Inside the Royals’ Hidden Holiday Retreats: The Exclusive Places They Go to Escape the Public
Royal watchers hoping to see photos from the private summer holidays of the Prince and Princess of Wales and their three children will be bitterly disappointed as the fiercely guarded family uphold their tradition of top secret getaways.
For years Prince William and Catherine have managed to escape the UK to luxury destinations around the world, many times going undetected without a single photo ending up online.
The Prince and Princess of Wales have been enjoying the summer before they return to work in the coming weeks. Chris Jackson/Getty Images
It’s not an easy feat for the Wales’ who are, arguably, the world’s most famous family with two future kings and a future queen among them.
Prince William and Catherine, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis will soon join King Charles at Balmoral Castle, continuing a royal tradition started nearly 200 years ago. And while we’ll see photos from the king’s arrival at the gates, the rest of the royal family’s time at the Scottish Highlands estate is kept under wraps.
Before then, the Wales’ are likely to have spent time somewhere a little warmer and more exotic, carefully chosen because of strict rules banning paparazzi, prying eyes and outsiders.
Prince William and Catherine are well-known to protect their family time with an iron-clad fist, taking a zero-tolerance approach to paparazzi photos or camera phone snaps of them when off-duty.
And in the rare instance that a photo is taken of the royals on holidays, either by a rogue photographer or member of the public, many legitimate news outlets refuse to publish the images, respecting the privacy of the royals who are entitled to time away from the spotlight.
One of the reasons William and Catherine, and their children, can holiday without being pestered by the public or paparazzi is by carefully choosing destinations where discretion is paramount and access is tightly controlled.
It is part of a wider public relations approach in stage-managing not only their downtime but allowing access to their family on their own terms, via officially released photos and occasional videos from the palace.
This family photo was taken on the Isles of Scilly during a private holiday and shared by Kensington Palace in April. Matt Porteous/Kensington Palace
And it’s in stark contrast to how Prince Harry and Meghan have done things recently. The Duchess of Sussex recently shared 12 photos in a “summer rewind” post on Instagram, including snaps taken on holidays in Portugal and in the UK.
The Sussexes, who have been vocal in their quest for privacy and security in the six years since leaving the royal family, appeared to have no qualms about sharing photos from their private getaway last month. Within minutes of the photos being posted, it didn’t take long for people to identify the places Harry and Meghan, and their two children, had been.
Though the Sussexes were long gone by the time of the duchess’ post, the photos gave a candid look inside the enviable and privileged private lives of the Sussexes, who continue to switch between wanting privacy and publicity.
The Isles Scilly, UK
This picturesque archipelago sits off Cornwall in southern England and has been a holiday spot of choice for many years for the Prince and Princess of Wales and their children.
The place is so loved by the family that they have chosen to release photos and short videos of their children, taken in Scilly, to mark important milestones including a home video for Prince George’s 13th birthday in July.
To mark Prince George’s 13th birthday, the Prince and Princess of Wales shared a video of the now teenager climbing rocks while on holidays in Cornwall at Easter. Instagram/Prince and Princess of Wales
In April, to celebrate the couple’s 15th wedding anniversary, William and Catherine shared an informal photo of the family laying together on the grass, taken during an Easter break there.
The Wales’ prefer to stay on the private, family-owned island of Tresco where they can enjoy the white-sand beaches, crystal blue waters and sub-tropical gardens.
Prince Charles and Princess Diana and their sons Princes William and Prince Harry on June 1, 1989 on the island of Tresco in Scilly. AP
But that’s all you’ll see from William and Catherine’s time there. The locals are said to be fiercely protective of the royals when they come to visit and know to leave them alone when they are out. To those in Scilly, William and his family are treated like everyone else.
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In 2016, Prince William and Catherine made an official visit to the isles where the prince recalled fond memories from holidaying there with his mother, Diana, and Prince Harry many years ago. One local said the royal brothers “were left alone, no one disturbed them” when they were there with Diana.
Prince William has another connection to the Isles of Scilly. As Duke of Cornwall, he holds a large portion of the land there through the Duchy of Cornwall.
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Mustique, the Caribbean
The exclusive Caribbean island of Mustique has long been a favourite hangout for the Wales’, the Middletons and the British royal family.
Such is the exclusivity of the island, those who visit can only do so at the invitation of someone who owns a villa or try and book one of the 17 rooms in the island’s only hotel, The Cotton House. Just 500 people live on the island and it is a mere 5.6 square kilometres.
Villa Antilles, on the island of Mustique in the Caribbean, has hosted the Wales family and the Middletons over the years. Mustique Island
The Middletons have been holidaying on Mustique for many years now and they regularly go there with Prince William and Catherine.
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“It is a slice of complete heaven,” India McTaggart, entertainment and royal correspondent for The Telegraph UK told the publication’s Daily T podcast recently. McTaggart and her family have holidayed on Mustique over the years.
“It’s not like a real place. Everyone is barefoot…it’s so casual, everyone is very relaxed. It’s such a community hub and it’s the same families that go there again and again to the same villas, the villas are absolutely breathtaking and they are very palatial and gorgeous.
“The sea views, the long infinity pools…the backdrop there is just out of this world.
Princess Margaret, centre, and her friends Lady Ann Tennant and Colin Tennant waiting on the jetty at Mustique to greet Queen Elizabeth II. The Royal Yacht Britannia can be seen in the background. nna\mleach
“Much like it was during Princess Margaret’s time, long lunches turn into evening parties. You can hike, too, if you want to be wholesome.”
Prince William and Catherine have stayed in the exclusive four-bedroom Villa Antilles, owned by Andrew Dunn − a property developer and friend of the prince’s − located in the Endeavour Hills. A week-long stay inside Villa Antilles costs between $46,000 to $65,000. It comes with a housekeeper, butler, live-in chef, private pools and gardens.
They have also stayed at The Cotton House and other villas in the past.
Prince William and Catherine have also become “firm friends with the people there”, The Mirror’s Russell Myers said.
In 2011, they invited Basil Charles, of the famous Basil’s Bar on the island, to their royal wedding at Westminster Abbey.
Myers said: “If you are surrounded by people who you wholly trust, it allows you to let your guard own like nowhere else on earth. When you are away from prying eyes you can party to your heart’s content.”
McTaggart said Mustique’s exclusivity attracted “the great and the good”.
“A lot of the names are quite famous. Discretion is understood there.”
The Princess of Wales, pictured at Wimbledon in July, has long favoured summer escapes with her family to the luxury island of Mustique. Clive Brunskill/Getty Images
Before William and Catherine’s time, Mustique was famed for being a retreat for Princess Margaret who was gifted a plot of land when she married Antony Armstrong-Jones.
It became known as Les Jolies Eaux (or Beautiful Waters), a five-bedroom neo-Georgian mansion which was then gifted to her son, David, in 1996. But Viscount Linley sold the property in 1999 and it can now be rented for just under $50,000 per week.
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Princess Margaret fled to Mustique when her marriage broke down and she found herself in headlines around the world when photos of her affair with Roddy Llewellyn were taken from a long-lens camera during a holiday on the island in 1976.
Verbier and Klosters, Switzerland and Courchevel, France
The ski fields of Switzerland and France are popular with not only the British royals but kings, queens, princes and princesses throughout Europe.
Prince William and Catherine, with Prince George and Princess Charlotte, during a ski holiday to Courchevel in the French Alps in March 2016. John Stillwell/PA
In 2020, Denmark’s now King Frederik and his wife Queen Mary moved to Verbier with their four children where they planned to live for three months. They own a chalet there and had enjoyed many family holidays in the town over the years and chose to enrol their children in an international school. But they returned to Denmark soon after, when the coronavirus pandemic put a stop to their plans.
Over the years, the royals have shared photos from their holidays on the slopes favouring luxury resorts in Verbier and Klosters, in Switzerland, and Courchevel in the French Alps.
In recent years, the royals have chosen ultra-private getaways to the snow in contrast to how the situation used to be decades before. William and Catherine were seen in Courchevel in early 2026 with their children and a year before when a French tabloid published photos of the private getaway, much to the anger of the couple.
Meghan accused of ‘stealing’ spotlight from King Charles
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In 2016, Prince William and Catherine were photographed with Prince George, two, and Princess Charlotte, 10, during a four-day holiday to Courchevel. They later shared several photos of what Buckingham Palace, at the time, described as their “first holiday as a family of four and the first time either of the children have played in the snow”.
When Prince William and Prince Harry were young, their family holidays started as private occasions before the children were paraded in front of the media for a pre-arranged photocall. The arrangement may seem strange now, but it was a way for the press to get photos of the royals while also giving them space to be normal.
In 1995, when one paparazzi continued to pursue Princess Diana and her young sons after a planned photoshoot on the skifields, the royal lost her cool.
Then-Prince Charles was photographed with his two sons in Klosters during a family holiday to Switzerland in the late 1990s. Tim Graham Photo Library via Get
“Please leave,” Diana tells the photographer in the now-infamous footage.
The princess continues, her hand over the camera lens: “As a parent, could I ask you to respect my children’s space? I brought the children out here for a holiday and we’d really appreciate the space. As a parent, I want to protect the children. Thank you.”
In his 2022 docu-series Harry & Meghan, on Netflix, the Duke of Sussex said of the planned photocalls: “Paparazzi used to harass us to the point of where we had to be forced into smiling and answering questions to the travelling press pack.
“And that made me feel really uncomfortable from the get-go. It was never fair and it never worked.”
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Then-Prince Charles and Camilla during a visit to the holistic health retreat SOUKYA in India in 2017. SOUKYA
India
Queen Camilla is known to favour a holistic health resort in India where she can relax away from the demands of public life.
Days after finishing their official tour of Australia and Samoa in November 2024, King Charles and Queen Camilla checked into the Soukya Holistic Health Centre, a wellness resort near Bangalore.
It was Charles’ first there since becoming king and he previously spent his 71st birthday there in 2019. Camilla has been visiting with her husband, and on solo trips, for many years.
Following the royal tour to Australia, Charles and Camilla had the entire resort to themselves as it was closed to other guests and outsiders for three days.
They stayed in the $2000 per night, three-bedroom presidential suite, complete with a dining room, a kitchen and an outdoor shower surrounded by banana palms and flowers.
The resort was founded by Harvard-trained physician Dr Issac Mathai and is described as an “holistic health destination to restore your body’s natural balance of mind, body and spirit”. Dr Mathai has become friends with the king and attended his coronation.
The 30-acre organic farm claims to be a “first-of-its-kind healing sanctuary”.
The wellness centre offers guests traditional and natural medicines including Ayurveda, homeopathy, yoga, naturopathy and other complementary therapies.
Alcohol, non-vegetarian food, mobile phones and smoking are all prohibited with guests having to sign a contract before entry.
Break the rules and pay $5000.
