Make a cool escape to the Pacific Northwest’s Portland and Seattle.

If you’re looking for a lazy weekend with some specks of city flavor, perhaps a car ride north to the Russian River Valley can give you the "R & R" you desire without feeling too far from your city roots.

If you are like most people from the USA, you probably have never heard of Torremolinos, but it is one of the gayest vacation towns in the world.

Opened this past July the market is one of several new upscale stores setting up shop in Sonoma County’s gay getaway resort town along the Russian River. The establishments are injecting a bit of city life into the tranquil country setting.

Long a destination for weddings, Hawaii extended the aloha spirit this year to civil unions and wedding planners are anxiously awaiting the stroke of midnight on December 31 when LGBT couples take advantage of the new law

"Half of the people here are homosexual," said the narrator on the TMZ Hollywood Tour bus video, adding, "the rest are just gay."

On a beautiful spring day in the oft-rainy city of Vancouver, British Columbia, where Out There was there doing a little gay reconnaissance, it seemed the whole urban populace was outside, enjoying the natural light.

Just a 90-minute drive from San Francisco, the Russian River has a long history of being one of the Bay Area’s favorite getaways. "It’s gays meet hippies meet rednecks - and we all get along," says one Guerneville resident.

"Do you know the way to San Jose?" Dionne Warwick famously asked, channeling Burt Bacharach and Hal David . Yes, Out There does, but truth be told, we don’t find ourselves driving SJ-bound all that often.

People from Los Angeles love to make fun of San Francisco and vice versa. We might not admit it openly, but behind the rivalry, we kind of like each other.

We love our job, really we do, most days it’s just as much fun as a tickle party at former Rep. Eric Massa’s house. But it’s important to get away every now and then...

San Diego was in crisis during my trip earlier this month. For the first two days of my visit, the temperature didn’t get above the mid-50s. It was windy. At one point, there was even light rain.

I was bundled up as I walked through the snow in a pristine forest earlier this month. Kids and adults were cross-country skiing, sledding, and playing in the snow. Just an hour later, I was at a patio restaurant in a T-shirt in the warm sun looking for a table with shade.

Las Vegas, once home to all-you-can-eat buffets and gritty gambling grottos, now shoots for the stratosphere with the opening of the 67-acre CityCenter. At a cost of $8.5 billion, CityCenter is the most expensive private construction project in America.