A decade ago, making phone calls from abroad meant one of two things: either a trip to a crowded call center…or phone bills that could add up to hundreds of dollars for the convenience of chatting from home.

Surgery in India was the only way to save William Cory Foulk’s 30-year-long calling as an endurance athlete. The cutting-edge procedure he needed wasn’t available in the U.S.—and it wouldn’t be for another five months.

There’s a helpful clause in most ticket-purchase agreements that most travelers don’t know about. It's a guaranteed-airfare policy that says if the price of your ticket drops after you purchase it—you’re entitled to a refund of the price difference.

At first, it was every two months. Then once a month. But that wasn’t often enough for Larry Snyder. So in 2008 he packed his bags, and he and his German shepherd took a one-way flight to Medellin, Colombia.

On a hill above Cotacachi, at a bend in the road overlooking an impossibly green valley, someone has painted a sign on a post. It says “Dios esta aqui.” God is here. No matter what your religious beliefs, this place makes you believe in a higher power.

We have a winner...a place where smiles come so naturally that friendliness seems genetically wired. Here 12,400-foot mountains shade verdant-green rainforests...and five-mile-long stretches of Pacific sands sit nearly undisturbed (for now).

The Emerald Isle has always been one of Europe’s more expensive destinations, but the country’s black economic cloud has a silver lining if you’re a visitor

“I don’t know how you can live with yourself,” a reader wrote to me. “By recommending places like Ecuador, you’re placing the lives of Americans in danger. Don’t you remember the four church women who were killed in Honduras?”

They call it la vida buena (the good life) in these parts, and if you’re looking for it, then look no further...