Spain wins gay-friendly destination award

The 2005 Out & About travel awards, given to destinations that recognize the value of and are marketing to gay, lesbian, transgender, and bisexuals, have named Spain as the overall best destination for the glbt crowd. The top 10 domestic U.S. cities are:

Atlanta

Boston

Chicago

Hawaii

Las Vegas

Los Angeles

New Orleans

New York City

San Francisco

Washington, D.C.

(Visit the award sponsor, PlanetOut, for more details.

I found this paragraph in the press release to be pretty interesting, too:

For the 12th straight year, Sandals Resorts' continued discrimination landed them on the "Rock Bottom" list, which comprises an infamous -- yet ever-shrinking -- group of places. Although the resort stated publicly that they changed their "heterosexual couples only" policy, OUT&ABOUT Travel received an internal memo Sandals sent to their sales agents last year that stated, ' we will continue to market exclusively to conventional male/female couples in love. There will be no departure from this original market niche.'

If anyone from Sandals is reading this, I'd be curious to know if this is true or not.