How frequently do you visit neighboring cities?
 

How often do you visit cities near your own, and what compels you to visit these places? Also, what cities are close to you that are just not on your radar?

I'm thinking about cities that you visit regularly to get a different experience from your own city, but not places you visit because you have family there, or your company sends you on regular business trips there.

For me, in Vancouver, it's sort of tough since I'm jammed in the top, left-hand corner of the habitable map (sorry, Anchorage, you're just too far). Inevitably, the cities I visit are going to be south and east of me. And while there aren't many to choose from, most of them are pretty good and pretty different to warrant repeat visits.

Basically, my visits include:

Seattle. About once or twice a year. A bit of a sister city to Vancouver - at least in my impressions. I go regularly enough that I have a few hangouts. Also, somewhat necessary to travel through to get to areas in southern and eastern Washington and Oregon, and to use the airport to fly to other places in the US more cheaply than from Canada.

Victoria. About once every year and a half. Victoria is a bit of a pain to get to, since the ferry ride makes it roughly a 4.5 hour journey to go 60 miles as the crow flies. However, Victoria is sort of a West Coast, Canadian version of Savannah (with some residential areas that look vaguely Australian) and probably one of the most underrated cities on the continent. Whenever my wife has a business trip, I try to tag along because we get to take our car on the ferry for free and the hotel is already paid for.

Portland. About once every 2 years. Portland is a bit of a Vancouver antidote.

New York. Once every 2 years. Probably the only city I cross the continent for to visit on a regular basis, for obvious reasons. I used to go because friends of mine lived there, but I still go despite all of them having moved away.

LA About once every 3-5 years. It's very urban-nerdy of me, but there is a certain appeal in visiting a "megacity" and just knowing that a city has more than 10 million people makes it feel bigger and more animated. I know it sounds pedantic, but that's the main reason I feel the urge to visit LA every few years. It just happens to be the closest megacity to where I live, and it also gets better every time I go.

And places that are close but not on my radar?

This one is tough because, again, there are so few cities near Vancouver. It's probably one of the biggest drawbacks of living here. San Francisco or Calgary would be the next closest real cities, but they seem pretty far away. I've been to them both once, and that was years ago.

Living in Thunder Bay? Um . . . Does Winnipeg count as neighbouring?

When in Ottawa for school I'd usually manage the GTHA once a year (excluding transferring flights). Only visited Montreal once, but that's because I didn't realise how cheap and easy it was to visit. Going to visit more now.

Living in chicago, the only nearby city I visit frequently is milwaukee, and that's because my wife is originally from there and still has family there, we head up I-94 about 12 times a year or so.

Living in SF, I rarely visit nearby cities unless it's to visit a friend or family or go to Home Depot or something. I'm about to move to Oakland though, and have a feeling I'll be visiting SF pretty frequently.

edit: if you're talking about visiting cities in different metro areas...then it happens even more rarely. In the past few years the only cities I've visited outside of the Bay Area have been Sacramento, Asheville, and random small cities/towns in the central valley of CA.

Though I just noticed you want to hear about cities that are visited for the "experience", but not to see family/friends/for work, and in that case...Oakland and Berkeley I guess. And if it can't be in the same metro area, then I've been nowhere. If I had more money i'd travel a lot more.

Not very often. I'm in Paris a couple times a year if that counts. From NYC, I would visit friends in DC.

i'm in either chicago, kansas city, or louisville/lexington, ky every other month or so. i've already been to kansas city twice in less than a month. random trips to nashville or memphis.

im in miami and/or new orleans once every year or two during the winter.

the rest of my domestic traveling is to a new city or two every year, but i've basically run out of "new" us cities. im turning abroad this summer. i'm returning to philadelphia this fall.

Depends on what you mean by neighboring cities. I presume you obviously don't mean intra-metropolitan areas, towns and cities.

I've been to New Orleans, Beaumont, Montgomery, San Antonio, Austin, Lake Charles and Lafayette in the last 14 months. I thought about going to Dallas-Fort Worth to "escape" the Tropical Storm (i.e. just take a mini-vacation) but I can't think of a single good reason to go, at least as far as sights of interests that aren't sports related. (In reality I know some but they don't interest me). And as it turned out that's exactly where it headed after making landfall, so it was a good decision not to do so.

Well, that depends. I never thought of that when I made the post.

There are suburbs of Vancouver that I've never been to in my life.

My urge to explore my surroundings is stronger than the average person, but it's not that strong.

Given that the GHA is bigger than some states, there are plenty of towns I haven't been in around here and that includes Galveston County, where I've resided for over 20 years.

Sacramento--several times a year.

Santa Cruz--several times a year.

Monterey & Carmel--several times a year.

South Lake Tahoe--several times a year.

Reno--several times a year.

Los Angeles--at least a couple times a year.

Las Vegas--once every couple years.

Portland--at least once a year.

Seattle--once every couple years.

San Diego--once every couple years.

It's all basically the same metro but I get to San Francisco probably once a week.
Wine Country (Sonoma/Napa area) probably once a month.
San Jose probably once a month, maybe once every other month.
Sacramento probably 3 times a year.
Portland has been pretty consistently once a year.

I don't get out much to be completely honest. I've gone for weeks on end where the only reason I've left my own little neighborhood is to go to work.

My parents and brother live in Phoenix, so I usually go down there from Flagstaff about once a month, but I hardly ever visit Sedona or Prescott even though theyre closer.

I'm an hour and a half from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and usually try to go to or three times a year, usually in Fall and Winter when the weather is cooler, there aren't as many tourists and the park waives entrance fees on select weekends.

I try to go to LA/Orange County about once a year to see friends from college.

I'm four hours from both Las Vegas and Albuquerque and have only ever been to both to visit once. I really need to change that.

The last time I visited a neighbouring city was about a year ago when I took the Go bus to Hamilton and walked around the downtown area for an afternoon.

I'm thinking of taking the Megabus to Buffalo and doing the same thing this summer.

San Francisco - several times a year
Oakland - once, sometimes twice per year.
San Jose - once every few years
Los Angeles - Haven't been in 16 years. I hate LA.
Reno - once every few years
Tahoe - every summer

Vegas is the only city close to SLC I visit often.

Once a week I take the GO Express Bus down the QEW to Hamilton to visit my 102 year old father in the Home.

Not with any frequency. There are a couple towns (Stettler and Castor) in central east Alberta that I make a pilgrimage to every year but that's it.

Pensacola, FL and Gulf Shores/Orange Beach, AL - 2 or 3 times a year. (easy and quick beach weekends)

Atlanta, GA - last visit was in 2012. (Nice aquarium)

Baton Rouge, LA - last visit (for non-work related reasons) was in 2010. (The state capitol has a nice tour with some interesting history, otherwise...meh.)

Memphis, TN - last visit was in 2008. (Enjoyed Beale St. and good BBQ)

Houston, TX - last visit was in 2007. (Literally for a Maroon 5 concert)

We go camping in various places around Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi, but that's not really visiting a city since we're in the woods. Otherwise, our trips involve flying to far off places. (i.e. Yellowstone (and maybe Cancun or Panama) this year; San Juan, PR and Yosemite last year.)

When I lived in Toronto, I took advantage of that city's [relative] centrality to other bigger cities, and would visit Montreal, Buffalo and NYC with some regularity, and popped over to Boston, Detroit, Chicago and Ottawa at least twice and made it to Philly and Cleveland because I felt that I should go at least once.

If I lived in Europe, I would take advantage of their low cost airlines and high speed rail system to access all their great cities on a regular basis

Maybe you begin to appreciate these things more when you live in a relatively isolated corner of the world.

I am kind of beached here in Austin nowadays. I visit New Orleans and Fort Worth every year or so to see family and friends I also make it to NYC every year or so, and I am a out in LA/Palm Springs to visit family about every two years. I never visit nearby San Antonio. I don't like the place at all. I keep making plans to go over to Houston, but then I never go in spite of the fact that I find Houston to be gritty and interesting. It has been three years since I was last there. I am almost 70 years old now. When I was younger (and lived on either the east or west coast), I was constantly flying off to visit places. I have been to most of the major cities in North America, Mexico, South America, and Western Europe at some point in time. I was an especially frequent traveler to cities in Europe, but I have not been there in over a decade. I am still fascinated by cities, but I am amazed to discover that I can't motivate myself to travel much any more.