Rio de Janeiro vs Yellowstone and Grand Teton

Rio's setting is unmatched — granite peaks rise directly from the city between Copacabana and Ipanema's beaches, with the Christ the Redeemer statue watching over it all from Corcovado mountain. Samba, Carnival, and a beach-centred daily culture define the city's rhythm, alongside favela communities that are an essential, complicated part of Rio's social fabric.

Yellowstone and Grand Teton sit side by side in northwest Wyoming, linked by a short parkway, and together they make one of the great American road trips. Yellowstone, the world's first national park, holds more than half the planet's active geysers, including Old Faithful, plus the rainbow-colored Grand Prismatic Spring, the thundering Lower Falls of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and terraced hot springs at Mammoth. It is also the best place in the Lower 48 to see big wildlife: bison herds in Hayden and Lamar valleys, elk, pronghorn, bears and, with patience and a spotting scope, wolves. Just south, Grand Teton's jagged peaks rise straight out of the valley floor above Jackson Lake and Jenny Lake, with sunsets that rival anything in the West. Fly into Jackson Hole or Bozeman, rent a car and plan on long but rewarding drives. Neither park uses timed entry, but in-park lodging books up months ahead, parking at Old Faithful and Grand Prismatic fills by late morning, and most of Yellowstone's roads close to cars from early November to late April, so summer and early fall are the main seasons.