Top Travel Days of 2025, Seeing the Caillebotte Show at the Getty Center


When I worked full-time as a travel writer, I tried my best to help promote cities after devastating circumstances reduced tourism in those destinations dramatically. I visited New York after 9/11, New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, and Nairobi after a horrific mall bombing scared many travelers away. And there I was again in early April, this time in LA after wildfires destroyed the communities of the Pacific Palisades and Altadena. Unless you make a concerted effort to drive to those neighborhoods, you really didn’t see the impact the fires made on those regions of the city. But you certainly felt it when talking to people who live in LA. It seems like everyone knew someone sadly affected by this latest disaster.

The city was a glorious escape from the cold out East, with uninterrupted sunshine and temperatures reaching the upper 70s. We dropped our luggage off in our spacious suite at the Maybourne Beverly Hills, where every room has recently been renovated and its rooftop restaurant, Dante, is one of the hardest reservations to get in the city. We headed over to the Farmers Market, where I used to have meetings as a budding screenwriter, to dine on tasty Trejo’s Tacos, owned by actor Danny Trejo. Then we walked some ten minutes to the LACMA, which housed three excellent exhibitions on Mesoamerican Art, African bead art, and an Asian calligraphy show where the artists used abstraction to create exciting ink-based canvases.

This only whet our appetite for the Caillebotte retrospective the next morning at The Getty Center, the real impetus for making our way to LA. On its first stop before heading to the Art Institute of Chicago this past summer, the show was a mesmerizing look at the changing boulevards and bridges of Paris through the eyes of this gifted painter. Under clear blue skies, the Getty looked better than ever, especially walking around the gardens in bloom, before viewing the Getty’s permanent collection and its bounty of riches. The weather was so sublime that we next headed to Santa Monica Pier, rented bikes, and cruised along the ocean on the bike trail to Venice. Heavenly!

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Following in the Footsteps of Canada’s Group of Seven Artists

Guest Post by Amy Perry Basseches

While vacationing last summer in the Georgian Bay area of Ontario, a few hours north of Toronto, my husband Josh and I ventured to the Tom Thomson Art Gallery in Owen Sound. Many Americans are not familiar with the famous painters in the “Group of Seven,” but in Canada they are revered. Also known as the Algonquin School, these Canadian landscape artists worked from 1920 to 1933. The most famous name associated with the Group of Seven is likely Lawren Harris (1885 – 1970), who actor/comedian/art collector Steve Martin brought to the US via exhibits in Los Angeles and the MFA in Boston. One of Harris’ paintings sold for more than $3 million last November. Tom Thomson predated but seriously influenced the Group of Seven. He died before its official formation, mysteriously drowning in 1917 in Canoe Lake in Algonquin National Park, Ontario. Thomson grew up just outside of Owen Sound, an inlet on Georgian Bay, and the small museum there pays homage to his work and impact. I particularly enjoyed the early photography of the Group of Seven painters as they fished, swam, and camped, before setting up their easels “plein air.” If you are interested in seeing more paintings from the Group of Seven, visit the wonderful McMichael Canadian Art Collection, just outside of Toronto in the town of Kleinburg on your next trip to Ontario. 
 
Tom Thomson, sketch for The West Wind, Spring 1916, oil on wood. Collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.
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Art Lovers Will Savor The Alfond Inn, Winter Park

It’s not everyday that I turn around to peer at a piece of art hanging from the walls of a hotel. Usually it’s some commercial print of ocean and seabirds. But last week, while spending the night at the Alfond Inn in Winter Park, Florida, I found myself walking aimlessly through the hallways just to check out the art. When I found an ethereal print by Neeta Madahar, repped by one of my favorite galleries in Boston, Howard Yezerski (now Miller Yezerski), I had to dig a little deeper to see what’s up. I found out that the Alfond Inn, a 112-room boutique hotel debuted last August, thanks to a $12.5 million grant from the Harold Alfond Foundation. Profits from the inn will go directly to Winter Park’s Rollins College for a scholarship fund. Harold Alfond founded Dexter Shoe Company, and his son Ted and wife Barbara are both Rollins alumni. Barbara serves on the board of trustees at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and the couple is recognized by ArtNews as two of the 200 most important art collectors in America. With the assistance of independent Boston-based curator Abigail Ross Goodman (who once ran the Judy Rotenberg gallery in Boston), the couple amassed a 100-piece contemporary art collection solely for The Alfond Inn. Not too shabby. 

 
I wish I could have spent more time in Winter Park, a great walking town of boutique shops and restaurants, just outside of Orlando. The Alfond Inn also houses a rooftop pool and a great Southern restaurant, Hamilton’s Kitchen, where I dined al fresco on chicken and grits that evening. I’d happily stay there again, just to walk the hallways. 
 
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Following in Tom Thomson’s Footsteps at Algonquin Provincial Park

On our first day at Bartlett Lodge, we signed up for a Tom Thomson tour with our guide, Malcolm. Tom Thomson was arguably Canada’s first iconic painter, sketching lone birches and pines swaying in the wind on the shores of Algonquin’s many lakes. While not technically a member of Canada’s Group of Seven artists, he was good friends with many in the group and would have certainly been a member if he had not died under mysterious circumstances at Algonquin in 1917. Thomson would spend a good 5-year span at Algonquin before his untimely death and Malcolm did a thorough job showing us the many sites where his paintings were created. We started at Tea Lake Dam, where Thomson first camped in the area along a babbling brook. Thomson was also known as an accomplished angler and paddler and you can easily see him living happily on the water’s edge here. It helped that Malcolm brought along a laptop to show us the sketches that were created in this exact spot and many other locales we would visit that day. 

The bulk of our time was spent on Canoe Lake, the busiest part of Algonquin, and where they serve a Tom Thomson burger at the Visitor Center. We took “Winnie the Tinnie,” a motorized canoe around the entirety of the lake, passing celebrated Canadian overnight summer camps, like Camp Ahmek, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was both a camper and counselor. At Hayhurst Point, we docked and walked up a small hillside to see a plaque that Group of Seven artist, J.E.H. MacDonald, created in memory of his friend. No one is certain how Thomson died, but his canoe arrived back to the shores first, and soon his body was found in the waters. It was ruled an accident, but there were some unruly characters living in the park in those early years, and many still believe he was murdered. Malcolm showed us the sight where his body was found and the small cemetery where he is now buried (another controversy since some people think his body was taken), before we headed back under heavy rains. The heavyu drops splashed off the water of the lake, creating a pointillist canvas that Thomson would have appreciated. 
 
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Tobago Jazz Experience, April 18-26

As I shovel the 2 feet of snow out of my driveway this morning, my thoughts turn to Tobago. Best known as a beachcombing and birdwatching paradise, the island is also known for it music festivals. One of the best is the annual jazz festival in April, where Caribbean performers pair up with big name singers. Already confirmed for this April are Jill Scott, Jennifer Hudson, and Kool & the Gang. A full schedule should be available shortly. If you need recommendations on places to stay nearby, give us a call. 

 

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Lake George Week, A Landscape That Inspired Georgia O’Keeffe

In the mid-90s, I was hired by Art & Antiques Magazine to write a story on the period of time painter Georgia O’Keeffe and her husband, photographer Alfred Stieglitz, lived on the shores of Lake George. This was to coincide with a photography exhibition of Stieglitz’s work at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. I knew renowned abstract sculptor David Smith lived in Bolton Landing, but I honestly had no idea O’Keeffe lived in Lake George, since she’s far better known for her New Mexican motif. From 1918 to 1934, O’Keeffe would spend a good portion of her summer at the lake. She would return to Lake George for the last time in 1946 to spread Stieglitz’s ashes at the foot of a pine tree on the shores of the lake. Today, those ashes lie on the grounds of the Tahoe Motel. Next door, the house they lived in, Oaklawn, is still standing at The Quarters of the Four Seasons Inn. On a wall next to my desk, I have a poster of a dreamy mountain and lake landscape simply titled Lake George (1922). My brother, Jim, purchased this for me at the San Francisco Museum of Art, where the original O’Keeffe oil still hangs. 

O’Keeffe wasn’t the only artist inspired by the majestic Lake George landscape. In the 1860s, most of the noteworthy Hudson River School painters, including Thomas Cole and Jasper Cropsey, descended on the shores of the lake to put oil to canvas. Exquisite works by 19th-century American landscape painters like Albert Bierstadt and William Merritt Chase can be found at the Hyde Collection, a gem of a museum in nearby Glens Falls. I returned to the Italian Renaissance-style villa yesterday, only to be blown away once again by the bounty of impressive works that include paintings by Rembrandt, Botticelli, Raphael, El Greco, Rubens, Renoir, and Picasso.
 
A special treat was an exhibition on contemporary sculptor Larry Kagan. Kagan twists tubes of steel into abstract shapes that, when illuminated, project shadows on the wall into images of a bald eagle or a stilletto. I love the images that pay homage to artists Andy Warhol and Keith Herring. Bring the kids–this is an exhibition for all ages to enjoy. Much has been made about the reopening of the Clark Art Institute this summer in nearby Williamstown, Massachusetts. Art lovers should make one additional stop to tour the Hyde. You’ll be happy I sent you! 
 
 
 
 
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Put Naumkeag on Your Berkshires Must-Do List

If you’re heading up to Tanglewood this week to catch the NPR show, “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” on Thursday night or Harry Connick, Jr. on Saturday night, make a slight detour and check out what’s happening at nearby Naumkeag in Stockbridge. Formerly owned by the Choate Family of New York before it was bequeathed to The Trustees of Reservations in 1958, Naumkeag is a 44-room Berkshires “Cottage” from the Gilded Age, filled with arts, antiques, and collections around from around the world. But it’s the outdoor gardens that truly inspire, a masterpiece of 30 years of collaborative work by former owner, Mabel Choate, and her dear friend, Fletcher Steele, one of America’s first modern landscape architects. 

 
Described by the Library of American Landscape History as a “playground for the imagination,” The Trustees have just completed Phase 1 of an extensive 5-phase, 3-year, $3 million garden and landscape restoration project designed to rejuvenate the gardens and bring them back to Choate and Steele’s original vision. The transformation includes the renovation of Fletcher Steele’s iconic Blue Steps, one of the most photographed features in 20th-century American landscape design, celebrating its 75th Anniversary this summer.