Before I get to that headline, thanks to all of the writers including our newest contributors, Nicole Wojcik and Maxine Thompson, for stories in this edition of Diablo Gazette.   You all did a great job.

There was a recent online article on Condè Nast Traveler written by Cynthia Drescher,  a professional travel journalist,  that chose Concord as #7 in a Top 10 list of places to retire…in the World!  Not in Diablo Valley, the worldI posted this on our facebook page and the news spread like wildfire. Claycord.com posted the same and the reaction was similar, but to a much larger scale. Hmm, I wondered. Where are these other places?

  1. Coronado, Panama 2) Penang, Malaysia 3) Cascais, Portugal 4) San Miguel de Allende

5) Killarney, Ireland 6) Corozal, Belize  7) CONCORD, CA.  8) Grand Haven, MI 9)Santa Fe, NM

10) Louisville, KY           You can read the original article here.  http://goo.gl/mQyhBb

Those paradise communities are some heavy hitters.  I decided to do some research to see what would inspire such a pronouncement for Concord.

I called Jack Hvlack, Chairman of the Tourism Business Improvement District. He was aware of the article but denied having any influence.  He referred me to the promotional agency, Red Sky.   I spoke with Account Manager Brian. He said it wasn’t them. They are too busy trying to promote fun living in our Valley, landing conventions and such, not retirement. He suggested that the article could be organic, inspired by U-haul who had had recently published an article declaring Concord as #1 growth city of 2015.  The CN Traveler’s author was unavailable for comment, so case closed.  It’s true. Congratulations Concord.

But the mystery continues.  Whoever showed world traveler, Cynthia Drescher around Concord, all I can say is “Wow! You really know how to show someone a good time!”