These cities claim top honours in travel magazine’s annual awards.
Wanderlust’s 21st annual travel awards saw the magazine’s readers vote “in their tens of thousands” on the places in the world that “captured their imagination and inspired their wanderlust” with top tens for city destinations in Europe and also across the rest of the world.
The location claiming the rest of the world No.1 city status was New Orleans in the US, the largest city in Louisiana said to have a “distinctive vibrancy” with “music its beating heart, filling the streets of the Marigny neighbourhood”. The place popularly known as the Big Easy hosts Mardi Gras, one of the biggest carnivals outside Rio in Brazil (7th place), with the party starting in January and lasting weeks; Mardi Gras officially falling 47 days before Easter.
Among the surprise entries to many in the worldwide list is Cartagena in Colombia, its walled city centre UNESCO-listed, with a number of churches and palaces to investigate along with trendy restaurants and bars in the Gethsemane neighbourhood – Cartagena is joined by fellow South American locations Quito and Rio in the top ten.
In Europe, another walled city wowed readers of Wanderlust, Dubrovnik in Croatia taking first place, as both city and country continue to impress holidaymakers. The city’s cobbled streets give it a “fairy-tale appearance” but Dubrovnik also offers insights into its past, with war museums and monasteries aplenty, and cliff bars where you can enjoy a drink while watching the sun go down. Tallinn in Estonia took the silver honour, with its gothic architecture and café society creating a “magical setting for a city escape”.
