Fethiye’s iconic cove, Turunç Pınarı, Turkey
(Picture: Yazz Collection )As snowdrops carpet London’s parks and our winter moods begin to thaw with those brilliant shards of morning sunlight, spring brings hope and late night scrolling through villas and hotels, with such a tantalising glimpse of summer.
But why wait? April (and the Easter break in particular) brings with it a rare opportunity to jet off for a week without even denting your annual leave. The Mediterranean and European islands off the coast of Africa have already clicked into holiday gear by April, with a soft breeze and soul-warming sunshine a welcome alternative to the summer fry.
Sicily – Il Gabbiano
Full of secret beaches, not-so-secret beaches where Italians soak in the rays along warm quarry-like slabs, and magnificent, crumbling palazzos, Sicily is an island of wild variety and romantically tired splendour. Breakfasts are sweet feasts of brioche con tuppo and granita, lunches are long and lazy with cannoli finalés, and afternoons purr on under the shade of an olive tree or parasol… until arancini and Etna Bianco arrive in time for those golden syrup sunsets.
Just outside honey-hued Palermo and five-minutes’ drive along the coast from Cefalù’s warren of Medieval streets, lies an islet that clings to the land via a few rocks. Staggering down it is Il Gabbiano, whose three sun-drenched terraces and two stories of traditionally dressed rooms, their Sicilian tiles framing twinkling Tyrannian views, could only be born in the fantastical mind of a novelist. Steps guide deliriously happy guests down the islet’s steep slopes to two pretty coves, where the sun cuts tortoiseshell patterns along the water and kayaks can be pushed out for a morning paddle.
From £3,142 per week (sleeping 2) in April and from £3,922 per week (sleeping 5, full occupancy) in April; thethinkingtraveller.com
Antiparos, Greece – The Rooster
Paros’s laidback little sister, Antiparos is passed around the Greek island cognoscenti in hushed tones – eyebrows will be raised at any Instagram location slips. Indeed, the island remains deliciously unspoilt, with tavernas hovering over turquoise water and octopus drying off along their roped railings in the sun. Those in the know make annual pilgrimages here (often for weeks on end) for simple pleasures: lazy beach days, Kreatopita (Greek meat pie), moussaka, and feta-laden salads, as well as sunsets that burn the Aegean horizon.
The island’s new hot-ticket hotel, The Rooster, channels Antiparos’s back-to-basics appeal, though with an elevated take on earthy fabric and textures, and cane furniture profusion. Chiselled from local stone, suites spill onto terraces in driftwood, raffia, and cacti, with sweeping Aegean views and a salty Mediterranean breeze.
The daily coastal plunder, a nearby farm’s top-brass meat and vegetables plucked from the Rooster’s organic gardens, are worked into imaginative twists on Greek classics – just one element of the hotel’s holistic approach to wellness. Far from strict restraint, the wellbeing mood here is Greek yoghurt drizzled in lavender honey and poolside recalibration in that generously prompt spring sunshine.
Doubles from approx. £754 per night including breakfast; theroosterantiparos.com
Gran Canaria – Hacienda Buen Suceso
Long synonymous with cheap package holidays, Gran Canaria is slowly redeeming itself, or at least its wild, tropical charm (that was for too long eclipsed) is at last gaining some recognition. The white sand of its knockout beaches glimmers year-round, with generously long days of sunshine and reefs off the coast teem with marine life for divers to explore.
Capital Las Palmas is a labyrinth of traditional seafood restaurants, while the go-slow South West is peppered with empty dune-flanked beaches, quaint fishing villages, and plenty of charming AirBnB options (Finca Paraiso is a volcanic marvel). Just 15 minutes from Las Palmas in the island’s north west, Hacienda Buen Suceso lords over its own acres of banana plantations. Its eccentric traditional Spanish interiors are the antithesis of the wipe-clean package-holiday aesthetic, with wrought-iron beds, estate landscaping, and porous drawing rooms filled with chandeliers and that no-nonsense North African light. You’d be forgiven for not leaving the verdant confines of the converted farmhouse, or the shade of its smooth Spanish arches, but nearby Arucas’s rum factory may just do it.
Doubles from £128 per night; haciendabuensuceso.com
Mallorca – Can Ferrereta
Mallorca’s slow-living spirit and craft tradition (not to mention its spectacular beaches and generous sunshine) have lured in a new wave of global creatives, relieved that the Balearic island’s all-inclusive spell is over. Springing up alongside this profusion of ceramic studios and galleries are a cluster of seriously cool hotels, whose architecture has been cleverly woven into Mallorca’s sun-soaked landscape and its heritage (often with contemporary rigour).
One of them is Can Ferrereta – the country equivalent of its urban sister Hotel Sant Francesc Singular in Palma – whose restrained modernism works in harmony with the traditional finca’s character. Fresh, wooden-beamed spaces are prepped in white linens, cream tiles, and milky paints, with black lighting and bannisters layered on in sharp charcoal strokes. Light spills through crittal doors onto an ivory indoor pool, while cedar and olive trees line up along its al fresco, clean-cut equivalent, along with guests nursing glasses of Spanish white. The setting may feel gloriously remote, but Can Ferrereta lies in Santanyí – a time-warp cobbled town of independent boutiques, galleries, and markets worth exploring.
Doubles from £280 per night including breakfast;slh.com
Andalusia – La Zambra
The Costa del Sol has a bad rep – unsurprisingly so in places with decades of feverish development of eye-sore blocks catering to the package holiday crowds. But amid the concrete atrocities and Prosecco-soaked beaches are some unspoilt and surprisingly lovely pockets offering a glimpse of this region pre-mass tourism.
La Zambra is one of them – a recent rebirth and complete rebrand of the 80’s glamour-magnet Byblos, by Palma-based architectural maestros Esteva i Esteva (famed for their use of natural materials through a contemporary prism). Taking refuge near Mijas, in the cooler and much quieter Andalusian hills (between Malaga and Marbella), La Zambra offers a refreshing take on a healthy holiday, with various wellness ‘journeys’ tailored to guests’ needs and stints in the Turkish baths, saunas, or technogym rounded off with either fresh seafood or healthy salads at Palmito, or rich, smoky tapas washed down with Spanish red at Picador. The Kids’ Club here is truly superb – a reason to go in itself if sprogs are in tow.
Doubles from £450 per night including breakfast; lazambrahotel.com
Puglia – Masseria Pistola
The sun-scorched corner of Italy where artisanal rhythms still hold sway and trulli dot the scrubby landscape, Puglia is gloriously warm in spring. The heel of Italy’s boot is washed by both the Adriatic and the Ionian Sea, with crowded cubic houses hovering over the tide and, inland, acre-upon-acre of olive groves and dishevelled countryside that is harvested for the region’s famously simple (and exquisite) menus.
It’s here, in the unspoilt Canale di Pirro, that Masseria Pistola keeps watch over the estate’s vines. The main gabled farmhouse has been renovated with the utmost respect for the building’s 18th century wrinkles, while the surrounding trulli appear etched into the valley’s soft trees and shades. With a deliciously warm pool, four acres of manicured gardens to swan around, and a chef whipping up Puglian delights, this is the blow-the-budget spring vitamin D boost with only a short haul to contend with.
Minimum seven-day booking from £21,600; masseriapistola.com
Turkey – Yazz Collective
The country has suffered one of the world’s most devastating, tragic earthquakes in recent history and. if there has ever been a time to not only donate to those on the ground, but also invest your tourist buck in a country whose GDP heavily relies on it, it’s now.
Turkey’s coastline and islands may lack the airtime of neighbouring Greece, but you only need to edge a little into unchartered territory, and calm glassy bays and empty white sands flanked by a wild tangle of greenery and flowers soon spring into vision. Some of these are only accessible by boat, such as Fethiye’s ethereal Turunç Pinari cove, where Yazz Collective is new to Turkey’s elevated beach club scene. High on the list of priorities is lowering shoulders several inches (the verdant mountainous backdrop and gentle slosh of salt water against the beach will easily see to that). Eco-friendly architecture weaving into the untouched beauty is given a contemporary lick and all the little luxuries you’d hope for in a haute hotel. As a laidback beach club, a post-yoga juice and from-the-garden breakfast typically drifts onto the beach, where DJs keep to the cove’s go-slow rhythms (ramping things up on Saturday nights for wild sand-in-toes parties). Hikes and long morning swims are well rewarded with spanking fresh seafood lunches and seasonally led Mediterranean plates – all braised, baked, or woodfired to perfection.
Doubles from £420 per night with breakfast included; yazzcollective.com
Menorca – Alaior Gardens
Unlike Mallorca and Ibiza, Menorca’s coastline never succumbed to the hideous high rises flanking vast stretches of its Balearic neighbours’ beaches. Instead, much of the island remains frozen in time – its towns a bougainvillea-smothered labyrinth of shuttered traditional houses and its wild, sun-doused countryside a trove of alluringly dishevelled fincas keeping watch over their citrus trees and olive groves. The island’s beaches feel a little celestial, with impossibly blue water lapping warm boulders in coves – the sort of light blue that hits as food dye or a far-flung lagoon.
In the island’s rural heart lies Alaior Gardens, a statuesque villa softened by the vines clinging to its railings and the olive trees obscuring its imposing symmetry. Sleeping eight, this tastefully restored four-bedroom villa peers over two acres of fragrant Mediterranean gardens, whilst inside, stone walls, terracotta tiles, and original wooden beams evoke Old World Menorca. Guests can soak in the island’s abundant spring sunshine poolside, or on loungers in the garden, with active intervals of volleyball or badminton.
The nearby village of Alaior is old Menorca personified, whose 14th-century church and ice-cream cafés are well worth exploring. The pretty beach of Son Bou is only a 12-minute pootle away, with a nature reserve teeming with birds just behind its dunes.
