High-octane holidays

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3 MARCH 2004
Orlando Bloom is renowned for his affection for action activities, while fellow stars Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford get their kicks from doing many of their own onscreen stunts. If you're bored, blasé or beached-out and fancy sharing a similar challenge, how about signing up for an adrenaline break of your own?

Kite-surfing, Morocco
A wide and windy beach is what you need for kite-surfing and you’ll find it at Essaouira in Morocco, along with schools offering the latest equipment and English-speaking tuition. There’s plenty to keep non-surfing partners happy, too. Its battlements, narrow alleys and fishing harbour make Essaouira one of the country’s most charismatic and photogenic towns.

Jimi Hendrix was clearly charmed – he penned Castles Made Of Sand on its golden beach. And why not unwind with a couple of nights staying in a riad, a converted townhouse in the medina in Marrakesh? Just the thing for catching up with the action in the exotic Djemaa el Fna square.

Mountain activities, France
Canyoning, climbing, rafting, paragliding… a multi-activity Alpine break in Chamonix beside Mont Blanc certainly isn’t for wimps. The thrill of canyoning lies in abseiling down waterfalls, sliding along natural waterchutes and jumping into pools of clear mountain water.

If that doesn’t give you enough of a buzz, follow it up with a trek across glacier crevasses with crampons. Or, if you prefer a loftier view of the Alps, Chamonix offers some of the most spectacular paragliding in Europe.

Don’t worry: tuition is on hand and you can always team up in a "tandem" with your professional instructor. It will all seem worth it at the end of the day when you relax at the spa at your stylish hotel – knowing you can do it all over again tomorrow.

Mountain biking, Turkey
The Cappadocia region of Turkey boasts some of the world’s most bizarre landscapes, its rock formations eroded into surreal shapes and sculptures. Successive ancient civilisations carved caves and even underground cities into the soft volcanic rock.

Mountain bike is the ideal way to explore this area away from the tourist hordes and to discover the nooks and crannies that others can’t reach. Best are the fairytale “chimneys” of the Göreme Valley where you can spend your nights in a chic five-star cave hotel. Here guests can cool off in the swimming pool after all that pedalling, and sip sundowners at sunset on the terrace while enjoying panoramic views.

There’s even time for a bit of retail therapy: at the beginning of a tour you can have a day in Istanbul to visit the mosques, take a trip up the Bosphorus and plunder some of the 3,000-odd stalls in the Grand Bazaar.