The Caribbean. It has palm trees. It has beaches. We like it. But surely there’s more to it than that? There certainly is — if you know where to look. So, this winter, rather than trailing back to the same old haunts, make straight for the connoisseur’s Caribbean: five islands that can offer something more than the fly-flop-fry formula we know all too well. There’s the pristine nature of Dominica, the ramshackle charm of Bequia, the amazing coastline of Anguilla, the spectacular scenery of Virgin Gorda and the underwater wonders of Tobago.

All are perfect for anyone who’s feeling a bit “been there, done that” about the Caribbean — or for beginners who want to bypass the first-timers’ experiences and head straight for the good stuff.

Unless stated, all package prices are per person, for one week in January, and include scheduled flights and transfers

DOMINICA

HANG ON — isn’t Dominica the costa with coconuts, an all-inclusive hell? Nope, that’s the Dominican Republic. Dominica is a very different proposition: probably the only island in the Caribbean that Columbus would still recognise. A combination of rugged topography, impenetrable rainforest and dark-grey or jet-black volcanic beaches — as seen in Pirates of the Caribbean — has immunised the island against mass tourism. It’s a destination for lovers of nature rather than sun beds, hikers rather than hedonists. The Smithsonian Institute described it as “a giant plant laboratory unchanged for 10,000 years”.

Slightly larger than the Isle of Wight, Dominica has the biggest spread of virgin rainforest in the Caribbean, a green duvet of fairy dells and fat-girthed hardwoods that comes tumbling down from the giddy heights of Morne Trois Pitons National Park and into the sea. While Antigua boasts 365 beaches, Dominica claims a river for every day of the year, as well as umpteen waterfalls, freshwater pools, thermal springs, brilliantly plumed birds and 1,000 species of flowers. Pull on the hiking boots and get in among them, or head for the beach and go diving or snorkelling: there’s window-pane visibility and a diversity of wrecks, walls, subaquatic hot springs, giant sponges and rare black coral.

Dominica is also fascinating for its blend of colonial heritage, West African roots and the only surviving indigenous Indians in the Caribbean: 3,000 Caribs, who call the island “Tall Is Her Body”, live in the northeast corner.

But... don’t expect fancy hotels, great beaches or evening entertainment. In addition, all that greenery depends on a lot of rain — as much as 300in a year in parts. Heaviest falls are between May and November; the west side is the driest.

How far? Eleven hours, via Antigua.

How to do it: there are no direct flights from the UK, so it’s best to fly from London to Antigua with British Airways (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com), Virgin (0870 789 1011, www.virgin-atlantic.com) or BWIA (0870 499 2942, www.bwee.com) — all from about £720 — or from Manchester with BMI (0870 607 0222, www.flybmi.co.uk), from £534. Connections to Dominica with Liat (www.liatairline.com) start at £47. Charter Flight Centre (0845 045 0153, www.charterflights.co.uk) has charter flights from London to Antigua; from £421.

Of the few tour operators who feature the island, Trips Worldwide (0117 311 4402, www.tripsworldwide.co.uk), offers a number of small guesthouses and the Fort Young hotel, on a cliff above the sea and a walk from the easy-going, ramshackle capital, Roseau; from £995, B&B. Or there’s the new, top-drawer, five-room Habitation Chabert (00 1-767 445 7218, www.habitationchabert.com), with doubles from £140, B&B.

On a tighter budget, try the six apartments at Calibishie Lodges (767 445 8537, www.calibishie-lodges.com; from £50pp, half-board, based on four sharing), or Picard Beach (767 445 5131; from £100 for a cottage sleeping four).

BEQUIA

THE LUSHEST of the 30-odd islands that make up the Grenadines, Bequia offers something rare in the Caribbean: you can plug into local life rather than remain cocooned in your hotel. Whether you’re sipping punch in its bars, eating rotis on the Belmont waterfront or simply lazing and limin’ under the big almond tree (known as the “Houses of Parliament”) in the middle of Port Elizabeth, the tiny main town, you’ll be as likely to meet fishermen, seafarers and boat-builders as other tourists. The laid-back experience has more in common with life on a Greek island than it does with many of its neighbours. For what it’s worth, sleepy, titchy Bequia is one of my all-time favourite islands.

There’s a good range of locally owned, affordable guesthouses (see below), but many visitors stay afloat: it’s a boaty place, with a high proportion anchoring in Admiralty Bay as they work their way down the Grenadines chain. Landlubbers can also take to the water: from Port Elizabeth, hop by Rasta-powered water taxi to excellent beaches or step aboard an old wooden schooner, Friendship Rose, for a day trip to Tobago Cays, a snorkelling paradise, or the superstar retreat of Mustique. There’s diving, too, with Dive Bequia (00 1 784 458 3504).

But... There’s a scrappiness to the place that refined tastes might find disagreeable. Forget fine dining, smart hotels with children’s clubs and wellness spas. And it’s small: if there’s a current of restlessness coursing through your veins, you might want to add a second island to your travel plans.

How far? Ten hours if you go the quickest way, via Barbados. How to do it: Barbados is the best gateway island, served from London by British Airways (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com), Virgin (0870 789 1011, www.virgin-atlantic.com) and BWIA (0870 499 2942, www.bwee.com); and from Manchester by BWIA and BMI (0870 607 0555, www.flybmi.com). Returns start at about £700. First Choice (0870 850 3999, www.firstchoice.co.uk) has charter flights from Gatwick and Manchester; from about £430. Connections with SVG Air (www.svgair.com) start at £220.

Few tour operators feature Bequia, and most of these offer houses rather than hotels. Caribbean Islands Club (020 8232 9781, www.carib-club.com), for example, has Mockingbirds, a villa with pool and sea views, for £1,250, including private air transfers and 4WD hire, based on six sharing. More affordable villas are available through Toad Hall (01548 852407, www.toadhallcaribbean.com).

Independent travellers also have a good choice of guesthouses. One, bang on the waterfront, is the 15-room Frangipani (00 1-784 458 3255, www.frangipanibequia.com; doubles from £70), owned by the former prime minister, James Mitchell — who was born in room No1.

Next door, run by Mitchell’s former wife, Pat, is the Gingerbread (784 458 3800, www.gingerbreadhotel.com; £70), where the attractive rooms each have a kitchenette.


TOBAGO

LOCALS CLAIM it was the original Robinson Crusoe island, with many of its beaches meeting all the requirements of castaway central casting.

For every sandy strand with a hotel, there are at least three with nothing more than a tiny village — and frequently not even that. But you really need to pack your binoculars as well as a cossie, hiking boots as well as flip-flops, and a diving mask as well as shades, because there’s a lot more to Tobago than beaches.

The central spine of mountains, a last fling of the Andean chain, are matted in rainforest, threaded with trails, cooled by waterfalls and home to more birds per square mile than anywhere in the world. Aside from the rainforest, Tobago’s other natural wonder lies underwater, especially off Speyside, where more than 20 dive sites lie within a 10-minute boat ride. You can see brain coral as big as a bungalow, a wreck and, with a lot of luck, a blue manta, the dark, silent delta of the deep.

Despite the ease of getting there, the impact of tourism on Tobago has been surprisingly light: the development is low-rise, largely inoffensive and mostly gathered in one corner (Courland Bay).

The best of the beaches include Englishman’s Bay, a deserted crescent of golden grains backed by palms and a bamboo forest, and Pigeon Point, sheltered by a reef and, thankfully, officially protected from development.

But... Although access is easy, it’s not ideal for families, with little to interest young children or teenagers apart from the beaches. There’s not much in the way of heritage, either, apart from the occasional ruin of a sugar mill or fort. Other drawbacks include the infrequent cruise ship, which offloads a cargo wholly inappropriate to the scale of the place; the slow pace of things (sometimes welcome, but not when waiting for a taxi for the airport or a quick bite to eat); and a few harmless but pestering beach hustlers.

How far? Nine-and-a-bit hours, with a choice of nonstop flights.

How to do it: BA (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com) and Virgin (0870 380 2007, www.virgin-atlantic.com) fly from Gatwick, and BWIA (0870 499 2942, www.bwee.com) flies from Heathrow. Returns start at about £700. Excel (book through Golden Caribbean: 0870 777 6911, www.goldencaribbean.com) has charters from Gatwick; from £371.

About 20 tour operators offer packages to Tobago, featuring both hotels and villas. The old-fashioned but charming Arnos Vale, for example, costs £836, B&B; or try Blue Haven, where, in the 1950s, the likes of Robert Mitchum and Rita Hayworth came to pop their champagne corks into the sea; £995, B&B. Seashells Villas, with a private pool, costs £664, based on six sharing.

All three are available through Just Tobago (01373 814234, www.justtobago.co.uk).

If you’re looking for something more intimate, try the nine-room Old Donkey Cart (00 1-868 639 3551), also known as Half Moon Blue — a cross between a boutique hotel and a quirky inn, with doubles from £100, B&B. Another good bet for independent travellers is the Seahorse Inn (868 639 0686), a restaurant with four rooms; from £70, B&B.

ANGUILLA

ON PURE topography, Anguilla seems to have drawn all the short straws. The mostly flat, arid land, as scrubby as an old doormat and unable to yield much by way of bananas or sugar cane, was even neglected in the early colonial scramble (though it did end up British pink on the map).

But welcome to the age of the beach. Over, the past 20 years, Anguilla has been popular with very wealthy people who want to wear — and do — very little. The island’s blazing white sand is the best in the Caribbean. And the sea’s not bad, either: every shade of blue, the shoreline hemmed with turquoise and opal.

While the beaches are the natural draw, it’s the man-made ingredients that have shaped Anguilla’s pattern of tourism. Its appeal lies as much in what it hasn’t got as what it has. Wetbikes, casinos and cruise ships are banned. There are no golf courses (although one will open in 2006), all-inclusive resorts or shopping malls. Hotels are few, and their standards are high.

Aside from 33 beaches — on offshore cays as well as the main island, some with watersports, some with fishing villages — Anguilla’s vital statistics include 85 restaurants and 9,860 locals, all seemingly well disposed to visitors.

But... If beaches aren’t your bag, go elsewhere. Or at least compromise with a week here and a week elsewhere, with Antigua the obvious choice. St Kitts, Nevis and St Barts also make successful travel partners. Or you can hop on the ferry (20 minutes) and spend the day shopping on St Martin.

How far? About eight hours to Antigua, then a wait at the airport, followed by a connecting flight of about 40 minutes with Caribbean Star or Liat (see below) — a bit swifter if you fork out for a private charter.

How to do it: fly to Antigua with BA (0870 850 9850, www.ba.com) or Virgin (0870 789 1011, www.virgin-atlantic.com), from Gatwick; or with BWIA (0870 499 2942, www.bwee.com), from Heathrow. Prices start at about £720. BMI (0870 607 0222, www.flybmi.com) flies from Manchester; from £534. First Choice (0870 850 3999, www.firstchoice.co.uk) has charters from Gatwick; from £456. Connect from Antigua with Liat (www.liatairline.com) or Caribbean Star (www.flycaribbeanstar.com); from £168 return.

Several Caribbean specialists feature the two top hotels: the Moorish-styled Cap Juluca (from £2,936, B&B), and the Malliouhana, with its excellent restaurant and children’s club (from £2,418, room-only). Both can be booked through Caribtours (020 7751 0660, www.caribtours.co.uk), which will also feature a new resort, Ku, from £1,606 — amazing value for Anguilla. (Look out for our exclusive first review of Ku on November 27.) A brand-new Charming Escapes brochure (www.charmingescapes.com; ready soon) contains 15 mid-market properties and guesthouses that can be booked direct.

They include the eight-room Lloyds guesthouse (00 1-264 497 2351, www.lloyds.ai), near Crocus Beach, with doubles from £70, B&B; and, on the highest point of Anguilla, Brookland Island View Apartments (264 497 5078, www.brooklandsislandview.com; from £442 per week).

VIRGIN GORDA

THIS IS A little-known island in a country that rarely makes our shortlist of Caribbean options. Scattered over miles of incomparably blue sea, the steep, green chain of the British Virgin Islands is among the most peaceful and least exploited corners of the region.

This particular Virgin — the “Fat One”, according to Spanish explorers, with a belly of forested hills (protected as a national park) in the north and flattish lands of scrub and cactus in the south — is the second-largest of the BVIs, yet it’s still just eight square miles. Most visitors come by boat, drawn by the huge expanse of sheltered turquoise waters in the North Sound, two miles across and enclosed by reefs and mini islands (including Mosquito, Prickly Pear and Richard Branson’s Necker Island). Gorda offers superb stretches of pure white sand, some as good as the Caribbean gets, with Little Dix Bay, a half-mile sweep of a beach, the conventional best.

The island’s spectacular birthmark, however, is The Baths, where patches of squinting sands meet outcrops of pinky-grey granite boulders, Dali-soft and as big as clouds. To explore them, you have to walk and wade, Indiana Jones style, through a playground of grottoes, caves and seawater hot tubs before emerging on the silky beach of Devil’s Bay beside the peppermint sea.

Every form of sailing imaginable is on offer here, from beginners’ dinghy lessons on the lake-like waters of North Sound to fully crewed yachts.

Onward connections are with Liat (www.liatairline.com) or Caribbean Star (www.flycaribbeanstar.com); from £100. First Choice (www.firstchoice.co.uk) has charters to Antigua from Gatwick; from £456. The B in BVI certainly does not stand for budget, although more affordable accommodation options include Olde Yard Village (www.oldeyardvillage.com), which opens this month. Each of its 19 units has a kitchen, and there’s a communal pool; from about £150 per night for two.

Or try the mid-range Leverick Bay (www.leverickbay.com), on the south shores of North Sound; about £100 per night for two. Several operators feature the two top properties. Biras Creek, Relais & Châteaux posh and favoured by high titles with low profiles, costs £1,970 with Caribbean Expressions (www.expressionsholidays.co.uk), including all meals and the use of Boston Whaler motorboats to zip around the sheltered waters of the Sound.

A better bet for families is Little Dix Bay (imaginative kids’ club, good spa); £2,295, room-only, also with Caribbean Expressions. Boaties should go to Bitter End, a hotel with its own sailing school and 150 boats for the use of guests; £1,999, full-board, with Virgin Holidays (0870 990 4215, www.virgin.com/holidays). But the island’s ultimate des res is a house, Baraka Point, built in a cluster of detached pavilions on their own promontory above the sea, and available fully catered through ITC Classics (01244 355527, www.itcclassics.co.uk); about £1,000pp per week if 14 share.