The world’s best beaches, wherever you’re wintering

Sidi Ifni, Morocco

Legzira

It’s one of the more sacred-feeling encounters of earth, sea and sky I’ve seen. Legzira has long been famous for its arches: these low passages have been formed over millennia in the three massive promontories of red rock and soil, and they reach like fingers across the beach itself – at low tide, a huge, dull mirror of rusted pewter – into the grey Atlantic. One of these collapsed in 2016, occasioning the birth of a whole class of “I was there when…” gypset surfers and world-wanderers, who seem to miss the point that Legzira is still singular, and very beautiful. It’s an easy day trip from Agadir or Tiznit, and the nearby town of Sidi Ifni has a handful of guest houses for anyone wishing to commune with the scenery a bit longer.

Sylt, Germany

Weststrand

Sylt is one of Germany’s northernmost North Sea islands, and this northernmost of Sylt’s beaches is technically above the border, putting it – sort of – in Denmark. As long and thin as the tall grasses that ripple all up and down its coastline, Sylt is buffeted by winds much of the year. The bliss that’s specific to Weststrand is in its pristine cleanness, and its emptiness; cycle over from the town of List, through tall, heathered dunes to an improbably white, undulating strip that disappears into the southern horizon, it’s so long. The sea is shallow, cold and clear; the sand marked here and there with striations of seashells, mostly long razor clams, fragile and nacreous. Pull your anorak over a thick jumper, pack a flask of whatever, and walk in near-solitude all the (short) day long.

Byron Bay, Australia

Wategos Beach

Designating one beach to rule them all in the Lucky…