IT was lunchtime in Palermo, and in the old quarter, a small trattoria was filling up with burly construction workers and fishermen in sodden boots — all crowded around rickety tables watching a soccer match on a staticky television set. The place was noisy with clanking glasses and men talking over one another. Platters of sautéed vegetables and grilled calamari lined the countertop, and the perfume of sizzling garlic drifted through the room. I scanned the other tables and ordered what everyone else was having: spaghetti, drizzled with olive oil and laden with fresh clams, mussels and tomatoes.

But when the pasta arrived, drenched in a briny, spicy tomato broth, there was no fork and no waiter in sight. There was just the owner, known simply as Pina, shuffling in threadbare slippers, a lighted cigarette precariously perched on the edge of her mouth. “You need a fork?” Pina barked. Her gravelly voice was so intimidating that I was ready to eat with my hands. “Get it yourself. Top drawer, next to the stove.”

If eating in Palermo's rustic trattorias seems like visiting someone's home, that's because it often is. Pina, a gruff Sicilian mother, keeps a bedroom behind the kitchen and five days a week opens her canteen-sized dining room for lunch, serving some of the most authentic food in this port city.

At Zia Pina (Via Argenteria, 67), four blocks from the Tyrrhenian Sea, you won't find a sign welcoming diners, written menus, a reservation book or even a telephone. Instead, there are half a dozen tables, biblical paintings and dented pots and pans gurgling and steaming on a beat-up stove.

But you can't simply walk in. If Pina doesn't like the look of you, she'll tell you the trattoria is closed — and she'll do it as she's serving platters of stuffed mushrooms and grilled swordfish to a table of hungry fishermen. Luckily, I arrived with my Sicilian friend Emanuele, a photojournalist who has been eating at places like Zia Pina since he was a child.

The food of Palermo, like its rocky shoreline and weathered faces, is a bit rough. Vegetables are crudely chopped; fish is served with head and tail; everything comes under a veil of coarse sea salt. Pina's cooking was no exception. She was partial to pasta tossed with fresh shrimp, calamari or sea bass, as well as hearty salads of potatoes, capers and onions. If you're still hungry, you're welcome to seconds, but don't expect Pina to bring them. You can help yourself from the caldron on the stove.

At-home trattorias are not the insular tradition they used to be in Sicily. What began decades ago as lunch counters for blue-collar workers, usually started by their wives at home, are spreading to garages and empty houses — and they are becoming increasingly popular with young Sicilians and businessmen, who come for the laid-back atmosphere, low prices and arguably the best food in Sicily.

The amateur chefs are cautiously opening their doors to the public, and their menus are expanding, too, though not by much. They are still open only for lunch (about 12:30 to 2 p.m.), prices are remarkably cheap (pasta is usually under 3 euros, about $4 at $1.38 to the euro), and the recipes were handed down from the chef's grandmother. A click more relaxed than standard trattorias, these places have the air of an old-fashioned speakeasy — the proprietor might sleep in the back room, and the entrance is purposely hard to find, with unmarked doors, few signs and no advertising.

And because the places are not entirely legal, the would-be restaurateurs don't have to worry about things like workplace insurance, smoking laws, liquor licenses or even taxes. “Most of these places pay protection money to the Mafia,” Emanuele said. “They just want to serve good food to their regulars and keep their heads down.”

Well, that and watch soccer. A few days later, Emanuele and I walked into La Rosa Nero, or the Pink Black — a small, free-standing concrete hut in the middle of the quiet, dusty Piazzetta della Api. On a Saturday afternoon last January, the scene inside was another story. Two small rooms, painted pink and black, were crammed with flimsy plastic tables and crowded with groups of men hunched over bowls of steaming pasta, plates of fried calamari and small cups of red wine. Their eyes were fixed on the television — Palermo versus Lazio, and Palermo was losing. Shouts and jeers filled the small trattoria. There wasn't an empty seat in the house.

Rosa Nero is run by a young man named Benedetto. He wouldn't reveal his last name because his trattoria is not licensed and he preferred not to call attention to himself. Benedetto explained that this used to be his mother's house. Friends would come over to watch soccer, and his mother would whip up bowls of spaghetti with sardines. Before he knew it, the dining room had grown into a neighborhood soccer club and, as more friends came, a trattoria was born.

Emanuele and I sat down next to a group of teenagers and ordered the house special: angiova, or pasta with sardines. It arrived like an untossed salad — whole sardines (heads on), chunks of tomato and a splatter of pine nuts and sweet raisins, all piled atop a small mountain of pasta. I grabbed the fork and spoon, and mixed it up until it turned into a hearty sauce — sweet, salty and a little nutty.

Full and happy, we got up to leave and I started to leave a tip. “This isn't done,” said Emanuele. “These places don't pay taxes; all the money goes in their pockets.” Do they ever get in trouble with the law? “See those two men in the corner?” he pointed. “They're police, and they like the food as much as the rest of us.”

On my last afternoon in Palermo, Emanuele and I walked down to the waterfront, to an area known as Piazza Kalsa. Our destination was Padre Aldo (again, no address, no phone). The trattoria could easily be mistaken for someone's home — a tidy house on a residential block with a little garden on one side and a paved driveway on the other. “I was born next door,” said Aldo Balestreri, a lively 77-year-old with a stubbly white beard. “My specialty is grilled fish.” He paused for dramatic effect. “And Camilla Parker Bowles ate here once.”

Mr. Balestreri added that this used to be a taverna — a hall where men drank grappa until sunrise. Then, one summer about 40 years ago, he rolled a barbecue grill onto the driveway and started cooking meat. Next thing he knew, he had a trattoria.

Despite the chilly weather, most patrons were sitting at plastic tables on the driveway, now a patio. We sat down and listened to the menu. Moments later, an antipasto of olives, sardines, tomatoes and capers, drizzled in olive oil and coarse grains of salt, arrived on a worn block of wood. For pasta, we had spaghetti with baby shrimp, mussels, rough-cut garlic and spicy red pepper flakes. We washed it down with chilled red wine and watched the lunch crowd ramble in — young suntanned couples, gray-haired men with callused hands, and teenage boys with greasy hair and baggy jeans.

Then Padre Aldo re-emerged, holding two swordfish steaks. He slapped them on the grill and started calling out the day's menu over the hiss of the barbecue. A few moments later, he brought us two plates of spada alla palermitana, or swordfish Palermo-style — lightly breaded with a few drops of olive oil and a fat lemon wedge.

The three courses and a bottle of wine came out to 20 euros. As we walked away, Aldo called out from the searing iron grill: “You never asked why they call me Padre Aldo. It's because they think I'm Jesus — my food is that good.”

I AM in a deep, deep tunnel, die-straight and dark and two miles long, a fingernail of faraway brilliance at its mouth brightening every second until, with startling suddenness, it is daylight. Ahead of the car are scores upon scores upon scores of mighty towers, climbing endlessly into the foggy sky, like some surreal and unexpected ruined city. It is a sight utterly to astonish the unprepared, akin only perhaps to the moment when a Midwestern soybean farmer is flushed out of the Lincoln Tunnel into the canyons of Midtown Manhattan.

But this is not New York. This is central China, and a remote part of the mountains of northwestern Hunan province, until lately seldom visited and indeed until 50 years ago barely even settled. The tunnel is brand new, built last year for the equivalent of $200 million, and the towers to which it leads are not skyscrapers — well, they are, though not made of steel and glass, but natural, of a buff Cretaceous sandstone, and topped with clinging pine trees. There are well over 3,000 spires, and they make up what the United Nations 15 years ago declared to be one of the most remarkable geomorphological spectacles existing on our planet.

The Wulingyuan National Park is magnificent enough — for its topography, for its rare plants and trees and for its stupendous (though panda-free) fauna — that it has been officially designated by Unesco as demanding protection for the benefit of all mankind. Once word of this designation became known, though, all mankind decided it wanted a look-see — and armies of tourists began to descend on the wilderness of northwestern Hunan, trampling the trails, muddying the ground and causing deep anxiety among those charged with managing the region’s treasures.

So far, only a smattering are Westerners. But the Chinese themselves, who with their newfound freedoms and prosperity (and cars and superhighways and cellphone towers) are fast discovering their country as never before, have all of a sudden, and in their millions, discovered Wulingyuan.

The manner in which that discovery is manifesting itself speaks volumes about the way the world can and should be dealing with its most precious places.

The deliciously intricate geology of China — basically an immense tectonic plate endlessly tormented by titanic collisions with the neighboring plates that bear India and Australia — is of course responsible for both the fabulous complexities and the extreme isolation of Wulingyuan. Sixty million years ago there were tropical seas there; sometimes they were deep, leaving soft and fossil-rich limestones, sometimes shallow, leaving hard beach-sandstone. Then the land rose under tectonic pressure, and the weathering of the limestones and sandstones proceeded in that peculiar way that is called, after a geologically similar area in Slovenia, karst. The limestones dissolved over millions of years into fissures and sinkholes and immense caves, the sandstones cracked into knife-edged pillars, some of them like needle-shaped mesas, fully 1,000 feet high.

Tourists come to this increasingly accessible corner of China to see both — although most I spoke to said they had come for the landscape of towers, which looks uncannily like the ink-and-paper drawings that for centuries have presented a defining aspect of classical Chinese art. Yet there is a difference: the art is fanciful, the imagined landscapes of the creative mind; the geology of Wulingyuan has produced more than 100 square miles of landscape that is very much the real thing, however fantastic it might at first appear.

As I drove there from the immense and grubby city of Chongqing, a hard day’s journey, I confess to having fairly low expectations. The weather was unpropitious, to say the least: it was raining hard, and a stiff westerly gale was blowing the stain of city pollution almost to the fringes of the park. I had been to countless other Chinese tourist sites before and had winced at how often the authorities seemed to render their charges into Asian versions of Gatlinburg or Blackpool or, at best, Disneyland.

But at that first sight of those soaring towers at the tunnel mouth, everything changed. (As did the weather: as if by an edict of the gods the wind eased, the rain softened until it had become no more than mist, and the summits of the pillars became wrapped in fronds of cloud as delicate as skeins of silk.)

The scenery in Wulingyuan turns out to be so immense and impressive, and yet so geologically frangible, that it seems positively to demand to be cared for. Like the Grand Canyon and Monument Valley, the huge forests of pillars stand foursquare against the distant blue hills, announcing themselves to be the very treasures that Unesco declares them to be. At every twist and turn of the road there is a view to make one gasp.

In terms of astonishment I found myself saying time and again, as I gaped from cliff-edge and bridge and viewing tower: This is as great as the Great Wall. And all the while I had to remind myself that Wulingyuan had been made by nature for China, and though it looks in places almost too perfect and carefully hewn to be true, not made, like the wall, by politically motivated man.

Yet politics has contributed significantly to turning Wulingyuan into an important way-station for the modern Chinese visitor. A senior Communist soldier named He Long — who was from the minority Tujia ethnic group and so was particularly venerated for his loyalty to the Maoist cause — happened to come from this region of Hunan. During the Civil War of the 1930s he took refuge in the canyons and remote river valleys, venturing out from time to time to wreak havoc on any nearby Republican forces.

When the war was over and the People’s Republic was declared in 1949, Marshal He became a national hero, and the theaters of his battlings entered the geography of the national epic, along with the route of Mao Zedong’s Long March and the details of the capture of Beijing. So a trickle of visitors started in the mid-1950s, all ardent pioneers taking part in a patriotic pilgrimage. A gigantic bronze statue of Marshal He was erected, looking suitably heroic on a cliff edge, a quiverful of 600-foot sandstone spears bristling up from the depths behind him. To touch the hem of the marshal’s cloak in Wulingyuan is, for many, the realization of an immense ideological ideal.

But now it is mostly about tourism, and pleasure. In the late 20th century, a rapidly changing China realized that it had in Hunan a scenic amazement on its hands. It already had the Great Wall and Guilin and the terra-cotta warriors of Xian. Now, within easy reach of Shanghai and Guangzhou and not too far from Beijing, it had a gem of a place, hitherto unknown, unseen, scenically unforgettable, culturally impeccable and politically just the ticket. The central government declared it the country’s first National Forest Park in 1982; Unesco awarded it World Heritage Site status in 1992, and then, in 2004, declared it one of the world’s GeoParks, a classical and world-class demonstration of remarkable geology. Whereupon the floodgates opened, and all China began to pour in.

A brand-new domestic airport has just opened in Zhangjiajie City, 20 miles away; a new road will connect the park to Chongqing, which has a municipal population exceeding 30 million and lies just 300 miles to the west and will soon not take a long hard day to drive, as it had taken me; a four-lane superhighway has just been opened to the huge city of Changsha, three hours off; four flights daily connect to Hong Kong. There are even more flights connecting to Seoul, and Wulingyuan is being heavily advertised on South Korean television.

I had my fears. I have been on the Great Wall on a stifling summer’s day; I have seen Kyoto’s Philosopher’s Walk in mid sakura season, and I have known Venice during the Biennale — and so I have seen the third circle of tourism hell, and I fret over its potential for spreading. But now that I have been there, I have little hesitation in applauding the Chinese for managing this most extraordinary of sights — using a mixture of ruthless discipline and tender care. Wulingyuan, it seems to me, works. This truly world-class spectacle is remaining, if barely, uncrowded and unruined by the immense battalions who now quite understandably wish to see it.

High technology and high cost control the crowds. A truly bewildering array of entry charges — all of them displayed on a board at the park entrance that has to be fully 20 feet long to accommodate their various permutations — comes down to one reality: it costs a bald 248 yuan to get in. That is about $32, a little more than an average week’s wages in China.

Once inside there are more charges: to ride a bus or the aerial cableway (Austrian-built, installed last year, and breathtaking as it swings between and above the sandstone pillars); to take a three-car glass-walled elevator bolted up the side of one of the tallest pillars; to visit the caves (which are privately owned by one of Deng Xiaoping’s grandsons); to circle an artificial lake owned by a Hong Kong investment firm. There is some rather tame whitewater rafting, too, 130 additional yuan for an experience not much more exciting than tubing on the middle reaches of the Susquehanna.

All things considered, a Chinese family visiting Wulingyuan can easily spend two months’ pay in a single day. A foreign family will perhaps feel less pain, but because of the high prices all feel a sense of privilege once inside — which is a feeling, I am fast coming to think, that responsible 21st-century tourism should perhaps engender.

Moreover, the gatekeepers know exactly how many are inside the park at any one time, and they have the power to shut would-be visitors out, which might seem harsh, but to those trapped in a heaving summer scrum on Piazza San Marco or inside the Forbidden City, it is the kind of decision that would probably seem a sensible relief.

The disadvantage is that the park’s cost-free walkways — most notably that along a three-mile canyon close to the lower entrance — can be unbearably crowded, with long lines of strollers (and the unfit and the elderly in bamboo sedan chairs) creating an ugly and noisy congestion. As elsewhere in Wulingyuan, there are monkeys aplenty for such mobs to see and feed (illegally); but if there really are cloud leopards and pangolins and all the other animals and birds for which this reserve is said to be famous, the commotion along the Golden Whip River Canyon has clearly sent them all scurrying off into the forest.

As most Western visitors would dearly like to do, I suspect. The park regulations do not seem to allow overnight camping; but they do permit wandering on half-defined trails, and I imagine that most outsiders who get to the park would have little interest in paying obeisance to Marshal He, but would relish the chance, especially if the weather is good (and springtime, when the cherry and plum trees are in full blossom, is splendidly cool and misty) to walk, and commune with that rarest of treasures — Chinese nature.

And there is one superb benefit for doing so, I discovered as I trekked up the 3,000 stone steps to a temple site on top of one of the mountains. According to signs posted every half mile or so, there is No Smoking, anywhere inside the park. I didn’t see a single soul lighting up — and in China that is quite remarkable.

The consequence is that in Wulingyuan, not only are the peaks tall and the waters clear, the birds in full song and the flowers in bloom, but the atmosphere is — as almost nowhere else in China — well nigh perfectly clear. And that is perhaps the very best reason to go. Here you can breathe fresh air, something that in today’s China is the most precious of finds, and a very great delight.

VISITOR INFORMATION

Wulingyuan National Park, about 860 miles southwest of Beijing, covers more than 100 square miles in Hunan Province and encompasses four major scenic areas: Zhangjiajie Forest Park, Yangjiajie Scenic Spot, and Tianzishan and Suoxiyu Natural Resources Reserves. A tour of several attractions takes about three days.

A general-entry ticket, good for two days, costs 248 yuan ($31.90 at 7.77 yuan to the dollar) at the park gates. Separate tickets are required for cable cars, lifts and access to some areas. Within Suoxiyu Reserve, for example, prices include 130 yuan for rafting on the Maoyan River, 65 yuan to visit Longwang Cave (Dragon King Cave) and 62 yuan for Baofeng Lake.

The most convenient airport, Lotus Airport (Hehua Airport) in Zhangjiajie City, about 23 miles from the park entrance, is served by daily flights to and from several major Chinese cities. The two-hour flight from Beijing on Air China or Hainan Airline costs 1,470 yuan , with discounts available during the off-season. Flights from Hong Kong on China Southern Airlines arrive twice a week. A taxi from the airport to the national park costs 80 to 100 yuan , with most drivers open to negotiation.

There is no direct bus to the park, but buses run from the airport to the bus station in downtown Zhangjiajie City, and from there to the park every 10 minutes from 5 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Traffic at the park gate is usually light, with long lines expected only during peak holiday periods, such as October and the first week of May. Shuttle buses within the park connect major sites.

Hotels within walking distance of the park gates include Hunan Xiangdian International Hotel (86-744-5712999), with mountain-view rooms starting at 480 yuan ; Hunan Pipaxi Hotel (86-744-5718888), in the courtyard style of the local Tujia people, with rooms from 440 yuan ; and Best Western Premier Zhangjiajie (86-744-5669888), the best-appointed of area hotels, with rooms from 800 yuan. To get the lowest rates, book through a travel agent.

Most visitors have breakfast and dinner at their hotels and eat lunch inside the park, where restaurants are easy to find at popular tourist sites but rare in less visited areas. The most popular fast-food places in the park are Tianzi Fastfood, with three locations, (86) 744-5618588, (86) 744-5617888 and (86) 744-5617777, and Tianqiao Fastfood, (86) 744-5719226. These offer buffets as well as regular meals, including such local delicacies as wild fungus, pine mushroom, sweet corn on the cob, kiwi, partridge and wild boar. Locally run restaurants are also found in the park.

In Zhingjianjie, try Xiang Li Ren Jia (Second Floor, Tianmen Clothing Mall, Huilong Road, Zhangjiajie City, 86-744-8297977), featuring local sour and spicy Hunan-style dishes. By LIN YANG

SNOOTY travelers could be forgiven for overlooking Brussels, a European capital whose iconic monument is a 17th-century bronze statue of a little boy urinating into a fountain. But travelers who ignore Brussels, home of the European Union, twice-fried French fries and the Surrealist painter René Magritte, do so at their peril. For one thing, there is the food — a veritable galaxy of Michelin stars. Then there is the beer: more than 600 varieties, including ales brewed by monks. Add to that a thriving design scene, and the city — once dismissed as a provincial and humorless wasteland — is finally making cultural waves. Just join the crowds in front of the Manneken-Pis, the pixyish statue, and you'll get the idea. Locals delight in dressing up the young boy as Elvis or, sometimes, in a giant condom.

Friday

5 p.m.
1) BEERS ON THE GRAND' PLACE

For centuries, tourists have reportedly fainted when confronted with the sheer beauty of Florence. This won't happen in Brussels. The city does not have the Uffizi Gallery or Michelangelo's “David.” But it does have the Grand' Place, a truly marvelous square in the city's center. Brave the hordes of tourists (and the kitschy lace shops and overpriced seafood joints nearby) to drink a Trappist beer at Le Roy d'Espagne (Grand' Place 1; 32-2-513-0807, www.roydespagne.be), an atmospheric bar in one of the Grand' Place's grandest guild houses. Expect pigs' bladders hanging from the ceiling and harried waiters in long white aprons that match their long faces. Grab a seat on the outdoor terrace so you can gawk at the Baroque square.

8 p.m.
2) RABBIT STEW

Brussels is a foodies' paradise, and you'll struggle to eat a bad meal. A standout among the hundreds of traditional Belgian brasseries is Les Brassins (36, rue Keyenveld; 32-2-512 6999; www.lesbrassins.com), a lively place that serves 50 different brews and Belgian classics like lapin à la Kriek (rabbit stewed in flavored beer) and stoemp (a winter stew with potatoes, carrots, onion sauce and sausages) for under 15 euros ($20, at $1.35 to the euro). The restaurant is at the end of a hard-to-find back street in Ixelles, a neighborhood popular with expatriates. After your meal, wander up the street and find the plaque marking the birthplace of Audrey Hepburn.

Midnight
3) JAZZY BARS

In a city full of alluring bars, the granddaddy of cool may be the L'Archiduc (6, rue Antoine Dansaert; 32-2-512-0652; www.archiduc.net), in the downtown area near the stock exchange. Ring the doorbell, go through a steel bubble swinging door and marvel at the Art Deco room, furnished with high ceilings and an undulating bar. Nazis were rumored to have frequented the bar during the German occupation; today, the clientele consists mainly of goateed beatniks and media types. L'Archiduc is particularly popular with jazz fans — Miles Davis once jammed there — and impromptu jam sessions often take place on weekends. A warning: the service can be nonchalant, verging on nonexistent.

SATURDAY

10 a.m.
4) BREAK FOR NOUVEAU

If the institutional modernism of the European Union's sprawling offices leaves you cold, escape can be found in the city's Art Nouveau, the flowery architectural style popular at the beginning of the 20th century. One of the genre's finest practitioners, and a father of Belgian Art Nouveau, was Victor Horta. Visit his home and studio, which have been turned into the Musée Horta (25, rue Américaine, St.-Gilles; 32-2-543-0490; www.hortamuseum.be; hours are 2 to 5:30 p.m., but earlier tours can be arranged by e-mail at least a week in advance). The exterior is typically Belgian: understated. The interior hides lots of astonishing details, including a grand stairwell made of marble and wrought iron that undulates into the expressive shapes of an abstract painting. Natural light pours down from a stained-glass canopy onto the floral mirrors, Tiffany lamps, mosaic floors and carved banister. The effect is dreamlike — until the hordes of tourists bring you back to earth.

Noon
5) MOULES FRITES, ANYONE?

For lunch (from July 17, when it reopens), head to the 80-year-old Aux Armes de Bruxelles (13, rue des Bouchers; 32-2-511-5550; www.armebrux.be), near the Grand' Place, which has some of the freshest buckets of mussels, complete with French fries and mayonnaise. Real Bruxellois eat the first mussel with their fingers, and use the empty shell as a utensil for scooping up the rest. Don't forget to mop up the mussel soup with a hunk of crusty bread. If you want a spot away from the tourists, moules frites aficionados swear by Au Vieux Bruxelles (35, rue St.-Boniface; 32-2-503-3111; www.auvieuxbruxelles.com) in the heart of a lively Congolese neighborhood, which serves delectable mussels made with beer, curry and blue cheese, for about 20 euros.

2 p.m.
6) SHOPPING À LA BELGE

Bargain hunters throughout Europe flock to the Place du Jeu de Balle for a flea market in Brussels' oldest quarter, the working-class but quickly gentrifying Marolles. The market has everything from African masks and retro cinema chairs to fake reproductions of old Belgian masters like Bruegel. The surrounding streets — Rue Blaes and Rue Haute — are peppered with a quirky mix of antique furniture shops, galleries and cafes. For more froufrou surroundings, walk five minutes north to the Sablon, an upscale district frequented by bourgeois grannies whose outfits match their French poodles. The district's jewel is the Place du Petit Sablon, a small and picturesque park framed by an imposing Gothic church, with railings by the Art Nouveau master Paul Hankar, as well as statues of famous Belgians you've never heard of.

6 p.m.
7) SWEET BREAK

Get a chocolate boost at Pierre Marcolini (1, rue des Minimes; 32-2-514-1206; www.marcolini.be), one of the best places to buy chocolate in a city that takes the cocoa bean very seriously. An assortment of 33 chocolates, including truffles and dark chocolate, costs 16.50 euros.

9 p.m.
8) ROYAL CUISINE

Some restaurants in Brussels leave you feeling giddy, if not a bit ecstatic. Museum Brasserie (3, place Royale; 32-2-508-3590; www.museumfood.be), a new place from the Flemish chef Peter Goossens, is among them. (His other restaurant, Hof van Cleve, has three Michelin stars.) Set in a Victor Horta building that's part of the Royal Museums of Fine Arts, the minimalist interior is dominated by immense black chandeliers and attracts Flemish hipsters and matrons alike. The kitchen specializes in updated Belgian classics like eel in green sauce, veal kidneys with Ghent mustard and spit-roasted cockerel — all accompanied by perfect frites (Mr. Goossens started his culinary career peddling fries). The wine cellar, encased in sleek glass, offers a nice mix of French and New World varieties, including a delightful Flemish chardonnay with hints of seaweed. For dessert, order the waffles from Liège, a town in Belgium, which manage to be baroque without being too sweet. Dinner for two, not including wine, runs about 70 euros.

Midnight
9) BOHEMIAN BROTHEL

For good times, stumble over to Goupil le Fol (22, rue de la Violette; 32-2-511-1396), an eccentric, three-story bar housed in a former brothel that looks like a cross between an opium den and a 1970s porno set. The walls are covered with old paintings of nudes and lurid landscapes, as well as vinyl LPs. Sink into one of the couches, order one of the owner's favorite fruit wines and party into the wee hours, with an Edith Piaf song blaring from a nearby jukebox. Those with less bohemian instincts should stay downstairs, as the clientele gets more and more risqué the higher you climb.

Sunday

11 a.m.
10) A FAMILIAR BRUNCH SPOT

You can find this bakery chain in Manhattan or Paris, but the original Le Pain Quotidien is in Brussels and remains one of the better brunch spots in a town that's not great at doing brunch. The flagship bakery is on the Grand Sablon (11, rue des Sablons; 32-2-513-5154; www.lepainquotidien.com) with large pine tables crammed with jams, chocolates and bread. The wait can be irksome, but the farmers' bread is hot from the oven, coffee is served in large bowls and the cheese tartines are always fresh. Plus, on those rare Brussels days when the sun is out, the retractable roof lets in a slice of heaven. Breakfast for two, about 40 euros.

1 p.m.
11) PICNIC AT A CHATEAU

For pastoral escape, stroll the grounds of the Château de la Hulpe (111, chaussée de Bruxelles; 32-2-653-6404; www.chateaudelahulpe.wallonie.be), an enchanting French-style castle built in 1842 that overlooks 561 acres of woods and ponds on the border of Brussels' Forêt de Soignes. The castle is not generally open to the public, but the grounds — adorned with rhododendrons and azaleas — are more than worth the 25-minute train ride. And the farmhouse of the main castle houses the Fondation Folon (6A, drève de la Ramée, La Hulpe; 322-653-3456; www.fondationfolon.be), which shows the work of the prolific Belgian artist Jean-Michel Folon.

VISITOR INFORMATION

SN Brussels Airlines and American Airlines have daily flights from Kennedy Airport in New York to Brussels Airport, while Continental Airlines flies from Newark. A recent Web search for early August showed round-trip fares starting at $1,037.

The best way to get into central Brussels is on the 30-minute Brussels Airport Express to Central Station. It runs every 15 minutes and costs 3 euros, or $4.05 at $1.35 to the euro.

Brussels hotels are expensive, thanks to the constant influx of Armani-clad diplomats. One bargain — starting at 95 euros for a double — is the Baroque Hotel Mozart (23, rue du Marché aux Fromages; 32-2-502-6661; www.hotel-mozart.be), which has 50 comfortable, compact rooms.

If you packed Armani, try the Jolly Hotel du Grand Sablon (2/4 rue Bodenbroek, 800-221-2626, www.jollyhotels.com/eng), a luxurious hotel on a chic square within walking distance of the Royal Palace, the Grand' Place and the main museums. Summer specials start at 99 euros.

WITH the summer travel season upon us, many pet owners are facing the question of what to do with the pets when the family goes on vacation. Some choose to take Fido and Fluffy along; others prefer to leave them behind with friends or send them on their own vacations by boarding them at a kennel for pampered pets.

Last month the Practical Traveler column offered tips on traveling with dogs from Cesar Millan, a dog behaviorist better known as National Geographic Channel’s Dog Whisperer. Dozens of readers wrote in and posted their own tips and suggestions at nytimes.com/travel. Some cat owners complained that the column left them out and had hints to pass on to other feline fans. Others had questions about flying pets overseas or as checked baggage. A few took issue with Mr. Millan’s thoughts on sedation. And several shared their experiences about airlines and hotels that were particularly accommodating to their four-legged companions. Here is a sampling of what some had to say, along with a few more tips based on my research and reporting. (Letters have been edited.)

Ron Dylewski from Pittsburgh, Pa., who frequents cat shows and has taken his 20-pound Maine coon cat on the road for more than 40 weekends in the last year, offered these tips:

• Get a soft carrier that has removable wheels. It’s much easier to roll that much weight around than to have it on your shoulder for miles.

• Keep a very close watch on what sort of plane you’ll be on. Many of the regional jets have limited space under the seat, and even if you book a pet ticket online, the lack of space may not be flagged for you. Also, you can be in trouble if the airlines substitute another type of plane at the last minute.

• We generally try to get window or center seats, where the under-the-seat space is better than the aisle seat.

Although Cesar Millan condoned sedating dogs traveling in the airplane cabin — as long as the owner was careful to test the medication and monitor the pet’s reaction to it before traveling — some readers were adamantly opposed.

Kevin O’Brien of PetRelocation.com, which specializes in pet transport, said: “Sedation is by far the worst possible thing you can do to your pet before their long flight. Sedation, mixed with altitude, creates a dangerous cocktail that prevents the animals from using their natural ability to regulate their body temperature and to control their own stress. We suggest that the human take the pill, as the pet will have a better experience than most humans when flying with commercial airlines.”

Alexandra Kovach from Washington, who has a small dog named Ripple that was sedated for a cross-country trip, wrote: “It was really hard on her and her heartbeat slowed and she got so lethargic — it was frightening! She slowly recovered after the flight after getting sick a few times, too.” Ms. Kovach recommended using Calming Essence, an herbal remedy, instead.

Martin Delfin, who said he moved to Madrid from Puerto Rico two years ago with Toby, his “five-kilo mixed terrier,” said the dog “did fine on the eight-hour flight,” having taken half of a Pet Sedate tablet. The only side effect: “He did seem to suffer a day of jet lag (just lay around and slept, like most humans).”

Cesar Millan won’t fly his large dogs, since they must travel as checked baggage or in the cargo hold of the plane. Rather, he prefers to have them travel in a recreational vehicle. But readers who must resort to air travel for their pets wanted some guidelines for large animals on flights.

To help avoid delays and reduce the stress on your pet, book a nonstop flight whenever possible. During the summer, try to book an early morning, evening or overnight flight, when the temperatures are cooler. Airlines typically will not accept pets as checked baggage or cargo when the temperature is forecast to exceed 85 degrees at any location on the animal’s itinerary. And some airlines will not accept snub-nosed dogs, like Boston terriers, bulldogs or pugs, during the summer as they tend to be particularly sensitive to heat.

FIND out if the country you are visiting has any quarantine or other health requirements by contacting its embassy or a consulate. Pets must be at least eight weeks old and fully weaned before flying within the United States, for example. Dogs must have a certificate showing they have been vaccinated against rabies at least 30 days before entering the United States.

Americans flying to Britain are eligible for the Pet Travel Scheme, or PETS, which allows dogs and cats from certain countries to enter Britain without the normal quarantine, as long as they are fitted with microchip tracking devices and have been vaccinated against and tested for rabies. Information about this program is at www.defra.gov.uk.

For those traveling from Britain, Vanessa K. Will, who relocated from Scotland to Michigan last year with her two border terriers, Ede and Atze, had a suggestion: “The best tip I have is to find a reputable pet relocation specialist in the United Kingdom to handle the booking, etc. It doesn’t cost much more, and they often know the ins and outs in a way that’s very helpful. The people at James Cargo at Heathrow are very helpful (they also run the animal reception center at the airport). ... I did consider taking the Queen Mary 2 from Southampton to New York. They allow dogs in a special kennel area where you can visit them, and they get walked several times a day. Humans are allowed unlimited baggage, and between the cargo and excess luggage charges you’re saving, a small inside cabin comes out to about the same.”

Another reader, Jack McBride, had advice on pet-friendly hotels: “Although some hotels charge extra for pets, it’s worth it, and generally less expensive than putting them in a kennel. The AAA has an excellent guidebook (“Traveling With Your Pet”) that lists pet-friendly accommodations in all states.”

Dale, from Orlando, prefers La Quinta Inns for his two long-haired miniature dachshunds: “The accommodations are minimal, but it beats sneaking the dogs into the room under blankets at the Marriott.”

IT seems it's necessary to visit Venice every few years to reaffirm that a couple of things haven't changed. One, the world's favorite city hasn't yet sunk into the sea, and two, the food isn't nearly as bad as most “experts” report.

In fact, we remain aware of Venice's impending demise through reports, not observation, and the food is beyond a doubt the most underrated in all of Italy.

To many Americans, it's somehow seen as a shortcoming that all the good Venetian restaurants specialize in fish, and use less butter and garlic than in much of northern Italy, almost no Parmesan or prosciutto, and but a few spices. Yes, the cooking is limited in scope, intensely regional and seasonal; but Alice Waters has been proclaimed a genius for cooking this way.

It all seems strange at first, but then you remember that Venice was the seat of an empire, and is unusual even in a confederation of former city-states. They do their own thing there, and they do it so well that you can eat variations of the same dishes over and over and keep enjoying them.

And if Venice's good restaurants are expensive, there are swell places to stay that are not, and you can walk almost everywhere, saving tons of money on taxis. To eat well, you must go to the right places — not the pizzeria at the base of the Accademia, or any place in St. Mark's Square. And the right places are either the bacari (the neighborhood wine and snack bars) or the undeniably pricey old reliables and their imitators.

Time after time this year, I found the best cooking in Venice restaurants at the same places I'd found it during my last lengthy visit, more than 10 years ago.

The general recommendations are these: Avoid places with tourist menus, eat loads of fish and drink white. (That you can walk everywhere allows you to freely imbibe the excellent local wines, like Soave, which in general is like no Soave you'll get in the United States.) In the good places you'll be served shrimp — or prawns or any of the dozen or so local names for that family of crustaceans — that make you think no other shrimp should exist.

One place new to me, and serving my favorite version of slightly updated traditional Venetian food at a relatively reasonable price, is Osteria di Santa Marina (Castello, Campo Santa Marina 5911; 39-041-528-5239; www.osteriadisantamarina.it). It is a cute but not funky joint with rough-plank wood walls, glass-front dark wood cabinets, hanging metal lampshades, and windows overlooking the lovely campo.

I was interested in the 55-euro tasting menu (about $75 at $1.37 to the euro) but not in salmon carpaccio, so I asked the waiter for a substitution. After lengthy and intensely amiable negotiations, with many suggestions on his part, I wound up with a customized tasting menu, the majority of which was substitutions.

When I ate just half of every dish (I'd lunched at Da Fiore), they discounted the bill 25 percent. “It's just the way we do things here,” my waiter said.

This in a city widely considered to be filled with thieves.

What I ate was super: black sea bass ravioli in mussel-clam broth, beautifully hand shaped and pinched on top, like dim sum; perfect black barley risotto with mushrooms, zucca (pumpkin) purée, and a couple of first-rate grilled scampi; grilled octopus on a bed of potatoes mashed with olive oil, along with cold, slow-cooked tomato — a surprising touch that worked — and a garnish of lardo (cured fat) tangled with a wafer of black bread; zucca saor (saor is the local marinade, usually of raisins, pine nuts, oil, vinegar and onion) with thin fried slices of artichoke and soft shell crab.

Then there was the inevitable, ubiquitous, emblematic and wonderful fritto misto, served on greaseless brown paper and featuring the local tiny soft-shell crab, about the size of a silver dollar — crisp, light, hot, irresistible. I liked the desserts, too, especially the almond nougat with chantilly, raspberries and pistachio ice cream, and the lemon sorbet with licorice.

That was the most ambitious and perhaps most enjoyable meal I ate in Venice, but it was not necessarily the best. That honor would have to go to the popular, deservedly hyped Da Fiore (San Polo, Calle del Scaleter, 2002; 39-041-721-308; www.dafiore.net), which, despite its tuxedoed staff and expense (figure at least 100 euros a person for three courses plus dessert and a moderately priced bottle of wine), is friendly and not at all stuffy. From the moment I tasted the amuse-bouche — shrimp broth with orange peel — I was sold. The food restores faith.

This was followed by crostini with the most tender and delicately flavored shrimp, wrapped in thin slices of lardo with a little rosemary, and then a plate of lightly fried and ultra crisp vegetables: red onion, Treviso (the local radicchio, served everywhere in season), celery, broccoli, asparagus and zucchini. Was there lemon?

“We don't do that here,” I was told. “Maybe you'd like a little pepper?”

Did I say Venetians do their own thing?

With the exception of a few vegetarian items and a duck breast, the menu — which changes daily — was all fish. I next had bigoli, whole wheat pasta with sardines and caramelized onions, unfortunately in a slightly silly thin bread bowl.

Next up was fried eel with celery and blueberries. I thought this, too, might be contrived, but I wanted the eel. It didn't disappoint: the fish was gorgeously filleted, with its deep-fried and edible skeleton around the outside of the plate like a necklace. The sweet, perfectly cooked fish was so hot and crisp I nearly burned my mouth; the celery was shredded, lightly drizzled with good olive oil and salt; and I had to admit the blueberries found a place there, their sweetness offsetting the bitter celery.

A hot-and-cold Roman-style dish of puntarelle with anchovies underneath and striped bass baked with bread crumbs on top was nearly as dazzling.

Another perennially highly rated spot is Fiaschetteria Toscana (Cannaregio, 5719; 39-041-528-5281; www.fiaschetteriatoscana.it), abundantly decorated with Venetian glass lamps, amusing prints and painted plates from restaurants all over Italy's north. Upon entering this overly bright, elegant and relatively small place — there might be 40 seats — you see a refrigerator case with the offerings of the day's fish.

But, as I learned chatting with the waiter, there are often other options. “We have a few monkfish cheeks in the kitchen,” he told me, as if I'd be a fool not to seize all of them.

I ordered a plateful, and they were served, not unexpectedly, perfectly fried and about 30 seconds out of the oil. I next sampled the tiny, sweet razor clams, like most of the food there ungarnished and served as if they needed nothing else, which was indeed the case.

A fine salad, made on the spot, featured tiny arugula and Treviso; grilled white polenta was as good as it can be; and, finally, there was intensely flavored fresh black pasta with local lobster. I drank a full-bodied, fat, rich Soave (Pieropan La Rocca, 2004), which I finished with a fantastic selection of cheese, all from northern Italy.

Nor could I resist the custard fried in butter and sugar, which is prepared in the dining room and scents the air with such a strong aroma that I'm quite sure 10 customers a night who normally forgo dessert cave in and order it. (It's worth the splurge.)

At Toscana as well as elsewhere, most customers arrived between 7:30 and 8 p.m. — Venice is known to be an early-eating town, to the delight of many Americans — and by 8:15 the refrigerator case was emptying out, and the waiters were suggesting fewer dishes, certainly not the monkfish cheeks. There were maybe five minutes between courses; it's all completely understated, efficient and minimalist, if not cheap (like Da Fiore, around 100 euros a person).

In each of these restaurants, the waiters had been friendly, English-speaking and helpfully suggestive. That trend continued at Al Covo (Castello, 3968; 39-041-522-3812), where I nearly fell in love with the gentleman who served me, initially because he sold me on a cheaper bottle of Soave than my first choice, 8 euros instead of 30, and then because he told me exactly what to order. And he was right.

Al Covo is venerable and much loved, a funny little place with tables outside, a pink terrazzo floor, cushioned benches lining the walls, leather chairs, gauzy curtains and, in lieu of flowers, various vegetables in vases on the tables. I seem to remember it being inexpensive when I was there in the mid-90s, but now, like everything else, the price has ballooned to around 75 euros a person. (The exchange rate, obviously, is working against Americans; a restaurant this good for $75 a person including wine, anywhere in the States, would be unique.)

I started with a tasting of stockfish (dried cod) dishes, all very sweet and mild, with lovely textures: a kind of brandade on polenta; a light stew with tomatoes and peppers; another with anchovies. I then moved on to pasta with shrimp sauce, made with local shrimp and very intense. (It was between this and a plate of mixed seafood, which looked equally fantastic, but I was on a pasta roll.)

The salad was of arugula, radicchio and celery, a nice combo; it was mixed by the waiter, and I swear when I asked for salt he scoffed. It was followed by local sole, simply grilled, with olive oil; this he boned for me. Dessert was a kind of nut-crumb-spice cake, with a not-overly-sweet caramel sauce; I liked it.

Finally, there was Osteria Vecio Fritolin (Rialto, Calle della Regina, 2262; 39-041-522-2881; www.veciofritolin.it), supposedly the last of the original fritolin, fry shops specializing in (what else?) fish. It's an unpretentious little place (you can eat well there for about 50 euros a person), with an appropriately small menu that presumably procures its fresh fish from the nearby Rialto.

I had been sent there with this message: you will eat fritto misto all over Venice, but you won't eat it better than you will there. This turned out to be the truth.

The fritto misto comprised tiny whole cuttlefish; whole baby sardines; a triglia (red mullet, known as rouget in much of the world); several sizes of shrimp, some whole, some not; nicely fried zucchini; and fried polenta. All the frying was expert, and in olive oil. That the rest of the food didn't measure up was more a comment on the high quality of the fritto misto than on the deficiencies of everything else.

If all this doesn't appeal to you, you either don't like fish, vegetables, pasta and polenta, or combinations of the above, or you don't like fried food (which can, with effort, be avoided, though why you'd want to I can hardly imagine). If it does appeal to you, go — there's a pretty good city to look at while you're walking to the restaurants.