Take a bucks & spade break

27/04/2008

SOUTH WALTON

SOUTH Walton in the Florida Panhandle region has the best quality sand in the world. That’s the claim from boffins at a Maryland university, who’ve clambered down from their ivory towers to evaluate beaches around the globe. After years of in-depth research they’ve told the locals what they already knew: that the 26 miles of white sand on this Gulf of Mexico coast are hard to beat. Education’s never wasted.

HOLIDAY INFO: Stay at the Courtyard Sandestin at Grand Boulevard where a room in May for two costs about £32.25pp per night – go to www.marriott.com. BA Holidays have a seven- night fly/drive to Orlando from Gatwick from £379 next month. Call 0844 493 0758.

SANTA BARBARA

OPRAH has a house here. John Travolta acts as an unpaid tour guide for visiting friends and you’re likely to spot Brad and Angelina sharing a wheatgrass sundae in a beach bar. Forget Hollywood – the real A-listers are crowded into this beachside town of just 100,000 chilled Californians. Stay at the Spanish-style Harbour View Inn, just across the road from Stearns Wharf and the beach and near dozens of restaurants (organic, calorie-controlled menus, of course).

HOLIDAY INFO: A week at the Harbour View Inn from £1,275pp and £595 kids including car hire and Virgin flights to San Francisco early July. Go to www.virginholidays.com

SOUTH CAROLINA

TAKE advantage of the cheap dollar rate this year to travel further afield to South Carolina. This is where you’ll find some of the finest beaches in the United States, less developed than much of Florida or California. Take the kids to family-friendly Myrtle Beach, part of a 60-mile stretch of white sand near championship golf courses and theme parks such as the Grand Strand and Hard Rock Park.

HOLIDAY INFO: A week in June at the Colonial Green Condominiums – five minutes from Myrtle Beach – costs £699 per adult (twin share) and £549 per child (two-11), rising to £849 per adult (£674 per child) in July and August. Prices include flights from Manchester or Gatwick, car hire and two-bed self-catering accommodation. Go to www.bon-voyage.co.uk

REDONDO BEACH

LOCATION for the slow lane scenes in Cannonball Run, The Portofino sits on a private peninsula in King Harbour. The harbour is also home to a colony of California sealions – beach babes who swim, feed and sunbathe right in front of the hotel. Borrow one of the hotel’s free bicycles to wheel along the seafront to Redondo Beach pier.

HOLIDAY INFO: A week’s room-only stay at the three-star Portofino on Redondo Beach in LA starts from £822pp in June (kids £372). The price includes flights when two share through BA Holidays, go to www.ba.com or call BA Holidays on 0844 4930758 (add £15pp surcharge for telephone bookings).

FORT LAUDERDALE

LOW-COST airline Zoom starts direct flights into Fort Lauderdale next month, making holidays to this corner of Florida cheaper than ever before. Combine flights with a Summer of Discovery offer in the city (June 1 to September 3), where holidaymakers buy one holiday activity and get one free, whether it’s scuba diving, spa treatments, riverboat cruises or museum entry. Stay at the recently opened boutique hotel Il Lugano overlooking a canal. Rooms have kitchenettes so you can save on hotel breakfasts (pricey in US hotels).

HOLIDAY INFO: For tourism tips go to www.sunny.org/discovery or 0870 770 0710. Flights with Zoom start from £299 return (www.flyzoom.com). Il Lugano rooms start at £80 per room per night. Book direct at www.illugano.com

SARASOTA

SWAP theme parks for the white, sandy beaches of Sarasota this summer and explore little islands strung like fairy lights along the coast. Take the kids on a safari on a canopy walk at Myakka River State Park. It’s a far cry from Animal Kingdom yet you’re only 90 minutes’ drive from Orlando and 45 minutes from Tampa.

HOLIDAY INFO: Take the family on July 22 for a week at the Helmsley Sandcastle. The price with car hire and flights from Gatwick is £3,219 for two adults and two kids. The hotel is on the beach and has two pools and lots of watersports. Book through www.americaasyoulikeit.com – for tourist info go to www.sarasotafl.org

WAIKIKI

PACK your baggies for a surfing holiday on Waikiki, the Hawaiian beach that is the ancestral home of surfing. This is the place to come for those big breaks you see in aftershave ads. Bit too scary? Then join a Polynesian outrigger canoe ride from the beach and hike up to the volcano at Diamond Head.

HOLIDAY INFO: Ten nights at the three-star Aqua Aloha Surf Hotel in June costs £785 adults with up to two kids (two to 11) paying £599 each. The same holiday in July or August costs £885 adults and £729 kids. Prices include flights and B&B. The hotel is two blocks from the beach and has a pool and spa. Go to www. bon-voyage.co.uk or call 0800 316 0194.

CAPE COD

CYCLE the 25-mile long Rail Trail and walk beside the protected National Seashore when you holiday around New England’s Cape Cod. This is the best place on the east coast for whale watching, on boat trips out of Barnstable Harbour. Take a ferry across to Martha’s Vineyard and don’t miss Plimouth Plantation – a recreated pilgrim fathers village (www.plimoth.org).

HOLIDAY INFO Bon Voyage sells a 10-night June holiday to the four-star Green Harbor Resort at West Yarmouth – a family-friendly resort with its own beach. The holiday costs £755 adults and £675 kids – to cover flights from Manchester or Gatwick, car hire and apartment stay. The hotel has a heated pool. The same holiday in July or August costs £995 per adult and £799 per child. Go to www.bon-voyage.co.uk

ST PETERSBURG

ST PETE’S Fort De Soto Park has been voted North America’s top beach by global online holiday website TripAdvisor. It’s part of a 35-mile string of beaches across eight islands. The sand is like icing sugar. There are cycle and walking trails or you can hire a kayak to paddle along the coast. Nearby Caladesi Island was runner-up in the beach awards, part of a state park and one of Florida’s few undeveloped barrier islands.

HOLIDAY INFO:

Funway Holidays has seven-night packages to St Petersburg and Clearwater from £799 per adult (£339 per child aged two to 11) sharing a room, until June 3. The price includes BA flights to Tampa and a room at the Tradewinds Sandpiper on St Pete’s Beach, car hire plus a Macy’s discount shopping card. Go to www.funwayholidays. co.uk or call 0844 557 0770.

DAYTONA BEACH

REV up the engine for a seaside holiday at high speed when you take the kids to Daytona this summer. The Florida resort is the home of NASCAR stock-car racing and has a string of land-speed records to its credit. There’s plenty of space to spread your towels along the 23-mile beach (where cars are banned during summer to give the fiercely protected beach turtles a safe nesting ground). Dust off the sand to visit the Daytona International Speedway (www.daytonabeach.com).

HOLIDAY INFO: Funway Holidays sells seven nights’ room-only at the Oceanside Inn on Daytona Beach from £565 until the end of June. Price includes Virgin flights from Gatwick, car hire and shop discounts. Go to www.funwayholidays.co.uk

THE KEYS

EUROPEAN camping operator Keycamp is crossing the Atlantic to Florida this summer. Their campsite at Sugarloaf Key has its own marina, spa and a swimming pool. Use the camp as a base to explore further afield, taking boat trips to deserted beaches, snorkelling or diving in the Looe Key National Marine Sanctuary and sea kayaking through the mangroves. Key West is a 20-minute drive away for partying!

HOLIDAY INFO: A week’s stay in August at Sugarloaf costs a total £495 for a family of two adults and one child. The price includes car hire but not flights. Go to www.keycamp.co.uk or call 0844 406 0319.

SAN DIEGO

GO for a moonlit cruise on Bahia Belle – a 19th Century-style steam wheeler – on a seaside holiday in San Diego. Stay at Mission Bay, the largest man-made aquatic park on the West Coast. It’s a 4,000-acre peninsula jutting into the Pacific with Seaworld, rides, boat rentals and hiking and biking paths. There are also playgrounds for the kids, making it work as a family resort. Stay at Mission Bay’s Bahia Resort Hotel, which has a children’s club.

HOLIDAY INFO: United Vacations sells a week at the Bahia Hotel, flights from Heathrow to San Diego with United and car hire from £799pp through May and June. Go to www.unitedvacations.co.uk or call 0844 499 2229.