Compare 576 Travel Destinations

Tunisia's capital is where the Arab Spring began — where Mohamed Bouazizi's December 2010 self-immolation in Sidi Bouzid triggered a revolution that toppled Ben Ali and spread across the Arab world. But Tunis's layered history runs far deeper: Carthage's ruins 15 km north, the UNESCO Medina of Tunis (one of the Arab world's finest, with Ez-Zitouna Mosque at its heart), the Bardo's extraordinary Roman mosaics (world's largest collection), and Sidi Bou Said's blue-and-white clifftop village above the bay.

A British Overseas Territory of 40 low-lying coral islands strung between the Bahamas and Hispaniola — Grace Bay’s 12 miles of powdery white sand and turquoise water regularly tops world’s-best-beach rankings, the third-largest coral barrier reef in the world rims the islands (snorkelling and diving among the Caribbean’s best), and the bioluminescent Conch Bar Caves on Middle Caicos sit alongside Mudjin Harbour’s dramatic limestone cliffs. Higher-end and significantly quieter than Bahamas alternatives. Uses US dollars despite the British flag; British nationality, US currency.

Rolling hills, cypress-lined roads, medieval hilltop towns, and some of the world's best wine. Tuscany is the Italy of postcards — and it delivers. Florence anchors the region with Renaissance art, but the real magic is in the countryside: Siena, San Gimignano, Val d'Orcia, and the Chianti wine region. Renting a car is the best way to explore.

Bali's cultural and spiritual heart, set 200 m up in the foothills above Denpasar — the rice-terrace, monkey-forest, yoga-shala alternative to the surf-and-club Bali of Seminyak and Canggu. The Sacred Monkey Forest sits in the middle of town with 1,200 long-tailed macaques; Tegallalang's terraces are 9 km north; The Yoga Barn runs 15 daily classes; and a hundred warungs serve nasi campur for IDR 25,000. Eat Pray Love did the marketing in 2010, and the digital-nomad wave hasn't really left.

Rajasthan's "City of Lakes" is India at its most romantic — white-marble palaces ring Lake Pichola, with the Taj Lake Palace floating on its own island. Founded 1559 by Mewar king Maharana Udai Singh II. The City Palace is Rajasthan's largest, Bagore-ki-Haveli puts on a nightly folk-dance show, and the Monsoon Palace crowns the sunset hill. James Bond Octopussy filmed here. Day trip to Kumbhalgarh Fort (UNESCO, second-longest wall after China). Cleaner air and saner traffic than Delhi or Agra.

The world's coldest capital city (winter lows −40°C) holds roughly 45% of Mongolia's population on the steppe between Russia and China. Gandan Monastery with its 26m Buddha, Sükhbaatar Square, the Chinggis Khaan Equestrian Statue (40m stainless steel) an hour east, and Gorkhi-Terelj National Park 2 hours northeast for ger camps and Turtle Rock. Naadam Festival (July 11–13) is the peak cultural window — wrestling, horse racing, archery. Gateway to the Gobi Desert by train or flight. Best June–September.

A 348-metre sandstone monolith (taller than the Eiffel Tower) rising from the Northern Territory's Red Centre — sacred to the Aṉangu Traditional Owners who have inhabited the area for at least 30,000 years, dual UNESCO listed for both natural and cultural significance, and jointly managed by the Aṉangu and Parks Australia under one of the world's most successful Indigenous co-management arrangements. Climbing the rock was permanently banned in 2019 out of respect for Aṉangu beliefs; the 10.6 km base walk, the Mala ranger talk, and the Mutitjulu waterhole are the proper ways to engage with the site. Pair Uluru with Kata Tjuta (36 sandstone domes 30 km west, with the Valley of the Winds walk that many consider more dramatic than Uluru itself) and Bruce Munro's Field of Light installation, and the desert evening dining experiences (Sounds of Silence, Tali Wiru) — the Red Centre delivers the most spiritually charged landscape in Australia.

Officially the southernmost city in the world — 'Fin del Mundo' (End of the World) — and the standard departure port for ~90% of all Antarctic Peninsula cruises (October-March, $7,000-$25,000+). The Beagle Channel (Darwin's HMS Beagle) frames the city on one side; the Martial Mountains rise on the other. Tierra del Fuego National Park (12km west) holds the southern terminus of Argentina's Ruta 3 marked 'Buenos Aires 3,063 km'. The 1902-1947 prison is now an excellent Maritime Museum. Tax-free Tierra del Fuego makes electronics and Argentine wine cheaper than mainland; Cerro Castor ski resort 26km away is the world's southernmost commercial slope.

Utrecht is the Netherlands without the Amsterdam crowds, plus a quirky architectural feature you will not see in any other Dutch city: the medieval canals run a level below the street, and the old wharves (werfkelders) along the Oudegracht are now packed with restaurants and bars at water level. The 112-metre Domtoren is the tallest church tower in the country, the DOMunder tour walks you through 2,000 years of buried Roman and medieval foundations, and the compact medieval center is built for bikes and slow afternoons. Twenty-seven minutes by Intercity train from Amsterdam.

Spain's third-largest city sits on the Mediterranean coast 350 km southeast of Madrid — the birthplace of paella (originated in the rice paddies and orange groves of the Albufera lagoon south of the city), home to Santiago Calatrava's futuristic City of Arts and Sciences (Europe's largest cultural-architectural complex), and built around the 9 km Turia Gardens — a linear park created in the diverted riverbed after the 1957 flood. Add Las Fallas (the UNESCO Intangible Heritage festival of 700+ giant satirical papier-mâché monuments burned in March), the medieval El Carmen quarter, the modernista Mercado Central (Europe's largest fresh-produce market), the Holy Grail in the cathedral, and a wide urban beach reachable by tram — and Valencia delivers more variety per square mile than any other major Spanish city.

Built by the Knights of St. John after the Great Siege of 1565 — UNESCO 1980, one of Europe's smallest capital cities (0.8 km²) and European Capital of Culture 2018. St. John's Co-Cathedral holds Caravaggio's Beheading of St. John masterpiece; Upper Barrakka Gardens fire the saluting battery daily at noon and 4pm; the Grand Harbour is ringed by the Three Cities (Vittoriosa, Senglea, Cospicua) older than Valletta itself. Mdina — Malta's "silent city" — is a 30-minute bus away. Schengen EUR, 90-day visa-free entry for most Western passports (ETIAS from 2026).

Chile's bohemian port city — UNESCO-listed hillside neighborhoods blanketed in street art, connected by century-old funiculars, and buzzing with poets, galleries, and seafood.

Vancouver is where mountains meet the Pacific — snowboard in the morning, kayak in the afternoon, and eat world-class sushi for dinner. Stanley Park, Granville Island, and the Capilano Suspension Bridge are highlights, but the city's real draw is its setting. The food scene reflects its Asian-Pacific crossroads, especially in Richmond's Chinese restaurants.

Laotian karst valley town on the Nam Song River that outlived its deadly tubing era — the 2012 crackdown reset it as an adventure hub. Dawn ballooning over the limestone, Blue Lagoon caves, rock climbing, kayaking. The 2021 Laos-China Railway cut Vientiane and Luang Prabang to 1 hour each.

One of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities, Varanasi is the spiritual heart of Hinduism. The ghats along the Ganges, evening aarti ceremonies, and silk weaving tradition create an unforgettable experience.

The medieval capital of Bulgaria from 1185 to 1393 — a tiered amphitheatre of red-roofed houses stacked across the cliffs above a horseshoe bend of the Yantra River. Tsarevets Fortress rises from its own peninsula on the eastern hill, its restored ramparts and Patriarchal Cathedral hosting a son et lumiere show on summer nights that floods the rock in coloured light. Samovodska Charshia is the restored craft street of woodcarvers and coppersmiths in the Old Town below. Three hours by train from Sofia, this is the traditional gateway to Bulgarian rural tourism in the Balkan range.

118 islands stitched together by 400 bridges across a saltwater lagoon — a thousand years of maritime republic concentrated into 7.6 km² that have no cars and never will. St Mark's Basilica's gold mosaics under five Byzantine domes, the Doge's Palace and Bridge of Sighs, the Rialto Bridge across the Grand Canal's S-curve, Burano's painted houses and Murano's glass furnaces in the lagoon, and the gondola routes that have run essentially unchanged for 400 years. UNESCO-listed in its entirety; under serious pressure from 25 million annual visitors and Acqua Alta floods, with a €5 day-tripper fee in effect peak summer.

A UNESCO city of 2,000 years of continuous urbanism in a single Adige river bend — the third-largest surviving Roman amphitheatre still hosting the world’s biggest open-air opera season, the Casa di Giulietta balcony where Shakespeare’s romance lives in collective imagination, Castelvecchio’s Carlo Scarpa-restored Scaligeri fortress, the marble-paved Piazza delle Erbe market square, and the Valpolicella wine region in the eastern hills. The smartest base in the Veneto for visiting Lake Garda, Venice, and the Palladian villas.

The largest sheet of falling water on Earth — 1,708m wide and twice as tall as Niagara. Locally called Mosi-oa-Tunya ("the smoke that thunders"). Zimbabwe's side delivers ~75% of the views and the postcard panoramas; Zambia's side has the Devil's Pool experience at Livingstone Island in the dry season (Sep-Dec). Adventure capital of southern Africa: bungee from the 111m Victoria Falls Bridge, Zambezi Class V rafting, helicopter Flight of Angels, lunar rainbows on full moons. Hwange NP nearby for safari combos.

Vienna is the city of music, imperial grandeur, and coffeehouse culture. The former heart of the Habsburg Empire impresses with its Baroque palaces, world-class museums, and a cultural scene that rivals any European capital. Classical concerts, Sachertorte, and wine taverns in the Vienna Woods — it's refined without being stuffy.

Southeast Asia's most laid-back capital, Vientiane is a charming Mekong River city of golden stupas, French bakeries, and sunset cocktails along the riverside promenade. The golden Pha That Luang stupa is the national symbol and the Buddha Park is delightfully eccentric.

A UNESCO-listed Spanish colonial city on the Ilocos Sur coast of northwest Luzon, founded in 1572 and the best-preserved example of a planned colonial settlement in Asia. Calle Crisologo is the cobblestone showpiece — a strip of two-storey ancestral mestizo houses where horse-drawn calesas still clatter over the stones at sunset. Beyond Crisologo: the Bantay Bell Tower, the St Paul Metropolitan Cathedral, the Ilocano food canon of longanisa sausage and empanada, and the burnay clay-jar workshops. An hour by flight from Manila to Laoag, then 90 minutes by van south, or 8 hours direct by overnight bus.

Iceland's southernmost village — 750 people clinging to the foot of Mýrdalsjökull glacier, with the black-sand crescent of Reynisfjara and the Reynisdrangar sea stacks two minutes' drive west. The red-roofed clifftop church above town is one of the country's most photographed landmarks. Vík is the practical base for the South Coast circuit (Seljalandsfoss, Skógafoss, Sólheimajökull, Dyrhólaey), 187 km / 2.5 hours from Reykjavík on the Ring Road.

Lithuania's capital has the largest Baroque Old Town in Eastern Europe (UNESCO, 70+ churches), but its most singular feature is Užupis — a self-declared breakaway republic that announced independence on April Fool's Day 1989, has its own "president," and has posted its Constitution in 23 languages on a wall. Gediminas' Tower overlooks the city from a hill that's also the end of the 1989 Baltic Way human chain (675 km of people holding hands from Tallinn to Vilnius). One of Europe's most underrated capitals.