Unpacked by Afar | Travel Smarter, More Responsibly

AFAR
AFAR
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Unpacked by Afar is your weekly guide to where to go, how to travel, and everything worth unpacking in between. Each week, host Aislyn Greene and the Afar team travel the world and dig into the big questions behind every great trip, from the best new hotels and national parks to traveling more responsibly. Some weeks we follow a story through music, food, and culture. Others we tackle a tricky topic, share our favorite destinations, or help you plan where to go next. Because the travel world is complicated. We're here to help you unpack it.

  1. 1d ago

    Five Questions for the Man Who Walked a Fault Line in Japan by Feel

    This kind of Japan travel doesn't show up in guidebooks. In January 2024, a major earthquake struck the Noto Peninsula, lifting the seabed 15 feet into the air and exposing an ocean floor that locals walked across—harvesting octopus and abalone—to get home. This week on Unpacked, Five Questions, host and Afar executive editor Katherine LaGrave is joined by Afar contributing writer Ryan Knighton, who recently wrote a feature about traveling along the peninsula. Ryan, who is blind, visited Noto two years after the earthquake on a slow walking tour, drawn by the parallels between this remote coastal peninsula and his own earthquake-prone home on Vancouver Island. What he found was a place not broken, but mid-repair—and a Japanese art form that made sense of everything. THIS WEEK’S GUEST Ryan Knighton is an author and Afar contributing writing whose stories consistently find the textures, flavors, and human stories that sighted travelers walk past. A former English teacher in South Korea, he brings a slow, sensory approach to Japan travel and beyond—listening to sushi chefs talk about their knives, walking earthquake fracture lines with his feet, and finding the people who hold a place together.  IN THIS EPISODE What blind travel in Japan actually looks like: why guides, sushi chefs, and strangers become the mediators of a place, and what it feels like to walk an earthquake fracture line with your feet instead of seeing it with your eyes Why Ryan chose the Noto Peninsula for his Japan travel debut: a remote, earthquake-prone coastal community with striking geographic parallels to his own home—and a story of post-disaster recovery he felt compelled to witness in person The food that made the trip: Tokyo-style sushi whose origins trace directly to a 1923 earthquake, Japanese barracuda, Noto sea salt gelato at 10 a.m. in a parking lot, and a tuna described by his wife as looking like a ruby The scene that didn't make the final cut: a couple walking home after the earthquake on a newly exposed seabed—15 feet of ocean floor lifted overnight, scattered with octopus and abalone, with kids too excited about sea creatures to be scared How kintsugi—the Japanese art of repairing broken objects with gold—became the metaphor that unlocked the entire story, and why it took a gold leaf factory on day one to understand what Noto was actually about LINKS & RESOURCES Ryan's Afar story on Noto, Japan Walk Japan Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture Somamichi Restaurant 2024 Noto Peninsula Earthquake — background CHAPTER MARKERS 00:00:00 Introduction 00:02:00 Japan Travel on Foot and Without Sight 00:05:00 The Ethics of Disaster Tourism 00:07:00 Food as Craft, Craft as Place 00:10:00 The Scene That Didn't Make the Cut 00:12:00 Walking the Fracture Line 00:14:00 Mr. Squid and the Spirit of Noto 00:16:00 Kintsugi as Metaphor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Five Questions for the Man Who Walked a Fault Line in Japan by Feel

  2. 6d ago

    Why Women's Travel Writing Matters More Than Ever

    For the past several decades, writer and editor Lavinia Spalding has championed women's travel writing. She's helmed seven editions of the Best Women's Travel Writing—the celebrated Traveler's Tales anthology—including the latest, released on June 9th. Over the years, she's read hundreds of submissions a year from women around the world and distilled them into one essential collection. So host Aislyn Greene sits down with Lavinia to talk about what two decades of editing these stories has taught her about how women explore the world, and why amplifying those voices matters more than ever right now. THIS WEEK’S GUEST Lavinia Spalding is the author of Writing Away: A Creative Guide to Awakening the Journal-Keeping Traveler , seven-time series editor of The Best Women’s Travel Writing, and co-author of With a Measure of Grace, This Immeasurable Place, and two editions of the Frommer’s EasyGuide to New Orleans. She has been teaching for more than 30 years and leads writing workshops online and around the world. She lives with her family in New Orleans. Watch her TEDx talk here, and subscribe to her Substack newsletter for updates and essays. IN THIS EPISODE How Lavinia shapes each volume of Best Women's Travel Writing like a playlist—balancing place, tone, voice, and the ratio of dark to light—and why this year's theme might be best described as "flashes of insight that arise from connection" The essay that has never left her: Sandra Gail Lambert's pre-dawn solo kayak trip through the Florida Everglades, written from a wheelchair, with stakes so high that every preparation detail becomes profound What two decades of reading women's travel writing has taught Lavinia: never underestimate a woman, and women who write about travel tend to be actively seeking transformation, not just sights How the legacy of male-dominated adventure travel writing—conquest narratives, man-versus-place drama—may have conditioned women to fear solo travel, and what it looks like as that changes Why a women's travel writing anthology still matters in 2026: to amplify voices of autonomy and adventure at a moment when women's rights and freedom of movement are under pressure CHAPTERS 00:00:00 Young, Fearless, and Filled With Wonder 00:03:00 How a Volume Comes Together 00:07:00 The Traveler She Was, the Traveler She Is 00:10:00 Building the Playlist 00:14:00 The Stories That Live Inside Her 00:19:00 Never Underestimate a Woman 00:23:00 Who Gets to Be an Adventurer 00:28:00 Why It Matters Now LINKS & RESOURCES Best Women's Travel Writing, Volume 13—Bookshop.org Traveler's Tales Lavinia'swebsite Lavinia'sWriting Away Substack Lavinia's essay for Afar and Aislyn's essay for Afar West With the Night by Beryl Markham Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Why Women's Travel Writing Matters More Than Ever

  3. Aug 12

    This Is One of the Best Architecture Cities in America

    Buffalo, New York might be the greatest architecture city you've never heard of. In the fourth and final episode of our Unpacked by Afar series, we explore how this Rust Belt city became one of the richest showcases of American architecture anywhere in the country. Host Aislyn Greene tours Buffalo with Ed Howard, a docent and guide with Explore Buffalo. Ed shares that Buffalo was one of the wealthiest cities in America and drew the biggest names in architecture to build here. Stand on a single downtown corner and you can see work by the architects behind the Flatiron Building, the Twin Towers, and the first true skyscraper. Buffalo is also one of only two American cities with major works by the "holy trinity" of American architecture, Louis Sullivan, H.H. Richardson, and Frank Lloyd Wright, whose Martin House is here. Then come the surprises: the industrial grain elevators that inspired modernist masters, and the Frederick Law Olmsted park system that led the man who designed Central Park to call Buffalo the best-planned city in the country. It's a story of boom, near-ruin, and hard-won revival, a city that nearly lost its treasures and fought to save them. This is cultural travel at its most rewarding, a piece of American travel culture hiding in plain sight. If great architecture is a reason you travel, Buffalo belongs near the top of your list of American travel destinations. Meet this week's guest Ed Howard, docent and tour guide at Explore Buffalo Chapters 00:00 — A Secret Architecture City 03:32 — Five Masters, One Corner 06:40 — The Holy Trinity 11:05 — Saving the Landmarks 17:00 — Grain and Grass Where to go to explore Buffalo's architecture Explore Buffalo — Walking, bus, and boat tours led by local guides; the single best way to take in the city's architecture. Frank Lloyd Wright's Martin House — Wright's Prairie-style masterpiece, fully restored, and one of his finest residential works. The Guaranty Building — Louis Sullivan's 1896 skyscraper, once nearly demolished, now restored to its original glory. Richardson Olmsted Campus — H.H. Richardson's monumental former hospital; part is now a hotel, and Explore Buffalo runs hard-hat tours of the unrestored wings. Buffalo Central Terminal — The grand 1929 Art Deco train station, mid-restoration. Silo City and Duende — The towering grain elevators that awed modernist architects, with a bar tucked right among them. Delaware Park and the Olmsted parkways — The green system that earned Buffalo its "best-planned city" title. Go deeper at buffaloah.com, a database of hundreds of Buffalo buildings, and plan your trip with our Buffalo travel guide. This is the fourth and final episode of our Buffalo series. New here? Go back for Buffalo's food scene, its neighborhoods, and its Black history. And follow Unpacked, a travel podcast from Afar, for more unique travel experiences around the world. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    This Is One of the Best Architecture Cities in America

  4. Jul 29

    Hallowed Ground: The Street at the Heart of Buffalo's Black History

    For 185 years, some of the most important chapters of American history have unfolded on a few blocks of Buffalo's East Side. In the third episode of our four-part Unpacked by Afar series, we walk the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor, the beating heart of Buffalo Black history, with the man who has made preserving it his life's work. Executive director Terry Alford grew up on these streets and is now leading their revival. He guides host Aislyn Greene through 185 years of Buffalo Black history: a church that was one of the last stops on the Underground Railroad, the home where the Niagara Movement was born, the club where jazz greats jammed until dawn because they weren't allowed to sleep in the hotels they had just played, and the radio station that became the megaphone of the Civil Rights movement. Then he shares how urban renewal nearly erased it all, and how he is fighting to bring it back, guided by the Ghanaian principle of Sankofa: move forward, but never forget where you came from. This is cultural travel at its most moving, a piece of American travel culture far too few people know. It is also one of the most powerful travel stories we have told, and a lesson in responsible travel: how to visit a place and honor the people whose stories made it. If Buffalo Black history is not yet on your list of American travel destinations, this episode, and this corridor, will change that. Meet this week's guest Terry Alford, executive director of the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor Commission Chapters 00:00 Buffalo's Black History 04:19 Underground Railroad to Jazz 10:02 Loss and Revival 13:42 A Vision for 2030 Where to go to explore Buffalo's Black history Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor — Start at the visitor center and tour the anchor sites, all just steps apart. Michigan Street Baptist Church — Built in 1845, one of the last stops on the Underground Railroad, with a newly restored interior. Nash House Museum — The preserved home of Rev. J. Edward Nash and Frances Nash, plus the Frances Nash community garden and Tuesday farmers market. The Colored Musicians Club & Jazz Museum — The only continuously running, all-Black-owned club in the U.S., with Sunday night jam sessions and a jazz museum. WUFO Black Radio History Collective — The historic voice of Buffalo's Civil Rights movement. The Freedom Wall — The AKG's 28-portrait mural of Black Civil Rights figures, at the corridor's northern entrance. Read more in Afar's guide to Buffalo's Black history along the Michigan Street corridor, and plan your trip with our Buffalo travel guide. This is episode three of a four-part series. Next week, we explore Buffalo's astonishing architecture, one of the best-kept design secrets in America. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Hallowed Ground: The Street at the Heart of Buffalo's Black History

  5. Jul 24 ·  Bonus

    Asheville Hiking, Waterfalls, and the Oldest Mountains on Earth | The Travel Guide

    This is the final stop on our five-part audio guide to Asheville, North Carolina, and we’re heading for the trees. In this episode of Unpacked by Afar, host Aislyn Greene laces up for Asheville hiking, and discovers why the oldest mountains on Earth are also some of the most beloved. On a tour with Hike Bike Kayak Asheville that takes Aislyn and guide David into the Pisgah National Forest, Aislyn learns that Asheville hiking means far more than a simple walk in the woods. These are among the oldest mountains in the world, cloaked in one of the most biodiverse forests in North America, home to thousands of plant species and waterfalls around nearly every bend. David leads her to quiet swimming holes and points out plants that grow nowhere else on Earth. She stands beneath Looking Glass Falls and hears how a single valley packs in world-class rock climbing, fly fishing on the Davidson River, and a 60-foot natural water slide called Sliding Rock. Zoom out, and the scale is staggering. The Great Smoky Mountains and the Blue Ridge Parkway are among the most visited places in the entire national park system, and Mount Mitchell, the highest peak east of the Mississippi, rises just up the road. It helps explain why so many people who come here for Asheville hiking end up never wanting to leave, and why the outdoors are one of America’s great travel destinations. It’s a landscape you can dip into for a single afternoon or disappear into for a week. It all adds up to a rich piece of cultural travel and a fitting finale to our guide: a reminder that in Asheville, the wild is never far away. Whether you want a gentle waterfall stroll or a hard climb to a summit view, the trailheads are closer than you think, and the payoff is some of the most beautiful country in the eastern United States. Consider it your guide to where to go and what to know. Unpacked by Afar is a travel podcast that unpacks one destination at a time. That’s the end of our Asheville audio guide, so catch up on the whole series in the feed. CHAPTERS 00:00:00 Older Than the Atlantic 00:02:30 Meeting My Guide 00:06:30 The Blue Ridge Parkway 00:11:00 Looking Glass Falls 00:13:15 Wildflowers and Orchids 00:16:15 Behind Moore Cove GUESTS | David Teafatiller of Hike Bike Kayak Asheville, our hiking guide PLACES WE VISITED Pisgah National Forest Looking Glass Falls Sliding Rock Davidson River Blue Ridge Parkway Great Smoky Mountains National Park Mount Mitchell State Park MORE FROM AFAR Asheville Travel Guide 10 Travel Itineraries for Exploring Asheville Your Way (includes an outdoor itinerary) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Asheville Hiking, Waterfalls, and the Oldest Mountains on Earth | The Travel Guide

  6. Jul 24 ·  Bonus

    Asheville Food and the Growth of a Farm-to-Table Town | The Travel Guide

    This is the fourth stop on our five-part audio guide to Asheville, North Carolina, and it may be the tastiest one yet. In this episode of Unpacked by Afar, host Aislyn Greene digs into Asheville food, and the surprising reason this mountain city punches so far above its weight at the table. Aislyn joins a walking food tour with Sita of Eating Asheville, eating her way through a town where farm to table isn’t a slogan but a fact of geography. Along the way she: Discovers that Asheville food can be a real relief for anyone with dietary restrictions at the celiac-run kitchen of Strada Italiano Hears the moving, Helene-shaped story behind Mehfil from its owner, Raj Tastes mountain-grown rice at the farm-to-table cornerstone Table with chef Catherine Smedley Forages Appalachian flavors at Luminosa And finishes with a former science teacher turned chocolatier, Melissa Quinn, at Asheville Chocolate. It’s a scene built on tight relationships between kitchens and the farms a few ridges away, where the rice on your plate might have been grown just up the road, and where a devastating hurricane the year before only deepened the sense that these restaurants belong to their community. But great Asheville food is also a question of who gets to make it, and whose history gets remembered. In a segment on the region’s Black foodways, Aislyn talks with two of the city’s most celebrated chefs, Ashleigh Shanti of Good Hot Fish and Rakim Gaines of Capella on 9, about Affrilachian cooking, representation behind the stove, and the stories layered into every plate. Their conversation is a reminder that a food town’s story has to include the people history has too often left off the menu. It all adds up to a rich piece of cultural travel and a portrait of one of the best small food towns in the country. Whatever you come hungry for, consider this your guide to where to go and what to know. Unpacked by Afar is a travel podcast that unpacks one destination at a time, with a real love of food and travel. This Asheville audio guide has one more episode to go, so look for it in the feed. CHAPTERS 00:00 A Real Food Town 03:00 Strada's Gluten-Free Surprise 05:00 Mehfil and Raj's Story 09:45 Table's Mountain Rice 12:40 Foraging at Luminosa 18:15 Cooking on The Block 23:15 Dessert With Melissa Quinn 26:00 Come Hungry GUESTS Sita, operations manager and tour guide, Eating Asheville Walking Food Tours Raj, owner, Mehfil Indian Restaurant Catherine Smedley, chef de cuisine, Table Chef Sean McMullen of Luminosa Melissa Quinn, head chocolatier and owner, Asheville Chocolate Ashleigh Shanti, chef and owner, Good Hot Fish Rakim Gaines, executive chef, Capella on 9 PLACES WE VISITED Strada Italiano Mehfil Indian Restaurant Table Luminosa (in the Flatiron Building) Asheville Chocolate Good Hot Fish Capella on 9 MORE FROM AFAR Asheville Travel Guide A Local Chef’s 2-Day Travel Guide to Asheville Immerse Yourself in Asheville’s Culturally Diverse Experiences Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Asheville Food and the Growth of a Farm-to-Table Town | The Travel Guide

  7. Jul 24 ·  Bonus

    Black Mountain and the Region's Creative Soul | The Travel Guide

    This is the third stop on our five-part audio guide to Asheville, North Carolina, and it takes us just outside the city to the small mountain town of Black Mountain, North Carolina. In this episode of Unpacked by Afar, host Aislyn Greene goes looking for the creative soul of the region, and finds it everywhere: in the galleries, in the glass studios, and above all in the music scene. Aislyn starts with breakfast at Cousins Cuban Cafe, then walks a town so small you can cross it in a few minutes, passing murals of Black Mountain’s famous daughter, the late Roberta Flack. She also traces the ghost of Black Mountain College, the radical, short-lived arts school just outside town that helped shape modern American art before it closed and all but disappeared. She plays with fire at the North Carolina Glass Center alongside executive director Candace Riley and glassblower Mark DeShields, learning how the quartz buried in these mountains helped turn the region into a glass capital. Over dinner at Hell or High Water, chef Eric Morris explains how Appalachian food ways, and a hurricane, gave the restaurant its name. But the heart of the episode is music. At a listening room called White Horse, Aislyn meets managing director Zach Hinkle, who traces the surprising, and nearly lost, blues and gospel roots of Asheville music, and explains why this corner of the Blue Ridge has always pulled creative people in. The episode ends inside a benefit concert, where the whole community turns out to keep a beloved venue alive. It all adds up to a rich piece of cultural travel: the story of why a tiny mountain town became one of the most quietly influential creative places in America, one of the South’s most surprising travel destinations, and why the Asheville music scene still draws people to these hills. Consider it your guide to where to go and what to know. Unpacked by Afar is a travel podcast that unpacks one destination at a time. This Asheville audio guide continues, so look for the rest of the series waiting in the feed. CHAPTERS (00:00) Welcome to Black Mountain (01:30) Breakfast at Cousins Cuban and a walk through town (04:00) Playing with fire at the North Carolina Glass Center (06:30) The quartz that made a glass capital (11:00) Dinner at Hell or High Water (13:30) A restaurant named for the storm (17:00) Inside the White Horse listening room (19:00) The nearly lost blues of these mountains (22:00) A benefit concert, and why the music survives (27:00) The creative soul of Black Mountain GUESTS Candace Reilly, executive director, North Carolina Glass Center Mark DeShields, glassblower, North Carolina Glass Center Eric Morris, executive chef, Hell or High Water (Foothills Local Meats) Zach Hinkle, managing director, White Horse Black Mountain Featured musicians at the White Horse benefit: Robin Bullock, Bill Maddox, Dr. Bill Bares, Peggy Ratusz, and Chris Rosser PLACES WE VISITED Cousins Cuban Cafe North Carolina Glass Center Hell or High Water Trillium Table White Horse Black Mountain (performing at the Monte Vista Hotel during renovations) Stay: Peri Social House MORE FROM AFAR Asheville Travel Guide 10 Travel Itineraries for Exploring Asheville Your Way⁠ (including a music itinerary led by Virtuous) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Black Mountain and the Region's Creative Soul | The Travel Guide

  8. Jul 24 ·  Bonus

    Asheville Wellness and 150 Years of the Mountain Cure | The Travel Guide

    This is the second stop on our five-part audio guide to Asheville, North Carolina, and it reaches back a lot further than you might expect. In this episode of Unpacked by Afar, host Aislyn Greene unpacks the long, strange story of Asheville wellness, and why doctors have been sending patients to these mountains for more than a century and a half. To understand where Asheville wellness began, Aislyn talks with David Freedman, an infectious disease physician and travel medicine expert who retired to the city. He explains the era of climatotherapy, when clean mountain air and a just-right altitude were prescribed for the respiratory illnesses of the Industrial Revolution, and for the deadliest disease of the 19th century, tuberculosis. It’s a history written into the architecture itself, from buildings angled toward the prevailing wind to the once-ubiquitous sleeping porch, and even into the phrase “health resort,” which Asheville helped invent. Then Aislyn brings the story to the present, where Asheville wellness has grown into one of the most diverse scenes in the country. She heads into the Asheville Salt Cave and Spa, surrounded by 30 tons of ancient Himalayan salt, and hears from owner Jodie Appel about the surprising family story that started it all. She also sits in on a sound bath with sound therapist Kristin Hillegas, and gathers the full, wonderfully weird range of what you can try here, from hydrotherapy and aura photography to a practitioner known as the Breath Nurse. It all adds up to a rich piece of cultural travel and a portrait of a place locals call the Happy City. Whatever draws you to these mountains, it’s a reminder that the best travel experiences often start with simply feeling better, and that knowing where to go can be its own kind of medicine. Unpacked by Afar is a travel podcast that unpacks one destination at a time. This Asheville audio guide continues across three more episodes, so look for the rest of the series waiting in the feed. GUESTS David O. Freedman, infectious disease physician and travel medicine expert, Asheville Jodi Appel, owner, Asheville Salt Cave and Spa Kristin Hillegas, sound therapist, who runs Serenity Sound Healing of Asheville and leads sound baths at the Center for Spiritual Living Asheville Tebbé Davis, guide and storyteller, Asheville By Foot walking tours (returning from episode 1) PLACES WE VISITED Asheville Salt Cave and Spa Center for Spiritual Living Asheville Serenity Sound Healing of Asheville The Spa at Omni Grove Park Inn CHAPTERS (00:00) A century-old prescription: go to the mountains (01:40) A sound bath to begin (02:10) Meet David Freedman and the science of climatotherapy (03:40) Fresh air, altitude, and the architecture of breathing (07:50) Tuberculosis and the “Robber of Youth” (09:20) John Dickson’s “cure” and the birth of the “health resort” (11:10) From sanitariums to a modern wellness scene (11:20) Inside the Asheville Salt Cave (13:00) Jodi Appell on salt, her father, and opening the spa (17:00) A sound bath, up close (19:00) Why Asheville calls itself the “Happy City” (20:45) People still come here to feel better MORE FROM AFAR Asheville Travel Guide 10 Travel Itineraries for Exploring Asheville Your Way (includes a restorative, wellness-minded itinerary) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    Asheville Wellness and 150 Years of the Mountain Cure | The Travel Guide
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Unpacked by Afar is your weekly guide to where to go, how to travel, and everything worth unpacking in between. Each week, host Aislyn Greene and the Afar team travel the world and dig into the big questions behind every great trip, from the best new hotels and national parks to traveling more responsibly. Some weeks we follow a story through music, food, and culture. Others we tackle a tricky topic, share our favorite destinations, or help you plan where to go next. Because the travel world is complicated. We're here to help you unpack it.

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