Colombia

Direct flights from Madrid, Miami and New York land in Bogotá's El Dorado. From there, a one-hour domestic hop drops you into the tropical heat of Cartagena de Indias. We suggest three nights in the Andes to acclimatise, then five on the Caribbean coast — a rhythm the country itself seems to prefer.

In Bogotá, the Gold Museum holds the largest collection of pre-Columbian goldwork in the world; the Botero Museum, a block away, is the quiet counterpoint. In Cartagena, the Walled City is a UNESCO site you can walk in a morning — colonial churches, plazas dedicated to García Márquez, and the mango-yellow façades that appear on every book cover about the country.

Colombian coffee has spent the last decade becoming, quietly, the best in the world — single-estate lots from Huila and Nariño now rival anything from Ethiopia. In Cartagena the kitchen turns to the sea: red snapper with coconut rice, ceviche with mango and lime, and the slow, spiced sancocho that shows up at every long lunch.

From Cartagena, an hour by lancha reaches the Rosario archipelago — Playa Blanca, coral reefs and a lunch of freshly caught fish under palm shade. From Bogotá, the funicular up Monserrate delivers you to 3,150 metres and the best panoramic breakfast on the continent. Both are day trips we help arrange, privately, from the front desk.