A question for the non-US X-Markers...

**Bugbear** · 1st July 10, 01:42 PM

Originally Posted by ForresterModern

Having just moved from the southwest I can recommend a few days in the Las Vegas area, do your gambling thing but also get some time in Ron's part of the world and go visit the Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, Bryce Canyon, and Zion. Breathtakingly spectacular, and nothing really like these areas in the whole world.

jeff

There's also some very interesting places in the Las Vegas, New Mexico area...

**Detroitpete** · 1st July 10, 02:26 PM

Not sure if I should post here or not, since my thought is that the OP was thinking more in terms of those not from the states and where they'd like to visit.

But if time and money were of no object and I could lead a tour of the US, I think I'd like to show you:

Washington D.C.: Not for any particular political reason, but so you could see some amazing museums and the historical sights that so recently were the places from which those with a dream helped stitch together a nation.

Our former 'rustbelt' cities: Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit. So you can see that we still keep reinventing ourselves from cities that were the backbone of manufacturing and now are becoming more cosmopolitan, but still with a bit of broad-shouldered, plain-speaking honesty to them.

Appalacia: The entire spine of theses mountatins to the Smokeys. What amazing vistas. What peaceful streams. The dawn breaking over a ridgeline with the scent of pine is something that will stay with you.

New Orleans: To show you that despite hardships, we still love our food, drink and merryment.

Texas Panhandle: You need to stand out on a scrub field and see nothing in every direction. It makes one truly humble.

The Rockies and Bad Lands: Haunting and comforting. The scale of these sights are again humbling.

San Francisco: A great walkable city with some of the best food anywhere.

And for my own homeland...I'd show you the deep forests and cool running trout streams of northern Michigan. Sitting on a rock watching otter take your trout. A red-tailed hawk circling above. Deer in the woods behind you. Pulling walleye into the boat as we fish our great lakes.

We'd stay until the first snow so you could hear how quiet but still how alive the woods are.

From history and culture, to natural beauty, to hussle and bussle and back to simple things like hay cutting in August and dinner with friends.

That's a tour I'd like to plan for you.

**BoldHighlander** · 1st July 10, 02:33 PM

Originally Posted by Detroitpete

Not sure if I should post here or not, since my thought is that the OP was thinking more in terms of those not from the states and where they'd like to visit....

And just by coincidence I saw this new thread that touches upon that very subject (showing XMarkers around your "hometown"): where would you go?

**Detroitpete** · 1st July 10, 02:45 PM

DOH! Sorry--didn't see it

**ThistleDown** · 1st July 10, 03:11 PM

Be careful Sir William. Remember your original question was: "Imagine, if you will, that you are going to visit the United States for a few weeks. Cost of the airfare, hotels, meals, transportation, and other fees is not a major issue.

Where would you like to go in the United States and what would you like to see or do?"

You are getting answers from your own countrymen about what they would like a visitor to see. I don't think that was what you wanted, was it, to plant new ideas in the mind of a potential tourist? It seems to me that you had a hidden question within the first one: "what do you already know about that you want to see?" Subtle, very subtle -- but very, very good

Rex

**Chas** · 1st July 10, 03:11 PM

If I may, I would like to add a bit more European insight.

As a general rule of thumb, Europeans are not overly impressed with North American cities. I have worked in cities in the UK that were old, long before 'Columbus sailed the ocean blue in Fourteen Hundred and Ninety Two'. The foundations of my last house were laid down in the 12th century. We've seen 'modernism' and 'post-modernism' and 'brutalism' and frankly can take it or leave it.

Just being a city isn't good enough - we've got our own thanks.

But the natural beauty - that is where your country scores. And in the end, that is what will impress Europeans and give them something to remember.

Regards

Chas

**Bugbear** · 1st July 10, 03:22 PM

Originally Posted by Chas

If I may, I would like to add a bit more European insight.

As a general rule of thumb, Europeans are not overly impressed with North American cities. I have worked in cities in the UK that were old, long before 'Columbus sailed the ocean blue in Fourteen Hundred and Ninety Two'. The foundations of my last house were laid down in the 12th century. We've seen 'modernism' and 'post-modernism' and 'brutalism' and frankly can take it or leave it.

Just being a city isn't good enough - we've got our own thanks.

But the natural beauty - that is where your country scores. And in the end, that is what will impress Europeans and give them something to remember.

Regards

Chas

We have ancient cities over here too, Chas. Zia Pueblo comes to mind. Ron might chime in on the Hopi...

* I'll try to keep quiet now.

**Chas** · 1st July 10, 03:36 PM

Originally Posted by Bugbear

We have ancient cities over here too, Chas. Zia Pueblo comes to mind. Ron might chime in on the Hopi...

* I'll try to keep quiet now.

No argument from me, Ted. I had assumed (probably mistakenly) that that the ancient cities had at some time been abandoned and would come under a heading of 'ancient artifact'. I did not realise that they had been in constant habitation - sorry.

Regards

Chas

**Bugbear** · 1st July 10, 04:16 PM

Originally Posted by Chas

No argument from me, Ted. I had assumed (probably mistakenly) that that the ancient cities had at some time been abandoned and would come under a heading of 'ancient artifact'. I did not realise that they had been in constant habitation - sorry.

Regards

Chas

Na, I was just saying. It can be very interesting, and there's several places like that.

However, the Phoenix area has been inhabited continually for eons, thousands of years, but it has had risings and fallings of populations/cultures. We still use some parts of the Hohokam water works that fell out of use before the Spanish showed up. It's been modified with cement etc, of course. I really don't think people feel, deep down below what they have been told, so disconnected from the past of the land out here, at least I don't. I can't imagine why our international air port, Sky Harbor, would have Native American motifs all over the place, other wise. Ancestors of the people who lived here before the Spanish et al showed up still live here and contribute to the local culture. That's the way we are.

**ThistleDown** · 1st July 10, 04:30 PM

I don't think that Zia Pueblo would be considered a "city" to Europeans, but the point Chas is making is that there are very few -- if any -- cities in America that are in themselves intriguing to Europeans. The area of New Mexico that includes Zia Pueblo would certainly be of interest because it is the vast wilderness that entices.

Someone else mentioned Las Vegas. Monte Carlo and Monico are far more interesting to those Europeans who wish to gamble. And in Europe that's the only reason one would go to Las Vegas (or Reno).

There are many population centres in the US that have seen human inhabitation for a long time, but it is not an American such as you, Ted, knowing about them that Sir William is interested in. He wanted to know what the rest of the world knows: where in the US would Europeans, Asians, Africans, South Americans and those from Oceana want to visit if we had our druthers, lots of time and an unlimited budget?

Rex