The most beautiful destinations on the planet

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This was published 7 years ago

The most beautiful destinations on the planet

By Brian Johnston
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Beauty may well be in the eye of the beholder, and philosophers have puzzled over just what beauty is, and whether it is universal since Plato first scratched his head in the agora. Since then, our perceptions of beauty have changed over the centuries, providing rich layers of art and architecture, and shifting cultural attitudes to the great outdoors and how to appreciate it.

Yet somehow, it isn't that hard to reach a consensus among travellers. Surely we all know beauty when we see it in a building, a landscape or even an entire country. We recognise what provokes pleasure and happiness, and set off down the road to find it. The only serious argument is over choosing which destinations have the best looks of all.

We've challenged Traveller top travel writers to come up with some answers, and think you'll find it's a wonderful world.

COUNTRY

THE PLACE Switzerland

THE LOOKS Hard to believe the Alps were once viewed as dangerous and misshapen until the Romantic poets came along with their gushing and gambolling. You'd be a strange creature not to be awed by Switzerland's beauty, whether you're flying over its pavlova panoramas, taking a train along vine-clad lake shores or hiking through flower-filled meadows where happy cows munch.

DON'T MISS The Route des Vignerons (Winemakers' Road) between Lausanne and Montreux will really smack your gob. It takes you through World Heritage-listed vineyards teetering above Lake Geneva, across which the French Alps are majestic under epaulettes of snow. See lavaux-unesco.ch; lake-geneva-region.ch.

ESSENTIALS Spring and autumn have cooler weather free of summer haze, revealing splendid alpine views; for scenery on skis, try January or February. See myswitzerland.com.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

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UNITED STATES

No matter how you define beautiful, the US has probably got it: from soaring standalone volcanoes in Oregon to Florida's lugubrious Everglades greenery, via multicoloured New England leaf-peeping and dramatic western desert canyons. See visittheusa.com.au.

SOUTH AFRICA

South African landscapes aren't modest. Its canyons are enormous, mountains scrape the clouds, Stellenbosch vineyards are gorgeous and Cape Town hunkers between wild ocean and table-top mountains. See southafrica.net.

CANADA

From the soaring beauty of the Rocky Mountains to the rugged charm of the Yukon, the windswept Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia to the continental charm of Quebec, there's no shortage of photo opportunities in Canada. See canada.travel.

JAPAN

From morning shower to chopsticks at breakfast to bedtime when you might lie down on a strange mattress, Japan surprises at every turn with constant reminders that this is a most astonishing place. See jnto.org.au.

ITALY

Is it the light? The history? The sheer wonder of its variously captivating landscapes? Its preserved villages, monuments and ways of life? The people and their sense of fashion? The food? Its myriad quirks? It is all of these. See italia.it.

CITY

THE PLACE Venice

THE LOOKS Even before you go there you know Venice. The facade of St Mark's Basilica, the Rialto Bridge, the view across the water to the Church of St George – they're as familiar as the Eiffel Tower. No other city projects itself so radiantly to the world, yet nothing prepares you for the moment when you board a vaporetto and set off past the baroque palaces along the Grand Canal. The reality of Venice is far more fabulous than anything the imagination could construct.

DON'T MISS Among the traditional dining delights of Venice are the bacari, small wine bars that also specialise in cichetti, small, antipasto-style finger food. Bacari predate the city's tourist invasion, and they remain a refuge of Venetian voices and mannerisms.

ESSENTIALS Avoid peak tourist season, between mid-June to mid-September. November to January is quiet, when Venice has a sublime winter beauty. See italia.it.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

KYOTO, JAPAN

Just in case you ever tired of Kyoto's incredibly beautiful temples, shrines, pavilions and gardens, there's also Arashiyama Bamboo Grove, a forest on the outskirts of the city that might just be the most photogenic location of them all.

VANCOUVER, CANADA

You can spend hours pedalling Vancouver's shorelines and never pass an unpleasant moment as bays unfold promenades and cafes, basking seals, cedar trees and hydrangea-draped gardens. See tourismvancouver.com

VALLETTA, MALTA

Wander Valletta's steeply sloping streets, where limestone townhouses festooned with baroque balconies glow in the Mediterranean sun, and you realise that its founders the Knights Hospitaller were both formidable fighters as well as fine city planners. See visitmalta.com.

ISTANBUL, TURKEY

This is almost a requiem to this beautiful but tragic city, already heavy with mystery and melancholy. Riven by contradictions – East and West, secularism and political Islam, Istanbul must now bear the pain of violent upheaval. See visitistanbul.org.

ST PETERSBURG, RUSSIA

Sitting astride the Neva River and numerous canals, this is a city of water vistas at every turn towards golden domes and giant statues, baroque mansions and churches, all bathed in pale northern light that lasts past midnight in summer. See visit-petersburg.ru.

CAPE TOWN

From the ground, it's the way clouds form a tablecloth around Table Mountain as it rises seemingly from the sea. From the top of the mountain, it's the combo of the beaches, the flats and the fynbos-swathed National Park enveloping below. See capetown.travel.

ISLAND

THE PLACE Santorini, Greece

THE LOOKS Santorini is the essence of a Greek island, where sea meets weather-beaten rock and the colours are bold and elemental. Blue-domed chapels stand on hilltops, houses are white cubes, sunsets flamboyant orange. The crater cliffs of this half-moon island, which plunge into a bright blue sea, are the remnants of a giant volcanic explosion. On the island's gentler side, vineyards, olive trees and stone-circled fields form a pretty patchwork.

DON'T MISS Sunsets are practically worshipped on Santorini, as they provide the ultimate romantic moment to view the scenery awash in low golden light that turns to red and purple over the sea. The high point of the cliffs (360 metres) at Imerovigli or the castle ruins at Oia are prime lookouts for the day's last hurrah.

ESSENTIALS Visit in April-May or October, cooler and less crowded. See santorini.gr.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

SICILY, ITALY

Both natural landscapes and glorious cultural layers make Sicily beautiful. There are smouldering volcanoes, rugged coastlines and wildflowers everywhere in the mountainous interior. See italia.it.

PALAWAN, PHILIPPINES

If you were to dream up a tropical island paradise – including limestone karsts rising from impossibly clear waters, fringing coral reefs, an interior of jungles and waterholes – you couldn't come up with anything better than Palawan. See itsmorefuninthephilipines.com.

SKYE, SCOTLAND

If wild, haunting highland landscapes are your thing, Skye delivers. The west-coast island has sheep-haunted bogs, chilly beaches and dramatic valleys where shaggy cattle moan. See skye.co.uk.

BORA BORA

When people ask, "What's the most beautiful place you've ever seen?", my answer is always the same – even though it's hard to describe the exact shade of Bora Bora's lagoon. Sometimes I call it Listerine; other times I go for I'll-never-forget-you-blue. See tahitinow.com.au.

MADEIRA, PORTUGAL

Part of the Macaronesian archipelago known as the "Pearl of the Atlantic" or "Floating Garden", this subtropical, emerald green and mountainous volcanic beauty 600 kilometres off Morocco is Portuguese, but its culture is European and African. See visitmadeira.pt.

JOURNEY

THE BERGEN LINE, NORWAY

THE LOOKS Norway's Bergen Railway Line could easily have been designed just for sightseeing, with its 496 kilometres of track connecting Oslo to the coastal town of Bergen, a spectacular journey that takes passengers through some of the most remote and rugged parts of the country, past lakes and meadows, through tunnels, over mountains, along desolate highlands, near rugged coastlines. The fact this is a regular old commuter line, used by Norwegians as part of their daily lives, makes the Bergen Line all the more incredible.

DON'T MISS All of the highlights take place in the one spot: the window of your train carriage. Spend hours with your nose pressed to the glass and you will see everything that makes the journey so memorable. It is also highly recommended, however, to take a side trip on the Flam Railway, a steep 20-kilometre section of track that runs from the town of Myrdal to Flam.

ESSENTIALS There's no bad time of the year to ride the Bergen Line – summer is bright and green, winter is spectacularly white, and the shoulder seasons offer a mix of both. See nsb.no.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

GLACIER EXPRESS, SWITZERLAND

From the foot of the Matterhorn to Davos or St Moritz, the seven-hour ride is a succession of snow-capped peaks, deeply cleaved valleys and luscious green meadows with dappled cows and Hansel-and-Gretel houses.

GARDEN ROUTE, SOUTH AFRICA

Serrated mountain ranges, wild beaches, lagoons where flamingos strut: barely an inch of this 200-kilometre coastal driving route isn't beautiful. Towns such as Wilderness and Knysna are surrounded by scalloped sands and shimmering lakes where kingfishers flash. See southafrica.net.

WEST COAST, IRELAND

Ireland's west is one long, meandering drive past green stone-walled fields, plunging puffin-haunted cliffs, craggy islands and wild scenery at the Ring of Kerry, Dingle Peninsula and Cliffs of Moher. By the time you reach Galway, lakes, moors, mountains and Iron-Age forts are the stuff of Irish poetry. See ireland.com.

ROUTE 66, US

Every twist and turn of this classic route from Chicago to Los Angeles is beautiful in some way: the flat expanses of the midwest, the truss bridges of Missouri, the haunting landscapes of Arizona and New Mexico – arid, remote, yet filled with soul.

ICELANDS PARKWAY, CANADA

It's tricky keeping your eyes on the road while driving the Canadian Rocky Mountain's Icefields Parkway: your attention will be diverted by soaring mountains, glacier-fed rivers, and – with luck – bears and coyotes along the way.

MONUMENT

MACHU PICCHU, PERU

THE LOOKS It's not the altitude that will take your breath away; it's the sudden, in-the-flesh sight of those ancient Incan ruins set down, quite casually it seems, atop a peculiarly levelled precipice. The world falls away from this settlement on every side, defying its existence: there is the icy Urubamba River curling around it far, far below; there are the fog-filled valleys that are the foil to Machu Picchu (old peak) and Huayna Picchu (young peak), the jagged spear of rock that rises up protectively behind this lost city of the Incas.

DON'T MISS Pose for a photo with that classic postcard image – the Incan ruins framed by Huayna Picchu – in the background. You'll smile with disbelief every time you look at it.

ESSENTIALS Machu Picchu is best visited during the dry season (April to September) but try to avoid the high season (June to August). Instead of trekking or going by commuter train, take Belmond's luxury Hiram Bingham train to Machu Picchu and into Belmond Sanctuary Lodge – the only hotel located beside the citadel. See belmond.com; visitperu.com.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

PETRA, JORDAN

For sheer spectacle, it's hard to beat Petra, the ancient city carved out of sandstone cliffs in what is now Jordan. The real show-stopper is the building known as the Treasury, its elaborate facade carved directly into the cliff, but even the approach to Petra, winding through a narrow defile, is simply spectacular. See visitjordan.com

PERSEPOLIS, IRAN

It's hard not to feel small when standing amid the ruins of the ancient Persian capital of Persepolis. More than 2000 years ago the Persian kings nailed the art of awe-inducing aesthetics so well that even the little that is left is jaw-dropping. See whc.unesco.org.

SHWEDAGON PAGODA, YANGON, MYANMAR

A tapering spire gilded with solid gold plates and capped with diamonds, rubies and sapphires, this is one of the holiest of all Buddhist shrines, animated by saffron-clad monks performing rituals on the stupa's marble-tiled platform. See myanmar.travel.

TAJ MAHAL, INDIA

The world's most famous monument to love is also its most attractive, a shining marble edifice that is even more impressive in the flesh than it is in the millions of photos that are taken there every day. See incredibleindia.org.

ACROPOLIS

Monuments are about storytelling and what a story Athens' sacred rock of the Acropolis tells. It rises luminous, its main buildings – the Parthenon, the Propylaia, the Erechtheion and the Temple of Athena Nike ensconced 150 metres above the city on a flat-topped rock. A universal symbol of civilisation. See visitgreece.gr.

NEIGHBOURHOOD

THE PLACE New Orleans Garden District

THE LOOKS Swoon over an entire neighbourhood of 19th-century southern mansions built on a one-time vast plantation lost in a divorce settlement and divvied up into 80 city blocks. Each block's antebellum mansions were once surrounded by huge lawns and gardens – thus the district's name – but a second wave of development squeezed in more mansions built in a charming kaleidoscope of styles.

DON'T MISS If strolling the neighbourhood sounds too energetic (especially in summer's humidity), see the mansions from the quaint St Charles streetcar, which trundles along oak-lined St Charles Avenue.

ESSENTIALS The teal-and-white destination restaurant, Commander's Palace, serves haute Creole fare along with 25c martinis. See neworleanscvb.com.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

JORDAAN, AMSTERDAM

This is the Amsterdam most tourists would be dreaming of, a place of houseboat-lined canals, of tall, wonky terraced houses with shuttered windows and gabled roofs, of centuries-old churches and cobbled squares. Perfection. See iamsterdam.com.

ILE ST-LOUIS, PARIS

In the lee of the tourist hot spot of Ile de la Cite, this island in the Seine is a pint-sized treasure, home to an ambrosial cheese shop, a classic brasserie and the best ice-cream shop in Paris. See en.parisinfo.com

CONSTANTIA, CAPE TOWN

Nestled into the crook of Constantiaberg (on Table Mountain National Park's southerly flank), Constantia is at once both beautiful and practical: residents live amid glorious mountain views and the working vineyards that have somehow survived urbanisation.

LA BOCA, BUENOS AIRES

They're passionate about two things in rough-round-the-edges La Boca: colour and soccer. Caminito is surely one of the world's most dazzlingly colourful streets, while La Bombonera soccer stadium is as much a temple to sporting passion as a sports venue. See argentina.travel/en.

NEW TOWN, EDINBURGH

Most, if not all, first-time visitors to the gorgeous Scottish capital are naturally attracted to the city's Old Town with the Royal Mile as its centrepiece. But the elegant World Heritage-listed New Town (actually older than European Australia) is a less visited open air museum of beautifully preserved 18th and 19th century architecture. See visitscotland.com.

RIVER

THE PLACE Middle Rhine, Germany

THE LOOKS There are certain places in the world whose beauty is so familiar from films and fables, that when you see and experience them in person, it's kind of surreal. The Rhine Valley is one of those. It's a dream of a place. Scores of fairytale castles, impossibly pretty medieval villages, breathtakingly steep banks of vineyards producing famous wines and a wide, sparkling, snaking river running through it – that's a vista that stays with you, long after you've left. Though there is hiking, cycling and land-based sightseeing aplenty, it is best appreciated by boat, where you understand how this majestic waterway forged such beauty.

DON'T MISS Above the storybook charms of Rudesheim am Rhein's historic alleyways is the takeoff point for the Seilbahn, a cable car gliding high over seemingly endless vineyards to reach the elevated Niederwald Monument. The sculpture is magnificent but the vantage point presents a panorama of the winding river and its pretty banks, extending to faraway hills. It's simply dreamy.

ESSENTIALS Summer is river cruise season and the vineyards are a glossy green. In autumn, they glow with vibrant reds and the crowds are less. But each season has its charms here. See germany.travel.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

COLORADO, US

Few rivers have worked harder over their lifetime than the Colorado. Throughout its 2330-kilometre course, it has carved out brutally steep canyons – including the big boys in Utah and Arizona – and as a result, rarely looks anything less than spectacular. See coloradoriverbasin.org.

WAIKATO, NEW ZEALAND

The Waikato, at 425 kilometres, is New Zealand's longest river but the best part comes just before it tips into Lake Taupo. Spa Thermal Park, as the name suggests, is a spot where thermally warmed waters tumble into the bracing river. See newzealand.com.au.

ZAMBEZI, AFRICA

Few major rivers remain as pristine as this 2700-kilometre serpent – Africa's longest east-flowing river navigating six countries. Zimbabwe's Mana Pools, an 80-kilometre game-rich stretch of Zambezi 15 degrees south of the equator is prime Zambezi – one of Africa's last great wilderness areas. See natureways.com.

LI, CHINA

The landscapes around Guilin in south-west China are magical, best admired on a six-hour sightseeing trip down the Li River where the almost surreal scenery reaches its culmination in the karst peaks around Yangshuo. See visitguilin.org

NILE, EGYPT

The Nile is a great slash of life-giving water through the red rock of Egypt's desert. On its banks erupt palm trees and sugarcane, mud-brick villages and the brooding temples and tombs of a fabulous ancient civilisation. The scenery is best admired from a river-cruise ship. See egypt.travel.

NATIONAL PARK

SERENGETI NATIONAL PARK, TANZANIA

THE LOOKS Tanzania's Serengeti National Park conjures Africa at her most exemplary: swaths of sun-bleached savannah stretching off into infinity; storm clouds gathering above a heat-seared landscape; granite kopjes punctuating the grassland; thorn trees silhouetted against an electrifying orange sunset; lions dangling from the branches of trees; and that immense, unending stream of wildebeest making their annual migration northwards in search of fresh grass, and back again to give birth.

DON'T MISS The Serengeti is synonymous with safari, and there's only one place to sleep while here: under canvas. Zip up your tent flaps and fall asleep to the raw, magical sounds of the African bush.

ESSENTIALS There is never an off season in the Serengeti, but June and July are when you're most likely to see those hordes of wildebeest crossing croc-filled rivers in the world's largest terrestrial migration. See classicsafaricompany.com.au

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

GRAND CANYON

Take your heart into your hands, shuffle forward, check your footing, grab the handrail as vertigo takes hold and stare down as the belly of the earth is laid bare at your feet and the aeons reel away in a vision both terrifying and sublime.

JIUZHAIGOU, CHINA

What Jiuzhaigou lacks in worldwide recognition and ease of pronunciation, it certainly makes up for in sheer good looks. From its crystal-clear waterways to its spectacularly plumed forests, Juizhaigu is a picturesque surprise. See cnto.org

GALAPAGOS, ECUADOR

Consider it the world's most exotic zoo. Ecuador's Galapagos Islands rewrote our ideas on evolution after Charles Darwin noted the variations in finches' beaks. The islands channel a rather stark beauty but the real drawcards are its furred, feathered and web-footed residents. See ecuador.travel

FIORDLAND, NEW ZEALAND

Home to some of the world's greatest hikes, including the Milford, Routeburn and Kepler tracks, the 1.2-million hectare Fiordland National Park's wild beauty is almost unseemly. See fiordland.org.nz

LOS GLACIARES, ARGENTINA

Named to perfection, Los Glaciares is seamed with 47 major glaciers, including that poster child of ice: Moreno Glacier. The largest continental icecap outside Antarctica is here, as is needle-tip Cerro Torre and the bulk of Monte Fitz Roy.

FIVE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL BUILDINGS

ST BASIL'S CATHEDRAL, MOSCOW

Propping up one end of Moscow's Red Square, St Basil's is an almost fairytale-crazy collection of colourful onion domes. Each dome crowns a side chapel ringed around a central church, and together they sit atop a comparatively simple ochre-brick structure, which only accentuates the whimsy.

PALAIS GARNIER, PARIS

This opulent baroque masterpiece in the Second Empire Beaux-Arts style has been called the most famous opera house in the world, a Paris symbol like Notre Dame or the Sacre Coeur Basilica. Being the setting for The Phantom of the Opera probably helps. See operadeparis.fr

PANTHEON

Rome's second-century Pantheon is remarkable for its perfect proportions and ahead-of-its-time engineering but to me its most eye-catching feature is the oculus that allows a single, laser-like beam of sunlight to illuminate the dome's intricate interior. See turismoroma.it

ST MARK'S BASILICA, VENICE

A giddy, ornamented fusion of Byzantine and Western art and one of the supreme works of Christendom, the basilica also bears witness to Venice's devotion to wealth, power, war and theft. See turismoroma.it

HUNGARIAN PARLIAMENT BUILDING

Architect Imre Steindl channelled the Gothic Revival lines of London's Palace of Westminster, and threw in a massive central dome for good measure, when designing the Parliament Building that dominates Pest's shoreline. See budapestinfo.hu

FIVE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL MOUNTAINS

KILIMANJARO, TANZANIA

Kilimanjaro rises untethered from the surrounding plains, its peak capped somewhat surprisingly with snow (this is equatorial Africa, after all). Perhaps it's this incongruity that renders Kili (as the locals call it) so heartbreakingly beautiful: a lone, dormant volcano bearing witness to the prehistoric creation of Africa's Great Rift Valley. See worldexpeditions.com/au.

HUANGSHAN, CHINA

Eastern China's Yellow Mountain features improbably teetering rock topped by bonsai-bent pine trees, all shrouded in shifting, atmospheric mist. Millennia of human effort has added dizzying pathways and stairways to heaven. See huangshan.com.cn.

RIGI, SWITZERLAND

Take the rack railway up Rigi and the views get ever more splendid at each bend. Lake Lucerne shrinks to a puddle and towns looks like Legoland. When you arrive at 1797 metres you see lakes on every side and a 200-kilometre range of jagged snow peaks. See rigi.ch.

DRAKENSBERG, SOUTH AFRICA

The Dragon's Mountains (or "Barrier of Spears" as the Zulus call them) emerge from rolling countryside south of Jo'burg. First there are eroded sandstone gorges where antelopes roam, then a spectacular drive over the Oliviershoek Pass to table-top mountains dwarfing villages beneath. See drakensberg.org.

DOLOMITES, ITALY

Set hard against the Austrian border, this is an ice-sculpted region of lush alpine valleys where cows with clonking bells wade through wildflower meadows, set against limestone peaks that charge skyward and laced with the finest alpine walking trails on the planet.

TOWN

THE PLACE Old Town of Dubrovnik

THE LOOKS Many fell for the walled city of Dubrovnik long before HBO cast it as King's Landing in Game of Thrones. Not just for the unsurpassed beauty of its forts, ports, turrets and towers overlooking the sapphire blue of the Adriatic Sea, but for the scars that remain more than 25 years after the 1991 Siege of Dubrovnik.

DON'T MISS the two-kilometre walk around the top of the city walls for views over the Old Town and sea (cost: $23).

ESSENTIALS May to June or September to October are the ideal months to visit (warm, but not crowded). See tzdubrovnik.hr.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

ACOMA PUEBLO, US

Acoma Pueblo is a 12th-century Native American settlement clinging improbably to the summit of a tiny mesa. After the 90-minute guided tour of North America's oldest continually inhabited community, descend via an ancient stairway where residents have worn handholds into the rock over centuries. See acomaskycity.org.

RONDA, SPAIN

Picture Spain and Ronda is it: blue-tiled patios and whitewashed houses, orange blossoms, barrels of sherry, a bull ring, flamenco bars and clip-clopping horse-and-carriages that haul tourists around this hilltop town. Tangled alleys hide Moorish-era mansions, baroque churches and cobbled squares. See turismoderonda.es.

TSUMAGO, JAPAN

In the trough of the Kiso Valley surrounded by the forested hills of Japan's Alps, the delightful traditional machiya townhouses lining the single main street of this historic post town transport you to Japan's Edo period.

PORTOFINO, ITALY

Tucked into a cranny on Italy's Ligurian coast, Portofino is gorgeous any way you look at it: from its tiny harbour, jostling with fishing boats; its piazzetta, flanked by cafes and boutiques; its elevated lookout at Castello Brown, from which you can see the village's lolly-coloured houses tumbling down the hill.

CESKY KRUMLOV

The setting on a loop in the Vltava river would be enough, but Cesky Krumlov gets greedy with its buildings. Walls are meticulously and decoratively painted to create a grand mirage of intricacy, while the castle tower rises above as a Renaissance fairytale. See ckrumlov.info.

FIVE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL LAKES

PLITVICE LAKES, CROATIA

A series of 16 aquamarine lakes laced together by waterfalls in a pocket of wooded hills in central Croatia. With a colour palette alternating between luminous jade and crystalline sapphire, this carnival of light reminds me of an underwater aurora borealis. See np-plitvicka-jezera.hr.

LAKE ANNECY, FRANCE

Embedded like a jewel in the velvet green embrace of the French Alps, Lake Annecy has waters clear enough to see flitting fish and its pebbled bottom. The shoreline is ringed by little castles and pretty villages such as Talloires, and Annecy old town is outrageous with flower-boxed petunias. See lacannecy.com.

LAKE COMO, ITALY

Like a supermodel, Lake Como has an excess of beauty and money. Every summer, the rich and famous (and the simply fabulous) flock to this northern Italian playground in the foothills of the Alps to frolic in the azure waters, zoom about in speedboats, stroll the villages, top up tans and to raise a glass or two to la dolce vita.

DAL LAKE, INDIA

In summer, a flat sheet of water spread across a valley, offset by the Shankracharya hills in the foreground and, further off, the dramatic Pir Pinjal and Himalayan mountain ranges. Houseboats are tethered to its banks, and brightly coloured shikaras – the gondolas of Kashmir – ferry visitors this way and that.

LAKE BLED, SLOVENIA

Start with a pristine lake. Surround it with high peaks. In the foreground, add an island crowned with a picturesque church. For a bit of background drama, throw in a medieval castle atop cliff. Voila – you have Lake Bled, Slovenia's most picture-perfect destination. See slovenia.info.

FIVE OF TRAVEL'S UGLY DUCKLINGS

BERLIN, GERMANY

The German capital lacks the millennia-old ruins of Rome, the canals of Amsterdam, and the architecture of Paris. What it does have, however, is graffiti. And some of the best nightlife around.

BEIJING, CHINA

There are charming parts to Beijing – the old hutong areas, for example, have plenty of character. However, the entire city is usually under a pall of thick pollution, which doesn't make it easy on the eye.

NAPLES, ITALY

Though it has a pleasant enough historic old town, the bulk of Naples is filled with decaying apartment blocks and rubbish-strewn streets. That's not to say you shouldn't go there, however. Naples has far more character than most people expect.

OSAKA, JAPAN

On its own, you wouldn't consider Osaka a particularly unattractive city. However, it sits right next to Kyoto, one of the prettiest places in the entire world, which renders poor Osaka the family's ugly duckling.

MUMBAI, INDIA

There is plenty to love about Mumbai, but it is certainly not a place you'd call beautiful. When your city has a sprawling population of almost 12 million people, it's enough of a job to just keep it running, let alone looking good.

CONTRIBUTORS

Andrew Bain, Michael Gebicki, Ben Groundwater, Kerry van der Jagt, Julietta Jameson, Brian Johnston, Ute Junker, Katrina Lobley, Alison Stewart, David Whitley, Catherine Marshall.

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