Out of This World and Into the Clouds

WORTH A TRIP: You've got to hand it to Travel + Leisure. Its February issue features a destination that most other travel publications have ignored: Mars. Or it might be Utah. Jeff Wise follows members of the Mars Society, "an international fraternity of frustrated would-be astronauts" who journey to such places as Hanksville, Utah, to put on simulated space suits and pilot Martian rovers across the Mars-scape. Okay, the rovers are really Kawasaki all-terrain vehicles, but the Utah terrain does resemble that of Mars; just ask anyone who's been to both.

The society, with chapters in 43 countries, attracts people whose dreams of space odysseys were dashed by the termination of the Apollo program in the 1970s. They take their cues from NASA, which, in preparing for various space flights, sought terrestrial sites that might duplicate conditions on alien worlds. Haughton Crater, on Canada's Devon Island, for example, looks much like a Martian impact crater might (except for the polar bears, one assumes). Chile's Atacama Desert may be the driest on Earth, and it shows how life might survive in Martian soil. T + L also suggests similar trips you could do on your own. Bring your own Illudium PU-36 Explosive Space Modulator.

WORTH A FLIP: In Américas, sloggers through Guatemalan cloud forests are rewarded by glimpses of what the Maya called the "God of the Air": the rare quetzal, a dandified bird with a long, flowing tail. Featured on modern Guatemalan currency, the bird was so revered in pre-Columbian times that killing one was punishable by death. Seeing one today requires patience, good luck and a high tolerance for mosquitoes. . . . That practical GPS unit of yours has a whimsical side. Transitions Abroad explains "geocaching," an international treasure hunt wherein players are told the cache's geographical coordinates outright, but it's up to them to figure out how to get there. On your way to the cache (typically items of little monetary value placed in Tupperware and hidden in rural locations), you can learn a lot about the host country and its natural attractions and perils. (Pardon us, Mr. Bull, but have you noticed any Tupperware here in your pasture lately?) . . .

PBS essayist Anne Taylor Fleming calls Big Sur "California at its raw and wild and dramatic best." But this is Town & Country, so we also hear about two romantic inns (one where Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth once kept a cabin), yoga classes and shiitake-duck pizza. Her portrait of day's end in Big Sur: "tucked-in, door open, fire blazing, the ocean down there, out there, both intimidating and beautiful in the moonlight." . . . The wind on Samso "can just about suck the eyelashes off your face." Or so says Florence Williams in Outside after a visit to the Nantucket-size Danish island. It's thus no wonder the island has converted to wind power, not only achieving carbon neutrality but exceeding it. And -- holy synergy -- it has developed a new industry: energy tourism. "Some 2,000 turbine peepers visit the place every year." It's "the Fantasy Island of the greenie set." . . . Porter Fox in Men's Journal searches for signs of Ernest Hemingway in Cuba. It's not that difficult: "Tracking Hemingway in Cuba is like probing Graceland for signs of Elvis." There seem to be more pictures of Papa than of Fidel. But seeing Cayo Contrabando, the setting for the final scene of Hemingway's unfinished "Islands in the Stream," is harder. And on the cayo is . . . well, not much. But the problems of getting there reveal much about contemporary Cuban life.

WORTH A CLIP: The real "secret" in Budget Travel's "Secret Hotels of the Riviera Maya" appears to be how inexpensive these hostelries south of Cancun are. You might have to give up direct beach access at the less pricey ones, but rates start at $65 a night, breakfast included. And one of them, built by Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar, has a secret tunnel.

WORTH A NOSH: "As we walked, the scents of oregano, mint and thyme, crushed underfoot, rose into the hot, dry air." This natural herb garden is a meadow on the Lycian coast of Turkey -- and in the pages of Gourmet. A sailboat trip through the blue waters is brightened further by the work of a trained chef specializing in classic Turkish cuisine. Go for the diving; stay for the borek and lamb chops. . . . Condé Nast Traveler identifies "the 24 coolest beachfront restaurants in the Caribbean," places to go when you want to eat well but don't want to dress up. From an uninhabited island off St. Martin, where the restaurant's only neighbors are goats, to the Fish Pot Restaurant on Barbados, to Sunshine's on Nevis, whose main attraction is the Killer Bee cocktail, these are places where the "dress code is come as you are -- just don't come naked."

-- Jerry V. Haines