Beach Travel Tips

Mexico's cheapest beach towns are Puerto Escondido, Mazunte, Mazatlán, La Paz, Progreso and Bacalar at roughly US$40–70 a day. Cancún and Tulum cost double for the same sand.

Solo travel in the Caribbean works best on Puerto Rico, Barbados, Curacao, Aruba, the USVI and Cayman — walkable, bus-linked, Level 1 advisories. The real cost is the single supplement.

The best Caribbean markets: Castries (St Lucia), Marigot (St Martin), St George’s spice market (Grenada) and Willemstad’s Floating Market. Go before 9am, bring cash, skip conch and coral.

Four Caribbean ferry chains work without a plane: the Virgin Islands from $25, Guadeloupe to St. Lucia on L’Express des Îles, the Grenadines, and St. Maarten to Anguilla in 20 minutes.

The Caribbean's historical beaches worth a detour: Salt River Bay on St. Croix, Long Bay on San Salvador, Port Royal, Playa Girón, English Harbour, Pigeon Island and Holetown.

Caribbean beach weddings cost about $500–$600 per guest in 2026. Barbados and the Dominican Republic have no residency wait; Jamaica and the Bahamas need ~24 hours.

The Caribbean's biggest beach festivals in 2026: Trinidad Carnival (Feb 16–17), Barbados Crop Over's Grand Kadooment (Aug 3), Antigua and Aruba Carnival, Reggae Sumfest, and Bahamian Junkanoo.

The history of nude beaches begins with Germany's FKK movement, which opened the first official nude beach on Sylt in 1920, then spread to France, Croatia and the US.

Nude beach safety is mostly sunburn and chafing prevention: reef-safe SPF 50 reapplied every two hours, an anti-chafe balm, water shoes, and the rip-current and stingray basics.

Pack a large towel, a sarong for transition zones, reef-safe mineral sunscreen (required by law in Hawaii and Palau), a dry bag for your phone, water shoes, cash, and after-sun.

Never photograph anyone at a nude beach without explicit consent, and expect cameras and phones to be banned at private naturist resorts. What US, UK, French and German law actually allow.

Nude beach legality by country: broadly legal in Spain, Germany and France, allowed only on designated beaches in Australia and the US, and illegal across much of Asia, Africa and the Pacific.

Japanese beaches operate by different rules — designated swimming zones enforced by whistling lifeguards, beach house etiquette, tattoo considerations, and strict trash protocols. This guide covers the norms that make a Japanese beach day run smoothly.

A tour of beach cocktails from around the world, covering Caribbean rum punch and ti' punch, Brazilian caipirinhas, Thai buckets, Mediterranean Aperol Spritzes, Spanish tinto de verano, Mexican micheladas and margaritas, plus where to drink each and how to make them at home.

A curated beach reading list of 20 books across fiction, suspense, nonfiction, and travel writing, from The Beach by Alex Garland to Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, with notes on what makes each one work beside the ocean.

A guide to the best beach towns for vacation home purchases, covering ten locations across the US, Mexico, Europe, and Asia with current property prices, rental income potential, tax implications, and foreign ownership rules.

A field guide to the beach vacation mistakes that ruin trips: booking peak season, skipping sunscreen protocol, ignoring rip currents, overpaying through hotel excursion desks, and the art of doing less so you enjoy more.

The essential beach vacation packing list for families with babies: sun protection, swim diapers, travel cribs, feeding logistics, and every item that actually matters based on real-world beach trips with infants from 6 to 18 months.

A full-body beach workout using only bodyweight and sand: lower body, upper body, core and sprint intervals, with scaling for beginners and advanced athletes, plus sun, hydration and heat-illness guidance from the CDC and dermatologists.

Beach day trips from ten major European cities, from Barcelona to Sitges and Lisbon to Cascais to Athens' Athenian Riviera and Rome's Sperlonga, with train logistics, costs, water temperatures, and honest assessments of each destination.

Five beach destinations optimized for retirees and long-stay travelers, with monthly cost breakdowns, healthcare access details, visa requirements, and base town recommendations for the Algarve (Portugal), Penang (Malaysia), Crete (Greece), Hua Hin (Thailand), and Spain's Costa Blanca.

The best beach restaurants serve fresh local catch in settings where sand between your toes is the point, not a service failure. From Sunshine’s corrugated-roof shack on Nevis to the 500-label wine list at Phuket’s Boathouse, this guide covers 12 standouts across four continents.

The best beach walks and coastal hikes worldwide, from Portugal's Fishermen's Trail and Italy's Path of the Gods to Australia's Great Ocean Walk, California's Lost Coast, and Kauai's Kalalau Trail, with distances, difficulty levels, and practical advice for sun, tides, and footwear.

A worldwide guide to beach fishing covering gear basics, how to read beach structure, and the best destinations including Cape Hatteras, K'gari (Fraser Island), Namibia's Skeleton Coast, South Padre Island, and New Zealand's Bay of Plenty, with licensing rules and catch-and-release practices.