Explore SWFL: 3 ways to enjoy the Southwest Florida coast by water this year
As our weather gets warmer, it's the perfect time to get out on the water.
Whether you're a local or a tourist, you can enjoy Southwest Florida's gorgeous views from the water.
Here's a few ways to enjoy our coastal views.
If you're lucky, you can spot dolphins just by exploring the coast. But if you want an even better chance of seeing the friendly sea creatures, consider booking a specialized dolphin tour.
Naples Water Tours: Dolphin Tour (napleswatertours.com)
Island Time: Fort Myers Dolphin & Shelling Cruises (islandtimecruise.com)
Southwest Florida has the most beautiful sunsets. One of the best ways to experience them is on the water.
Boat Naples: Sunset Cruise (boatnaples.com)
Sight Sea-R: Fort Myers Island Sunset Cruise (sightseaflorida.com)
Even if you've lived in SWFL your whole life, there might be things you haven't seen yet. A sightseeing cruise is a great way to spend an afternoon and support a local business.
Naples Princess Cruises: Sightseeing Cruise (naplesprincesscruises.com)
Adventures in Paradise: Fort Myers Beach Boat Tours (fortmyersbeachboattours.com)
This article originally appeared on Naples Daily News: How to book sunset cruise, dolphin tour, in Naples and Fort Myers
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Skift
a day ago
- Skift
Marriott Opens Its First-Ever StudioRes Hotel
STR reported U.S. lodging data for the week ended May 31. U.S. hotel RevPAR was down 1.9%, led by a 1.6% decline in occupancy. Group RevPAR was up 60 basis points. Morgan Stanley held their 2025 Travel & Leisure Conference at the same time as the NYU Conference, with many of the same companies presenting at both. MS said most companies talked about a better demand backdrop as tariff talks progressed and volatility eased, but within sectors, MS pointed out the disparity, highlighting TNL vs. VAC, MAR/HLT vs. CHH/WH, and others, owing to the spreading out of more limited demand growth. MS also continued to hear positive commentary on the high end of their hotel owner/operator panel. C-Corps reiterated confidence in room growth, and nobody actually admitted to seeing any signs of a recession despite all the concerns. As the insiders at Pebblebrook Hotel Trust continued buying stock, Truist Securities lowered their target price to $9 from $10. They maintained their Hold rating. Marriott International, Inc. announced the opening of StudioRes Fort Myers, the first-ever StudioRes hotel and the company's debut in the midscale extended stay segment. The 124-key property offers communal spaces, outdoor patios, fitness centers, food and beverage vending, and casual workspaces. Marriott anticipates strong growth for StudioRes in the coming years, with over 40 properties across the U.S. and Canada anticipated to open by the end of 2027. The Renaissance Boston Seaport District debuted its new multi-million dollar renovation, including its 471 guestrooms and suites, expansive Club Lounge, and re-imagined lobby. Situated in Boston's lively Seaport District, the property offers 21,000 square feet of meeting and event space, an indoor pool, sauna, fitness center, and Peloton rooms. The property's dining establishments include Capiz, Starbucks, and the Club Lounge for Marriott Bonvoy members. In McKinney, Texas, the city council has approved a resolution authorizing the city manager to execute a Chapter 380 Economic Development Program and Agreement with Craig Ranch Luxury Hotel to bring a JW Marriott resort hotel to the city. The luxury hotel will feature 290 rooms, over 51,000 square feet of conference space, a pool with a lazy river, a fitness center, multiple dining options, a lounge with a terrace and poolside service, pickleball courts, a business center, and a retail gift shop. The project will also include at least 45 for-sale condominiums served by a dedicated amenity deck. The Hilton New York Fashion District unveiled a fresh new look as part of extensive property-wide renovations. The property updates include a complete refresh of all 280 guestrooms, public spaces, and meeting areas. The property also includes a rooftop bar, modern dining options, a business center, and a fitness center. The Hilton New York Fashion District is managed by Aimbridge Hospitality. The renovation was managed by Aimbridge's Design & Construction team. Park Hotels & Resorts is planning to develop another tower at its Hilton Waikoloa Village campus on Hawaii Island that would cost between $225 million and $250 million. The project would develop 213 additional keys at Hilton Waikoloa Village. According to Park Hotels & Resorts, plans are for the structure to be either a hotel or a timeshare. These plans for a major expansion come as Park is already investing in a $68 million renovation to its Palace Tower at the Waikoloa resort. It also has several projects on Oahu at its Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki Beach Resort, including the planned AMB Tower, which is awaiting city approval, and an $83 million renovation to its Rainbow Tower. Additionally, if the AMB Tower is approved, Park said this could open up a potential 39-key expansion at its Diamondhead Tower by moving existing administrative and sales offices to the new tower. With current renovations at its Waikiki and Waikoloa campuses, and if the new towers are approved at both properties, these projects could amount to around $861 million to $931 million in total. Four Seasons, in partnership with Strategic Property Partners, announced plans for a new luxury hotel and private residences in Charleston, South Carolina. Featuring 139 guestrooms and 36 branded residences, the upcoming eight-story, newly built Four Seasons Hotel and Residences Charleston will be located in the city's historic district. The hotel will feature four restaurants and bars, an outdoor pool with private cabanas, 7,000 square feet of event space, a spa, a fitness center, and curated retail offerings. Ennismore announced four new hotel signings in Mexico and the joining of Balfour Miami Beach to the Morgans Originals collection. The four landmark signings in Mexico include Delano East Cape in Los Cabos, Hyde Mexico City, The Hoxton Mexico City, and Mama Shelter Mexico City. 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Wall Street Journal
7 days ago
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A Savvy Travelers Guide to Italy's Other Great Art City
Art-loving visitors to Italy tend to follow a well-trodden path through Rome and Florence. But during high season, lines at the Vatican and the Uffizi Galleries can be punishingly long. By the time you finally catch a glimpse of Caravaggio's 'Bacchus,' you might be in need of a drink yourself. There is an alternative. The grand port city of Naples—though best known now for pizza, the mafia and as a launching place for passengers to Capri and the Amalfi coast—has also been a Mediterranean cultural mecca for millennia, back to the days of the ancients. A mere day trip away, you can find historic treasures in the ruins of Pompeii, whose lavishly decorated villas were preserved when neighboring Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 A.D.—a brilliant snapshot of ancient Roman artistic refinement and taste. Nearly 2,000 years later, Naples' own surviving masterpieces still thrill. Founded in 470 B.C., it is among Europe's oldest cities, and by the 17th century, was a hotbed of artistic activity, home to painters like Caravaggio, José de Ribera and Artemisia Gentileschi. That Baroque legacy is still palpable. On a recent trip, I went in search of 'Baroque Naples,' having studied that iteration of the city in college art history classes. But once I was on the ground, it soon became clear that Naples' wonders exceed any one artistic moment. Looking down across the city and sea from my first stop, the hilltop Museo di San Martino, I immediately saw the appeal of Naples, both glorious and gritty. White sailboats dotted the bay and clusters of drab apartment towers, draped in drying laundry, climbed the inland hillsides. In between, the city spread like a carpet toward the slopes of Vesuvius in the distance. A former Carthusian monastery, San Martino is replete with treasures. What struck me most were the luxurious personal quarters of the prior, with their colored marble floors and frescoed walls and ceilings. The pope's private Vatican chambers aren't open to the public, but they certainly don't have a sea view. The city's golden age dawned in 1734 when Naples and Sicily became an independent kingdom under King Charles of Bourbon, a great-grandson of Louis XIV of France. Charles launched an immense building program, whose legacy includes royal palaces adorned with the vast art collection his mother bequeathed him. Charles also greenlighted the excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum and built one of Europe's first opera houses, the Teatro San Carlo, in just eight months. 'Naples doesn't really do small,' explained Sylvain Bellenger, former director of the Museo di Capodimonte, a museum housed in a massive pink and gray palace that is just one of three built by Charles in and around Naples. (Another, Reggia di Caserta, is a Unesco World Heritage site just 30 minutes outside the city.) Even larger than the Uffizi Galleries in Florence, the Museo di Capodimonte is currently undergoing renovations—but still has 50 galleries containing enough masterpieces by the likes of Masaccio, Raphael, Michelangelo, Titian and Correggio to merit repeat visits. When the other galleries reopen this fall, visitors might be surprised to discover pieces by Louise Bourgeois, Andy Warhol and Candida Höfer, many referencing either Naples in general or the Capodimonte in particular. Should you choose, like me, not to venture to Pompeii, the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli ably scratches an itch for antiquity. Three floors of classical sculptures are chockablock with artifacts, including the famous Farnese Hercules, acres of elaborate Roman mosaic floors and delicately painted walls brought from Herculaneum and Pompeii. One irreverent surprise: A small gallery of erotic sculptures and ancient sexual aids. (Prudes and parents, fear not: There's a warning at the entrance.) Among other niche museums worth a stop is the Museo Nazionale della Ceramica Duca di Martina, in the lush gardens of the Villa Floridiana. And the Gallerie d'Italia, whose collection ranges from the 17th century to the first decades of the 20th, has been newly installed in the circa-1940 Banco di Napoli, a boldly muscular (read: Fascist) celebration of classical architecture. Eager to check a duomo off your list? Naples has one, too. In its San Gennaro chapel's splendid treasury, a new curator is fond of mixing modern art amid the saintly relics. A show of contemporary ex-votos (on view through Sept. 30) features diminutive devotional works by artists such as Mimmo Paladino, Igor Mitoraj and Yves Klein. It occurred to me inside that I'd never seen more people conversing out loud and in public with religious paintings and sculptures than I did in Naples. Even in the offseason, visitors will want to pre-book tickets for smaller private chapels such as Sansevero, with its haunting suite of Baroque sculpture including 'The Veiled Christ' in which artist Giuseppe Sanmartino somehow summons a transparent veil out of marble. Also worth a stop: the tiny Pio Monte della Misericordia, where Caravaggio's iconic 'Seven Acts of Mercy' looms large over the high altar. In the 1990s, the city launched Le Stazioni dell'Arte, an ambitious, ongoing public art project to transform its metro stations in partnership with architects and designers like Karim Rashid and Òscar Tusquets. Since 2012, the arts foundation Made in Cloister, has provided work and exhibition spaces to promote contemporary Neapolitan artists in a 16th-century monastery that was most recently a carwash. More recently, London art dealer Thomas Dane opened his first international branch gallery in a chicly renovated 19th-century palazzo in Chiaia. 'I never expected to open [satellite] galleries,' he said. 'But…it struck me that if there was one city where artists would want to spend more time and explore, it was Naples.'
Condé Nast Traveler
18-05-2025
- Condé Nast Traveler
Me, Stanley Tucci, and a Food-Filled Escapade Through Florence
I've traveled to Florence to spend time with Tucci while he films his new 10-part docuseries, Tucci in Italy, with National Geographic and BBC, which premieres on May 18. He has been filming for four months, with another three to go, but the show is already highly anticipated: Two years prior to filming in 2024, CNN canceled his two-season Emmy-winning show, Tucci: Searching For Italy, which had gained an avid following thanks to the actor's charming deep dive into the culinary scene in Italy, his motherland. From chatting with the locals of Naples, the birthplace of pizza, to indulging in tastings of Minoro's fresh limoncello—the world learned the potential of Tucci as a well-rounded, fun, and informative travel host. This time around, Tucci says, he felt 'more himself.' 'As an actor, when storytelling, I was always playing a character,' he explains. 'It didn't feel so natural to present myself to the world, as myself.' Since Searching For Italy's cancellation, though, he's continued to find his footing as the ambassador of a certain brand of good living: He's released a new book, What I Ate in One Year, and is growing his loyal base of followers thanks to his ongoing cooking and negroni making on Instagram. For the National Geographic show, Tucci says viewers won't find him 'climbing up anything' as some travel hosts on the channel do. Instead he will be doing what he does best: spending time with people and their stories in some of his favorite regions of Italy, whether that's one of the few remaining southern-Tuscan cattle herders or a relentless nonna who doesn't trust even the butcher to cut the meat from her farm. Tucci, who researched and scouted chefs, tastemakers, locals, and foodies with the production team for months leading up to filming, says he wants the people they spotlight to 'feel like they don't have to perform' and for the show to 'feel truly authentic.' There's also a greater sense of history and connection between the episodes this time, says Tucci. In one, we see him return to Tuscany for the famous bareback horse race Palio di Siena, where he films in the kitchen with local Sienese chefs ahead of the Contrada dinner, a gigantic communal feast to celebrate the race and feeds each of the city's 17 districts.
