Where is hot in April? Our top 14 destinations
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Spring is in full bloom, but so too are April showers, dampening Easter plans and keeping UK temperatures cool. Elsewhere in Europe, though, April sees the mercury steadily rise, making it a pleasantly off-peak time to take a classic city break, or explore a chic Mediterranean island without the crowds. Prefer buzz to solitude? Hit up street-shaking carnivals everywhere from South America to the Deep South. Now’s a fine time to find bargains on castaway islands, or maybe take that big trip Down Under, where warm autumn temperatures are forgiving enough for beach breaks, urban exploring and adventures in the wild. So without further adieu, these are the 14 destinations that are hot in April.
Where is hot in Europe in April?
As we settle into spring, there are plenty of European destinations that are considerably warmer than the UK without having to travel too far. Below, we recommend Rome (average temperature 19℃), Santorini (average temperature 19℃) and Capri (average temperature 20℃) as well as Sicily's capital Palermo (average temperature 19℃) and Cyprus (average temperature 21℃).
These are the 14 best and hottest destinations to visit in April and where to stay to make the most of your holiday.
Getty ImagesPalermo, Sicily
Average April temperature: 19℃
The capital of Sicily has known many eras in its time – and the relics of these past periods are everywhere. The result is a city that genuinely blends cultures, cuisines and architectural styles seamlessly – Baroque churches and Middle Eastern-style buildings jut up against each other in a landscape backed by mountains and fringed by the sea. In April, temperatures have started to rise comfortably – go before the summer crowds flock in a few month's time.
Where to stay in April: Villa Igiea, a Rocco Forte Hotel, is set on a graceful estate that feels worlds away from frenetic Palermo. See our edit of the best hotels in Sicily for more inspiration.
sfabisukCyprus
Average April temperature: 21℃
Clear skies and beautiful beaches make this island – closer to the Middle East than Europe – an evergreen favourite for sunseekers. Families come here for the smart-but-relaxed hotel scene and all-but-promised good weather, while honeymooners love the island for its 160-plus beaches and secluded stays up in the interior mountains.
Where to stay: The best hotels in Cyprus include beachfront Amara, which has a next-level sushi restaurant on-site, and one of the best family holidays in Europe, Almyra.
Getty ImagesRome, Italy
Average April temperature: 19℃
You’ve done Rome, so now for the greater luxury: doing it as the Romans do. Temperate April is a fine time to explore the city as the locals see it, rather than as it’s visited: no dashing from sight to sight, madly ticking boxes, but rather making the most of the walking weather to wander, wonder and get gloriously lost. Around six miles from the Eternal City’s centre, Centocelle is a happening suburb steeped in contemporary Italian cool. Natural wine bar Menabó is a tough reservation to snag, but worth it for roasted octopus and grassy Grechetto. Even in Rome’s more crowded corners, there are delicious secrets hiding in plain sight. On Piazza di Spagna, find metaphysical painter Giorgio De Chirico’s apartment just as he left it in the late 1970s, with cluttered studio and a brilliant arrangement of his canvases and sketches.
Where to stay in April: close to Palazzo Borghese is Hotel Vilòn, a mansion-turned-boutique-hotel on a blink-and-miss-it cobblestoned street.
Getty ImagesCartagena, Colombia
Average April temperature: 31℃
Easter in Colombia is the year’s biggest, most essential celebration, and it swells Cartagena’s streets with feasts and parades. Holy Week – leading up to Easter Sunday – is not the time to visit if you’re crowd-phobic, but to see this sultry city at its most festive, it can’t be beat. Temperatures here are steamy year-round, and the old town has long lost its best-kept-secret tag, so you might as well lean into the heat and the hordes. Plus, it’s still very romantic, with its corn-yellow colonial mansions, flower-filled balconies, clip-clopping horse-drawn carriages and palm-dotted squares. Stir in generous measures of rum cocktails and salsa music, and you’ve got yourself a hell of a holiday, even if it’s not exactly subdued.
Where to stay in April: Stay at Casa San Agustin, the best boutique hotel within the old city walls, so you can take restorative breaks on its sun-drenched rooftop and in its L-shaped pool.
Getty ImagesSantorini, Greece
Average April temperature: 19℃
Santorini isn’t the A-lister’s Greek island because of its beaches, many of which are imperfect black-sand or pebble numbers. Nor is it for privacy, given that 15,000 locals share their home with around two million visitors each year. No, Santorini is the darling of fashion photographers, romantics, influencers and bon vivants because it is, quite simply, the Med’s most stunning sight. An inhabited caldera, its chalk-white villages and sea-view suites teeter on steep lava cliffs, skirting an interior of bewitching Aegean blue. The sunsets are so pinch-me perfect, advancing dusk sees Santorini’s hairpin roads clogged with buses, all agitating to catch that peerless shot. Behold the revelation, then, that is April: restaurants and bars newly flung open after a stormy winter, hotel rates pleasingly discounted. It might not be quite sunbathing weather yet, but it is vineyard weather and slurping oysters-in-your-seaside-cabana weather and cocktails-on-your-roof-terrace weather.
Where to stay in April: at Nous, a luxe retreat with unique architecture and design notes that hit a lovely harmony between a remote hideout and a lively base.
Getty ImagesCapri, Italy
Average April temperature: 20℃
April is when Capri springs to life again, with enough sunny days to warrant packing a beach bag (though only hardened wild swimmers would dare a dip in the sea). Mid-month, beach clubs start opening up for the season, but there’s plenty to do before the party people dock. Take the chair lift to Monte Solaro for a heart-swelling panorama over the Gulf of Naples; hire a gozzo fishing boat and explore Capri’s hidden coves and grottoes; go window-shopping for chic villas spilling bougainvillaea; wander the island’s decidedly upmarket, curving streets. And for every see-and-be-seen restaurant and seaside bar, there’s a genuine gem. Da Paolino, with tables set between rows of fragrant trees in a lemon grove, is a favourite with designer Nicky Zimmermann.
Where to stay in April: On a cliffside hovering above Marina Grande, the island's humming harbour, JK Place Capri is a welcome refuge from the tourists congesting the port below.
Getty ImagesBazaruto Archipelago, Mozambique
Average April temperature: 25℃
In the 1950s the Bazaruto archipelago, a string of six, immaculate islands off the sleepy shores of mainland Mozambique’s Vilankulo, had a certain reputation. Particularly the Santa Carolina hotel, on one of the smaller islands, where a colourful mix of the rich, renegade and rock ’n’ roll would land on its private airstrip, primed for clandestine revelry (it’s said Bob Dylan composed his song ‘Mozambique’ on the hotel’s baby grand). Decades of civil war spoiled the party, but today Bazaruto is quietly making a comeback, thanks to the splendour of its wild, dune-backed beaches, left for the longest time to themselves. And authentic island life isn’t just for visitors. Bazaruto, in particular, offers a rich, living tapestry of vibrant villages, waving schoolchildren, freshwater lakes, savannah grassland and mangrove swamps.
Where to stay in April: On the island of Benguerra AndBeyond has a bush camp-style hideaway with private plunge pools and cocktails served from a traditional sea-going dhow. On Bazaruto, the largest island, Anantara has a scattering of thatched beach villas and its signature spa.
Getty ImagesMauritius
Average April temperature: 27℃
One of the great pleasures of Mauritius is the culture: a real world of hot curries, temples and tea plantations outside the hotels. And now, one white-sand beach retreat aims to bring these disparate spheres together. SALT of Palmar – an east-coast eco hotel complete with organic food, e-bikes and hip rooftop bar – encourages guests to take part in its Skill Swap programme, matching them to islanders with similar passions so they might bond over regionally nuanced takes on shared skills. Artists might meet local painters and craft cocktail-makers could match with Mauritian mixologists – such as Denis Aristide, a taro farmer who also steers the hotel bar and favours ingredients including ylang ylang essence sourced from a local boutique estate. With cyclone season ending in March and May ushering in winter, April might just be the best time to get to know Mauritius.
Where to stay in April: At the most acclaimed hotel in these parts, LUX* Grand Baie.
Getty ImagesNew Orleans, USA
Average April temperature: 26℃
New Orleans is so much more than the French Quarter, but it’d be daft to come here in April and miss the Easter parades. As flamboyant as Mardi Gras, if somewhat less raucous, several separate processions march their floats and Sunday-best bonnets through the famous neighbourhood, including a truly fabulous Gay Easter Parade. The weather might suit sunny wanders among Garden District antebellum mansions, but save some time for hipster Bywater: Bacchanal’s fairy-lit wine patio is a must. Meanwhile, more contemporary hotels are leaping from strength to strength here.
Where to stay in April: at Peter & Paul: a converted Catholic church and convent in Marigny – the French Quarter’s equally jazz-club-packed, but more boho-artsy, neighbour – it’s a masterclass in design, and the service is trѐs bien.
Getty ImagesPerth, Australia
Average April temperature: 25℃
Long out on a limb – Perth is bunched into the corner of Western Australia, separated from the rest of the country by vast swathes of punishing outback terrain – the riverside state capital is now, for the first time, reachable by direct flight. Qantas must’ve clocked the new cultural cachet that’s lately made Australia’s most isolated city a proper rival to capital-in-all-but-name Sydney and cool-kid Melbourne, launching a non-stop from Heathrow in 2019. But you don’t travel 17 hours just for a sunny city break – though Perth is certainly that (it’s palpably pulsing with new energy: slick restaurants showing off Swan River views; blockbuster galleries and street murals; the spanking-new Ritz-Carlton Perth). Wider WA, though, possesses a wilder allure. Ningaloo Reef is just as jaw-to-the-floor ravishing as the Great Barrier, and with far fewer visitors; the Kimberley’s immense gorges and bizarre natural rock sculptures (see: the Bungle Bungles) are about as humbling as landscapes get. Oh, and the beaches. Everything about WA is hot.
Where to stay in April: at COMO The Treasury, the first COMO outpost down under.
Getty ImagesSri Lanka
Average April temperature: 32℃
Sri Lanka has had a tough go of things in the past few years – but more recently, the teardrop island has had a serious renaissance and is now back on most peoples' bucket lists as a wonderful warm weather destination. Across the island, you'll find astonishing beaches, national parks with jaw-dropping wildlife-spotting opportunities, hill country paddies to explore – as well as some of the best food in this part of Asia and some seriously smart hotels, too.
Where to stay in April: Wild Coast Tented Lodge in Yala National Park is the spot for animal lovers. Beach bums with deep pockets should check out Amanwella.
Getty ImagesSt Barth’s, Caribbean
Average April temperature: 29℃
The Caribbean’s chicest island is back in business, after twin hurricanes Irma and Maria wreaked havoc in the region in 2017. And April is the sweet spot for lapping up its revamped boutique suites and beach clubs, with the winter crowds gone and storm season safely some time away (typically kicking in around July).
Where to stay in April: Two of our favourites, secluded Hotel Le Toiny and Villa Marie Saint-Barth (sister to the glamorous Villa Marie Saint-Tropez), were hit hard by the hurricanes, but have come back better than ever. The former, hidden away on St Barth’s rugged south-east side, has relaunched its beach club, with seafront pool, sunbeds and no end of chilled rosé; the hotel, all whites and creams and petrified wood, has also added eight new rooms, with pools and ocean-view terraces. At the island’s opposite end, Villa Marie – whitewashed, shuttered, with dangling bamboo egg chairs – has been fully restored.
Getty ImagesSeville, Spain
Average April temperature: 25℃
This Spanish city is finally getting the recognition it deserves, but spring and autumn are the ultimate times to visit Seville. Temperatures can reach a balmy 25℃, but if you work around school holidays you’ll avoid the hordes of tourists visiting during half term and Easter break. The city is best explored through its food scene – our favourite lunch spot is Mercado de Triana, where Bar La Muralla serves up proper tapas amid bustling locals buying groceries and catching up with friends. For dinner, book a table at El Rinconcillo, a centuries-old restaurant where the waiters will tell you the best things to order (on and off menu). It's slightly cooler than in the summer months, so spend afternoons strolling through the city’s prettiest parks – the Royal Alcázar is the loveliest green spot come spring
Where to stay in April: Nobu Seville offers the best of both worlds: a buzzy spot right in the city centre, close to all of Seville’s top restaurants and bars, with a zen rooftop space for relaxing come sundown, plus there’s a plunge pool if the weather is warm enough. Read our full list for more of Seville’s top hotels.
Getty ImagesMarrakech, Morocco
Average April temperature: 25ºC
Marrakech is beautiful year-round, but the city is truly spectacular come spring. Tourists slowly start coming to the city around this time of year, so come early to make the most of the city. The medina comes alive as the city begins hotting up, with flashes of bright colours from overflowing bags of spices, the distant echoes of prayers and the hustle and bustle of the marketplace – all best enjoyed before the temperatures reach their peak in the summer months.
Where to stay in April: La Mamounia is always a safe bet in Marrakech. Having played host to the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Winston Churchill and Alfred Hitchcock, hours can be whiled away in the hotel’s vast gardens, peaceful pool or rooftop balconies. Take a look at our guide to Marrakech’s best hotels for more inspiration.