THIS time of year Corn Hill Beach in Truro, Mass., on the outer arm of Cape Cod, is a joyful, teeming playground. At low tide, the warm water of Cape Cod Bay recedes to expose banks of smooth sand, which swarm with kids, dogs and blissfully vacationing parents. As the sun sinks toward Provincetown, it cuts through a hazy summer sky, shimmering off the quicksilver bay. It picks out Corn Hill, at the north side of the beach, and daubs the tiny cottages at its crest in sure, vibrant strokes.

At that moment, the sandy rise is no longer simply Corn Hill, the site of the Mayflower Pilgrims’ first encounter with the fruits of indigenous agriculture, but it is “Corn Hill,” Edward Hopper’s iconic 1930 oil painting.

Hopper spent nearly 40 of his 84 summers in Truro, the rolling, lightly populated stretch of the Cape between Provincetown and Wellfleet. Together, these three communities comprise the Outer Cape: lands that, while connected to the mainland, have long served as a haven for those seeking something different. The Pilgrims, who landed there in 1620, gave way to 19th-century whalers, and then to the artists, writers and freethinkers who began spending summers there nearly a century ago.

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July 13, 2008

THIS is not how one thinks of Peru. I opened my eyes without moving on the soft desert floor. A perfect orange sun was rising over a distant ridge, its undulations mirroring the mound where I had rolled out my sleeping bag the night before. My ears hummed in the silence. All around me, in dawn-lighted tans, whites and stripes of purple and orange, wind-sculptured forms extended in the limpid desert air. I saw no people; no signs of life at all.

All of Peru’s coast is arid, but south of Lima it becomes profound. It is one of the driest places on earth, the desolation is broken here and there by verdant valleys where streams venture seaward from the distant Andes.

Almost half all visits by foreigners to Peru include a stop at Machu Picchu, and with good reason — the ancient Inca site is spectacular. Yet the country is far more than a one-hit wonder. The geography that gave rise to numerous ancient civilizations — dry coast, a backbone of high mountains and tropical rain forest in the east — endows the country with unparalleled natural areas.

And many are accessible, easy to add to an Inca heartland trip. In February, I visited two of Peru’s extremes — the desert and the rain forest. (The third extreme — the snow-capped high Andes — I left for another visit.)

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July 13, 2008

SOME 15 years ago, Valencia Street was a forbidding mix of auto body shops, papered-over storefronts and hole-in-the-wall restaurants. Despite a smattering of Victorian houses and lesbian bars, few outsiders were drawn to this grungy edge of San Francisco’s Mission District.

Then came the dot-com money. Trendy coffeehouses arrived. Hip boutiques opened next to cool bars. And now the wide, low-slung street has become a gathering spot for the city’s latest breed of cool-hunting hipsters.

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