This week sees a deluge of articles on the family, with an exploration of Berlin and its kindercafes, a baby hotel inAustria and a rundown of the best child-friendly getaways for Easter. If you’re looking for peace and quiet on your holidays, our Escape section will be perfect – from a South African cruise to the small islands of the South Pacific we’ve got it covered. And if you prefer your holidays more hedonistic than holistic Nick Clarke’s guide to Miami is sure to be of interest.  This week’s categories are Food, Family, City, Escape and Outdoor/Adventure.

CITY

• “It is February, and although the skies are blue, it is 3F (-16C). Sparkling, fresh snow covers every surface. To the left of the long, birch-lined driveway stretches an icy lake. Beyond are snow-covered log-cabin stables. A couple of sleighs (sadly sans bells and bearskins) are half-buried in white near the stables, seats thick with ice. And beyond rises the house in which the writer was born and lived until a couple of weeks before his death: a handsome 19th-century, cream-painted double-storey dwelling, ringed by orchards of icicle-hung apple trees.” Lisa Grainger is in Moscow: On the trail of Tolstoy for The Telegraph.
• “Some people go to Stockholm to wonder at the royal palaces and the Vasa, the 17th-century warship that is one of Europe’s archaeological treasures. Not us. We have been touring the crummy part of town for hours, knee-deep in snow, looking for a woman who goes by the description of a “tattooed bisexual computer hacker with intimate piercings”” writes Helen Rumbelow in The Times. “…the Larsson phenomenon is unlikely to have passed you by, with every commuter train and airport stuffed with his bestselling trilogy, beginning with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. A film of the same name opens in London next week, and the Swedish capital is readying itself for a wave of Larsson pilgrims.” Rumbelow uncovers the Secrets of Stieg’s Stockholm.
• In The Independent Nick Clarke offers up a guide to Miami, “Some like it hot, which is why steroid-pumped and silicon-filled bods in barely-there swimwear head to Miami when the winter closes in elsewhere.” This is for The Hedonist: Miami.
• “It’s spring, so the days are warming up and the skies are clearing. And peak season for visitors to this fascinating ancient city is still a month or two away.” Siobhan Mulholland offers us a guide to 48 Hours In: Marrakech in The Independent, from unmissable cultural highlights to the best public gardens and how best to dine with the locals.

ESCAPE

• “The last time I was in Tuscany, it was July. Fields were ablaze in that golden yellow you see on postcards, bikers in neon Lycra were swarming the roads, and tour buses jammed the medieval piazzas. And I’d had the brilliant idea of inviting 120 non-Italian-speaking friends to the tiny village of Pienza for my wedding. “Beautiful, hot and full of Americans” was how one ungracious guest had put it.” In The New York Times Danielle Pergament discovers Tuscany Without the Crowds. “The real Tuscany, as locals have been telling me over the years, is found in the dead of winter, when the crowds are thinner and the rooms, flights and restaurants are pleasantly cheaper.”
• “The Society Islands lie deep in the Southern Pacific Ocean, a cluster of extinct volcanoes lying about halfway between Australia and South America. This remoteness adds to the archipelago’s allure, but the primary attraction lies in their beauty: warm blue waters contrasting with lush tropical landscapes. Honeymooners come here, as do the ridiculously rich. I was neither, but am a keen surfer, diver and walker, and the Society Islands offer some of the most idyllic venues for all of these sports.” In The Independent Ben Mondy discovers An ocean of possibilities: The South Pacific islands of Tahiti have it all.
• “The tiny island, north of Fort Lauderdale on Florida’s east coast, still boasts some of the country’s dreamiest estates, where the staff lives better than many Americans, cashmere sweaters in trademark pastel greens and pinks go for $800, and Rolls-Royces show up at Publix with regularity in a town where more is never quite enough.” In the New York Times, Geraldine Fabrikant gives us the best of 36 Hours in Palm Beach, Florida.
• In The Telegraph John Arlidge discovers Wolgan Valley, Australia: the resort at the end of the world. “Wolgan is an £80-million resort built from scratch in a valley a boomerang’s throw from the cliffs and canyons of the Wollemi and Gardens of Stone national parks – and the money has been very well spent…Forty-eight hours earlier, I’d been wading through a soggy London winter’s day. Here, now, I never felt more alive.”
• “Italian lessons and history classes might not sound like holiday activities, but when you are spending quite a bit of time on a cruise ship you might as well use some of it to exercise the little grey cells. Lines such as Swan Hellenic and Spirit of Adventure have always had guest lecturers on board, who talk about the history and cultures of the places being visited. It tends to be heavy stuff, but I remember once on Spirit of Adventure, cruising from Cape Town, we had a wine maker on board who brought along a bush and showed us how to prune it.” In The Telegraph Jane Archer gives us the lowdown on Cruises: cultural and specialist interest holidays.

OUTDOOR/ADVENTURE

• “Klosters and Davos have quite suddenly become the coolest places in the Alps for comfort skiers. Wealthy Russians and the rest of the jet set, who previously colonised Courchevel 1850 as the centre of their skiing universe, are deserting in droves and coming here instead,” writes Peter Hardy in The Telegraph. “Their reason? With 190 miles of piste and 56 lifts, the skiing for all standards is just as good, the off-piste is unquestionably better, and you get a lot more for your money. A chalet or apartment here will cost less than half what you would pay in Courchevel, while savvy travellers will opt to rent a catered chalet rather than book a hotel room.” Klosters and Davos: Conan Doyle and the height of cool.
• “I walk just behind the machete man, as he hacks a path through the tangle of clutching branches. He leaps back unexpectedly, crashing into me. A large, black and brown viper, a bushmaster, has reared up ahead. The snake is furious – the machete man stepped on its tail, invisible against the mulch of the forest floor. One of the most poisonous of South America’s snakes, its venom can kill a man in hours. And here we are, in the interior. No anti-venom; no medical staff; no helipads nor landing strips. Why did I get myself into this mess? Because I’m a writer.” Novelist Inbali Iserles in Adrift in a world that’s stranger than fiction in The Independent.
• “Just 64km long and 40km across at its widest point, and barely bigger than Greater London, it may be the third-largest island in New Zealand’s Pacific archipelago, but it’s a very distant third.” In The Independent Ben Ross voyages to Stewart Island: A lonely land of myth and wild wonders. “So densely packed is the crush of vegetation that for the most part it feels as if man has scarcely intruded here. It’s like visiting Conan Doyle’s Lost World except that instead of being attacked by pterodactyls, hikers who choose to follow the three-day 29km Rakiura Track along the coast are likely to see birdlife that is either rare or extinct on mainland New Zealand: a kiwi, perhaps, or yellow-eyed penguins, or the predatory, flightless weka.”
• “Driving across the plains that were once an arm of the Arabian Sea was an experience in itself – vast and featureless and encrusted with salt – the only sounds are of birds flocking to the skies and the grunts of other creatures nearby. With no other souls around, this makes for a rare and unique wilderness experience,” writes Caroline Eden in The Times, who ventured into west India to Go wild in the Little Rann of Kutch, Gujarat. “The main draw for the Little Rann of Kutch, and to some extent Rann Riders resort, is the abundant birdlife. Most sought after is the McQueen’s Bustard, a very rare bird that is often spotted by Muzahid’s team of wildlife experts.”

FOOD

• “It was over a bowl of delicious, spicy-sweet peanut soup with pesto made from huacatay, or Andean black mint, that I realized the vegetarian diner was now perfectly welcome in Buenos Aires. As a vegetarian traveling in a country where beef takes center stage, I expected my meals to be relegated to an assortment of side dishes – sautéed greens, some variation of potatoes – supplemented by the occasional granola bar,” writes Tanvi Chheda in the New York Times. “But during a recent visit, I was happily surprised, if not downright triumphant, to discover a cluster of recently opened restaurants serving tasty and fresh vegetarian fare.” A guide to Buenos Aires for Those Who Shun Steaks.
• “Landscape is often a good clue to local cuisine, and any gourmand touching down in Lanzarote may have a sinking heart: the arid volcanic countryside appears almost totally barren, surely a sign of slim pickings. But thanks to the perseverance of the local farmers, justly celebrated here as heroes, and to the bounties of the surrounding Atlantic, visitors will eat unexpectedly well.” In The FT Miranda Green indulges in Lanzarote’s tangy sauces.
• “Eating on the street is one of the most intimate ways to experience the culinary assault of Vietnam, particularly in the capital Hanoi. This is democratic dining: businessmen, schoolchildren and grandmothers alike squat on tiny plastic furniture to eat a swift, cheap lunch,” writes Michelle Jana Chan in The FT. “After nearly 100 years of French colonial rule – Vietnam achieved independence in 1945 – the influence of French cooking on the country’s eating habits is also easy to identify in its finest restaurants.” Chan discovers that Hanoi cuisine retains its French flavour.
• “Though we were frequent visitors to Burgundy, we had not been to Napa or Sonoma – America’s best-known wine regions – in ages,” writes Ann Morrison in The FT. “That situation was recently remedied when we spent a long weekend touring the contiguous wine valleys, about an hour’s drive north of San Francisco.” Morrison compares her experiences of the vineyards of Burgundy to California’s best wine cellars.
• In The FT Sue Style takes A train tour of Swiss restaurants. “Not only is the Swiss public transport system something of a miracle – user-friendly, civilised, punctual – an indecent number of restaurants are strategically placed within strolling distance of many of the country’s stations and lakeside boat moorings. Thus was born our food-lover’s journey through Switzerland taken entirely on public transport.”

FAMILY

• “I had to think long and hard before taking up a friend’s offer to stay in her three-roomed cabin in this remote area of the southern Californian desert,” writes Louise Millar in The Observer. “I had just reached a point where I couldn’t take one more holiday where my husband and I had to shout at our pent-up city kids to stop disturbing the gîte owners next door, or queue for an hour to feed a lamb, or drive six hours to a rural Devon campsite to find the group next to us erecting a 15ft pirate flag and unloading a sound system. Remoteness, nature and relaxation were what we craved. The kind of American wilderness holiday we took before kids, that let us wind down properly. A place where they could let off steam without prompting someone to ask, as our elderly neighbour did recently, if we had “thought about getting Supernanny in.”" And was it a success? Read on…‘The California desert was the kids’ backyard’.
• “Berlin, famed for its nightlife and creative scene, might not be the first place that springs to mind for a family weekend. Yet it often surprises visitors with its child-friendly infrastructure,” writes Paul Sullivan in The Guardian. “Of course, there are all the parks and open spaces (the sprawling Tiergarten chief among them), activities at the museums, plus quirky extras such as indoor/outdoor pools and puppet theatres. But what really sets Berlin apart is its ability to adapt services and trends that are popular with adults to suit adults who just happen to have children, too. Unique to Berlin is a new trend in stylish yet family-friendly places to eat, drink and play: kindercafes. With their blend of dedicated play areas and funky decor, they’re more reminiscent of Berlin’s hipster bars than the UK’s Wacky Warehouse chain.” The perfect guide to Berlin for families.
• “I am checking in to a hotel whose mascot is a giant orange kangaroo. Hideous perma-tanned marsupials and grinning gnomes greet us at the door, while a red waterslide snakes its way down the side of the building like an external intestine. I cringe at the tastelessness of it all, then look over at my 18-month-old daughter, and my inner hotel snob is silenced. Lily is entranced – a slow grin explodes into wide-eyed delight at the sight of the plastic kangaroo on a bench in the driveway,” writes Liane Katz in The Guardian. “How did it come to this? For me, hotels used to be sexy and enchanting places; now they are purely functional. Still, I figure, happy child equals happy parent, and I’m travelling without Dad so need all the help I can get.” Katz checks into Austria’s Babyhotel: crayons, kangaroos and contented kids.
• The Times highlights 20 best family getaways for Easter – and there really is something for everyone, from Florida fun in Orlando to a family safari in South Africa. Tiger tracking in the Himalayas or monster hunting at Loch Ness…

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