Where to go on holiday in September, from Chile to Canada

Travel inspiration for autumn

Marrakech is an easy escape from the UK (iStock)

Time to turn over a new leaf with an out-of-the-ordinary early-autumn escape. Think South American skiing, Canada’s heavenly lakes or a music festival in the Italian mountains.

Here are the best places to escape to in September.

Trentino, Italy

The Sounds of the Dolomites is performed at 2,000 metres above sea level (Paolo Bisti Luconi)

The hills are well and truly alive with music in Italy’s north east this month, as the Sounds of the Dolomites (until 15 September) returns for its 25th year of open-air concerts – everything from classical music to jazz and folk – held in stunning mountaintop spots, reachable only on foot. Think grand pianos played in open meadows and steel drum bands filling a ravine, and new for 2019, the first entire opera to be performed at 2,000 metres above sea level. Regional capital Trento is also a delight, where Renaissance palaces and piazzas meet apple strudels and beer halls that show the influence of Austria. Cyclists will be in their element around here, with 400km of paved biking paths fanning out from the town. For an upmarket “base camp”, stay at Hotel Costabella (rooms from £92) beside the San Pellegrino Pass.

Average temperature in September: 21°C
Flight time: 1h 45m (to Milan)

Marrakech, Morocco

Find some of Morocco’s best food and crafts in Marrakesh’s busy Medina (iStock)

Marrakech makes escapism so darn easy, its labyrinthine spice-scented souks and Moorish palaces lying less than four hours from the UK, with no time difference. Hardly surprisingly, then, that the city’s popularity continues to surge – American Express reports travel bookings have increased 89 per cent year-over-year – and Instagram is awash with people posing against Jardin Majorelle’s cobalt-blue walls or the prettily-tiled courtyard pool of Riad Yasmine (rooms from £138). “Marrakech taught me colour,” the iconic designer Yves Saint Laurent once said, and fittingly the city now has an excellent museum exhibiting the French fashion legend’s finest creations. September has the advantage of comfortably cooler temperatures, yet still balmy enough to linger in pavement cafes after dark for mint tea and mezze, after checking out the snake charmers and contortionists in Jemaa el-Fnaa square. Meanwhile, just outside the city, two cool electronic music festivals, Atlas Electronic (28 August-2 September) and Oasis (13-15 September), are taking place against a backdrop of the Atlas Mountains.

Average temperature in September: 27°C
Flight time: 3h 40m

Valparaiso, Chile

Inca Lake is surrounded by ski slopes (Brent Jacoby)

Skiing in September? Absolutely – it’s prime time to hit the slopes in the Andes. Its top-rated resort, Portillo, is just a couple of hours from Santiago and offers gloriously uncrowded slopes, with plenty of runs for beginners and seasoned skiers alike. The resort has one – fortunately, excellent – hotel option, Ski Portillo, its sunny yellow building sitting pretty at 2,880m (seven-night stays from £1,893, including lodging, meals, lift pass and more). There’s a huge hot tub for soaking weary muscles along with the bonus of ski-in, ski-out accommodation. And well, if the slopes are good enough for the US, Canadian, Norwegian and Austrian National Ski Teams to train on, who are we to argue? Tie in with a couple of nights in Santiago for the perfect city-meets-snow escape.

Average temperature in September: -2°C
Flight time: 14h 35m

West Ireland

View across the water to Galway City (iStock)

Tuck into the spoils of the North Atlantic coast at a Taste of West Cork (6-15 September) and the Galway International Oyster and Seafood Festival (27-29 September), marking the beginning of the native oyster harvest – the latter hosts the World Oyster Opening Championships (honestly, it’s a thing) plus parades, and plenty of stout and champagne to sip with your shellfish. Harbour town Galway is known for its arty bohemian scene, and also, increasingly, as a champion of organic, farm-to-fork cooking, the pinnacle of which has to be Michelin-starred Loam’s seasonal tasting menus.

But of course the biggest draw for most heading to south-west Ireland is the sensational coastal scenery: driving along the Wild Atlantic Way, you’ll constantly encounter windswept castles and vast sand beaches, as well as megalithic tombs older than the pyramids at The Burren, craggy, myth-infused isles like Skellig Michael, and the country’s biggest colony of Atlantic grey seals at Blacksod Bay. Break up the exhilarating journey by spending the night in a lighthouse (Irish Landmark has several rentals) or splash out on Relais & Chateaux’s Sheen Falls Lodge in Kenmare Bay.

Average temperature in September: 17°C
Flight time: 2h 40m

Alberta, Canada

Calgary is Canada’s up-and-coming city (Getty)

Did you hear? Calgary is getting cool; traditionally put down as Alberta’s bland business capital, a necessary jumping-off point for visiting the Rockies, now neighbourhoods like Inglewood and Kensington are hubs for craft beer breweries, indie boutiques and experimental art galleries. Get your bearings (and mountain views) from the 191m Calgary Tower, rising above the easily walkable grid layout of the city centre, before soaking up the early-autumn sunshine in Prince’s Island Park and cluing up on First Nations history at the Glenbow Museum.

The brand-new Residence Inn Calgary (rooms from £82 per night) is a handy downtown base, nodding to Calgary’s country-western heritage with its cowboy boot stitching design details. Outside the city, Banff National Park beckons, with its jaw-dropping glacial lakes-meet-mountains views and endless forest hiking trails; in September, it’s still plenty mild enough to kayak on Lake Louise and catch the larch trees’ leaves turning a bright golden yellow.

Average temperature in September: 16°C
Flight time: 11h