Best places to spend Christmas abroad

To many, Christmas can only be fully appreciated alongside a huge dose of cold, grey, wet weather. After all, what’s December all about if not braving a spot of ice skating, taking a selfie with Santa Claus or drinking hot chocolate at a Christmas market?

That said, the idea of spending the holidays soaking up the sun and trading in the snow for a week of warmth is one we think about every year. If you’re not quite ready to deck the halls, swap those woolly jumpers for swimwear and that festive mulled wine for some cocktails on the beach by spending Christmas abroad instead.

From family-friendly getaways to escape the cold, to adults-only escapes for some festive alone time, here are our picks of sun-filled destinations to visit for a Christmas holiday.

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Cyprus

Sun is pretty much guaranteed in Cyprus, with 340 days of sunshine a year and December temperatures reaching 20 degrees. But it’s not just the warm weather that makes it a fab place to spend the holiday season – there are also plenty of Christmas traditions. These include children going door-to-door singing kalanda (Christmas carols) to raise money for charity and ward off goblin-like spirits called Kallikantzaroi. Cypriots are big on food, too, eating everything from kourabiedes – a small almond cake – to the traditional stuffed turkey, over the festive period.

La Palma

If you don’t want to venture too far from home, a short flight to La Palma could be the answer. In mid-December, there are five hours of sunshine a day and temperature highs of 22°C – much hotter than the UK’s 7°C. It’s also a great place to spend Christmas if you like keeping it traditional, as the people in La Palma take the religious sentiment very seriously. A lot of time is spent creating the perfect Nativity scenes, with Franceses – a small village in the north-west of La Palma – having one of the best, featuring life-size models of Mary, Jesus and Joseph displayed in a cave.

Thailand

If you want to take it up a notch on the thermometer, book a trip to Thailand. The island of Phuket has toasty highs of 32 degrees in December, so you’ll be spending Christmas Day soaking up the sun on a white-sand beach instead of layering up your ugly jumpers. Plus, Thailand’s festive celebrations are a little more low-key than the UK’s, so it’s a great destination if you don’t want to spend the big day surrounded by Christmas lights and Michael Bublé on repeat. 

Dominican Republic

Eight hours of sunshine a day, highs of 29°C and more than enough beach to lay your towel on – the Dominican Republic has it all for the perfect Christmas holiday. But it’s a lot more than just a sun, sea and sand getaway – you can head out on an open safari truck, explore the pretty capital city of Santo Domingo, or snorkel with stingrays. If you’re a true Christmas lover, you’ll feel right at home here, too, as people in the Dom Rep celebrate the festivities from October all the way through to the new year.

Costa Rica

What better way to spend Christmas than surrounded by cute and funny company? No, we’re not talking about Hugh Grant, Love Actually-style – we mean sloths, monkeys and a whole host of other animals living in Costa Rica. People here go all–out with their Christmas decorations, covering their houses with tropical flowers, nativity scenes and home-made wreaths. As for food, nothing short of a banquet is good enough here. That usually includes chicken, pork tamales and a lot of rum punch, all of which are consumed before heading off to Midnight Mass.