The Complete Travel Guide to Tunisia

SUN? SEA? SAND?

Yes, the combinationa and an abundance. Squeezed between Algeria and Libya, and barely bigger than England and Wales, Tunisia may not get too much reference in the elite vacation spots, but does boasts a varied range of landscapes. Its sandy Mediterranean coastline stretches for almost 2,000 miles from Tabarka's oak and cork forests to the southern beaches of Djerba. As autumn takes hold, the northern beaches are getting chillier, but the climate in the south makes the winter months much more bearable because of the slight breeze. Away from the fertile coastal plains (this was once the bread-basket of Rome until the Roman invasions), the country's interior is charac-terised by olive-tree-lined fields that wouldn't look out of place in Tuscany, the remote Dorsale mountain range and four different types of "desert", creating numerous possibilities for adventure tourism.

Cinema directors have been drawn by the scenery and light, and Tunisia's countryside has featured in films as different as The Life of Brian (Monastir) and The English Patient (Mahdia, Sfax). Yet there's much more to this value-for-money destination than its climate and landscapes: empires have come and gone, leaving a rich architectural patchwork; stubborn vestiges of French colonial influence co-exist with the older Islamic traditions and the modern world; and nomadic Berber traditions have left their mark on what is now a largely sedentary culture, truly a remarkable sight to witness.

WHERE'S BEST FOR A BEACH HOLIDAY?