For three years in a row, Alexandria has held onto its title as the third best small city, according to a reader survey in magazine Condé Nast Traveler.
This year’s Condé Nast Traveler Readers’ Choice Awards, announced today, saw Alexandria hold onto its third-place spot, just behind Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Charleston, South Carolina.
The awards are voted on by roughly 575,000 magazine readers rated by travel experiences.
Unsurprisingly the description focuses exclusively on Old Town and King Street specifically. According to the magazine:
Washingtonians are all in on the secret, but it’s no surprise the rest of the world is catching up: Alexandria, Virginia, the charming, historic city just across the Potomac River from our nation’s capital, draws travelers and would-be residents alike. Most folks start to imagine moving there immediately after setting foot in Old Town, once they’ve strolled the red-brick sidewalks, clocking street after street of perfectly preserved rowhouses from the 18th and 19th centuries. When you visit, scope out King Street, packed with boutiques, restaurants, and specialty shops; then land at the waterfront, where you can watch the boats bobbing on the water before touring the Torpedo Factory Art Center, a collective of galleries and artists’ studios. End the day at Gadsby’s Tavern, where some of our founding fathers used to drink—don’t mind the actors in colonial garb.
Alexandria beat Aspen, Colorado, for the title a few years ago — Aspen isn’t on the top ten anymore — and is followed by Lexington, Kentucky and Greenville, South Carolina.
The award comes as Alexandria is seeing a record high for tourism spending in the city.
