Thus Yogyakarta was born, and Mangkubumi crowned himself Sultan Hamengkubuwono I. He spent the next 37 years building the new capital, with the Kraton as the centrepiece and the court at Solo as the blueprint. By the time he died in 1792, his territory exceeded Solo's. After his death, however, the Yogya sultanate went into freefall and spent most of the nineteenth century concentrating on artistic pursuits rather than warmongering. In 1946, the capital of the newly declared Republic of Indonesia was moved to Yogya from Jakarta, and the Kraton became the unofficial headquarters for the republican movement. With the financial and military support of Sultan Hamengkubuwono IX, Yogya became the nerve centre for the native forces. Today, over fifty years on from the War of Independence, the royal household of Yogya continues to enjoy almost slavish devotion from its subjects and the current sultan, Hamengkubuwono X, is one of the most influential politicians in the country.

Information by Rough Guides