Become an armchair traveller with this wishlist for the year ahead …
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My top goal for travel isn’t spendy. It’s opting for the beach over the hotel pool. I’ve been jammy enough to dip into some of the swishest pools. The majesty and stillness of Villa Feltrinelli’s pool, just metres from God’s version, Lake Garda. The five-star crow’s nest at 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge. Francis Ford Coppola’s onyx stunner he built for his daughter Sofia’s wedding at Palazzo Margherita. Or my many clocked hours at The Raleigh in South Beach – best at night, in black and white, waiting for a troupe of silver screen synchronised swimmers to pop up like Deco dolphins.
“A beach, even rammed, holds enough distance between you and everyone. There’s less to connect you to home, and so much more people-watching than people-judging.”
Beach days in Portugal
By the pool, however luxe, my sense nowadays is being trapped together with the guests. On a beach, we seem in it together. I’m talking about a proper beach now, not the penitentiary-chic lidos of Italy, or roped-off beach clubs, but any of the white sands south of Lisbon, the endless coves of Menorca sprinkled with jerry-rigged beachlife, locals set up in candy-striped foldy chairs, the aquarium vibe of Malindi in Kenya or St Lucia, the deafening surf of Saly in Senegal, the sandy civic jewels of Coogee or Venice. A beach, even rammed, holds enough distance between you and everyone. It muffles and baffles any detail in a conversation, music and voices overlap, and it’s hard to isolate anything. There’s less to connect you to home, and so much more people-watching than people-judging.
Over the past twelve months I’ve spent more time lying on the sand than in the previous quarter century. I didn’t think my near 54-year old back would approve, but it turns out uneven, firm warm silicon is actually just what the doctor ordered. There’s an analogue perfection to it all, the post-swim prickle, crackle and spark on the skin. It’s brine as a cure vs pool cleaner. Sand trumps tiles in 2025. @manandasuitcase
Claridge’s, London
THE ONE HOTEL TO RULE THEM ALL
I was back at the second World’s 50 Best Hotels Awards in London at the end of last year. There’s a list worth looking at now for anyone who’s hunkering down in winter, planning a future trip without having to consider the price tag. Again, the list was missing at least one Irish name, but hopefully that will change soon. Some choices were very conservative, like bumping Passalacqua in Como down to number two, which doesn’t make much sense if you know how spectacular that family-run palace is. As magnificent as many of the hotels I know are – Le Bristol, La Mamounia, Hotel Bel Air, Gleneagles, The Carlyle, all stunners, all of the time – for me, there is one hotel to rule them all. Claridge’s is its own category. A list of one. And if there was one night, it would be there.
SEE MORE: An Interview with Interior Designer Bryan O’Sullivan
Symi, Greece
THE STILL SLEEPY GREEK ISLAND
I tripped over Symi by accident last year and fell hard. I had been looking for it for 35 years – a still sleepy Greek island that’s handy to get to off season. Fifty minutes and a million miles from Rhodes, the main harbour town of Symi was flattened during World War II. I’d like to kidnap the town planners and rendition them to Ireland to sort out our coastal towns. They have created a beautiful pastel thing that complements the natural beauty of the Aegean. The stepped cobblestone lanes of the neoclassical candy-coloured toytown have a newness that counterintuitively makes you feel like you’ve gone back in time. I stayed in a handsome inexpensive apartment above a little restaurant, Tholos, with a home-cooked menu, where I had lunch and dinner daily, always with the tiny sweet Symi shrimp that the island made famous. If peace and quiet are at a premium nowadays when we travel, Symi is as aspirational a destination as there is. Symi for the winny this year. www.symi-hotel-aliki.gr.
Transcantábrico Train
THE POSH TRAIN JOURNEY
As that wisest of sages Kermit the frog would say, it’s not that easy being green. My bloated air miles may still keep me stuck on the naughty step but I want to be a good boy. I spent way more time on ferries last year than ever before and I do love a posh train, so my no-airport 2025 wishcast would involve the ferry to Santander or Bilbao, then happily waving goodbye to the Camino-heads. I’ll do some of their route, but by rail. Having martinis delivered via the white-gloved service in the sweetly cheesy, chintzy interiors of Pullman carriages from the 1920s on the heritage Transcantábrico service, as you cross northern Spain along the Bay of Biscay, that look like they were put together by the set designer of Morse, is my kind of Sunday evening drama. www.eltrentranscantabrico.com.
House Swap in Nantucket
THE HOUSE SWAP
Classy house rentals have become hilariously expensive. If you are lucky enough to have a home worth swapping, then it’s something to aim for this year. You may be bored with your neighbours, and to listening to the same neighbourhood guff. You might hate the mild weather that others dream of, so why not swap your gaff to play house and see through the eyes of locals in Paris, Athens, Kyoto or Byron Bay? House-swapping sites have improved no end, and some are exceptionally picky – a good thing. To an annual membership and cleaning fee add, unlike most rentals, an actual commitment to leave the place as good as you found it, which means that other countries are going to win big, as the Mrs Doyle Irish are probably most likely to leave it way better than they found it. There is a feelgood endorphin bonus too, as house-swapping is good for overtourism, as you aren’t renting some place that needs to keep working 52 weeks a year to pay its mortgage, and you could end up saving thousands. Dicky up your gaff for 2025 and get onto People like Us, Kindred or if you’re lucky enough, ThirdHome.