For our second trip to North America, we spent one month USA & Canada. It somehow managed to be full of a bit of everything: big cities and small towns, mountains, beaches, waterfalls, good food and amazing entertainment. We started in New York and zig zagged across the continent, ending in Los Angeles. I’ve always wanted to go on a road trip in the USA, so it was exciting to make that happen with a road trip down the Pacific Coast Highway in California, from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Below, I’ve shared our itinerary for one month in the USA & Canada. We spent 11 days in New York (David had to spend the first week there for work), 4 days in Miami, 4 days in Vancouver, 4 days in San Francisco, we drove the Pacific Coast Highway from San Francisco to Los Angeles, and ended our trip with 3 days in LA.

One of the things I love about traveling in North America is the regional diversity – in both landscapes and in culture. You can find a bit of almost everything, and especially in the United States, you can get a real sense of the history of different cities just by walking around and seeing the architecture, hearing the accents and the best part, eating the food!

Itinerary: One Month in the USA & Canada

• New York City – 11 nights
• Miami – 4 nights
• Vancouver – 4 nights
• Whistler – day trip
• San Francisco – 4 nights
• Napa Valley & Sonoma – day trip
• Pacific Coast Highway (San Luis Obispo) – 1 night
• Los Angeles – 3 nights

Trip Highlights

Natural Beauty

This trip was really built around spending as much time outside as possible, and luckily there is so much beautiful nature in North America. David and I both work full time, in jobs that keep us desk-bound most of the time, so we couldn’t wait to spend time in nature. Beaches, waterfalls, bays, canyons, coastlines and staggering mountains – there was a bit of everything! If we’d had an extra day in Miami we would have hired a car to go to the Everglades, but we didn’t have time. Also, all of the tours on offer seemed to spend a lot of time at an alligator farm which to me seems like a sad way to spend an afternoon.

I feel like I spent a lot of time in Canada battling my fear of heights and trying not to look down, but the views were worth the white knuckles.

• South Beach, Miami
• Whistler Village & the Peak to Peak Gondola, BC
• Sea to Sky Gondola & Stawamus Chief Provincial Park, BC
• Brandywine Falls, BC
• Riding bikes around Stanley Park, Vancouver
• Big Sur, California
• 17 Mile Drive in Monterey, California
• Jogging around the Reservoir in Central Park, NYC
• Hiking Runyon Canyon, LA
• Griffith Observatory, LA

Shows & Tours

I’ve mentioned before that walking tours are one of the things I want to do more of when I travel, because nearly every time I take a locally guided tour, I get so much more out of a place than if I’d just wandered around by myself. I took two food walking tours in New York City with Intrepid Urban Adventures, and loved them so much that I booked tours with them in Miami and San Francisco. In New York, we went to live theatre, comedy and jazz, and on the west coast we took day trips to the Napa Valley and Whistler Blackcomb. I booked the Warner Brothers Studio Tour on a whim the day before we left LA, and I’m so glad I did – I loved every minute!

• Comedy Cellar, NYC
• Sleep No More, NYC
• Village Vanguard, NYC
• Food Walking Tour of the Lower East Side, NYC
• Food Walking Tour of South Brooklyn, NYC
• Food Walking Tour of Little Havana, Miami
• Food Walking Tour of the Mission, San Francisco
• Napa Valley Day Trip, California
• Whistler Day Trip, BC
• Warner Brothers Studio Tour, LA

Favourite bars & restaurants

It’s easy to orient entire trips around dishes to try and bars and restaurants to check out, but I really tried not to do that quite so much this time. On my first trip to the states a few years ago, I spent nine weeks eating every unfamiliar food that came my way – and felt pretty gross by the end of the trip. I showed a little more restraint this time but didn’t feel like I missed out at all. One meal I was really looking forward to was Minetta Tavern in New York, which is from the same restauranteur as one of my other favourite New York City restaurants, Balthazar.

I really wanted to come back from this trip feeling healthier than when I left home, especially as we were away for a month – it’s easy to get unhealthy when you’re travelling for more than a couple of weeks! When I found a spot near our hotel with fresh, healthy food, I normally went back a few times – like Refresh in Miami, which is a hole in the wall juice bar, and By Chloe in New York, which does healthy vegan fast food.

• Minetta Tavern, NYC
• Murray’s Cheese, NYC
• City Winery, NYC
• PH-D Rooftop, NYC
• Catch, NYC
• Jack’s Wife Freda, NYC
• The Diamond, Vancouver
• Employees Only, Miami
• 11th Street Diner, Miami
• The Betsy, Miami
• Christine’s, Blackcomb
• Ball & Chain, Miami
• By Chloe, NYC
• Refresh, Miami
• Salt + Straw, LA
• The Brig, LA

New York City

It was my second trip to New York City, and on my first trip I spent two months in the city, so I’d already done a majority of the sightseeing I wanted to do. There is always more to see and do in New York, and I had a long list of ideas, but I didn’t feel pressured to cram lots into every day. This was lucky, because I had really bad jet lag for the first week  and was really crook the entire time I was in New York. I still did a few things each day, but had a lot more down time than I was planning.

One of my favourite parts of the trip was Sleep No More, an immersive theatre experience set in the “McKittrick Hotel”. A retelling of Macbeth is performed by actors throughout the hotel, and as there are different scenes taking part all over the hotel at any one time, each guest’s experience will be different.

Another one of my must-do experiences in New York was to see a show at Comedy Cellar in West Village. Stand up comedy can be so hit and miss, but I really enjoyed all of the acts – you can pretty much guarantee that anyone performing at such an iconic venue is the real deal. Comedy Cellar is known for hosting big name comedians before they’re famous, but also for having big name comedians drop in unexpectedly to practice new material. This didn’t happen when we were there, but I wasn’t holding out for a celebrity, and all of the comedians were great.

I took some great walking tours, with Intrepid Urban Adventures. These are locally guided walking tours that run for around 3 hours, and are small groups. I think local food is one of the best ways to understand a place and it’s stories, so I chose two food walking tours, one of South Brooklyn and the other of the Lower East Side. Both of these tours were so much fun, and nothing like some of the stuffier walking tours I’ve done. I enjoyed them so much that I booked more of their tours in Miami and San Francisco! I’ll be writing posts about each of these tours soon.

Click here to read more about my trip to New York.

Queue for brunch outside Jack’s Wife Freda, West Village

Miami

Melbourne winters are brutal (ish), so I was really excited to spend some time at the beach during this trip. We stayed at Washington Park Hotel in South Beach, which was easily the best hotel of the trip and one of my favourite hotels ever. I want to go back for a month! The hotel is housed in a cluster of gorgeous art deco buildings, the decor was super cute, the pool area had a killer playlist and I loved both on-site bars, The Swizzle Bar and a Miami outpost of Employees Only, originally from New York. I couldn’t believe it when I realised Washington Park Hotel had been the cheapest of our trip!

I’ve heard mixed reviews about Miami, but I loved it. Having grown up in Queensland, I am an unashamed beach snob, and I was worried I’d find that South Beach was just a lot of hype. I was delighted to find one of the most beautiful beaches I’ve ever been to! Long, wide, clean, white sand beach and calm, warm, clear,  I’m-never-getting-out turquoise water. HEAVEN.

We started most days in Miami with a run along the beach, and went to the beach or pool every day. July is actually not peak season in Miami, because it is super hot and humid. Luckily for us, as we grew up in a similar climate, we love hot, humid weather (just like home!) and it meant there were fewer crowds.

My favourite parts were the gorgeous art deco buildings along Ocean Drive, a walking tour of Little Havana and an afternoon spent in the colourful Wynwood neighbourhood. And lots and lots of time by the pool and at the beach. Did I mention I want to go back for a month? Read more about my trip to Miami here.

Vancouver

2017 was the first time in seven years that I didn’t visit a new country, and in hindsight I’m a little annoyed at myself that I didn’t make something work. I don’t like country counting just for the sake of it, but I am trying to push myself to keep seeing new places and experience new cultures every year, even though juggling full time work with farflung holidays is a struggle. I was really excited to visit Canada for the first time on this trip, especially as it’s renowned for it’s natural beauty. We spent a few days in Vancouver, since it is famed for having natural beauty in spades. We had  thought about squeezing a few days in Montreal, but I cut it in favour of an extra day in each place. I’d rather spend a bit more time in fewer places, and then go back again to check out more of eastern Canada another time. I really didn’t know what to expect of Vancouver, other than a gorgeous natural setting and very friendly people (check, check). I was surprised to find that it’s a small city of only 650,000!

My favourite parts of our time in Vancouver was riding a bike around Stanley Park and learning more about the First Nations at the anthropological museum. I haven’t ridden a bike since I was about ten years old, and it was sooo much fun. I want to hire bikes everywhere now!

Whistler

I wanted to spend lots of time in the gorgeous great outdoors on this trip, so it’s not surprising that the day trip to Whistler was one of my favourite days. I’ll write a full blog post about it, but it started with stops in Squamish at the Sea to Sky Gondola and Brandywine Falls, before heading up to Whistler. Between Whistler and neighbouring peak Blackcomb, there’s the Peak to Peak Gondola, which is the highest and longest gondola in the world.

I am terrified of heights, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t tear up when I spotted the Peak to Peak Gondola – we’d already bought tickets and were aboard the first gondola, on our way to the top of Whistler to get the Peak to Peak. It was too late to back out!  I had my eyes closed nearly the entire way to Blackcomb, but was feeling braver on the return journey and actually enjoyed it. The glass of wine at Blackcomb helped.

San Francisco

I absolutely loved San Francisco, and not for the many iconic sights that it is famous for. The city really took me by surprise – first of all, because it was so freaking cold. I’d heard about the infamous fog (it’s name is Karl, and it has it’s own twitter page!), but assumed that would be a winter problem. As it turns out, the fog is the worst in summer in San Francisco, and October – November is actually the warmest time of year. I had to buy a touristy San Francisco jumper from one of the stores along Fisherman’s Wharf, and then pretend I wasn’t wearing one while an Uber driver made fun of all the tourists who get caught out by the fog and have to buy a jumper.

I love San Francisco’s rich cultural heritage and thriving food scene, which is world renowned. My favourite areas were The Castro and Pacific Heights. The sun even came out for a couple of hours one day, and the whole city was so colourful and beautiful in the sunshine I couldn’t believe my eyes.

Napa Valley & Sonoma

From San Francisco, we did a day trip to the Napa Valley & Sonoma. It was exciting to visit such a famous wine region, however it also made me realise how very lucky we are in Australia to have so many beautiful wine regions on our doorstop – especially the gorgeous Yarra Valley!

Most of the Yarra Valley wineries ship internationally, so I was disappointed that none of the US wineries we visited shipped overseas. It was fun to try the wines, but I would have loved to be been able to ship home a few of my favourites.

Pacific Coast Highway

I’ve always wanted to do a road trip in the United States, and the journey from San Francisco to Los Angeles was the perfect opportunity. We drove between the two cities, on a road trip down the legendary Pacific Coast Highway, which is recognised as one of the most scenic drives in the world.

We lucked out when we picked up our hire car, because they offered us an upgrade from a standard sedan which we’d booked, to a convertible mustang, for just $35 a day! It was SO much fun driving down the coast in a convertible, thank you AVIS!

We stopped in Monterey, Carmel, along Big Sur and then stayed in San Luis Obispo overnight. On our second day, we stopped at a winery in the Santa Maria Valley, Solvang, Santa Barbara & Malibu before arriving in Los Angeles. We saw SO many beautiful places, that by the end of each day my head was spinning with everything I’d seen.

I love California, I was surprised how much it reminded me of home – of both Queensland, and Victoria, which was surprising as these are such different states in Australia.

Related: The Most Beautiful Places in California to Visit

Los Angeles

We had two full days in Los Angeles, and saw a few less “sights” than usual because a) we wanted to end our holiday at a more relaxed pace and b) LA traffic is a nightmare . We also had a shorter list of things we wanted to do here, so it worked out well!

The weather in LA was gorgeous, and I wish I’d had a bit more time to spend by the pool at our hotel, The Standard in West Hollywood.

My highlights from LA were hiking Runyon Canyon, the Warner Brothers Studio Tour and visiting the Griffith Observatory at sunset.

I love outdoor workouts if I’ve got an incredible view, so the Runyon Canyon hike was my idea of the perfect start to the day. At the Warner Bros tour, I was so inspired by how much hard work and creativity is poured into making movie magic that enchants millions of people around the world. I didn’t really appreciate how much of a creative hub LA is, given that the stereotypes focus more on the money-making, fame-hungry side of Hollywood.

Likewise, before visiting the Griffith Observatory I had no idea that LA is a leader in astronomy and aerospace, and found the exhibits really interesting, when all I’d planned to do was gawk at the view of sunset over the city and the gorgeous art deco architecture of the observatory.

We also visited Santa Monica, Venice Beach and wandered around Rodeo Drive. I probably wouldn’t do any of the latter again, but it was fun to see them for the first time. The actual beaches are beautiful, but Santa Monica is painfully crowded, Venice Beach feels pretty sketchy and I’m not fussed on malls or designer labels.

Once again, the United States blew me away with it’s regional diversity, fascinating history and bucketloads natural beauty, and I had SO much fun.

Have you travelled in the USA & Canada? Where are your favourite spots? Is there anywhere you’re dying to go?