The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011: Second Round
The first round of The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 was a voting frenzy, with generally tight competition in close races like Stockholm over Cairo and Bratislava edging out Valletta. Of all the races, I’d say Bellagio eliminating Tel Aviv was probably the biggest upset, although I’m not sure many would have foreseen Lubeck putting Washington DC out of the running. There was a single tie at the end of round one, and being the tie breaker, Vilnius squeaks into the second round just ahead of Mexico City.
Will it be Stockholm or Kyoto, Istanbul or Chicago, Barcelona or Amsterdam to make it to the Sweet 16 in The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament? Vote below before next Monday March 14th, 09:00am US EST and help choose who moves closer to the $150 prize. (Email and RSS subscribers will need to click through to this page to vote.)
The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Jerusalem vs. Quito
- Jerusalem - (Judy) (51%, 59 Votes)
- Quito, Ecuador - (Felipe) (49%, 57 Votes)
Total Voters: 116
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Prague vs. Singapore
- Prague, Czech Republic - (Jeruen) (70%, 81 Votes)
- Singapore, Singapore - (Paul) (30%, 34 Votes)
Total Voters: 115
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: New Orleans vs. Bellagio
- Bellagio, Italy - (Daryl) (56%, 60 Votes)
- New Orleans, USA - (JoAnna) (44%, 47 Votes)
Total Voters: 107
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: New York City vs. Chiang Mai
- Chiang Mai, Thailand - (Jeremy) (53%, 66 Votes)
- New York City, USA - (Michaela) (47%, 58 Votes)
Total Voters: 124
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Barcelona vs. Reykjavik
- Reykjavik, Iceland - (Dave) (59%, 62 Votes)
- Barcelona, Spain - (Katrin) (41%, 43 Votes)
Total Voters: 105
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Montreal vs. Lubeck
- Lubeck, Germany - (Stina) (54%, 66 Votes)
- Montreal, Canada - (Kate) (46%, 56 Votes)
Total Voters: 122
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Seattle vs. Budapest
- Budapest, Hungary - (Stephanie) (58%, 62 Votes)
- Seattle, Washington - (Mike) (42%, 44 Votes)
Total Voters: 106
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Sydney vs. Porto
- Porto, Portugal - (Stephen) (52%, 54 Votes)
- Sydney, Australia - (Mark) (48%, 49 Votes)
Total Voters: 103
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Paris vs. Vilnius
- Paris, France - (Amy) (53%, 55 Votes)
- Vilnius, Lithuania - (Julia) (47%, 48 Votes)
Total Voters: 103
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: London vs. Bratislava
- Bratislava, Slovakia - (Molly) (51%, 55 Votes)
- London, England - (Erica) (49%, 53 Votes)
Total Voters: 108
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Amsterdam vs. Rio de Janiero
- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil - (Rachel) (54%, 58 Votes)
- Amsterdam, Netherlands - (Alouise) (46%, 49 Votes)
Total Voters: 107
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Istanbul vs. Chicago
- Istanbul, Turkey - (Natalie) (64%, 66 Votes)
- Chicago, USA - (Nestor) (36%, 37 Votes)
Total Voters: 103
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Florence vs. Rome
- Florence, Italy - (Ashley) (58%, 57 Votes)
- Rome, Italy - (Akila) (42%, 42 Votes)
Total Voters: 99
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Vancouver vs. Cuzco
- Cuzco, Peru - (Katrina) (55%, 53 Votes)
- Vancouver, Canada - (Scott) (45%, 44 Votes)
Total Voters: 97
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Kyoto vs. Stockholm
- Kyoto, Japan - (Todd) (58%, 56 Votes)
- Stockholm, Sweden - (Alan) (42%, 40 Votes)
Total Voters: 96
Loading ...The Best City To Visit Travel Tournament 2011 - Second Round: Edinburgh vs. Bangkok
- Edinburgh, Scotland - (Betsey) (59%, 56 Votes)
- Bangkok, Thailand - (JW) (41%, 38 Votes)
Total Voters: 95
Loading ...You can view the entire tournament bracket in full size or click the image to view in wide-screen.
Vote for your favorite cities to travel to and next Tuesday, March 15th we’ll have a sweet 16 left on the road to the best city to visit in 2011.
Don’t worry if you missed this contest, I run several throughout the year. You can be the first to find out about the next one by signing up for my email updates, RSS feed, or bi-monthly newsletter.
blahh (14)
Deniz (12)
Audrey (11)
Dan (11)
Shane (8)
Someday I'll Be T... (8)
All done again. Some controversial pairings there!!
Julia
…now it’s really starting to sound like a real sports tournament!! Love it and good luck!
Awww, poor little Vilnius. Where next? Do I head for Germany or Turkey…?
Bring back Vilnius next year, yes? Each time its name is seen gives people time/opportunity to go look for information.
Bratislava and Porto beat out some big names this round!
Little Vilnius gave Paris a bit of the sweats I think and both Porto and Bratislava got in the lead relatively late. Good luck to Edinburgh in the next round
Looks like there are some neck and neck races here- I hope more people vote to break the winners out. It was sad to say farewell to Izmir- but now I’m all set to vote for the second best city
hee hee 
Too bad for this year
It will be interesting though were all of the votes from last week go…I suspect the races will get even closer.
With apologies to Anjuli, who nominated Izmir that lost to Edinburgh .. I would love to vote for my favorite city again, but where is Edinburgh vs. Bangkok?
Hi Betsey, my sincere apologies, I must have made a typo while lining up the polls. Edinburgh vs. Bangkok is up now at the very bottom. Sorry again and good luck!
Edinburgh is such a lovely city- it has everything one could want in a great city to travel to. I am rooting for it
Glad to see that it made it up on the chart!!
I voted but I was biased as I voted for the places i would like to go. Man this list was awesome Anil. You really cant lose with this list.
I’m glad you love the March Madness too and thanks for voting! No rules on who you have to pick, where you want to go sounds good to me
It’s March Madness already… man can’t believe it’s been a year since you did this last time. Love this contest best of all man!
When it rolled around again this time it really felt like no time had gone by at all…
LETS GO CHIANG MAI WOOO!!!
Up against NYC puts me in a tight spot on my choice. I’m confident Chiang Mai will come out victorious. Its the best city ever!
A tough match up but I know CM has some Internet love!
That is why I picked it. Well, that, and I really really really love the city.
This was Tough
Kyoto vs Stockholm phrrrr? so perfect in there own unique ways tough call
Some of those match ups I feel the same way – I look at both cities and just find it nearly impossible to pick between the two. Don’t know if it helps or hurts Iceland with another Scandinavian city in the mix
Some northern competition for you!
I had to do flipping of coins on some of these cities- but they were both soooo great- it would be impossible to make a choice! Good job pairing them up Anil!!
I left it all up to the preliminary round. It’s you all I have to thank for the great head to heads going on
i went with Kyoto but it was a hard choice, but Kyoto was fun as we accidentally took the lonely planet tour the wrong way around but it was the best mistake of the whole trip as it was empty with a large salmon up river feeling in the middle then empty again, was awesome but funny how every one was doing the same lonely planet tour ^-^
had it all to our selfs (minus the tea ice cream bundle in the middle that was getting a little hands on boy that strip is busy!)
and nothing wrong with a bit of northern competition its most welcome : )
Got in my votes for round 2! Sad to see that Lisbon didn’t make it but I guess that means it can remain a secret!
sometimes it is good to keep our favorite cities a secret- they remain untouched by the tourist throngs
There is some tough competition here! It also seems as though there are more US cities in the running this year, am I wrong? Great contest!
))
I think it’s on par with last year, although the variety geographically is definitely greater this time around.
Madness! I am officially blaming the fact that I was away from computer and internet for over a week for the fall of Toronto. Ah well.
Maybe next year, though Canada is well represented – a slight consolation!?
This is really putting my Geography skills to the test. Going to have to read up about it and then come back to vote for the rest. Coffee Time!!!
You’ve just given me the idea to create a map for next year’s competition
Go Prague!!! Yippee!!!
Given this bracket method, it’s interesting how things line up; even my voting preferences flip-flop sometimes as one city might be strong in one pairing but turn out weak when it advances to the next round and is paired with another city.
I’ve too noticed that the margin of victory doesn’t necessarily translate into the following rounds. Prague though is shaping up to be one of the favorites to go far early on.