Imagine driving 500 miles in less than three hours. Imagine traveling at an average speed of 170 mph for those three hours – and no, that last flight you took doesn’t count!

Midday Sunday, 30 brave men and 3 brave women set off on the 96thrunning of the legendary Indianapolis 500 motor race. Drivers will attempt to complete 200 laps of the 2.5-mile speedway – nicknamed the brickyard for the materials it was once made of – in front of a passionate crowd of over 300,000 people.

The Indy 500 declares itself the “Greatest Spectacle in Racing”, and while the glitzy and glamorous Monaco Grand Prix (also taking place today) probably has something to say about that, there’s no doubt that Indy is one of the most beloved auto races on earth.

All joking aside, TV can’t really do justice to the awesome power of the machines and the skill of the drivers who pilot them. We know. Standing in the infield four years ago (some people considered this most debauched place in America on Memorial Day weekends in the 70s and 80s), we were nothing short of astounded at how quickly the cars powered around each lap.

US race fans are of course hopeful to see an American return to ‘winner’s circle’ at around 3pm local time. In the last 15 years, an American has made it into victory row on only four occasions. Today’s race will have added poignancy as last year’s winner, Dan Wheldon of the UK, died in a violent accident in the final race of the 2011 season.

The man or woman who takes the checkered flag will be presented with the iconic Borg-Warner Trophy. And according to tradition, the winner also has to chug a pint of milk in front of the absurdly large 5-ft, 153-lb sterling silver mantelpiece-filler, which rather spookily has the sculpted faces of all previous winners around it.

Of course, the momentary embarrassment of wearing a milk mustache in front of millions of fans around the world is certainly lightened by the winnings – one of the richest prize funds in sport – a whopping $2.5-million

Petrolheads will be interested to know that this is the first time since 1996 that all entrants will use turbocharged engines, and only the fourth time since 1985 that all cars will be running a new model year chassis (meaning no one will be using an old design).

Written by insider city guide series Hg2 | A Hedonist’s guide to…

(Image: Chris Jones)

What do you get if you cross a bunch of artists with engineers and sadomasochist endurance “athletes”? The Kinetic Grand Championships, that’s what.

Otherwise known as the “Triathlon of the Art World”, this grandaddy of all kinetic sculpture races (remember this one in Baltimore?) takes place every year in California’s Humboldt County.

The race’s insane (or genius depending on your perspective) teams must negotiate a heartbreaking 42-mile course of road, sand, mud and sea over three stages set over three consecutive race days. Competitors – who clearly possess criminal amounts of free time – often spend months designing and building their magnificent contraptions.

Kinetic sculptures, for the uninitiated, are all-terrain human-powered works of art engineered to race over land and water. Constructed of materials that most would consider “junk”, these bicycle-propelled machines are without exception elaborately decorated, and often incorporate animated moving parts such as blinking eyes.

The championships are run annually over Memorial Day weekend. This year’s event begins Saturday, May 26 and finishes on Monday, May 28.

For a taste of incredible feats of human imagination and physical endurance on show during the Kinetic Grand Championships, check out some of last year’s competitors:

Written by insider city guide series Hg2 | A Hedonist’s guide to…

(Images: Tina Kerrigan)

They’re firing up the grills in Madison this Memorial Day weekend for the self-proclaimed ‘World’s largest Brat Fest.’ BratFest runs May 25 – 28 at the Willow Island Energy Center. The event redefines the term Bratwürst.

After loading up on brats, kraut and strudel you might want to rest for a while. Then, get up early the morning of Saturday May 26 and run it all (well, some of it anyway) off. The Brat Fest Run is a 5k event that will help you do precisely that. The course is laid out along the shores of Wingra Creek, and finishes up at Willow Island.

If all of this is a bit beyond either capacity of your stomach or legs to handle, wait a week and imbibe the music at the Isthmus Jazz Festival. June 1 – 2 are the dates. The setting: Memorial Union Terrace, with glittering Lake Mendota as the backdrop. The jazz runs the gamut: Dixieland, swing, bebop, Latin and free – with variations of funk and Hip-Hop thrown in for variety

Something more sedate? A landscape tour to the Taliesin Preservation and Frank Lloyd Wright Visitor Center should do the trick. Come see how Wright envisioned architecture in relation to the surrounding land. See how organic form and shapes made his creations architecture for the ages.

Something yet more serene? June 2 there will be an Arboretum Night Walk. Naturalists guide you through a twilight Wisconsin summerscape. Listen carefully as the insects bring life to the night. If the evening’s clear, see what the starts and planets are up to. This is Mother Nature’s soporific. The twilight sojourn sure beats hitting the bars before you go to bed.

Story by Jerry Chandler

(Image: Jellaluna)

It’s Memorial Day weekend, time for remembrance, family and very fast cars.

Ryan Briscoe has pole position for the May 27 Indianapolis 500. His four-lap time was 2-minutes, 38.9514 seconds. That averages out to 226.484 mph. Briscoe bested rival James Hinchcliffe by but a hair.

“This is unbelievable,” said Briscoe just after qualifying. Given its storied history, the 96th running of this historic race itself could be precisely that. Saturday May 26 promises to be pretty good too. That’s when vintage Indy 500 cars take to the Brickyard for Legend’s Day. Race cars ranging from 1911 to the 1990s will grace the track from 9:20 till 10:20 a.m., conjuring up a bit of nostalgia and whetting fans’ appetite for Sunday’s main event.

Among the machines on parade Saturday: the 1955 Kurtis Kraft Bardahl Special, the 1959 Epperley Bowes Seal Fast Special, and a car entered by the fabled Granatelli brothers back in 1949. Look quick and breathe deep of ancient fumes. The Speedway will be suffused by exotic Watsons, Eagles, Kuzamas, Penskes, Lolas and Marches. Sunday, it will be chockablock with fans.

With a capacity of a quarter-of-a-million-plus, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway is flat-out the planet’s largest spectator sporting facility. Churchill Downs, Yankee Stadium, the Rose Bowl, the Roman Coliseum, and Vatican City can all fit inside the capacious 253-acre oval. No hype, Indy is colossal.

If  you’re headed to the track on Sunday, know that the public gates open at 5:33 a.m. It’s time for the Military Tribute Lap at 11:10. Twenty minutes later, drivers get introduced.

One more thing: the weather forecast. The National Weather Service is looking for mostly clear skies and a high of 91.

Travelers, start your engines.

By Jerry Chandler

(Image: Fifth World Art)

There’s a ton of stuff to do in south Florida this Memorial Day weekend, especially in and around Fort Lauderdale.

Start the weekend, appropriately enough, at Fort Lauderdale Beach Friday May 25. That’s the site of the 2012 Jose Cuervo Pro Beach Volleyball Series. This is a very big deal, so much so that it’s being broadcast by NBC Sports Network nationally. Admission is free to this swath of sand and sun. The competition is keen. These folks are serious about their Beach Volleyball. Believe it.

Saturday, May 26 there’s another free-admission event, The Great American Beach Party. Follow the crowds to Fort Lauderdale Beach, the A1A and Las Olas Blvd. On tap are live performances, a classic car show (this is south Florida) and art displays. End the evening right with a special screening of another classic, the film American Graffiti. See what stars Ron Howard, Harrison Ford and Richard Dreyfuss looked liked when they were young.

More music? Revel in Jazz on the Square from seven till nine in Friday evening. Follow the music to the Village Grille, Lauderdale-by-the-Sea.

Round out the weekend Monday May 28 from seven to nine at night sat Boardwalk Friday Fest (they’re extending it this holiday). Look for live jazz, blues, pop and almost every other conceivable combination.  It will all be arrayed along the two-and-a-half mile expanse of Hollywood’s signature Boardwalk. The area is full of terrific ocean front cafes and restaurants.

Sea, sun, music, balmy nights and strange pink drinks – what more could you ask for in pursuit of your personal lost shaker of salt?

Fort Lauderdale is easy to get to. Southwest, Spirit and JetBlue are all prime players at Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport.

Story by Jerry Chandler

(Image: epitomized1)

Welcome to the sixth installment of our #FF or #FollowFriday feature! Each Friday, we’re listing 5 Tweeps we think will satisfy your hankering for travel inspiration. Be sure to let us know if you find them helpful. And if there’s an account you think we ought to be following, please do share it with us.

For the past couple of weeks we’ve shared the Twitter users that will help you get the most out your next trips to New York and Chicago. This week we’re continuing the trend by focusing on the best insider feeds for LA.

@GrubStreetLA If you plan on eating your way around the City of Angels in style you better follow the LA feed of the brilliant Grub Street blog network. Food and restaurant news sits alongside foodie event listings, ideas for places to eat and all sorts of food related stories and opinion.

@eaterla The best all-round performer, Eater is the (unashamedly American reference here) Matt Kemp of restaurant, bar and nightlife websites. Use the site’s LA Twitter feed to quickly select which of their articles are of interest to you.

@surfreportLA LA and its surrounding counties are world-renowned surf spots. Be sure your drive down to the water isn’t wasted with the daily crack-of-dawn surf reports.

@diglounge Each weekend, Dig Lounge consistently produces an insightful guide of the food and wine happenings in LA. Make sure you don’t miss out on a great wine tasting or food fair!

@LAist Los Angeles is home some pretty bizarre people, so weird things occur pretty regularly in the city. LAist keeps track of many of the human-interest stories – celebrity-based or not – that make LA such a unique place.

Be sure to follow @Hg2 for intelligent, irreverent and inspired travel advice.

Written by insider city guide series Hg2 | A Hedonist’s guide to…

(Image: Neil Kremer)

Here’s a twofer. Celebrate Memorial Day weekend in San Francisco and be there as the city’s signature landmark turns three-quarters-of-a-century old.

Before you embark, here are a few money-saving tips, courtesy of frugal fashionista and bargain hunter Kendal Perez:

Eat twice a day, and make breakfast a real meal. One of the best bargains in town is Mama’s on Washington Square. The omelets are outrageously good, the breads and pastries fresh, and the jam homemade. Sufficiently sated, head out to see the town.

The least expensive way to do that is to buy a three-day Muni Passport for a paltry $21. That gives you access to Muni buses and trolleys. Something quicker? Ride BART trains.

As for the city’s mythic cable cares, see  what makes them run. Visit the Cable Care Museum. Learn about the inventor, the technologies, the builders and the continuing efforts to save and rebuild the system.

Take a free, insightful tour of one of the city’s most powerful sites: the Coit Tower Murals. Created during the depths of the Great Depression by 25 of California’s most talented artists, these murals offer a window into the travails, and the resilience, of American workers.

Immerse yourself in the art and imagination of some of the folks who made San Francisco great. Spend a while at the Chinese Cultural Center. If your hotel is in or near Chinatown, make it a point to get up early in the morning and walk the area. That’s this reporter’s favorite SF experience. The food stores are just opening, the residents are going about their Tai chi exercise in the park, and the city – still shrouded in magical mist – is just beginning to wake up.

If you don’t end up leaving tour heart in San Francisco, you’d better see a doctor.

Story by Jerry Chandler

(Image: ground zero)

Some of the most creative art curators in the business call the Pacific Northwest home. From Portland to Vancouver they bring polished passion to their profession. Here are come examples:

• Ancestral Modern: Australian Aboriginal Art from the Kaplan & Levi Collection opens May 31 and runs through Sept. 2 at the Seattle Art Museum. The language of this exhibit is vividly visual. The topics are elemental, sometimes even epic. They’re depicted in more than 100 artworks from the late 20th to early 21st Centuries – painted on canvas, presented as ochres on bark, carved on wood, woven of fiber and cast in bronze. What they have in common is a sometimes surrealistic vibrancy.
• Beat Nation: Art, Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture comes to a close June 3 at the Vancouver Art Gallery. The name says it all. Beat Nation juxtaposes urban youth culture with Aboriginal identity. The result is revealing. Up in Vancouver the unceded territories of the Coast Salish Nations have been a meeting ground or Aboriginal youth for decades now. Maybe ironically, Hip Hop helps drive the new rhythms of this place, while art melds modern graffiti murals with traditional Haida figures. The exhibit is a fascinating insight into the cultural transformation of a generation.
• Three Fragments of a Lost Tale springs form the genius of John Frame, a California-based sculptor who works in stop-motion animation. The end-goal is to create a feature-length collection of animated and live-film vignettes. Three Fragments chronicles his work on the project over the last five years. This is imaginative, enthralling art – quite possibly unlike any you’ve ever seen. It’s being held over through Memorial Day, Monday May 28, at the Portland Art Museum.

Point your artistic compass northwest, book a flight and allow yourself to be swept away by what you’ll see.

Story by Jerry Chandler

(Image: mayanais)

The South’s the site for some sublime antiquing. West Tennessee is especially enticing. Here’s the plan: book a flight to Memphis, rent a car and head out. The Tennessee Antique Trail points the way to tempting treasures, and Delta Air Lines’ Memphis hub gets you to the general vicinity. The carrier offers a full 147 peak-day departures from MEM to a total of 54 destinations.

The first place you’ll want to stop after checking into your hotel is Memphis’ Antique Warehouse Mall. 55 vendors set up shop here, purveying vintage furniture, collectibles, cans, jars and just about everything in-between. The Mall’s owners aren’t novices to this business. They’ve been buying and selling antiques in the Mid South for a decade-and-a-half now. The result is an extraordinary aggregation of sumptuous stuff.

From Memphis, head by car to Alamo, Tennessee. That’s where you’ll find High Cotton – literally. High Cotton & Co. is an antiquer’s antique store, with a neat selection of architectural items, old tools, painted furniture and items in the rough. It’s the latter that are especially intriguing.

Selmer, Tennessee is the site of J & S Antiques, an aggregation of historic buildings filled with vintage and antique bookcases, dining sets, chests, bedroom suites, side tables and such. To show you how good Jeff Goodman and Scotty Goodrum are at stocking their store, J & S is a favorite of antique dealers too.

The area in and around Jackson is rife with good antique shops. One of them is Yesterdays Antiques. Jesse Byrum has been in business a quarter-of-a-century. He will help you find that perfect wedding or anniversary gift.

The neat thing this writer and wife Kathy have found is that antique exploration can turn up some unique, amazing, and comparatively inexpensive Christmas gifts. It’s never too early to start shopping. In the case of antique shopping, that exploration is the gift to you.

Story by Jerry Chandler

(Image: Kecko)

Mayssam was born and raised in Lebanon and lived in New York City before finally settling on Montreal about 20 years ago. In a few previous lives, she worked as an interior designer, a graphic artist and even dabbled in catering. She has since reconnected with her true passions – food and travel – and now roams Montreal (and the planet!) as a blogger searching for delicious culinary discoveries. From Michelin-starred restaurants across the planet to the latest hole-in-the-wall restaurants down the street, she wants to taste it all! Follow Mayssam’s adventures on her blog, Will Travel For Food.

Mayssam

Cheapflights: How much of a role does food play in deciding where you travel?

Mayssam: It plays a major role in deciding where I go, but it is not the only factor – because wherever I go, I always manage to find some delicious food to eat. I do have to say though that I usually book restaurants before I’ve even booked my plane ticket!

CF: What’s the most memorable food-related experience you’ve had traveling?

M: There have been so many, from the time I traveled to Turkey with my parents and picnicked on a hilltop in the Turkish countryside barbecuing our own meat and enjoying the fresh air to the first time I bit into a Momofuku cake truffle in New York City – both are very different experiences but just as memorable. Oh, and there was also last summer when I interviewed Albert Adria at his new restaurant Tickets in Barcelona then sat down to enjoy a meal prepared by him.

CF: How has exploring food taught you about people and cultures?

M: You learn so much about a culture through its food! What is the origin of tapas? I got a lesson in culture and history when I asked that question in Barcelona this past summer. Ask a question about food and odds are you will get so much more than you bargained for and that the answer will be so very interesting!

CF: Is there a destination that you visit regularly?

M: I go to New York every few months. I used to live there and I consider it a second home. It is a source of inspiration for me – and such a great eating destination!

CF: How do you discover local or off-the-beaten-path places?

M: The internet and social media are great sources of information. I get a lot of info and recommendations through my Twitter account: @mayssamaha. I have followers all over the world and love getting recommendations from the people who live in a city I’m visiting. I very often return the favor by recommending local places in Montreal.

CF: Do you have a routine for staying healthy when you travel?

M: I try to get as much sleep as possible even when I travel. I need my seven to eight hours of sleep to function properly. I also try and stay as hydrated as possible.

CF: What is an absolute must on your packing list?

M: My iPad, which is usually filled with maps and lists of places to visits, itineraries, reservations, books, music, etc.

CF: What’s your routine before you fly?

M: I clean my apartment and tidy up well and I leave very detailed instructions to the cat-sitter. I then make sure I have good music on my iPhone or iPod, and a good book in my iPad. I check my packing list and make sure I have everything. I then try and get a good night of sleep, which usually never happens because I am so excited about my trip!

CF: Any tips on researching a new destination before taking off?

M: Being a foodie, I usually go through my list of restaurants first and make reservations. I then organize the rest of my time around that. I research by looking on the net. If it’s a long trip, I will buy a paper guide of my destination to take with me.

Cheapflights is proud to have guest voices express their opinions. The views expressed are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of Cheapflights Media (USA) Inc.

(Images: Mayssam,Carrie MacPherson; Montreal, Manu_H)