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Twenty-five years of family thrills and spills

What is it about islands that makes them such appealing places for a walking holiday? Perhaps it’s the slower pace of life that encourages gentle rambling, that feeling of escape from the hurly-burly of the real world, the sense of exploring, as Shakespeare so famously put it, a “precious stone set in the silver sea”. Many islands offer a wonderful variety of landscapes and walking trails in a compact area: steep volcanic slopes, mountain ridges and gorges, lush river valleys, forests, beaches and secret coves.

Here, from the Mediterranean to the Pacific, the Solent to the Indian Ocean, is our selection of 20 great islands to explore on foot, with suggested walks for all types, from the gentle to the strenuous.

A view of Hobart, Tasmania, from Mount Wellington