Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to Tampa, Florida from $485

🌍 About Tampa, Florida

Tampa's distinctive quarter is Ybor City, the old cigar district built by Cuban, Spanish, and Italian immigrants in the 1880s — red-brick cigar factories, wrought-iron balconies, and descendants of the factory chickens still wandering the streets as a protected nuisance. Order a Tampa Cuban sandwich, not a generic one: it's roast pork, ham, Swiss, pickle, mustard *plus* Genoa salami, the Italian layer Miami refuses to add and the two cities still argue about. Parque José Martí, oddly, sits on a patch of deeded Cuban soil. Come October to May for warm, dry days and tolerable humidity. Skip June to September — it's brutally hot and sticky, with near-daily afternoon thunderstorms and hurricane season running through November. The pleasant months are also the pricier ones, so a cheap fare is worth grabbing fast.