Travel - Ranch & Coast - October 2006

New Year, New Destination New Year’s Eve heralds the biggest celebration on the calendar for many revelers. And since it’s best to make travel plans at least three months ahead (if not more), we decided to profile the party hot spots around the world now, from the weird to the downright wonderful. Watch laser lights play on the Kremlin’s walls, have a highland fling with 100,000 Scots, or pop those Champagne corks in Austria as 2007 dawns across the desert. — Amanda Watson Hogmanay, Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh Castle, lit up on its volcanic rock, is an incomparable backdrop to fireworks and music. Tickets for the Royal Bank Street Party have been like gold dust since organizers scaled back the event from 250,000 admissions 13 years ago to the current 100,000, because crowds are concentrated on only three streets. There will be music, dancing and — this being such a festival city — street theatre. But the real fun will start when the stages and screens go live at 10pm. Escape from all the street madness by getting into The Ceilidh in the Gardens. Tickets for this event — only in its second year — will also include a Royal Bank Street Party pass, and will be available starting on October 7. (www.edinburghshogmanay.org, www.toscotland.com) Season’s greeting: "Slainte mhath!" Reveillon, Rio De Janeiro, Brazil: Early on New Year’s Eve, hundreds of people will arrive on Copacabana Beach and toss flowers into the waves to ask Yemanja, the Afro-Brazilian goddess of the sea, to grant their wishes. By 8pm, when live acts start on four stages, a four-kilometer stretch of sand will be covered with candles, as 2,000,000 hedonists, mostly dressed in white, samba until the midnight fireworks, pause to watch, and then party on down for days. (www.braziltour.com) Season’s greeting: "Feliz ano novo!" Piazza del Popolo, Rome, Italy: Fireworks and rock music will ring in the New Year on the freshly restored piazza. Crockery will be tossed from balconies, Mass will be celebrated, and then, in the early morning, a massive children’s carnival will get under way on January 1 with performers on stilts, clowns, acrobats, and everyone in papier-maché masks. (www.romatourismo.com) Season’s greeting: "Buon capo d’anno!" — Amanda Watson
		Brandenburg Gate, Berlin, Germany: Since the early 1990s, millions have flocked to the gate, a symbol of the separation between East and West, for the annual "Silvester." Don’t miss three kilometers of partygoers, organized fireworks displays, a spectacular light show at the Siegessaule monument, and live performances. (www.berlin-tourist-information.de) Season’s greeting: "Gutes neues jahr!"

		Times Square, New York City: No booze allowed, and there are no toilets — plus if you don’t get there by mid-afternoon, you could find Times Square blocked off to pedestrians and traffic. But you should be there at least once in your life. Times Square offers music, balloons, pompoms, one ton of confetti, huge video screens, screaming crowds, a guaranteed appearance on worldwide TV, fireworks, and that Waterford Crystal ball lowered at midnight. Go early for the best spot near the ball, at Broadway at 43rd Street. (www.timessquarenyc.org) Season’s greeting: "What Are You Looking At?"

		Red Square, Moscow, Russia: It might not be quite like the year Boris Yeltsin resigned and Muscovites flocked to Red Square to fire rockets over the Kremlin walls, but it’s a picturesque place to party. Laser lights will play against the Kremlin walls, girls will trip around dressed as ice-maidens, and men come as Father Frosts. Hopefully, snow will be falling on the onion domes of Saint Basil’s Cathedral, and, by the time the bells of the Spasskaya clock tower chime, the crowds should be cheerfully drunk on Salute, a lethal mix of vodka and Russian Champagne. (www.moscow-city.ru) Season’s greeting: "Snovum godom!"

		Kitzbuhel, Austrian Tirol: Tirolean traditions are strong here and on December 31 there will be wine, food, dancing and song in a village of narrow streets, stone arches, and little wooden houses. On the slopes above the picturesque 13th-century village, as midnight approaches, 100 ski instructors will shoot down the famous Hahnenkamm run in formation before jumping en masse through meter-high flames to music. (www.austriatourism.com) Season’s greeting: "Gutes neues jahr!"