Go balmy in Bali
ENJOY life in the city and lazing on the beach with a two centre trip to the Far East for £995 per person. Stay three nights at the BerjayaTimes Square Hotel in Kuala Lumpur, then seven nights at the four star Lovina Bali, in Bali, both B&B. Flights leaving Heathrow on October 29 and internal flights are included. Ring 01293 762 456 or go to hayesandjarvis.co.uk. THE Foreign Office warning has been lifted and Tunisia is back on the map. Here’s why half a million Brits a year used to visit this North African gem. Jam-packed with goodies Tunisia is an Arab country that takes elements of France, blends them with oriental influences and Roman remains, chucks in timeless scenes of goat-herding and cave-dwelling and then mixes in glorious slices of beach-hugging Mediterranean, before wandering off in its sandy Saharan socks.
It is just three hours from the UK, but its location on the north coast of Africa means that its season lasts longer than most beach holiday favourites. And it’s cheap – prior to the terror attack that prompted the Foreign Office warning, you could get an out-of-season allinclusive week here for as little as £200. Tunis and Sousse The old walled city-centres, or “medinas”, particularly of capital city Tunis and second city Sousse, are compact car-free labyrinths where people live and where skilled carpenters, blacksmiths and other craftsmen work.
The alleys are studded with traditional bathhouses and madrasas – Islamic colleges – and there’s usually a tower to climb for great views.
At the entrances to these medinas there’s a tangle of lanes lined with stalls selling carpets, glass, leather, silk, carvings, perfume, and loads of things with tassels.
Such places throng with a tide of humankind, but the crowds thin as you go deeper – and you’ll soon find yourself in a quiet maze of lanes peopled with slinking cats and robed men fingering their worry beads, deep in thought. Hammamet and El Kantaoui: The best stretch of sand is undoubtedly at Hammamet, the longest established resort, whose narrow streets twist away from the sea.
Lined with ice cream parlours and patisseries, the smell of coffee and freshly-baked baguette wafts enticingly from its doorways.
Hammamet’s peach of a beach starts up by Cap Bon, where it is studded with fishing boats, and extends all the way down to the new resort of Yasmine Hammamet, with groomed soft sand bordering a beatific, somnolent sea.
There’s another fine stretch of sand further south, starting at the purpose-built resort of Port El Kantaoui and extending down to Sousse, getting broader as it goes.
Port El Kantaoui is where the terrorist attack took place in 2015, and it will probably struggle to win visitors back quickly. Sousse may fare better – it is an appealing place, combining city and beach like a Tunisian Barcelona. Carthage and El Djem Tunisia has a long history of civilisation, best witnessed in two key sites.
Carthage, birthplace of Hannibal and the remains of both a city and an empire, is messily located in the Tunis suburbs, although a lot of its best pieces are in the city’s Bardo Museum.
Meanwhile in the middle of the country sits the Roman amphitheatre at El Djem, visible from miles around.
It must have been a huge effort to produce the graceful arches of this African Colosseum. The amphitheatre, which had a capacity of 30,000, had the latest in technology – including platforms that rose up through the floor. The island of Djerba A low-slung, scrub-covered spangle of land, D Djerba – off Tunisia’s most southerly coast – is co connected to the mainland by a causeway.
In Homer’s Odyssey this was supposedly the la land of the Lotus Eaters, who spent their days in pe peaceful apathy – so, not much has changed in it its modern beachside hotels…
Meanwhile in its main town of Houmt El Souk, th the funduqs – whose vaulted rooms around fl flower-filled courtyards once offered shelter to it itinerant merchants – are unique places to stay.
Djerba’s big added bonus is its access to the re region called the Ksour, where the land rises up in humps like an elephant’s bristled hide. With ex extraordinary places like Ksar Hadada, a village