51 of the best holiday destinations for 2026: a month-by-month guide

Conversely, the cost of land-only tours — as the flight-exclusive holiday is known in the trade — has gone up, and by a lot. In 2025 the median price was £2,399pp. This year it’s 43 per cent higher at £3,438pp, but bear in mind that this analysis is based only on the 51 I selected. If, for example, five operators announce new trips down the Silk Road, I’ll choose the one offering the best value in terms of guiding, itinerary and the characterful accommodation — and those trips are never the cheapest.

For the record, though, of the 51 holidays that follow, there are nine that cost under £1,000pp; ten under £2,000pp, nine under £3,000pp and ten are under £5,000pp. The most expensive is a two-week cruise in the wake of Odysseus for £75,000pp — and that doesn’t include flights.

But while travel is becoming more expensive, the ambition of British tour operators to push the boundaries of tourism is unchanged. In 2026 you can swim around islands in Sulawesi; go birding at a reborn oasis in the Sahara; explore parts of the Amazon that tourists never usually reach; and, if this floats your lilo, be first to report on the new Ikos luxury all-inclusive when it opens in Crete. You might prefer a Finnish spa in a frozen forest; a ten-day hike through medieval Romania; or a luxury train trip through Thailand. As for me, there’s a tiger trip guided by the four conservationists who saved the species. I quite fancy that.

Other lists of this year’s best new holidays exist. But none is as good as this.

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January

1. New train through Thailand

The temple town of Uthai Thani

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Beyond the bucket parties and banana pancakes, Thailand is a nation of elegance and grace, and if it’s that quiet serenity you seek, you should join the queue for the new luxury sleeper train the Blue Jasmine. Made from restored 1960s rolling stock, the train takes 37 guests at a time on a nine-day tour of the Kingdom’s most serene precincts. Leaving from Bangkok’s old Hua Lamphong Station, you roll north to the ancient Siamese capital of Ayutthaya; onward to the temple town of Uthai Thani — popular with Thai tourists but rarely visited by foreigners; north to Chiang Mai for two days of wildlife, classical music and gastronomy; and then south through the Khun Tan mountains to fascinating ruins of Sukhothai (which translates to Dawn of Happiness). On day eight you’ll be back in Bangkok for a cruise on the Chao Phraya River.
Details Eight nights’ full board from £7,120pp, including two nights on the train and six in hotels, departing on January 24 (theluxuryholidaycompany.com). Fly to Bangkok

2. See the light in Norway

On January 17 the expedition ship MS Spitsbergen weighs anchor in Tromso to begin a new 500-mile round trip south to Lofoten and back. Billed “Ultimate Norway: Arctic Expedition under the northern lights”, it’s an active trip, exploring the Lyngen Alps and Senja and Vesteralen islands by small boat, kayak and on snowshoes, spotting whales, sea eagles and reindeer, and featuring a fireside beach picnic under the stars, a night out with the fishing community of Svolvaer, and the opportunity to combine a Nordic sauna with a polar dip. Take your Dryrobe. The northern lights, though, could be the main attraction: 2026 is when Solar Cycle 25 is expected to peak, and this sailing coincides with the new moon, further improving your chances of seeing the show.
Details Seven nights’ all inclusive from £3,438pp, departing on January 17 (travelhx.com). Fly to Tromso

• Discover our guide to expedition cruises

3. Up she rises in Cornwall

A shanty — a term derived from the French verb to sing — was a song used to make seafaring less miserable. Apparently belting out Weigh, Hey and Up She Rises over and over again made hauling heavy sheets with wet cables in angry seas ever so slightly enjoyable, but it’s even more fun now that the tradition has come ashore — in this case to a comfortable hotel just up the cliff from St Ives station. It’s the setting for a weekend of singing shanties, led by the Cornish folk singer and voice coach Nicole Tesseyman. You’ll begin by learning vocal warm-ups, breathing techniques, and how to sound like a sailor, and, with luck, you end up singing your own composition. You can check out Tesseyman’s songs on Spotify: her album is called Oll An Gwella.
Details Three nights’ full board from £429pp, departing on January 31 (hfholidays.co.uk)

4. Hannibal lecture in Tunisia

The ancient city of Dougga in Tunisia

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At the gates of Carthage in December 2024 an old man in a long coat, taped-up spectacles and a red chechia hat approached me and handed me a laminated card. It introduced him as a retired professor of ancient history fluent in eight languages now working as a freelance guide. He said he’d show me around for €5 and that’s how I heard his Hannibal lecture, one of the most fascinating tours of antiquity I’ve ever taken. Maybe you’ll meet him too on this new private guided road trip through the ancient history of Tunisia. If not, you’ll meet similarly erudite local guides at the Roman city of Dougga; Bulla Regia with the underground villas; and the rarely visited Sufi city of El Kef. The two final days at the coast give you time to wonder how Tunisia’s wonders have stayed hidden for so long. Departures are available throughout January.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £2,170pp, including flights and private guide (originaltravel.co.uk)

5. Red Sea dry January

The St Regis Resort on Ummahat Island in Saudi Arabia

If you’re going to put yourself through DJ, you might as well do it somewhere hot, architecturally astonishing and with zero chance of getting a pint. Welcome to Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea, an 11,000 square mile region of desert, mountains, beaches and islands at the northern end of the world’s third largest — and least explored — barrier reef. Developed for tourism as part of the kingdom’s diversification project, the Red Sea wants to be the most luxurious and most futuristic beach destination on Earth, and the world’s biggest hotel brands are queueing to get in. The St Regis Resort on Ummahat Island has 90 rooms — some on the beach, others overwater — and all with private pools and sundecks. There are Middle Eastern, Japanese and grill restaurants and two bars. Dry ones.
Details Five nights’ B&B from £4,495pp, including flights and speedboat transfers (abercrombiekent.com)

February

6. Artistic Marrakesh

El Fenn is still one of Marrakesh’s hippest stays

ALESSANDRO MOGGI

Vanessa Branson’s riad El Fenn passed into new ownership last year but there’s no sign yet that the hippest address in the medina has lost its knack for giving guests what they want. For years customers at its designer boutique have been picking up pots and cushions and asking, “Where do you get this stuff?” so in 2026 it’s time to open the contacts book and spill the beans. The new three-night curated art and design break guides guests through the medina and beyond to ateliers specialising in fashion, furniture, art, antiques, textiles, carpets, lighting and whatever else you have in mind, and while you can book the break any time, February 5-8 is when the 1-54 Contemporary Art Fair is in town — which could punch an even bigger hole in your bank account.
Details Three nights’ B&B from £754pp, including two curated tours, an art tour and a personalised shopping trip and some extra meals (el-fenn.com). Fly to Marrakesh

• More of Marrakesh’s best riads

7. Seychelles superyacht

Aqua Lares sails through the Seychelles to Zanzibar

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Aqua Lares is a new 250ft superyacht with just 15 suites accommodating a total of 30 guests with a one-to-one passenger-crew ratio. The latest addition to the Aqua Expeditions fleet, it’s built more for comfort than speed and, claims the line, is the first vessel of its type offering this level of luxury expedition cruise available to book by the cabin. The 11-night voyage sails east from Mahé through the Coralline Seychelles to Zanzibar. Diving, snorkelling and kayaking are on offer daily, and runs ashore include a hike on Aldabra — home to 100,000 giant tortoises — a visit to Pemba and a chance to explore the amazing coral stone ruins of the ancient port of Kilwa Kisiwani.
Details Thirteen nights’ full board from £19,800pp, including flights (scottdunn.com)

8. Finnish forest spa

Visit a reindeer farm in Finland

JAAKKO POSTI

If the idea of sitting in an outdoor hot tub as snow falls through the silence stirs some kind of Frozen-style longing then you should consider a trip to Galdu: Finland’s newest spa. It opened in December in a remote snow forest in the Arctic Circle. Galdu is the Sami word for the cold plunge that’s an essential part of the Finnish spa ritual. The two saunas and the steam room have picture windows that looks out on a scene from Frozen. There’s also a warm pool next to a freezing-cold plunge pool, and a restaurant specialising in Lappish cuisine. The three-night package includes a sleigh ride to a reindeer farm and a reasonable chance that you could be sitting in the hot tub beneath the northern lights. Husky sledding and snowmobiling are also available.
Details Three nights’ full board from £1,799pp, including flights, transfers and activities (discover-the-world.com)

9. Full circle in India

The 24 spokes in the wheel in the centre of the Indian flag represent the principles and virtues required for human progress. It’s an evolution of Mahatma Gandhi’s design, which depicted the spinning wheel as a symbol of the Homespun movement promoting self-sufficiency and non-violent resistance to colonialism. Early examples of Gandhi’s wheel were installed in the Mahatma’s Anasakti Ashram in Kausani, where you’ll be on day seven of this new walking tour around the Khali Estate in Uttarakhand. This Himalayan hill station, with views of the 25,646ft Nanda Devi, has been home to both colonisers and resisters including Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, and his sister Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, a freedom fighter and diplomat who became the first female president of the United Nations. The mystic Anandamayi Ma was also drawn to Khali, which suggests there’s definitely something in the air here.
Details Nine nights — eight full board and one B&B — from £1,885pp, including guiding and porterage (villageways.com). Fly to Delhi

• See other highlights of India

March

10. The long game in Mexico

Longevity is the hottest new trend in wellness — remember Putin and Xi’s discussion of eternal life caught on mic last September in Beijing? But while the Russian’s plan involved replacing organs, the Spanish expert SHA Wellness reckons you can stay alive longer through simpler processes. The company was founded in Alicante in 2008 by Alfredo Bataller Parietti, a property developer who beat 30 years of abdominal pain and a cancer diagnosis by focusing on diet, preventive medicine, emotional health, inner balance and natural therapies. SHA’s second facility is now open in Cancun, Mexico, and while it doesn’t sound like any fun the slebs love it. Choose from programmes such as detox and optimal weight (seven days), or a tailor-made option using “a revolutionary, science-backed approach to unlock longevity”. Let us know how you get on.
Details Seven nights’ full board from £9,599pp, including an Advanced Longevity programme (healingholidays.com). Fly to Cancun

• 50 of the world’s best spas

11. Ancient wisdom in Egypt and Greece

Visit the new Grand Egyptian Museum in Cairo

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“Every generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it,” said George Orwell. But which of us could build a Great Pyramid out of 2.3 million stone blocks perfectly aligned with north, south, east and west using hand tools, rope and long arithmetic? This new expert-led tour of Egypt from New Scientist celebrates the genius of the ancients: the engineering, astronomy and medicine of the pharaohs and the theoretical discoveries of the Greek scholars. You’ll spend three nights in Cairo visiting the new Grand Egyptian Museum; the pyramids at Giza; and the restoration labs at the National Museum of Egyptian Civilisation, then two nights in Alexandria, visiting the Bibliotheca Alexandrina and extraordinary catacombs of Kom El Shoqafa. The geologist and science communicator Chris Jackson will explain everything and, back in Cairo on the last night, there’s a dinner cruise on the Nile.
Details Six nights’ B&B from £4,558pp, departing on March 13 (newscientist.com). Fly to Cairo

12. Morocco’s desert star

Lake Iriqui reappeared in 2024

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A national park so remote that it hardly gets any visitors is a naturalist’s dream — and Iriqui is exactly that. Covering 475 square miles close to the Algerian frontier in the south of Morocco this desert reserve’s star attraction is Lake Iriqui. Once an important stopover for migratory birds, the lake had vanished after 50 years of drought but reappeared in 2024 after freak storms in the Sahara. Birds don’t take long to catch on and flamingos, geese and blue-cheeked bee-eaters are dropping in to share the park with resident sandgrouse, bustards, trumpeter finch and desert warblers, among others. Local Sahrawi guides are used to find hidden water sources on this new eight-day tour in search not only of birds but also the critically endangered addax antelope; the huge-eared fennec fox; and the desert monitor, which can grow up to 6ft long.
Details Seven nights’ full board from £2,295pp, including flights, departing on March 16 (naturetrek.co.uk)

13. Earn your conservation stripes in India

Travel in a small group to visit tigers in India

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When asked which humans have been the most important in saving the tiger, eight out of ten big cats recommend Amit Sankhala, grandson of Project Tiger’s founder Kailash Sankhala; Harbhajan Singh Pabla, an expert in captive-bred tiger reintroduction and translocation; Hashim Tyabji, who pioneered the use of tourism as a force for conservation; and Julian Matthews, conservationist and founder of Travel Operators for Tigers. Led by Matthews, this small group tour roams Madhya Pradesh, visiting Kanha, Pench and Satpura Tiger Reserves and the Bori Wildlife Sanctuary to meet the experts who have dedicated their lives to the salvation of a species that, 15 years ago, was on the threshold of extinction. It’s unlikely that a big cat tour with such stellar company will happen again, and with a dozen or so game drives included, there’s a decent chance of actually spotting the world’s biggest feline.
Details Thirteen nights’ full board from £7,995pp (steppestravel.com). Fly to Delhi

14. Wine and skiing in Italy

Alta Badia in Italy’s South Tyrol is the resort that came up with the Wine Ski Safari: the eminently sensible pairing of drinking with skiing. In principle, it’s easy: you ski from mountain hut to mountain hut, stopping at each to try the wines within. There’ll be more than 80 on offer this year, all from South Tyrolean vineyards and many of which you’ll never find in the UK. The event is now in its 16th year but the problem has always been the logistics required to be there on the day — usually the third Sunday in March. This year, that changes with the launch of a bespoke four-day package including everything you need but the Alka-Seltzer.
Details Three nights’ half-board from £1,769pp, including flights, transfers, ski hire, lift passes, a Wine Ski Safari ticket and some extra meals

• Discover more ski holiday ideas

15. Meet Olaf in Paris

You’ll probably have little choice once the kids find out that World of Frozen opens at Disneyland Paris on March 29. Disney has built the icebound Kingdom of Arendelle as the star attraction of the £1.7 billion transformation of the old Walt Disney Studios Park into Disney Adventure World. Visitors to the kingdom can wander streets populated by characters from the film, including a full-size, robotic Olaf, and have an audience with Anna and Elsa in the royal palace — but only they you remember to join the virtual queue via the Disneyland Paris mobile app early on the morning of their visit. Be prepared for a long day: the new night-time show, involving fountains, fireworks and 379 drones, is the highlight of the visit.
Details Two nights’ room only from £2,177 for a family of four, including accommodation at the Disney Hotel Santa Fe, Eurostar and park tickets

• Read more about Paris

April

16. Discover hidden Japan

Take the bullet train from Tokyo to the rural beauty of Fukui

ALAMY

Japan’s Golden Route is pretty but crowded — and, as with any tour sold as “golden”, the truth you seek is often hidden behind the souvenir shops, Tripadvisor stickers and Segway tours. This new self-guided trip takes you off the tourist trail to the city of Fukui on the north shore of Honshu, where forested mountains fall into the Sea of Japan. Long popular with Japanese foodies who come for the snow crab, Fukui’s coast is now catching the attention of international visitors due to the completion of the Shinkansen link that puts a region of temples, forests and coves just an hour and 20 minutes from Osaka. Over 15 days the Hidden Zen tour starts in Tokyo before taking the bullet train via Kyoto for six days in the peace, quiet and rural beauty of Fukui, the artistic hub of Ishikawa, and hot springs of Toyama.
Details Fourteen nights’ B&B from £7,180pp, including guides and excursions (insidejapantours.com). Fly to Tokyo

17. Operation K-pop

My nieces — like most kids, it seems — are in thrall to K-pop. I get it. For parents, there’s a choice: resist and be resented or surrender, splash out on this new K-pop-themed itinerary and hope they look after you in your old age. Neon-lit Seoul sets the scene and Hongdae offers the essential retail. Once properly attired, walk down K-Star Road, make a K-pop video at HiKR Ground, hang out with the Army (Adorable Representative MC for Youth) at the BTS Café or ZM-illenial, and do more shopping at the K-pop-up shops of Seongsu-dong. There are also activities for grown-ups, such as a bibimbap and kimchi cookery lesson, a hike on Hallasan, an island volcano, and a trip to the Seoraksan National Park. But, like, whatever.
Details Thirteen nights’ B&B from £4,200pp, including flights, activities and some additional meals (stubbornmuletravel.com)

18. Go with the Seine flow

Claude Monet’s garden in Giverny, France

ALAMY

Six new river cruises launch this month, ranging from eight days of medieval history in the Low Countries with National Geographic and Lindblad Expeditions (seven nights’ full board from £4,800pp; world.expeditions.com) to a Grand Epicurean Journey that starts with a sea voyage from Nice to Barcelona aboard the Scenic Eclipse and concludes with a river trip through the winelands of Bordeaux aboard the Scenic Diamond (15 nights’ full board from £10,829pp, including flights; scenic.co.uk). Then there’s Abercrombie & Kent’s launch of the ultra-luxurious Nile Seray, focusing on lesser-known treasures of ancient Egypt such as the tombs of Nefertari, Ramses VI, and King Tutankhamun (four nights’ full board from £2,314pp; abercrombiekent.com). But the new cruise that caught my eye is a five-night itinerary in France aboard the 42-cabin paddlewheel cruiser MS RE Waydelich. Its low draft means it can get up the Seine to St-Mammès before heading downstream to Giverny and back to the City of Light.
Details Five nights’ full board from £1,158pp, departing on March 31 (croiseurope.co.uk). Take the Eurostar to Paris

• Read our guide to river cruises

May

19. Run wild in the Highlands

Loch Hope lies between Loch Eriboll and the Kyle of Tongue in Scotland’s far north, about 90 miles from Inverness airport. It’s part of the 220,000-acre Wildland estate, a major conservation project owned by the Danish billionaire Anders Holch Povlsen and part of a 200-year plan to restore native woodlands and peatlands, regenerate habitats and support local communities by developing sustainable tourism. Hope Lodge, which joins existing properties Lundies House in Tongue and Killiehuntly Farmhouse in the Cairngorms, opens in May, offering seven bedrooms, a suite and two self-catering cottages, and activities including fishing, stalking, 4×4 tours, pony picnics and nature walks.
Details All-inclusive doubles from £1,100, including all activities (wildland.scot)

20. Further on the Orient Express

Expect champagne and formal dinners on the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express, a Belmond Train

Two versions of the Orient Express now operate in Italy. Both charge high prices for short journeys for luxury-loving tourists, but it’s easy to confuse them. One, owned by Accor, runs from Rome to Venice. The other, operated by Belmond, operates out of Paris. This is the Venice-Simplon Orient Express, with a new three-day journey for 2026 from the City of Light to Belmond’s Caruso hotel, 1,150ft above the sea in Ravello on Italy’s Amalfi coast. Champagne, fine wines, cocktails and formal dinners will help pass the time as you roll down the boot, waking up in Campania for a guided tour of Pompeii. More champagne awaits at the Caruso, a Belmond Hotel, Ravello, where the two-night programme includes cooking and art lessons; a private tour by boat of the hidden coves of the Amalfi coast and a gala dinner in the hotel’s Wagner Gardens.
Details Three nights’ full board from £8,600pp, departing on May 4 (belmond.com). Fly to Paris and back from Naples

• This swanky sleeper is a spoiling way to see Italy’s countryside

21. Insight into Istanbul

A new tour that’s been 11 years in the making offers a deep insight into the history, culture and fabric of Istanbul. As Constantinople, it was the last resting place of the Roman Empire and, until the 13th century, the richest, most cosmopolitan city on earth. Under the Ottomans the city rose again, proving that location, location, location — as the portal between Europe and Asia — was key, and if you’ve ever walked the steep streets of Galata or discovered street art in Kadikoy, you’ll know there are more secrets here than can ever be spilt. But this new seven-day exploration of Istanbul, led by Jim Crow, emeritus professor of classical and Byzantine archaeology at the University of Edinburgh, will throw light on some of them, thanks to a citywide network of contacts built up over a decade. This might be the best opportunity you’ll ever have to nail a deal on a carpet.
Details Six nights’ B&B from £3,495pp, departing on May 8 (petersommer.com). Fly to Istanbul

• More inspirational city break ideas

22. Cultural capital Oulu

An Arctic food lab, a climate clock and a Sami opera feature on a year-long programme of events in the Finnish city of Oulu: European Capital of Culture for 2026. It’s also the penultimate stop on a new eight-day rail journey from Stockholm around the forested shores of the Gulf of Bothnia. You get a whole day to explore the Swedish capital before checking into a private sleeping compartment for the overnight journey north to the buzzing Swedish university city of Umea and onwards to Lulea, home of the fascinating Gammelstad Church Town: 424 wooden huts built around a 15th-century church to allow the faithful to spend the night after Mass rather than travel home in Arctic weather. In Tornio you’ll cross the bridge into Finland, take a coach to Oulu, and reach the city of Vaasa — famous for its market — on day seven.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £1,635pp, including flights (regent-holidays.co.uk)

23. Walking in Transylvania

Sighisoara in Transylvania

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It was in 2018, on the 100th anniversary of the union of Transylvania with Romania, that the idea of building a path to unite the nation was born. Eight years later, the Via Transilvanica is complete, running 870 miles and potentially turning gorgeous Romania into the next big hiking destination. This ten-day group trip is focused on the Transylvanian end of the path, combining monasteries, museums and church visits with glorious walks of up to 13 miles a day. Much here seems unchanged since the 15th century, with an ageing population of foresters and farmers looking after a beautiful land exactly as the generations did before them. You’ll spend a night in the Unesco-listed medieval town of Sighisoara before a short final walk into the village of Bran — and no, despite what they tell you, Vlad the Impaler never lived here.
Details Nine nights’ B&B from £1,895pp, including some extra meals, departing on May 9 (intrepidtravel.com). Fly to Cluj-Napoca and from Brasov

24. Freewheeling in Veneto

Explore Veneto by bike on this new guided tour

When we were kids it didn’t matter if you had a racer, a BMX or your mum’s step-through, you took it on road, off road, up hills and through the woods — wherever you wanted to go. Then, as we grew older and more self-important, we needed specialist rides and more branded costumes than a Disney superstore. But gravel biking — geekspeak for riding your bike wherever you like — takes us back to the days before Strava when we whizzed about for the sheer fun of it. So if you join this new guided ride from Verona, remember it’s not a race. It takes you along Lake Garda and up into the Valpolicella Hills; through Mantova and Padua to the Basilica Palladiana in Vicenza. You ride about 30 miles a day, sleep in simple hotels and if you have a few pints of an evening, there’s no one in Lycra to judge you.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £2,295pp, including support vehicle, luggage transfers and some extra meals, departing on May 30 (skedaddle.com). Fly to Verona

• Read our full guide to cycling holidays

June

25. Gorillas in Uganda

You may spot gorillas while staying at Gorilla Forest Lodge

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When Geoff Kent met Yoweri Museweni in 1985 — a year before the latter became president of Uganda — he offered to invest in the protection of mountain gorillas in return for a lodge within the boundaries of the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. Gorilla Forest Lodge remains the only lodge inside the primary forest, and is still the prime spot where gorillas might well pay you a visit. The lodge reopened in 2025 after a complete refurbishment, adding ten suites, a newly expanded spa and a chandelier made of hand-rolled paper beads. The relaunch dovetails nicely with the new direct flight from Gatwick, so spend three nights here as part of a ten-day safari from Entebbe to Murchison Falls; Kibale; the Queen Elizabeth National Park; and Bwindi.
Details Eleven nights’ full board from £11,295pp, including flights, guiding and permits (abercrombiekent.com)

• How to see gorillas in Rwanda: everything you need to know

26. Swiss cottage

Huus Quell is a new wellness sanctuary with a longevity spa in Appenzellerland in northeastern Switzerland. The region at the foot of the Alpstein mountains — popular with the Swiss but largely unknown to the British — is at the nation’s cultural heart and has the cheese to prove it. The all-wood hotel has 30 rooms and the largest wine cellar in Switzerland but the longevity spa is the main attraction, with an infrared sauna for deep detox; cryotherapy at minus 110C to reduce chronic inflammation and encourage cellular repair; and hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which has been shown to reduce tissue ageing. The views are nice too.
Details B&B doubles from £440 (appenzellerhuus.ch). Fly to Zurich

• Discover what else to see and do in Switzerland

27. Italian castle stay

Castel Badia is a brand-new 29-room luxury hotel hidden deep in the maze-like Dolomite mountains of Italy’s South Tyrol. Except it’s not that new: built about 1,200 years ago, it became a convent in 1020 and home to a particularly freewheeling, hedonistic brand of upper-class Benedictines who refused to be cloistered, frequented public baths and were the life and soul of the local festival scene. Let’s hope the hotelier Aldo Melpignano has preserved that tradition along with the original medieval windows, vaulted ceiling and frescoes. He’s turned four of the cells into a spa, using herbs from the old Apothekergarten. Sixteen other gardens have been restored, and even though the Kronplatz ski area is just 30 minutes south, these are why you should come in June.
Details B&B doubles from £680 (castelbadia.com). Fly to Innsbruck

28. Îles d’Or on foot

Explore Îles d’Or on Headwater’s new walking tour

New for 2026 from the walking specialist Headwater is an eight-day exploration of France’s Îles d’Or: the islands of Levant, Port Cros and Porquerolles off the gorgeous coast of the Var in the south of France. It begins in Hyères: the oldest and still the classiest of the Riviera resorts, with a 7.5-mile walk on the western tip of the lovely Giens peninsula. On day three you take the ferry for a nine-mile walk on Porquerolles with loafing time on the Plage d’Argent, and on day four there’s a brilliant ten-miler from Plage de l’Argentière around the coves of Cap Bénat to Le Lavandou. Day five is a beach day; the next is a hike around the wild isle of Port Cros; and day seven takes you inland for an 11-mile walk via Pierre d’Avenon, from where you’ll have fab views of the islands you conquered.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £1,309pp, including ferries and luggage transfers (headwater.com). Fly to Toulon

29. The World Cup in the US

Dallas will host the England v Croatia game in June 2026

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It’s just six months until England take on Croatia in Dallas so it seems remiss not to include a Fifa World Cup trip in this list. Official England travel partner Sportsworld’s packages seem very reasonable at first glance: a two-game bundle to see the lads against Croatia at the AT&T Stadium in Dallas on June 17 and Ghana in Boston on June 23 costs from £3,995pp. But that includes neither the international flights (the cheapest at the time of going to press was £1,104 with BA) nor, quite importantly, the match tickets (up to £523 through the England Supporters’ Travel Club). Factor those expenses in and that’s closer to £6,000, but with hotel prices tripled since the draw — three nights, for example, in the Premier Inn-style comfort of the Hampton Inn and Suites in downtown Dallas has rocketed to £1,894 for the match from £814 the week before — good luck beating the Sportsworld package price.
Details Eight nights’ room-only from £3,995pp, including internal flight (sportsworld.co.uk). Fly to Dallas and back from Boston

• Read our guide to the 16 World Cup cities

July

30. Britain’s best campsite

Winner of the AA’s 2025-26 Caravan and Camping Awards is St Helens in the Park in Wykeham, seven miles west of Scarborough on the southern edge of the North York Moors National Park. Already in the book for my 2026 circumnavigation of the British coast for the 18th edition of the beach guide, the pet-friendly site lies in 36 acres of landscaped grounds, with four immaculate amenity blocks, a coffee shop, two posh glamping pods and pitches for caravans, campers and tents. The Downe Arms hotel and the North Yorkshire Water Park are both a short walk away. Book now, it’s going to be busy.
Details Tent pitches from £54 per night based on four sharing

• 50 of the UK’s best beaches

31. Grand tour of Scottish lighthouses

Take in the Pentland Firth and explore the lighthouses of Scotland

ALAMY

This new cruise for pharologists is focused on the work of the Stevenson family, three generations of whom were responsible for the construction of 15 of Scotland’s most spectacular lighthouses. Departing from Oban, the ten-day voyage goes via Ardnamurchan, Tiree, Gairloch, Kinlochbervie, Stromness, North Ronaldsay, South Ronaldsay, Sanday, Wick and Fraserburgh to Invergordon, with runs ashore to visit the Skerryvore Lighthouse Museum on Tiree, Smoo Cave in Durness; the prehistoric village of Skara Brae on Orkney; and the Museum of Scottish Lighthouses in Fraserburgh. Cruising aboard the 48-guest Hebridean Princess, you’ll also see Kyle Rhea and the Inner Sound, Wester Ross and the Sutherland Coast, Cape Wrath and the North Coast and the Pentland Firth. You’ll also find out which member of the Stevenson family preferred writing to lighting.
Details Nine nights’ all-inclusive from £7,995pp, departing July 14 (mundycruising.co.uk). Take the train to Oban

• Read our Scotland travel guide

32. Odyssey from Turkey to Italy

Retrace the steps of Odysseus on this tour

The biggest film of 2026 seems likely to be Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of Homer’s Odyssey, with Matt Damon in the lead role. Shooting in 70mm Imax, Nolan seems so confident of another blockbuster that tickets for the release of The Odyssey on July 16 went on sale a year early. It would be remiss, then, not to offer you the opportunity to retrace the hero’s route from Troy to Ithaca this summer. Admittedly, like Odysseus, you need “the wealth of twenty men” to embark on a 14-night trip that starts in Troy in Turkey, then flies to Sicily, home of the Cyclops; sails to the Egadi Islands, where Nolan filmed last summer, and ends on the Amalfi coast, mythical home of the sirens — all involving a private yacht and a helicopter and accompanied by expert guides, artists and performers.
Details Thirteen nights’ all-inclusive from £75,000pp (pelorustravel.com). Fly to Canakkale and back from Naples

August

33. Crete expectations

Ikos Kissimos is on Korfalonas beach in western Crete

When the first Ikos resort opened in Halkidiki in 2014 few realised how transformative the brand would be. All-inclusives had been around since the first Club Med opened in Mallorca in 1950 and they were, you know, OK. Caribbean properties were little better until Butch Stewart launched Sandals and it can’t have been long before the hotelier Andreas Andreadis wondered if offering champagne on tap would appeal to the European middle classes. It did, and new openings are awaited with the same feverish anticipation as a new series of Strictly. The wait, though, is over, with the opening of Ikos Kissimos: a 414-room new-build on Korfalonas beach in western Crete. It’s going to be harder to get into than Berghain, so book now.
Details Seven nights’ all-inclusive from £2,570pp, including flights, departing on August 9 (inspiringtravel.co.uk)

• Where to stay in Greece

34. Portuguese paradise

Amaria is a new boutique hotel

Amaria is an old farm turned new boutique hotel with 11 suites, two apartments, a pool, sauna and yoga deck in Portugal’s vast Costa Vicentina Natural Park, a 350 square mile sanctuary created in 1995 to protect one of western Europe’s last unsullied regions. Here, huge sandy beaches form a necklace along a wild coast, and life in the surrounding countryside moves as though there’s all the time in the world. The owners Nuno Avillez Oliveira and Phoebe Arnold — a former banker and fashion editor respectively — are part of the new breed reversing migration from the countryside and in search of the modo de vida extinct in the city. They’ve revitalised the vineyard and vegetable gardens, filled the old finca with art and design, and aim to provide a haven to “unplug, relax and recharge”. Have they succeeded? Check into Amaria and see for yourself.
Details B&B doubles from £288 (amaria.pt). Fly to Lagos

• Read our travel guide to Portugal

35. St Cuthbert’s Way

Take on a new 62-mile guided hike from Melrose Abbey to Lindisfarne

ALISTAIR DICK

Cuthbert, who served as prior of the abbey at Melrose and then Lindisfarne, had a knack of curing the sick. He died in 687 and when miracles of healing continued at his tomb they were taken as a clear sign of sainthood. Eleven years later the monks of Lindisfarne opened his coffin to sell his relics but to their shock they found his body in better nick than the day it was buried. They checked again in 1104, and in 1539, but Cuthbert’s body had still not decayed — which was taken as a sign of very great sainthood indeed. In 1827 they had another look and all they found were bones. You have a week to discuss this conundrum on a new 62-mile guided hike from Melrose Abbey to Lindisfarne, covering between 6 and 16 miles a day through the Eildon Hills and the Cheviots before crossing the sands to Lindisfarne. You’ll spend three nights in Ednam House hotel in Kelso and four in Nether Grange in Alnmouth.
Details Seven nights’ full board £1,309pp, including guiding and luggage transfers departing on August 14 (hfholidays.co.uk)

36. En famille in Normandy

Villa Rosehillin’s pretty facade

Hot off the presses from the quality holiday home agency Sawday’s is Villa Rosehill in the Seine-side medieval town of Vernon in Normandy. Just 47 minutes from the French capital’s Gare St Lazare and 90 minutes from the coast at Honfleur, Vernon is right next door to Giverny and the house and gardens of Claude Monet. The house, set in artistic gardens which give Claude a run for his Monet, sleeps up to 12 in five bedrooms, lies two streets from the river, seven minutes’ walk from the Wednesday market in the Place de Vieux-René and ten minutes walk from the railway station.
Details Seven nights’ self-catering for 12 from £2,121 in August (sawdays.co.uk). Take the ferry to Calais or train to Paris

• Mistakes I’ve made on self-catering holidays

September

37. Germany, Austria and Czech Republic by train

Ideal for trainspotters and their long-suffering husbands, this new two-week trip spends eight hugely enjoyable days crossing Germany and Austria, stopping in Cologne, Nuremberg, Vienna and Salzburg, and riding on heritage lines including the dramatic Semmering Line to Graz. You’ll also tour the impressive Deutsches Dampflokomotiv Museum before arriving in Prague for the Benesov Steam Locomotive Festival. The next train takes you to Dresden to inspect the Weisseritztalbahn and the Loessnitzgrundbahn steam railways before the tour terminates back in Cologne.
Details Thirteen nights’ B&B from £2,250pp, including rail travel from London, departing on September 11 (ffestiniogtravel.com)

• Discover the best rail holidays

38. Amazon prime

La Jangada is the first luxury catamaran on the Amazon

At the exact point where Peru, Colombia and Brazil meet lies Leticia, the embarkation point for the 1,011-mile journey down the Amazon to Manaus. Until now, the only option for tourists has been to pay £70 to sling a hammock on the deck of a cargo carrier like the Sagrado Coração De Jesus and join locals on the four-day commute to the big city. Now, though, there’s the opportunity to make that journey in comfort with the arrival of La Jangada: the first luxury catamaran to ply these waters. It’s slower than the Sagrado — taking 13 days — more exclusive, with just 12 cabins, and a bit pricier (see below) but if you’re one of the lucky ones you’ll be exploring the tributaries, searching for pink dolphins and jaguars; going piranha fishing; hiking in the rainforest and drinking cocktails on the top deck under fiery Amazonian sunsets. Note that there’s just one sailing this year.
Details Thirteen nights full board from £5,918pp, departing on August 31 (rainforestcruises.com). Fly to Leticia via Bogota

39. Outstanding outback

Explore Uluru up close with this five-day guided tour

You can race around Uluru, Parkrun-style; join guided Segway tours; book champagne picnics and pay £170 for dinner and a show with 1,100 drones telling the Anangu tjukurpa story. But you could never just walk across this sacred land, led by a local who is happy to explain the deep spiritual meaning of the monolith. That changes this year with Great Walks of Australia’s launch of a gentle, five-day guided hike over 33 miles from the Valley of the Winds in Kata-Tjuta east to Uluru. Partially led by Anangu guides, this hike has only been made possible by gaining special permission from the traditional owners to spend the night in the park. You’ll have two nights under canvas, two in lodges and will never look at that big red rock the same way again. The standalone price for three nights’ full board is £2,532pp (greatwalksofaustralia.com.au) — otherwise, do it as part of a luxury 15-day Grand Tour of Australia visiting Sydney, the Red Centre, the Daintree Rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef.
Details Fourteen nights — 11 B&B and three full board — from £10,795pp (steppestravel.com). Fly to Sydney

• Discover more of Australia’s best trips

40. Explore Tibet

Visit monasteries in Tibet

GETTY IMAGES

“If I can choose where to pass the evening of my life, it will be in Kyirong,” wrote Heinrich Harrer in his wartime memoir, Seven Years in Tibet. “There I would build myself a house of red cedar wood and have one of the rushing mountain streams running through my garden.” You won’t have quite as long to choose your fantasy sunset home, but 15 days on this new, expert-led group trip from Exodus is probably enough. Starting in Beijing, you take the high speed train 1,100 miles to Lanzhou before entering the Tibet Autonomous Region. Four days later, after a 21-hour journey on the Sky Train sleeper, you arrive in Lhasa, meeting pilgrims, monks and joining a cooking class. More monasteries pave the way to Everest, Makalu, Lhotse and Cho Oyu, seen from the north, and on day 13 you arrive in Kyirong. The tour ends in Kathmandu.
Details Fourteen nights’ full board from £3,899pp, departing on September 6. Fly to Beijing and back from Kathmandu

41. Alps on a plate

Gone, it seems, are the days when a walker’s rations comprised a dry cheese sandwich and a Kendal mint cake. Nowadays, gastrohiking is the fashion, and this new guided group trip through the French Alps from Walks Worldwide is a fine example. It starts with three nights in the Hotel Restaurant Val des Sources in Saint-Maurice-en-Valgodemard, a riverside hamlet in the Ecrins Massif in the Hautes-Alpes. Specialities of the maison include seven-hour lamb, home-cured ham and the spinach lasagne called oreilles d’âne, and when you move down the road to Chabottes for four nights at La Grange des Ecrins, more gourmet dinners await. As for the walking, it’s as easy on the eye as it is on the legs, with a seven-mile hike up to Lac du Lauzon on the most strenuous day.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £1,609pp, including some extra meals (walksworldwide.com). Fly to Marseille

October

42. The Valley of the Cats

I know the Valley of the Cats sounds a lot like a Sixties B-movie about a land of feline indolence — but it’s not. It’s an actual place in northwest China on the eastern side of the Tibetan Plateau: a magnificent U-shaped valley in the Sanjiangyuan National Park surrounded by the 16,000ft peaks of the Kunlun Mountains. The area has emerged as a hotspot for feline action, with good sightings of snow leopards, Pallas’s cat, Eurasian lynx and the Chinese mountain cat. Their presence is indicative of the high density of prey species, including kiang (the largest species of wild ass), blue sheep, Tibetan gazelle and woolly hare, and this new 13-day expedition from Wildlife Worldwide offers the opportunity to see all.
Details Twelve nights’ full board from £5,495pp, including flights, departing on October 15 (wildlifeworldwide.com)

• What to see and do in China

43. Follow Christie’s trail from Egypt to France

On January 12, 1976, Agatha Christie departed this life in non-suspicious circumstances. Fifty years later, sleuths can uncover her unmatched literary legacy with a new 19-night trip taking you by train, riverboat and plane to the scenes of her crimes, staying at some of her favourite hotels. It starts with two nights at the Sofitel Legend Old Cataract, Aswan — Christie’s favourite Egyptian hotel — before embarking on a cruise to Luxor; two nights in Cairo; then a flight to Istanbul for two nights at the Pera Palace, where Christie wrote Murder on the Orient Express. You then board the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express for a five-night rail journey via Belgrade and Budapest to Paris. “The two winters and one summer that I spent in Paris were some of the happiest days I have ever known,” Christie wrote. You have just two nights.
Details Eighteen nights’ B&B from £29,435pp, including some extra meals, departing on October 2 (theluxuryholidaycompany.com). Fly out to Cairo and back from Paris

• The best luxury Nile cruises

44. Hidden harbours of the Ionian Sea

Squeeze the last drops of summer on this sailing trip

This new flotilla sailing trip truly squeezes the last drops from the summer as it sets sail from the Greek island of Lefkas for a lazy cruise to the parts the other boats don’t reach. Palairos is the first stop — often associated with the mythical hero Palamedes, inventor of dice, without which the backgammon players in the kafeneia would be lost. Next, the island of Kastos, population 40; then the fjord-like inlet at Kioni — probably the prettiest harbour in the Ionian Sea. On day five you’re cut loose to sail wherever you like as long as you get to Meganisi the next day, and all too soon you’re back in Lefkas. If you’re wondering about sailing in October, you’ll find gentler winds, usually the sirocco from the south; warmer seas and far less traffic than high summer. It’s one for sailors with previous experience and you should have spent at least five days previously skippering a yacht of similar size — in this case a twin-cabin Sunsail 34.
Details Seven nights’ self-catering for four from £463pp, departing on October 18 (sunsail.com). Fly to Preveza

• Best Greek island cruises

45. Sardinian secrets

If you’ve wondered what lies behind the slick resorts of the Sardinian costas, here’s the autumn trip for you. New for 2026, this private tour takes you through the back streets of Cagliari; introduces you to the flamingos of the Molentargius wetlands; and shows you the extraordinary murals in the so-called museum town, San Sperate, which predate Banksy by 30 years. It takes you for a walk along the spectacular Cammino Minerario di Santa Barbara on the cliffs of the Costa Verde then to Arbus in the interior to meet Monica Saba, breeder of the native Pecora Nera, or black sheep. Try the cheese. Next stop is the abandoned mining town at Ingurtosu with an 8,000-year heritage that ended only in 1991. The trip ends with an in-depth exploration of Sardinia’s lost civilisation: the Bronze Age Nuragic tribes. Take a camera and a big appetite.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £3,549pp, including some extra meals (yellowwoodadventures.com). Fly to Cagliari

• Read more about Sardinia

46. Shadows of war in Germany and Poland

With peace more fragile than it’s been in most of our lifetimes, 2026 seems an apposite time to launch a new tour examining the origins of the Second World War. The journey takes you by rail from St Pancras via Cologne to Berlin to explore the Reichstag, the Topography of Terror exhibition on the site of the former Reich Security Headquarters the Jewish Museum and the Berlin Wall. On day five you travel to Poznan in Poland, where history lies deep. Occupied in September 1939, it’s the site of the first concentration camp built in Poland and the last resting place of 48 of the 50 men executed after the Great Escape. In Gdansk, nearly 200 miles north, you visit Westerplatte, where, at around 5am on September 1, 1939, Staff Sergeant Wojciech Najsarek is said to have become the first victim of a war that killed 70 million. The Warsaw Uprising Museum, Schindler’s Factory Museum in Krakow and Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum are still to come.
Details Thirteen nights’ B&B from £2,105pp, including rail travel from St Pancras to Krakow (regent-holidays.co.uk). Fly back from Krakow

November

47. Portrait of Frida Kahlo

The face that sold a million tote bags returns to Tate Modern in June with the opening of Frida: The Making of an Icon, featuring more than 130 of Kahlo’s works. Join the queue by all means but put the merch money towards a new trip from Journey Latin America visiting the places where Kahlo lived and worked. Start with four nights at the Four Seasons Hotel Mexico City, from where you can visit the Casa Azul — Frida’s cobalt blue birthplace — and the mercado in Coyoacan; the gondolas in Xochimilco Gardens where she met friends and the Museo Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo, where she lived until her divorce in 1939. Three nights follow at the Belmond Casa de Sierra Nevada in the arty city of San Miguel de Allende, where Kahlo and Rivera often came when times were good. You can’t help but notice: she seems to be staring at you from every shop window in the town. Go in November and you’ll get the Day of the Dead commemorations too.
Details Seven nights’ B&B from £3,125pp, including flights (journeylatinamerica.com)

• What to see in Mexico

48. Swimming in Sulawesi

Stay in a resort on the southern tip of remote Bangka Island

My nomination for the most exotic group trip of 2026 is this invitation to get a turtle’s-eye view of Indonesia’s Coral Triangle. Based at a resort on the southern tip of remote Bangka Island, off the northeastern end of Sulawesi, you’ll set off every morning to swim in the bath-warm Celebes Sea, come back for lunch, then head off again for an afternoon dip. You’ll swim through rock formations, along coral walls and, assisted by the current, down the coast of the neighbouring island, sharing the water with big fish such as fusiliers, jacks and rainbow runners, plus reef sharks, marble rays and the odd whale shark. The tour accommodates a maximum of 15, is rated “leisurely”, with each swim covering less than a mile.
Details Six nights’ full board from £2,139pp, departing on November 7 (swimtrek.com). Fly to Manado via Jakarta

49. Unexplored Sahara

This top-value desert trip from Fleewinter kicks off with a night in Marrakesh before heading south through the High Atlas and along the green Ounila Valley to the ruins of the Kasbah Telouet not far from where Ridley Scott’s Gladiator was filmed. From here you take the Dades Valley route — rightly rated as one of the world’s most spectacular roads — and after a night in a guesthouse you press on to ultra-remote Sidi Ali, 20 miles from the Algerian frontier, for a night in an auberge and a desert hammam session. By day four, you’re deep into the Sahara, hanging out with nomadic families and spending the night in a private tent at the Mharech Oasis, and on day five you’ll reach the desert city of Agdz. Turn left, and it’s 1,000 miles south to Timbuktu. Turn right, and you’ll be back in Marrakesh in time for tea.
Details Six nights’ B&B from £840pp, including a private guide and some extra meals (fleewinter.com). Fly to Marrakesh

December

50. André Rieu Dutch cruise

See André Rieu on the Spirit of the Rhine

MARCEL VAN HOORN

See the popular musician and conductor play live with the Johann Strauss Orchestra in Vrijthof Square in his home town of Maastricht before boarding the river cruiser Spirit of the Rhine to spend five nights following the River Meuse, the Waal and the odd canal downstream to Amsterdam. It’s a lovely journey, stopping off at Roermond for the Christoffelvlaai — a flan filled with chocolate, cherries and cream; Nijmegen for the market; and Utrecht for the culture — and its mascot, the cartoon rabbit Miffy. In between, miles of polders — low-lying land protected by dikes — which are often mist-shrouded on December mornings.
Details Seven nights’ all-inclusive from £2,739pp, including flights and concert tickets (saga.co.uk)

• 2026’s best cruise destinations

51. Top of the bucket list

You go to school, get a job and for the next 40-odd years of your life your freedom is limited to the duration of your annual leave. The dream trips are consigned to a bucket list to be ticked off after you’ve given your best years to The Man. And, in case you’d forgotten, that bucket is the one you’ll kick. One of many flaws in this model is that by the time you’ve got the time to chase your dreams, you’re ancient, incontinent and lacking in mobility. One solution is to take career breaks throughout your working life and self-fund those grand tours while you’re still young enough to make the most of them. It used to be called a sabbatical, or leave of absence, but now they’re calling it microretirement, and a survey released last September by the adventure tour operator Explore showed that nearly one in three of those asked were planning to give it a go. Maybe you should too, making 2026 the year you decide to fly now, pay later. One idea is to start with Explore’s new 14-day Zimbabwe and Botswana wildlife safari, beginning in Victoria Falls, travelling to Hwange and Matobo National Parks in Zimbabwe and onto Ntwetwe Pan, Savuti and Chobe in Botswana. And instead of coming home, stay on for a couple of months. If you do, let me know.
Details Thirteen nights’ mainly full board from £4,395pp, departing on December 22. Fly to Victoria Falls

• Discover more safari holiday ideas

What’s on your list for 2026? Let us know in the comment below