Choosing your dream property abroad can be one of the biggest decisions of your life. Our Lonely Planet guides ensure you have the most relevant and up to date destination information at your finger tips, to help you make the right choice.
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Australia
Endless sunbaked horizons, dense tropical rainforests, chilly southern beaches.
Australia's biggest attraction is its natural beauty. The landscape varies from endless sunbaked horizons to dense tropical rainforest to chilly southern beaches. Scattered along the coasts, its cities blend a European enthusiasm for art and food with a laid-back love of sport and the outdoors.
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Bulgaria
An enigmatic country at a very important crossroads in its history.
Images of cheap and nasty plonk downed at student house parties, budget ski holidays and umbrella-wielding Cold War assassins were once among the popular stereotypes, but Bulgaria today is a vastly different country from what it was even ten years ago - as more travellers than ever are discovering.
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France
Beautiful by name, beautiful by nature, la belle France is still turning heads.
Whether it's gastronomic greatness, artistic endeavour or cultural cachet you're looking for, there's no doubt that France still sits right at the top of the European heap. France is the country for which the word chic was invented - seductive and aloof, old-fashioned and forward-looking, but always characterised by a certain je ne sais quoi.
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Morocco
Pick up a flying carpet in the magical bazaars of Morocco.
Tangier, Casablanca, Marrakesh...just the names of these cities stir a hint of spice in the nostrils. Jostling crowds, the piquant tension of debate, space in perpetual motion - the minute you set foot in the country you know you've arrived somewhere very different.
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South Africa
Wildlife, wild times and a culture in repair.
South Africa is an exhilarating and complex country. With its post-apartheid identity still in the process of definition, there is undoubtedly an abundance of energy and a sense of progress about the place. Travellers are returning to a remarkable land that has been off the trail for way too long.
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Turkey
Hospitality, history and a hotline to the sun.
Check your Midnight Express stereotypes at the door - this is a rapidly modernising country with one foot in Europe and one in the Middle East. It's not all oriental splendour, mystery, intrigue and whirling dervishes but it is a spicy maelstrom of history knocking up against a pacy present.
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Barbados
This part of the Caribbean hasn't quite lost its British accent.
Barbados is the 'Little England' of the Caribbean, but not so much so that the locals have given up rotis for kidney pies, or rum for bitter ale. Bajans, as the islanders call themselves, are as West Indian as any of their Caribbean neighbours, and have tended to selectively borrow rather than assume English customs.
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Cyprus
Take a bite out of Aphrodite's island...Cyprus will seduce you.
Discover a country where East meets West, fashionable spas sit side-by-side with village kafeneia and heavenly beaches are backed by rugged mountains. While the coast calls to sunseekers and clubbers, inland is a haven of traditional villages, medieval castles and impressive ancient sites.
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Italy
La Dolce Vita has never been sweeter.
Europe's kinky over-the-knee boot has it all: popes, painters, polenta, paramours, poets, political puerility and potentates. Its dreamy light and sumptuous landscapes seem made for romance, and its three millennia of history, culture and cuisine seduces just about everyone.
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Portugal
Portugal's many fascinations come at a sigh-of-relief low price.
Portugal has a rich seafaring past, superb beach resorts, wistful towns and a landscape wreathed in olive groves, vineyards and wheat fields. Littered with UNESCO World Heritage sites and graced by one of Europe's most relaxed and attractive capitals, it also remains refreshingly affordable.
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Spain
The Spanish passion for living is deliciously contagious.
Once away from the holiday costas, you could only be in Spain. In the cities, narrow twisting old streets suddenly open out to views of daring modern architecture, while spit-and-sawdust bars serving wine from the barrel rub shoulders with blaring, glaring discos.
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United Arab Emirates
Everything from desert safaris to designer shopping, in true exotic luxury.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is a union of seven sovereign sheikhdoms, formed when the British withdrew from the Gulf in 1971. It boasts mountains, beaches, deserts, oases, camel racing, markets and the renowned duty-free shopping of dazzling Dubai - all packed into a relatively small area.