The southern city of Kaohsiung is Taiwan's largest port, its second-largest city and centre of the country's heavy and petrochemical industries. Despite this, today's Kaohsiung is a modern urban landscape of airy cafes, wide streets, waterside parks, public transport, bicycle lanes and cultural venues that have embraced and re-imagined the city's manufacturing past.
Mark Twain once wrote, 'Mauritius was made first and then heaven, heaven being copied after Mauritius'. He was right. Mauritius is rightly famed for its sapphire-blue waters, powder-white beaches and, yes, luxury resorts that provide a front-row seat onto some of the most beautiful views in the Indian Ocean.
Oslo is blessed with some incredibly beautiful parks which manage, in typical Norwegian style, to straddle the line between a bucolic naturalness and well-kept grace. As soon as the sun is out this is where you'll find locals lolling, picnicking and often getting their gear off and catching some rays.
Central Dalmatia is the most action-packed and diverse part of Croatia, with pretty islands, quiet ports, rugged mountains, numerous castles and an emerging culinary scene, as well as three Unesco World Heritage sites: Diocletian’s Palace in Split, the medieval walled town of Trogir and the ancient strip fields of the Stari Grad plain on the island of Hvar. Throughout it all, the rugged 1500m-high Dinaric Range provides a dramatic background.