Who needs Bora-Bora when you have Brittany? I'll wager that when you arrive on the Îles de Glénan, an archipelago off the southern coast of Finistère, you'll consider these desert isles as good as any that you might find in more exotic places. If you're not here for the sailing school, there is little to do except bury your feet in the white sand, kayak across a clear lagoon, or watch the black headed gulls, weave and dip, on their flight out to sea.

The Vedettes de l"Odet, based in Bènodet will get you there.
+33 (0) 2 98 57 00 58
www.vedettes-odet.com/
Google map: bit.ly/wtpoEz

I agreeI disagree

1.  
2. Send to friends

Forget about spa and yoga retreats, the best way to get rid of a festive flunk is to head into the woods with an axe. There's something surprisingly therapeutic about handling a tool used for millennia and on an axe workshop you'll spend a long weekend doing just that. You'll learn how to care for your axe, sharpen it, cross cut and limb a tree with it, split logs, and even how to carve with it. When you finally turn a mossy log into a kind of seat with it, you'll be radiating an inner joy greater than any that you might find on a holistic retreat. (Plus, the glow on your face from wielding the thing for 48 hours and camping out in those numbingly-cold woods beats any fifty quid facial.)

There is an axe course in Devon run by the Survival School.
www.survivalschool.co.uk/
+44(0)1453 752220

I agreeI disagree

1.  
2. Send to friends

At night the university town of Rennes comes alive. The boys swash and buckle in street corners, drinking, fighting, and vying for the attention of any pretty young girl that shimmers past them. The lecturers, meanwhile, hurry past their inglorious students, away from the aptly nicknamed rue de la Soif, to find themselves a quiet corner in the oldest wine bar in town, Le Nabuchodonosor. The floor is pock-marked, the tables are worn and wooded and the wines - endless wines - are chalked up on the board above them. Here, pressed into dark corners, they sit, devouring gossip and chat, till the small hours. Go join them – as the night closes in they’ll pull you over to their table and share with you their huge plates of bread, cheese and cold meats. Never mind that your French is dire – their animated English improves with each bottle that you buy, and drink together.

12 rue Hoche, Rennes
+33(0)2 99 27 07 58
Google map: bit.ly/sLceJW

I agreeI disagree

1.  
2. Send to friends