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Outside magazine, June 1997

The World's Great Towns

Pack Up the Grill, Honey, We're Moving to Reykjavík
Cosmopolitan culture. Real jobs. Polyglot neighborhoods. Great eats. And the Big Outdoors close at hand. So pick your hemisphere and start saying your good-byes: From Cape Town to Melbourne and Vancouver to Temuco, the world's ten most livable cities await.

Vancouver
Canada's least provincial city has proper leisure-time priorities. Plus: Joshua Hammer on smoothing out the myriad logistical details.

Reykjavík
There's little crime and virtually no pollution. So why doesn't all the world move there at once? Plus: Marshall Sella on misadventures in a foreign tongue.

Cape Town
Cape Town has the chance to become one of the more culturally interesting and dynamic places on earth.

Temuco
Pity all you jaded, I'm-a-world-traveler types haven't ever heard of Temuco, Chile.

Prague
The people of Prague believe life should revolve around beer, conversation, poetry, and music.

Melbourne
Melbourne life is plenty engaging even if you never venture beyond the city limits.

Porto
When a city tries to leap from the 19th century straight into the 21st, its metaphors are sure to get mixed. Plus: Guy Martin on how not to be an Ugly American.

Nouméa
Think Paris with palm trees but no pesky subway bombings (no subways, for that matter).

Istanbul
Istanbul is a town that accommodates, where the jazzy modern collides with the storied ancient.

New York
Yes, you read correctly. New York is a city of unfettered possibility — it's the opposite of a dead end. Plus: Ian Frazier on the sporting, scenic oasis that is, yes, New York City, U.S.A.