A Love Surprise: Perfect Valentine’s Day Getaways You Hadn’t Thought Of

Why settle for a card and flowers for this Valentine’s Day? Travel, dang it! If you’re thinking of venturing out, here are six ideas you probably hadn’t considered. Best of all, Valentine’s Day is on a Tuesday this year, meaning you expect some extra savings on mid-week deals in most places.

Wherever you go, be sure to toast Arizona. The state turns 100 February 14.

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(Lonely Planet)

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 Trade the winter blues for the azure seas and cerulean skies of these warm weather destinations.

1. Going medieval in Canterbury

Valentine’s Day roots took a turn as a special day for lovers when Geoffrey Chaucer wrote ‘Parlement of Foules’ – a dreamy 700-line poem with its narrator visiting Venus’s temple and a ‘parliament’ where birds choose their mates, on Valentine’s Day. Cute.

Of course Chaucer’s most famous destination, from Canterbury Tales, is Canterbury itself, a medieval hotspot in southeastern England, with one of the country’s finest cathedrals, great pubs and theaters, and a superb five mile walk on North Downs Way to the 12th-century castle in the wee medieval village of Chilham.

Valentines should opt for top-tier ‘fabulous’ rooms at the boutique hotel Abode Canterbury – rates are over 20% less mid-week – and a meal at Deeson’s (25-27 Sun St), and a local ale at Parrot (1-9 Church St), a wood-beamed pub founded in 1370.

2. Wine & the coast at Mendocino, California

One of the California’s great secrets is a coastal ride north of San Francisco from Sonoma County to Mendocino’s rugged peninsula. It’s almost completely undeveloped with no stoplights to break up the bliss.

Mendocino is the place to base yourself for a couple days any time of year. The luxury B&B MacCallum House, with a mix of historic cottages and homes to book, is 20% cheaper mid-week (Valentine’s Day is on Tuesday this year), with prices at $300 per person. Spend days walking along the shore, eating at the North Coast foodie-haven Café Beaujolais, or detouring to small-scale, family-run wineries and breweries nearby.

3. Panama & Colombia

Cartagena, Colombia – where Gabriel García Márquez supposedly based Love in the Time of Cholera (the town is never explicitly named in the book) – is one of the most romantic cities in the Americas. A Caribbean town with cobbled alleys and horse carts to ride, good food, flowers hanging from balconies and dance clubs exuding joy of the lively local ‘folk’ music vallenato – seriously, you won’t be able to just sit and watch. The lushly colonial Alfiz Boutique Hotel is a ideal spot, and you can plan a daytrip to snorkel nearby islands or go spa au natural at a mud volcano where everyone gets dirty.

A good way to take in Cartagena, and get more, is winter package deals from Latin Destinations which offer six-night trips to Panama City – Central America’s finest city – and Cartagena, from $1060 including hotel and flight. (It’s about a third cheaper if you leave Sunday night, not staying on a Saturday night.)

4. Love train to Churchill, Manitoba

Don’t overlook the north for romance. This year marks the greatest visibility for other-worldly ‘Northern Lights’ in 50 years. Across Canada and Alaska, nearly nightly shows of neon green, red and blue smear across the black skies, created as solar particles collide with earth’s magnetic field. Everyone truly needs to see it once.