The Chedi Club Hotel

Muscat, Oman

There are pools, and then there are the Chedi pools. They are enough, almost, to make you forget all the other reasons people go to Oman: the frankincense-infused souks; desert dune-bashing; craggy mountains of golden rock and cavernous valleys. The three pools – the pinnacle of which is the 103m aptly named Long Pool, overlooking the balmy waters of the Arabian Sea (also brilliant for swimming, by the way) – are enough to make you want to spend a week coddled within the resort walls, splayed under a cloak of sun. But the prospect of an indulgent dip is not the only thing that’s trumps at the plush Chedi.

The rooms do a very good job of making you want to stay put: mostly dark woods and crisp white linens, some are flourished with deft Omani touches like burnished metalwork. Cool, quiet retreats from the relentless Muscat heat, they boast complimentary minibars (in the club suites this equals carafes of gin, vodka and whisky), because the Chedi really isn’t a ‘done-by-halves’ kind of place. AM. Doubles from £315