Inspiration for May holidays

Just as the early bird catches the worm, so the early visitor to the Dordogne finds tranquillity, not to mention negligible queues at the main sights. Above  ground, there’s no shortage of graceful châteaux and immaculately laid out gardens to explore with the freedom of your hire car. Under  ground, there are just as many natural and man-made wonders, from the deep chasm of the Gouffre de Padirac with its lakes and stalactites, to the cave of Rouffignac with its prehistoric paintings of bison, mammoths and woolly rhinos.

You won’t find the party set in the corner of the island that our walking holiday explores. In fact, you won’t find many people at all, since May is still considered low season on Ibiza, despite usually being wonderfully warm. Other people’s loss is your gain, however – enjoy gentle walks along easy trails that lead you past glorious viewpoints and hidden coves where you can rest on the beach, watching the waves lapping at the shore, before continuing on your way.

Whether you choose a walking or a cycling holiday, May offers the best of both worlds in the Loire. The weather is pleasantly warm – ideal for lazy picnics on the riverbank – and the immaculate gardens of the many châteaux are a riot of colour, yet it is still relatively quiet, meaning you can take your time to admire the romantic castles and palaces.

Florence is renowned across the world for its Renaissance art but, throughout May, the focus shifts to music and dance for the Maggio Musicale festival, which features a range of concerts and ballet performances. Spending a couple of days in the city at the end of your holiday in Tuscany will provide a wonderful contrast to your week of walking or cycling. (Florence isn’t the only place to catch a festival in May: in Brittany, Tréguier holds its traditional pardon celebrations on the third Sunday, while in the Dordogne, there is a cheese festival in Rocamadour on Whit Sunday).

Come to these rugged mountains in northern Sicily at any time of year and you’ll feel wonderfully away from it all, but visit between mid-April and mid-May and you’ll also be rewarded as you walk by the masses of endemic flowers. As you can see from the picture, similar displays of colour greet the visitor in Puglia (Italy’s ‘heel’), home to almost 1,400 flowering plants. Here, you can choose to explore with a hire car or on two wheels.

Unlike our other suggestions, there’s no specific reason for including our walking holidays in the Aveyron and the Tarn here, other than May is a lovely time of year to visit. If you think that sounds lame in comparison, picture yourself walking through open, rolling countryside burgeoning with life, enjoying the sense of being away from it all deep in rural France, taking time out to stroll through ancient fortified villages steeped in history, and later sitting down to savour earthy south-western cuisine. Surely that’s very tempting, is it not?