Italy

Italy is the country people return to most, and the reason is simple: it rewards every kind of appetite. Rome piles three thousand years into strolling distance, then serves carbonara that makes you emotional. Florence hangs the Renaissance on its walls and lets you sleep across the river from it. Venice, seen early from the water before the day-trippers arrive, remains one of the great human achievements. Then the countryside takes over. Tuscany's cypress roads and vineyard estates. The Amalfi Coast's lemon terraces stacked above a glittering sea, best toured by private boat. Puglia's whitewashed towns, the lakes' belle époque villas, Sicily's temples and markets. Every region is its own country with its own kitchen. Italy does not need selling. It needs planning, and that is where we come in.