Lefkada Greece

Thanks to a causeway to the mainland that allows an easy 20km drive from Preveza airport, Lefkada delivers an accessible, intense shot of Greek island culture. You get a lot in a short period of time. An awful lot. From the galleries, shops and restaurants in the eponymous main town, to the pastel-hued waterfront tavernas, ice cream vendors and boat rentals of Nidri. West coast beaches include Kathisma, Egremni and Porto Katsiki – whose blinding white pebbles, soaring cliffs and electric-blue Ionian Sea make shades a necessity rather than a fashion statement.

That’s just the start. Head into the mountainous interior, where fresh air scented by oregano and thyme washes over monastic ruins, craft museums and snoozing villages where old men sell beer out of front-room fridges. And do stop for the view: the panorama over the red rooftops of Nidri, across Skorpios island – where Aristotle Onassis married Jacqueline Kennedy in 1968 – to mountains over 900m high is simply epic. For the more active traveller, the ports here are some of the best on the Mediterranean.

Southeast Sardinia Italy

The Caribbean’s a schlepp for a long weekend, so why bother when you have southeast Sardinia close to hand? One of the most modest, publicity shy regions of an island famed for its beaches and translucent shallows, the area around Villasimius and Costa Rei offers dazzling stretches of sand just an hour’s drive from the capital, Cagliari. Many places in the Mediterranean claim near tropical brilliance, but trust us, this is the real white powder, aquamarine blue real deal. There are too many peaches to pick from, but we recommend heading to Cala Sinzias backed with eucalyptus trees (a favourite of surfers when the wind’s up), 500m-long Cala Pira with its elegy inducing views of Isola Serpentara and wonderful snorkeling – any bay frescoed with anchored luxury yachts has something going for it – and small, gently sloping Punta Molentis,where the tropical comparisons reach their zenith. This short break is all about beaches and early summer warmth, so don’t expect the ancient stones, romantic mood and boutique inns of Tuscany’s hilltops or the Neapolitan Riviera. However, Villasimius is perfectly placed for the sand and will provide you with fine Sardinian fish dishes at La Lanterna including fregula with mussels and clams, and baby octopus with spicy tomato sauce, all washed down with good value local wine. And if you just have to have a shot of traditional Italian city life, there’s easily time to spend the first night in Cagliari, creating a nifty two-centre, long-weekend short break.

Split & Islands Croatia

Split: a wonderfully apt name. for a long early summer weekend, the Croatian coastal city – a gateway to the fabulous Adriatic islands – offers simultaneous servings of culture and sun-washed relaxation. Its ancient heart is the beautiful diocletian's Palace, built for the Roman emperor in Ad295, a living, breathing organic part of the city that has been tweaked and pimped over 1700 years. Alongside its houses, hotels and restaurants (try the contemporary dalmatian fare at Konoba Korta), Split’s bag of historical showstoppers includes subterranean halls once used to make wine and olive oil, the beautiful colonnaded central courtyard and 7th century St domnius Cathedral on the site of the emperor’s mausoleum – a nice irony given the Roman’s bloodthirsty persecution of Christians.

You could spend days wondering its labyrinthine alleys and people watching on the Riva – the seafront promenade – with its palm trees, bars and perfect west-facing sundowners. But this is a short break where you don’t just look at the ocean, you get out onto it. Three days gives you ample time to catch a ferry to Hvar, with its lovely if pebbly beaches like Uvala dubovica swaddled by deep green pine trees. The old port of Stari Grad, a former haunt of Edward VIII and Mrs Simpson, has sun-bleached lanes polished by millennia of footprints, while 30 minutes away, Hvar town offers splendid Venetian architecture seething with boutiques, bars – some like Caffe Gromit, overlooking the yacht-filled harbor – and chic, shades-on-the-head visitors.

Tarifa Spain

Fancy a short, soul-lifting blast of Southern European surf culture mingled with an earthy hit of North African architecture and food? You’re in the perfect place. Tarifa is a much undiscovered part of Spain on its most southerly tip, where Arabic ferry signs sit alongside advertisements for O’Neill and Oakley and the distance to Africa is mere kilometres. It has a strong, constant and fabulously pleasing breeze generated by the clash of the Strait of Gibraltar’s warm Mediterranean and cold Atlantic currents. A magnet for kite and wind surfers, their sails dot the ocean off Playa de Los Lances and Playa Valdevaqueros like a Jackson Pollock abstract. You can wander around Tarifa’s San Mateo Church, Alameda Gardens and cobbled Arab old town – the first town swallowed by the Moorish conquest of 711Ad – but this short break is more about the great outdoors: a wind-in-your-face hike along the beach, trying kite surfing lessons, tarifaspinout.com, or clambering over the vast dunes at Punta Paloma. You can always refuel on some of the best falafel known to man, served with fresh mint and cucumber, or on the wonderful lamb tagine with almond and prunes at restaurant Souk, before kicking back at night, café con leche in hand, to watch the twinkling lights of Morocco over the cedar forests and vine terraces of the Rif Mountains.

Miami USA

Subtropical Miami might seem an exhausting short break option, but kind connecting flights – depart Thursday early evening, fly back late Sunday afternoon – make it an exotic, accessible few-day trip.

It’s a sprawling complex destination, obviously but no self- respecting visit should ignore South Beach: a movie set made real with bronzed rollerbladers zipping along Ocean drive past soft- hued art deco buildings where ludicrously tall models sip cocktails alongside celebrities and hipsters, and where the beautiful and the tanned decorate the bleached white sand next to a shimmering Atlantic. Naturally, you’re here to relax not pose so try the excellent shopping of Española Way and supper at Barton G., where the eponymous chef’s fabulous American cuisine includes shrimp popcorn and grilled sea bass inside a paper bag sealed with laundry clips. Got the energy to explore elsewhere? Try buzzing Little Havana where grizzled senior Cubans play languid games of baseball in Maximo Gomez Park. Take a stop off at Los Pinareños frutería, which serves a legendary banana milkshake Cuban coffee blend, before heading to the lush bohemian charm of Coconut Grove, Miami’s oldest enclave. If you’re feeling flush, go to the upscale boutiques of Bal Harbour. Just make sure you’re Ralph Lauren chinos and pink shirt are well pressed.

Paphos Cyprus

If you’re after a short recharge for the body and mind, Paphos, on the southwest coast of Cyprus, offers an enticing bundle of beaches and ancient history, wrapped in a ribbon of warm sun stretching to over 300 days a year. The area around and about Paphos (far more civilized than some of the island’s wilder resorts) boasts 27 beaches, including the long curl of sands linking Cape drepano and Lara.

The photogenic harbour with its smatter of tavernas, cafés and boutiques is a good starting point to decompress, but for supper it pays to follow the tried and tested wisdom of heading back from the pretty waterfront to where Ta Perix serves the best meze in town including grilled quail, wild asparagus and wine-cured pork.

Paphos, however, also serves up some terrific cultural dishes. The Kato Paphos Archeological Park, a Unesco World Heritage Site, embraces ruins from prehistory to the Middle Ages, shining most brightly with its gorgeous mosaics on the floor of four Roman villas. There’s more art at Saint Neophytos Monastery, 10km away, with beautiful Byzantine icons in the church, and frescoes in the cave of the hermit saint, while further north nature takes over as creator on the Akamas Peninsula, where the Goddess Aphrodite is said to have bathed in the pool of the natural grotto.

We strongly recommend combining it with a visit to some of the local wineries, the marvelous modern-day legacy of production stretching back 5,000 years.

Kas & Kalkan Turkey

Turkey’s Turquoise Coast offers such widescreen drama, it’s hard to credit you’ve arrived on a short escape after a three-hour flight. Yet a budget flight to Dalaman followed by a spectacular, soul-lifting drive delivers you to Kalkan’s higgle-piggle of white architecture, sandwiched between a deep blue Mediterranean and relentlessly cyan sky. One of the country’s most sophisticated boltholes, it’s littered with villas and more than acceptable restaurants behind a pretty harbour – try the fresh seafood or wild boar at Aubergine on the waterfront.

Kas, slightly further to the east, developed as a bohemian drop zone in the sixties – hippies had terrible hair but a great eye for peachy hangouts – before surrendering to the yacht and gulet crowd. It still maintains a small fishing town vibe with narrow streets and chic boutiques, epic azure views worthy of Santorini and rock shelves (beach clubs) perfect for sunbathing. As for the Mediterranean, resistance is useless. Head to nearby Kaputas Beach backed by steep cliffs, or further west to Oludeniz, the poster boy for Turkish tourism with water of Maldivian clarity beneath 1,969m Babadag, a mountain ready to jump off for a tandem paraglide flight you’ll never forget. A long weekend also allows easily enough time for an inland excursion to the historic villages and citadels of Xanthos Valley, with the awe-inspiring, 300m-deep Saklikent Gorge and Patara Beach, birthplace of Santa Claus, guaranteeing you return home not just refreshed, but with unbeatable dinner party trivia.

Comporta Portugal

An easy hour or so drive south of Lisbon, Herdade da Comporta is one of Europe’s most stylish, understated hideaway: an enclave of barefoot, bleached wood style. Its low-key splatter of seven coastal hamlets, laced with remarkable villas, lets the continent’s A-listers, well-connected Lisboans and bon chic, bon genre Parisians, rub shoulders with artists, designers and surfers.

The glorious sweep of honeyed powder beach, culminating in the north with the 12km-long spit protecting The Sado Estuary, is backed by dunes, rice paddies and forests of cork oak and pine. You’ll want to dip a toe, although perhaps not a head, in the still chilly Atlantic, but Comporta is more about finessing the fine art of doing very little. We thoroughly recommend some beachfront lethargy, crashing on multicoloured beanbags or hammocks outside Comporta Café, eating clams in garlic, white wine and parsley at Ilha do Arroz, or keeping a lazy eye open for the nature reserve’s storks and flamingoes. development, inevitably, is planned, including a new Aman resort, but for the moment you’ll get a good value apartment in Comporta village, or can stay in the accurately named Sublime Hotel. Just remember, if you see the Monaco royals, or Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni pottering about in a golf buggy, close your mouth and don’t point.