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High season in many of our most popular far-flung destinations begins in late autumn and continues throughout the winter months. Planning ahead means you’ll get the best choice, the best deals and have something to look forward to.
Flirting with the blue lagoon
Approaching Kuramathi Maldives by seaplane you’ll get astonishing views of atolls, islands and bright blue waters that no AI could ever match. On this larger Maldivian island, luxuries fill out the days: floating breakfasts, private pools, lobster dinners and spa treatments ending with bubble baths.
With perfect spots to propose and spaces for both child and friend-groups, Kuramathi caters to everyone. The overwater villas are the stuff of fantasies and beach villas exude castaway escape. The Select All Inclusive upgrade hits the ceiling of tastiness, offering you nine à la carte restaurants.
At this sustainably savvy resort you’ll be padding along powder white sands, diving off jetties and swimming in the house reef with sweetlips. Rent a resort GoPro and capture every magical moment.
TOP TIP: Split your stay between Kuramathi and Kandolhu to experience both a large and small island.
7 nights All Inclusive from £2299pp based on selected October 2023 departures on SriLankan Airlines from Heathrow. Save up to £1186 per couple.
Creole cool from every corner
You’ll feel dreamily marooned at adults-only Lagoon Attitude, Mauritius where bar swings, bean bags and boho rooms meet a minimal imprint philosophy: furniture is repurposed from discarded boat sails and blue nets handed out if you want to pay it forward picking up debris out on the snorkelling trail. Couples sip white rum cocktails on sun bleached sands, build up tans kayaking across the lagoon and soak up sunsets with pulse-slowing SUP sessions.
From farm fresh food and sugar cane juices to curated experiences like chef-led cooking classes and musical lessons, this hotel shimmers with island spirit. Dinners are a highlight, especially at Creole-style Kot Nou for Mauritian tapas under twinkling lights.
TOP TIP: Book the family style dinner where selected hotel staff invite you into their home for an authentic evening meal.
7 nights All Inclusive from £1779pp based on selected January, February & March 2024 departures on Air Mauritius from Gatwick. Save up to 15%.
Have your cake and eat it
This Thailand multi-centre rockets you from markets, temples and Thai monks to serenity on the beach. It begins close to all the culture at Sindhorn Midtown Hotel Bangkok, Vignette Collection where a sky-high infinity pool, K-Pop rooftop restaurant and Siamese cocktail-serving Black Cat Bar are waiting. Kids get ball pools, obstacle courses and a telephone line to an all-day popsicle butler.
You’re then spirited away to Koh Samui’s Rocky’s Boutique Resort , a book-reading, pool-hopping beachfront retreat where you can snorkel with sea horses. Top marks go to the restaurant, a très chic ocean-facing French-Med affair.
TOP TIP: Book a sailing, snorkelling and swimming day on Rocky’s longtail boat.
10 nights Room & Breakfast from £2149pp based on selected November 2023 departures on Thai Airways from Heathrow.
A Caribbean love shack to sweep you off your feet
The owner of Keyonna Beach Resort, Antigua has created a stylishly simple couples-only all-inclusive hideaway, eschewing televisions and buffets in favour of beachfront cottages with private pools and à la carte dining fresh from the ocean and garden.
Here you get to know Antigua beyond the flour-white sands and peacock-blue waters, with a fantastic team leading yoga sessions and hikes to Mount Obama. Kayaks and snorkels are complimentary, the peppermint and vanilla massages are heaven and each of the 37 rooms include a Balinese double day bed on the beach.
TOP TIP: Take a yacht to nearby Cades Reef and snorkel with parrot and angel fish.
7 nights All Inclusive from £2399pp based on 12 & 14 December 2023 departures on Virgin Atlantic from Heathrow. Save up to 20%.
Calypso vibes for the whole tribe
You can build your own style of holiday at Windjammer Landing Villa Beach Resort St Lucia , walking on sunshine and paddle boarding until you’re weak at the knees. Kids run off for ballbashing tennis lessons while you ride horses along the sand or take yoga in hummingbird-filled gardens.
Multi-generational crews, solo parents and 2.4 families will find pizza and chips, shallow-ended pools and movie nights on the beach but also seafood and rum coconuts, in-water hammocks and transformative spa treatments. Then factor in the ocean. The snorkelling and sailing are sensational and the kayaking and windsurfing are free.
TOP TIP: Let one of the hotel’s skilled chefs come to your villa and whip up a gourmet feast.
7 nights All Inclusive from £2249pp based on selected November 2023 departures on British Airways from Gatwick. Save up to £2075 per couple.
Endless family fun or a grown-up side?
Head to a dreamy all-inclusive destination in Mexico for family escapades and love-struck couples. There’s Paradisus Playa del Carmen , a kids candy land of cookie making workshops, a water park and nursery service until 10pm. At the other resort Paradisus La Perla – Adults Only – All Inclusive , expect swish sake and tequila bars and glamorous adults-only restaurants and DJs at the main pool.
Guests over 18 years can free-roam the entire complex (except the excluisve Reserve areas which are well worth the upgrade) but everyone wakes up to lagoon-style pools, caster-white sands and Caribbean Sea.
TOP TIP: The hour drive to Tulum’s spectacular beaches and clifftop temples is totally worth it.
7 nights All Inclusive from £1999pp based on 3rd & 10th October 2023 departures on British Airways from Gatwick. Save up to 17%.
Experience the Emerald Isle of Asia
Ready to cycle across rice paddies and swim in Insta-perfect pools? Snorkel off Nusa Dua’s coast and spot macaques in Ubud? Our Bali twin-centre features far-flung retreats we love so much we’ve made them exclusive to Kuoni in the UK.
Sleep in an ultra-luxe villa at The Royal Santrian Luxury Beach Villas , swimming under stars in your private pool and celebrating the 24-hour butler service. Then, it’s on to Viceroy Bali’s wow-worthy jungle setting where breakfasts in a thatched roof bale hovering over your private pool are as dreamy as the frangipani massages and the sunsets turning Bali from emerald green to tangerine.
TOP TIP: Take a helicopter tour over Kintamani Volcano from Viceroy’s very own helipad.
10 nights Room & Breakfast from £3599pp based on selected November 2023 departures on Qatar Airways from Heathrow. Save up to £490 per couple.
Heaven is a place on earth
You’ll make enough memories at Outrigger Maldives Maafushivaru Resort to fill the Indian Ocean. The PADI diving courses and private boat charters are a James Bond dream. A marvellous marine biologist takes you swimming with manta rays and nurse sharks. And the striking dining scene and evening snorkelling set the mood for sweet dreams in an overwater villa with a private pool and a ladder leading into the boundless blue.
In the South Ari Atoll, this is the luxury version of Robinson Crusoe, on one of the Maldives most stunning natural islands.
TOP TIP: Book Moodhu Grill for a phenomenal dinner in a twinkling open-air pavilion suspended over the ocean.
7 nights Half Board from £3899pp based on selected January, February & March 2024 departures on SriLankan Airlines from Heathrow. Save up to 30%.
Life is better at the beach
What a scene Constance Ephelia in Seychelles is, sequestered between two of Mahé’s most stunning white sand beaches. This is a resort where magical moments happen on repeat. Five pools give off ‘another day in paradise’ vibes and restaurants cater to lazy beach lunches and fabulous evening feasts.
Honeymooners are lured here for the wow-factor hillside pool villas, swoon-worthy spa and ever-so romantic private dinners. Families come for the jam-packed list of adventures; zip lining, rock climbing, windsurfing and kayaking in take-your-breath-away surrounds.
TOP TIP: The hotel sits just in Port Launay Marine Park, a mustvisit for its Instagram-worthy beach.
7 nights Half Board from £2379pp based on selected December 2023 departures on Emirates from Gatwick. Save up to 25%.
Sprinkled with star dust from every angle
You come here to disappear. To sleep high above the Andaman Sea in a villa clinging to the clifftop. To glide to the edge of an infinity pool perched among tropical forest. Maybe you drift over to the spa for a foot wash and Thai massage, or you sharpen your knives in the resort’s acclaimed cookery school.
Paresa Phuket is a temple of serenity, a honeymoon hideaway and luxury family treat all at once. Every villa is irresistible but the Spa Pool Suites are something else, with their own open-air treatment sala and huge bathtub sunk into a private pool.
TOP TIP: Book an exclusive dinner on a double day bed floating in the fibre optic lit pool. For proposals, add the firework display.
7 nights Room & Breakfast from £2249pp based on selected November 2023 departures on Qatar Airways from Heathrow. Save up to 20%.
Stay in a Gold Coast designer beach pad
With its batik ceilings, peacock sculptures and legendary architect Geoffrey Bawa’s tropical modernist stamp, Sri Lanka’s Cinnamon Bentota Beach is a favourite of romantics and families. Restaurants serve up hawker-style feasts and catch-ofthe-day washed down with coconut arrack, and you’re soothed to sleep in breathtaking surrounds where the river, beach and Indian Ocean meet.
There’s nothing boring here: drift from glistening pools to corkscrew palm-dotted sands, watch monkeys cling to fisherman as you boat across Bentota River, or ride wave runners and try out water skiing.
TOP TIP: Add a few nights here after a Golden Triangle multi-centre holiday to cap off the trip of a lifetime.
7 nights Room & Breakfast from £1699, based on selected November 2023 departures on SriLankan Airlines from Heathrow. Save up to £658 per couple.
‘Shamwari’s Kids on Safari scheme mixes exciting game drives and bush walks with on-site playtime and visits to a wildlife rehabilitation centre and big cat sanctuary’.