43 holidays to take in 2024

January

Chilean self-drive adventure
January and February are ideal times to visit wild, rugged Aysén, Chile’s most sparsely populated region and one that remains off the beaten tourist track. Journey Latin America’s two-week trip includes six days driving along the Carretera Austral past fjords and glaciers, as well as three days on Chiloé Island and the chance to walk among the 1,000-year-old Fitzroya trees of Alerce Andino National Park. It costs from £4,630 per person, including accommodation, domestic flights, car hire and excursions; journeylatinamerica.com

Ski hideaways in the Dolomites
Launched earlier this month, Sky Alps’ new direct flight connects London and Bolzano, capital of the South Tirol, and seems likely to raise the profile of the western Dolomites among anglophone skiers. It’s an area that has had a swath of hotel openings recently, including My Arbor, a five-star “tree hotel” that stands on the edge of a forest on 66 stilts, and offers ski-in, ski-out access to the slopes of Plose (doubles from €490 half-board; my-arbor.com). Close by is Forestis, originally a tuberculosis sanatorium built just before the first world war at 1,800 metres, then reborn as a ski and spa retreat in 2020 with three striking towers and a penthouse featuring a private outdoor pool (doubles from €720 including half-board; forestis.it). Meanwhile, Sensoria Dolomites, an adults-only spa retreat, opened last year at the foot of the Alpe di Siusi ski area — and only half an hour’s drive from the airport (doubles from €510 all inclusive; sensoriadolomites.com).

Gerhard Richter in St Moritz
In 1989, German artist Gerhard Richter sought advice on where to go on holiday from the Swiss curator Dieter Schwarz, who suggested the Waldhaus, a very traditional, family-run hotel in Sils Maria in Switzerland’s Engadin valley. Richter loved it, returning again and again, and producing a huge body of work inspired by the high Alpine landscape. This winter an exhibition curated by Schwarz, featuring more than 70 of these paintings, photographs and sculptures, will go on show across three institutions in the valley: Hauser & Wirth St Moritz, the Segantini Museum (segantini-museum.ch) and the Nietzsche-Haus (nietzschehaus.ch) in Sils Maria, the house where Friedrich Nietzsche wrote much of Thus Spoke Zarathustra and Beyond Good and Evil. The exhibition runs until April 13 (see hauserwirth.com). Doubles at the just-opened La Margna St Moritz, five minutes from Hauser & Wirth, cost from SFr950 (£880) (gracestmoritz.ch). Doubles at the Waldhaus Sils start at SFr400 (waldhaus-sils.ch).

Caspar David Friedrich in Germany
To mark the 250th anniversary of the artist’s birth, Germany has designated 2024 the Year of Caspar David Friedrich (caspardavid250.de). The celebrations kick off on January 20 in his birthplace, Greifswald, in Mecklenburg-West Pomerania, but the highlights will be three exhibitions. The first, Caspar David Friedrich: Art For a New Age, continues at the Kunsthalle in Hamburg to April 1 (hamburger-kunsthalle.de), featuring more than 50 paintings, among them “Wanderer Above a Sea of Fog” and “Chalk Cliffs on Rügen”. Then, on April 19, a survey of his landscapes opens at the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin (to August 4, smb.museum). And on August 24, two Dresden galleries, the Albertinum and the Kupferstich-Kabinett, partner on a third show, Caspar David Friedrich: Where It All Started (to January 5 2025, albertinum.skd.museum). ACE Cultural Tours (aceculturaltours.co.uk) is running a Friedrich-themed tour of Germany tour led by the art historian Tom Abbott in September; details and cost will be published in early 2024.

February

The new Grand Egyptian Museum, Cairo
More than two decades in the making, the immense Grand Egyptian Museum is expected to open by the end of February. Among the 100,000-plus artefacts on display across 12 galleries, there will be 5,000 objects from Tutankhamun’s tomb, 2,000 of which have never previously been exhibited. Other treasures will include the 43-metre, 4,600-year-old boat commissioned by the Fourth Dynasty pharaoh Khufu, who built the Great Pyramid of Giza (itself visible from the museum’s panoramic windows); the Merneptah Pillar; and, in the soaring atrium, the 3,200-year-old, 83-tonne, 11-metre-high monumental figure of Ramesses II. Abercrombie & Kent (abercrombiekent.co.uk) will feature the museum as part of its seven-night Classic Egypt tour, from £4,480 per person.

Turkey in winter
An eight-day tour to Istanbul and Cappadocia soaks in the cultural tapestry of Turkey, without the summer tourist hordes. Guided by the erudite British travel writer and broadcaster Jeremy Seal and Cappadocian archaeologist Yunus Özdemir, the trip includes four nights in Istanbul. On the fifth day, guests will take a private boat up the Bosphorus river strait to the Sadberk Hanım Museum, whose exhibits span more than 4,000 years of Anatolian art and artefacts, before flying to Cappadocia — which, if the snow falls, turns into something like a fairytale. The next two days are spent hiking, visiting Byzantine rock churches, underground cities such as Mazı — a regional refuge from persecution since it was first excavated around the Roman period — and warming up around log fires with bowls of lentil soup and mugs of sahlep. It runs February 4-11 and costs from £2,300 per person; see somewherewonderful.com/tours

Clover Stroud in Marrakech
On May 9, bestselling British memoirist Clover Stroud publishes her fourth book, The Giant on the Skyline, about the psychic and physical hold of the landscape of home. For an intimate peek into her creative mind, sign up for the writing masterclass she is teaching in Marrakech in February. Stroud’s classes will include using poetry as creative inspiration, while other tutors (such as Alexandra Pringle, former editor-in-chief of Bloomsbury Publishing) offer practical advice on finding a publisher and agent. The backdrop is Jnane Tamsna, a hotel in Marrakech’s Palmeraie oasis, with candlelit group dinners and trips to the 11th-century Medina. The course runs from February 25 to March 1 and costs from £3,935 per person; see silkroadslippers.com

Contemporary art in Karnataka
Now a Unesco World Heritage Site, the Dravidian temple complexes of Hampi, capital of the 14th to 16th-century Hindu kingdom of Vijayanagara, have long been a reason to visit the south-west Indian state of Karnataka. From February, there will be a more contemporary imperative to visit, when Hampi Art Labs (hampiartlabs.com) opens close to the ancient sites. Founded by Sangita Jindal, chair of the JSW Foundation, the social development arm of one of India’s largest conglomerates, and her daughter Tarini Jindal Handa, its campus will offer artists not just exhibition space, but studios, workshops, artist accommodation and a café. The opening show features work by, among others, Lubna Chowdhary, Rohini Devasher, Atul Dodiya, Shilpa Gupta, Bharti Kher, Annie Morris, Manu Parekh and Dayanita Singh, as well as Ai Weiwei and Andy Warhol. Greaves India (greavesindia.co.uk) offers a tailor-made nine-night itinerary, featuring Hyderabad, Hampi and Goa, from £2,515 per person.

March

Impressionism in Paris
This spring marks the 150th anniversary of the exhibition that in effect launched Impressionism. In recognition of this, Paris’s Musée d’Orsay, home of the world’s largest collection of Impressionist paintings, is reconstructing it in Tonight with the Impressionists, Paris 1874 a virtual reality experience that its curators hope will recreate the “visual shock” of the original. There’s also an exhibition, Paris 1874: Inventing Impressionism, a survey, in the words of France’s culture minister, Rima Abdul Malak, “of unrivalled scope”, featuring 130 works by the likes of Cézanne, Degas, Monet, Morisot, Pissarro, Renoir and Sisley, some from the original show. The exhibition runs from March 26 to July 14; see musee-orsay.fr. Doubles at JK Place, 300 metres away, from €850, jkplace.paris. The show then transfers to the National Gallery of Art, Washington (nga.gov) where it runs from September 8 to January 19 2025.

Walking and wildlife in Tanzania
The Gol Mountains, rising to almost a thousand metres, sit at the remote northern edge of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, a much more visited safari honeypot. The mountains act as a buffer zone but in the green season are just as busy with wildlife. It was in the foothills of these mountains, at the Olduvai Gorge, that Louis and Mary Leakey found evidence of the planet’s earliest humans, including their 1959 discovery of the famous “Zinj” Australopithecus boisei skull. Tanzania-based safari specialist Nomad has launched a new light-touch expeditionary mobile camp, which will be operating in the Gol Mountains in March and April. Led by expert guide Prim Mlay, you’ll walk the mountains, covering up to 10 miles a day. Every night, the view changes, and if the weather is fine, you can throw off the canvas and sleep with just a net separating you from the stars. From £3,795 per person, for three nights, based on four people sharing; steppestravel.com

Damien Hirst in Provence
One of the finest sculpture parks in the south of France, as well as the site of one of its loveliest hotels, Château La Coste, near Aix-en-Provence, is also home to a clutch of architecturally striking pavilions and indoor exhibition spaces — designed by the likes of Tadao Ando, Oscar Niemeyer, Renzo Piano, Richard Rogers and Jean-Michel Wilmotte. This spring, Damien Hirst becomes the first artist to take over all five, as well as parts of the grounds, with a huge retrospective entitled The Light That Shines, which stretches from the 1990s formaldehyde works that made him famous to his recent “Secret Gardens” series. The exhibition runs from March 2 to June 23, (chateau-la-coste.com). Doubles at Villa La Coste from €1,200 (villalacoste.com), or try the five-star Château de Fonscolombe (fonscolombe.com), 10 minutes’ drive away, where doubles start at €324.

April

Riding in Andalucia
In 2019, George Scott pioneered riding trips through the Sierra Morena mountains of Andalucia and parts of Extremadura, where he was raised. He reopened historic routes once walked by pilgrims and shepherds. Where there was nowhere to sleep, Scott created magical Indian-style tented encampments in romantic ruins. This April, Scott opens up another piece of history, this time picking threads that wind in and out of the silver route — the Vía de la Plata — and crossing into Portugal when spring flowers carpet the hills. The ride, which starts out at Trasierra (Scott’s family home), covers some 150 miles. Guests, who all need to be competent riders, will sleep in bullrings and medieval castles. Evenings will be filled with flamenco, traditional gastronomic delicacies, and the sound of your horses tethered nearby. The ride runs April 21-28, costing €7,000 per person; georgescottrides.com

Opera at Versailles
Built for Louis XV in the grounds of Versailles, the Opéra Royal is a jewel box of a theatre, where the programme still tends to focus on the baroque. Forthcoming highlights include, on May 16, Cimarosa’s rarely heard L’Olimpiade (not strictly an opera about the Olympics, though Paris 2024 is clearly its peg and the games are alluded to in its libretto), and Handel’s Giulio Cesare, with Cecilia Bartoli and Andreas Scholl, on June 6. Other parts of the palace are used for performances too, not least the Hall of Mirrors, where Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas can be heard on April 20, and the Chapelle Royale, where Bach’s B Minor Mass and Mozart’s Great Mass in C Minor will be performed on April 5-6 and May 26 respectively. Tickets cost between €22 and €495, see chateauversailles-spectacles.fr. Doubles at Airelles Château de Versailles, Le Grand Contrôle, in the palace gardens, cost from €2,308 (airelles.com); or try the Waldorf Astoria Versailles (doubles from about €290; hilton.com).

An Oman voyage
Hud Hud Travels is known for its mobile camps throughout Oman, from the Selma Plateau in the eastern Hajar Mountains to the remote desert of Wahiba Sands. For 2024, it has a new itinerary: a four-night, five-day journey aboard a modernised dhow, Ibra. The vessel accommodates eight guests in four cabins and sets sail from Muscat’s Al Mouj Marina, heading north-west to the Ad Dimaniyat Islands. After two days’ diving, fishing, and snorkelling in this National Nature Reserve, the dhow sails to the mainland coast for two nights in the secluded waters west of Muscat. The itinerary pairs well with one of Hud Hud’s inland mobile camping experiences, which are especially wild in the Dhofar region, with its rich seams of history, including the former homeland of the Queen of Sheba. Costs from $4,126 per person (based on a private charter for eight people). See hudhudtravels.com

Willem de Kooning in Venice
Works by the Dutch-American abstract expressionist Willem de Kooning were chosen to represent the US at the Venice Biennale on six occasions between 1950 and 1988. This year, he finally gets a major exhibition of his own, not within the Biennale itself, which celebrates its 60th edition in 2024 (April 20-November 24, labiennale.org), but at the Accademia, the city’s pre-eminent gallery of old masters. Bringing together some 70 works, its focus will be to shed light on the time he spent in Italy during the 1960s, and the influence it had on his work. The exhibition runs from April 17 to September 15; gallerieaccademia.it. The newest hotel in Venice, Violino d’Oro (violinodoro.com; doubles from €658) is close by, as is the Pensione Accademia (pensioneaccademia.it; doubles from about €300).

Lambing at Penhein
Glamping has lost some of its cachet in the UK recently as unscrupulous operators throw fairy lights on any mildewed old tent and claim to be offering a hygge-infused hideaway. Penhein, in contrast, is the real deal: eight tents, well spread out in woodland on a farming estate near Chepstow in south Wales, near the English border. “Tent” is a misnomer — these are beautifully designed alachighs, a type of yurt used by a nomadic Iranian tribe, and come with proper beds, a wood stove and an en-suite loo. There are beautiful walks from the door, but come in the first three weeks of April and you can take part in “Lambing Live”, helping the farm team in the lambing shed. Expect to feed, mark (and cuddle) lambs — and perhaps even see one being born. Four nights for a family of four cost £480, plus £35 for the lambing; penhein.co.uk

May

A new Nordic art museum in Norway
Twentieth-century Nordic art may be less well known than design, but it stands to gain worldwide attention with the opening of Kunstsilo (kunstsilo.no), a major new museum that opens in the seaside resort of Kristiansand in May. Converted from a 1930s waterfront grain silo, it will house not just works from the collection of the city’s former municipal gallery but also that of Nicolai Tangen, chief executive of Norges Bank Investment Management, whose assemblage of Nordic Modernism runs to 5,500 works by 300 artists. There’ll be exhibitions too, the first featuring work by Axel Salto and Edmund de Waal. The nearest hotel is a Radisson Blu (radissonhotels.com), but the UK’s Tate and the Aspen Art Museum have booked groups of their patrons into Boen Gård, a historic farm-turned-hotel half an hour’s drive inland that’s noted for its restaurant and salmon fishing. Rooms at Boen Gård from NKr1,895 (£140); see boengaard.no

Exploring the Hindu Kush
Geographic Expeditions has built a reputation with its expert-led itineraries to lesser-visited parts of the world. It has been working in Pakistan since 1989 and this May launches a 16-day private tour into the Hindu Kush and western Himalayas. From Islamabad, you’ll travel up towards the historic Khyber Pass as the north of the country blooms with springtime flowers. You’ll make forays into different valleys to spend time with the Kalash people of Chitral. These mountain communities give an intimacy to an extreme journey of contrasts: the mixture of small villages and thriving cities, third-century rock inscriptions (possibly the first examples of writing in south Asia), visits to Taxila’s Buddhist monasteries, and the 16th-century Mughal strongholds of Peshawar. It costs from $13,500 per person (based on two sharing), with the tour also available at other times of year; see geoex.com

Spring gardens in Dorset
G&T Garden Tours is a new Dorset-based outfit offering unique access to some of the loveliest gardens in south-west England — many of them private, set in the rolling hills of the Jurassic Coast with its golden cliffs. Hosted by Dorset-based writers and gardeners Jason Goodwin and Simon Tiffin, their spring group trip includes visits to the Chilcombe garden of the late American painter John Hubbard, Jasper Conran’s Instagram-famous creation at the head of the Marshwood Vale, and a yew-and-sculpture garden belonging to British furniture maker John Makepeace in Beaminster. Expect a grand mix of owner show-arounds, good wine and convivial conversation, staying in a 17th-century manor outside Bridport. Taking place on May 14-21, it costs £4,800 per person full-board; see gtgardentours.co.uk

Trekking in Nepal
In the first days of May when the rhododendrons are dropping their blood-red petals, a long walk in the eastern Himalayas can feel like you’re stepping into a dream: silver-green lichens hanging from pines, yak herders moving their stock to greener ground, bells jangling along the old trading paths which, in freer days, used to connect the valleys of Nepal’s Solukhumbu with the high mountain passes into Tibet. Ang Lama, a Sherpa, is from the village of Phaplu. In 2024, he’ll be launching Beyul Camps, offering treks with his well-oiled team of cooks and camping crew to the holy lake of Dudh Kunda — a glacial lake and pilgrimage site sacred to both Hindus and Buddhists, located at 4,560 metres. The five-night circuit begins and ends at Lama’s family home, The Happy House, where guests can sink into yoga, massages, delicious food and local monastery visits. It costs from $2,000 per person for six days (based on three or more travelling together); see beyulexperiences.com

Cooking in the Lofoten Islands
Holmen Lofoten is a family-run hotel housed in a collection of traditional fishermen’s cabins in the remote village of Sørvågen, on the shores of the Norwegian Sea. It’s best known for its Kitchen on the Edge of the World programme — a chef and artisan-led experience that has attracted the likes of Sydney-based Lennox Hastie, famous for cooking with fire, and Jeremy Lee (of Quo Vadis in London’s Soho). This May, it will be led for the first time by a Norwegian chef, Heidi Bjerkan, whose Trondheim restaurant, Credo, has a Michelin star. Her cooking is the focal point of a four-night programme, including cookery demonstrations, artist-led workshops, such as wood carving and paper marbling, ocean fishing trips, hiking and foraging, and of course a series of multi-course dinners cooked by Bjerkan using local ingredients. Running on May 9-13, it costs from £4,700 per person; see holmenlofoten.no

June

Landmark Trust heads to Manchester
Think of a holiday with the Landmark Trust — the charity that restores historic buildings, then lets them out — and you probably picture a rural cottage or a folly on the fringes of a country estate. This year, though, the Trust is heading into the urban centre of Manchester to open a property that sits on the doorstep of Aviva Studios, home of Factory International and Manchester International Festival. Built in 1808, the Station Agent’s House stood at the fulcrum of Manchester’s industrial heritage, where railways and canals meet, and the heart of the world’s first purpose-built, inter-city passenger rail terminus. It sleeps eight and is due for completion late spring, with prices to be announced shortly. landmarktrust.org.uk

Georgia O’Keeffe in Chicago
“One can’t paint New York as it is, but rather as it is felt,” said Georgia O’Keeffe, America’s first great Modern painter. In 1925, soon after her marriage to Alfred Stieglitz, she moved into a 30th-floor apartment in the Shelton Hotel in New York, one of the city’s tallest residential skyscrapers, where she lived for more than a decade, painting the views she looked down on, as well as from street level. This summer, the Art Institute of Chicago presents Georgia O’Keeffe: My New Yorks, the first-ever exhibition to focus on her cityscapes and how they inform the desert landscapes she painted when she moved to New Mexico. It runs from June 2 to September 22, see artic.edu.

Doubles at The Langham, which occupies 13 floors of Mies van der Rohe’s landmark skyscraper formerly known as the IBM Building, (and whose concierge can organise tickets and tours) cost from $445; see langhamhotels.com

Exploring Ladakh in style
Shakti Himalaya is opening a new location in Ladakh this May: the four-bedroom Thiksey House, facing a 15th-century Buddhist monastery. It’s a striking addition to Shakti’s collection of traditional village houses, which are restored, upgraded and staffed. Guests make a circuit of several of them, travelling either by car or on foot, or a mix of the two (a smarter version of “tea house” trekking, which originated in Nepal in the 1960s). Days begin with yoga and meditation, followed by monastery visits, picnics, biking and white-water rafting along the Zanskar and Indus rivers, and of course walking. It’s a culturally sensitive, sophisticated way to experience a fascinating corner of the Himalayas which — as the price suggests — is suited to backpackers of old who no longer want to rough it. From $6,815 per person for an eight-day trip; shaktihimalaya.com

July

Hiking in Greenland
Kangerlussuaq sits above the Arctic Circle in western Greenland — a varied landscape of tundra, glaciers and moraines. A six-day hiking expedition with Turn Wild, setting out from Kangerlussuaq to reach the Russell Glacier, takes in this fragile landscape at an intimate level. Led by international mountain leader Ian McClelland, the trek covers around 85km, with about six hours’ hiking over rough terrain each day. Wildlife sightings are common, including Arctic hares, caribou and musk ox. Camps include the shores of a glacial lake, and the edge of the Russell Glacier. Expect a dramatic encounter with a changing world, which means this is also not a trip for the unprepared: a separate training weekend is mandatory. From July 14 to 20, or July 22 to 28; it costs £1,950 per person. See turnwild.com

Greek island bliss
Long in the shadow of its party-loving neighbour Mykonos, the peaceful, unspoilt island of Tinos is getting some slick new places to stay. There’s Odera (oderatinos.com; rates yet to be set), a luxurious 77-room boutique hotel on a private beach, due to open in late spring. And The Thinking Traveller, which rents smart houses across the Med, is launching the White Dovecote, a restored cluster of dwellings dating from 1831 on the edge of the village of Agapi. Together there are five bedrooms, plus a pool and outdoor kitchen — though the village tavernas are a short stroll away. A week for 10 people in July costs £11,975; thethinkingtraveller.com

Houseboating in Canada
Le Boat offers self-drive, live-aboard boating holidays in numerous European locations — from Venice lagoon and the River Lot to Loch Ness and the Caledonian Canal. This summer it is launching a new destination in Canada: the Trent-Severn Waterway and Kawartha Lakes in central Ontario, a 386km waterway made up of a series of natural lakes and rivers connected by sections of canal. It’s ideal for fishing, swimming and paddleboarding (and the forested islands are beautiful in autumn too), and there are charming waterfront towns to stop at along the way. A week in a Horizon 2 boat, which sleeps up to five with two bathrooms and a large sundeck, costs from £3,509; leboat.co.uk

August

Seaside glamour in Kent
Just outside the historic town of Rye, hoteliers Harry and Sigrid Cragoe bought a rundown 1970s motel in 2009 and turned it into the Gallivant, an in-demand beach hotel with a fine restaurant and Scandi-chic design. Now they are preparing for a second unlikely transformation, with a bid to change the fortunes of unfashionable Littlestone, Kent (where the pebble beach boasts views of a nuclear power station). Having acquired what was the Romney Bay House Hotel — built in 1929 as a private home by the architect behind Portmeirion, Sir Clough Williams-Ellis — they are turning it into a 13-bedroom hotel with interiors that “nod to the Hamptons, invoking the style and glamour of the early 1920s”. It’s due to open in time for summer, with doubles from £300; thegallivant.co.uk

A 4x4 adventure in Namibia
Namibia is good to visit year round, but August is ideal. It’s cooler (typically up to 20C in the day), rain is rare and the dry weather means that animals come to waterholes and so are easier to see. Safari Drive arranges self-drive trips across southern Africa in a 4x4 Toyota Land Cruiser equipped with a rooftop tent and camping equipment. The two-week Family Namibia trip tours many of the country’s highlights, including Etosha National Park, the dunes of Sossusvlei, the Skeleton Coast and the Damaraland, mixing camping with staying in hotels and remote lodges. From £2,921 per person (July-October); safaridrive.com

Galician road trip
Heatwaves in southern Europe are prompting growing numbers to turn their attention from Spain’s Mediterranean beaches to its northern Costa Verde, or “green coast”, in Galicia and Asturias. Original Travel has a new 13-day road trip that includes the Picos de Europa National Park, Ribadeo, the beaches and historic old town of La Coruña and three nights in Santiago de Compostela. It costs from £2,900 per person, based on two sharing, including flights from London, car hire, accommodation and guided tours; originaltravel.co.uk

September

E-biking in the Alps
September is a dreamy time to visit the Swiss Alps: the summer tourists have gone but the days remain warm and clear. For a real sense of moving through the mountains, try a guided off-road bike tour with E-Alps, which uses electric mountain bikes to tackle multi-day routes, staying in small village hotels or mountain huts. The five-day Verbier-Zermatt Haute Route, for example, covers 198km, exploring remote valleys between the two classic resorts and including a night at 2,085 metres in a private cabin with wood-fired hot tub and sauna. With a combined ascent of 8,400 metres, you’ll be glad of the electric assistance. Five days, starting September 4, from SFr2,890 (£2,656); e-alps.com

A luxury treehouse in Peru
The Peruvian Amazon covers more than half the country, and is home to some 800 bird species and 2,500 butterflies — a natural wilderness best enjoyed in the balmy days of September at the brand new, light-footprint Alta Sanctuary, which calls itself “the only luxury tree house in the Amazon Rainforest”. Guests will stay 110ft above the rainforest floor, in a one-bedroom treehouse built in the branches of a strangler fig. Expect to wake eye-level with chestnut-fronted macaws, toucans, trogons, tanagers and spider monkeys. Days are spent on guided treks through the rainforest and birdwatching. It’s not easy to get here — the journey includes four hours of driving on unpaved roads and a boat ride down the Las Piedras river — but, for birdwatchers especially, the undisturbed treetop canopy is paradise. Costs from $1,450 per night all inclusive; plansouthamerica.com

Summer’s end in Corsica
Everyone knows Corsica should be avoided in August, when French holidaymakers arrive en masse and relations between islanders and mainlanders can become tense. September is another matter entirely, offering both warm seas and welcomes. Among six new villas that Simpson Travel is adding to its Corsica collection in 2024 is the four-bedroom Villa Occhinello, set among granite boulders and gnarled olive trees, and with a pool overlooking the Gulf of Valinco. Beaches and mountain walks are within easy reach. From £1,114 per person, based on eight sharing the villa and including the flight from London and car hire; simpsontravel.com

October

Slower Silesia, Poland
Designed to be “an antidote to mindless mass tourism”, the Slow Cyclist was set up in 2015 offering immersive group trips to Transylvania. It’s since spread to countries including Greece, Spain and Italy, and this year is launching trips in Lower Silesia in south-west Poland. On a five-day itinerary, guests cycle up to 50km through forests, meadows and gently rolling hills, stopping at castles, rural villages and vineyards. From £2,390 per person; theslowcyclist.com

Morocco by train
October is a great time to explore Morocco, with cooler temperatures, clear skies and even the possibility of the first snows on the summits of the Atlas Mountains. Original Travel’s “Imperial Morocco by Train” itinerary would make a great half-term family adventure, starting in Fez, then moving on to Rabat and finally Marrakech. The seven-night trip, including flights from London, accommodation and first-class train tickets, costs from £1,910 per person; originaltravel.co.uk

Afloat in Arizona
A boating trip in the desert on the Arizona/Utah border must be one of the most bizarre holiday experiences available in the US. But at Antelope Point Marina, near Page, you can rent a houseboat and head out to explore Lake Powell, a reservoir with some 2,000 miles of shoreline surrounded by dramatic, desolate, landscapes. The houseboats are designed for big groups, and come with waterslides, barbecues and multiple sundecks. Moor up in a remote cove, spend the day swimming and watch as the setting sun turns the mountains gold, then red, then purple. Four days’ rental of a 59ft houseboat sleeping 10 costs from $5,255; see lakepowellhouseboating.com

November

Big wave watching, Portugal
November marks the start of big wave season at Nazaré, Portugal — and these are among the biggest in the world, the result of an underwater canyon that runs some 140 miles out to sea and reaches three miles in depth. Professional surfers come here for competitions and in the quest to be the first to ride a 100ft wave (the record currently stands at 86ft). Watching them, and the jet-ski drivers who tow them into position, is thrilling for spectators, and the cliffs provide a natural vantage point so close you can feel the ground shake as the waves crash. Nazaré is about 90 minutes’ drive from Lisbon so can easily be combined with a city break there. Stay just inland at the historic Montebelo Mosteiro de Alcobaça (montebelohotels.com; doubles from £111), or rent a camper van for a tour along the Silver Coast (indiecampers.com; from about £40 per night).

Winter heat in Sri Lanka
After years of economic crisis, many in the travel industry hope 2024 will be the year that tourism in the country bounces back, especially after the IMF’s approval earlier this month of the next tranche of a $3bn loan. A 10-night package, including five nights on the beach at the Ahu Bay resort, four at the Jetwing Kaduruketha ecolodge in the Hill Country and one at a century-old boutique hotel in Colombo’s leafy Cinnamon Gardens district (plus a leopard safari, walking on the Pekoe Trail and a tour of Colombo in a vintage Land Rover), costs £4,500 per person; experiencetravelgroup.com

Surfing West Timor
Originally created in 1988 by an American surfer, the Nihi resort on the Indonesian island of Sumba has been garlanded with awards in recent years. Now it’s working on a new outpost, on Rote Island in West Timor. Due to open in late 2024, Nihi Rote will have 25 thatched villas with private pools and, in keeping with the original, it sits on a beach that the company claims offers “world-class” surfing waves year-round. Rates to be set; nihi.com

First tracks in Val Thorens
For those who can’t wait to get their ski season started, Val Thorens, the Alps’ highest resort, is the place to start. Its 2024-25 season begins with the “Grand Première” weekend on November 23-24, when there’s the chance to test the manufacturers’ new skis, plus music, films, happy hours and raclette parties. For details of all the resort’s hotels, see valthorens.com

December

A family adventure in Thailand
Experience Travel Group’s new “jungle and secret island adventure” takes families off the beaten track, while still giving them a classic Thai beach experience. The tailor-made, two-week itinerary includes staying in a treehouse in Khao Sok, a remote lodge on Koh Phra Thong, and some laid-back beachside luxury at Koyao Island Resort, plus jungle trekking, kayaking and a snorkelling tour. Prices start at around £4,100 per person; experiencetravelgroup.com

Notre-Dame reopens in Paris
Not that anyone needs an excuse for a pre-Christmas weekend in Paris, when more than a million fairy lights illuminate the trees on the Champs-Elysées, the stores on the rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré vie to outdo each other’s decorations and the whole city feels en fête. But earlier this month President Emmanuel Macron announced that the cathedral of Notre-Dame would finally reopen to visitors on December 8. Closed since April 2019, when it was ravaged by fire, it won’t yet be fully restored, but about €700mn of the €846mn pledged to reconstruct it will have been spent. “Deadlines will be met,” the president stressed. “It’s a tremendous image of hope and of a France that has rebuilt itself.” See notredamedeparis.fr for updates. The three-star Hôtel Notre-Dame, designed by Christian Lacroix, faces the cathedral from Quai Saint-Michel; double rooms with a view cost from €263, see hotelnotredameparis.com

Winter walking in La Gomera
The diminutive Canary Island offers a taste of the tropics within easy reach of European cities, and is ideal for winter walking through cloud forest, mountain gorges, banana groves and coastal trails. Pura Aventura’s week-long trip includes a private tour around the small island capital, San Sebastián, and a day with a naturalist guide in Garajonay National Park, but it is otherwise self-guided, with luggage transferred between hotels. It costs from £1,500 per person, including most meals; pura-aventura.com

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