Wales
Rhossili and Worm's Head
Three miles of sand under a green down, and a tidal causeway to a serpent-shaped headland.
From the top of the village the whole bay lies below you at once: three miles of sand, a green down behind it, the ribs of a wrecked ship showing at low tide, and, furthest off, a rocky headland snaking out to sea that the Vikings named for a serpent. Rhossili is the end of Gower, the peninsula west of Swansea in south Wales and the first place in Britain called a National Landscape, and its beach keeps turning up on lists of the best in the world.
The walk out to Worm's Head is the adventure, and it has rules: the causeway is uncovered for roughly two hours before and after low water, the times are posted on a board by the crossing, and even locals get it wrong; Dylan Thomas, as a boy, was stranded out there until midnight. Grey seals haul out below the rocks; the beach is reached by steps from the village car park, and the Helvetia, wrecked in 1887, lies where she came to rest in the sand. Rhossili Down rises behind, where paragliders ridge-soar the updrafts on summer days, and the sand and cliffs have stood in for other worlds in Doctor Who and a run of BBC dramas. Gower is also where cockles and laverbread come from, the seaweed off these shores and the cockles from the Penclawdd estuary on the north coast, and the peninsula's walks, by local habit, end at a pub, most often the King Arthur in Reynoldston with its log fire. Bring proper shoes for the causeway, check the board, and give the headland its full two hours.
Solo
Time the tide, cross to the Worm early, and walk the whole three miles of beach back with the down above you.
Couple
The bay at sunset from the cliff path, the Helvetia's ribs in the low light, and supper at the King Arthur.
Family
Three miles of sand for the running, a shipwreck to find at low tide, seals below the headland and a causeway crossing with the tide board as the lesson.
Friends
A Gower weekend with the Worm's Head crossing as the set piece, Penclawdd cockles for the purists, and the pub at the end of every walk.
- Rhossili Bay is three miles of golden sand with towering cliffs and Worm's Head at one end, dunes at the other and a genuine shipwreck, the Helvetia of 1887, showing at low tide in between.
- Worm's Head is named from the Viking word for sea serpent, and the walk out over the causeway is possible only for roughly two hours before and after low water; the poet Dylan Thomas misjudged it as a boy and was marooned until midnight.
- Gower was the first place in Britain to be named a National Landscape, seventy square miles of cliffs, woods and beaches, and Rhossili regularly makes lists of the world's best beaches.
- In summer paragliders ride the updrafts off Rhossili Down above the bay, and the beach has doubled as a film set for Doctor Who and other BBC dramas.
Cockles and laverbread, the twin Welsh delicacies whose spiritual home is Gower: the seaweed gathered from this shore, the cockles still raked from the sands at Penclawdd on the north coast.
A pint by the log fire at the King Arthur in Reynoldston, the country pub the peninsula's walks tend to gravitate towards.
Manuel Antonio
Costa Rica
Capuchins patrol the sand beneath dozing sloths where rainforest walks into the ocean.
Vaitupu
Tuvalu
Tuvalu's largest island, where traditional sport te ano sends two woven balls flying at once.
Tortuguero
Costa Rica
Jungle canals where green sea turtles haul onto black volcanic sand under a moonless sky.
Kadavu
Fiji
Manta rays circle the world's fourth-largest barrier reef, off villages the road barely reaches.
Blaenau Ffestiniog
Wales
The town that roofed the world, where you bounce on trampolines slung inside a slate cavern.
Harlech
Wales
A castle on a crag waiting for a sea that walked away centuries ago.
Aberdaron
Wales
A church on the sand where pilgrims ate their last meal before the island crossing.
Beddgelert
Wales
A stone village at the meeting of two rivers, named for a legendary dog's grave.