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Christmas — luxury travel by Forest Travel
By Occasion · Christmas

Christmas

A fixed date, a full household, and the only real question — snow at the door, or the sea below.

Christmas is the least forgiving week in the calendar: a fixed date, a full household, and the best staffed houses committed long before the season opens. What is left is rarely what is published.

The decision is usually snow or sea. A staffed chalet in Zermatt puts the whole party under one roof with the mountain at the door. Tromsø & the Arctic works while the children are still young enough to be entirely convinced. A villa in the Caribbean trades the snow for a beach and, because the best are let by the fortnight, carries the New Year inside the same booking.

Where it lands: Zermatt and Aspen for the chalet, Tromsø above the Arctic Circle, and Turks & Caicos when the party includes children and the water is meant to be the point.

The Advisor's Guide

The Alpine Winter, Privately

St. Moritz and Zermatt on your terms — private instructors, reserved pistes at first light, the chalet with its own staff. A private, tailored journey of …

Read the guide →
Also in The Journal
Signature Journeys

Points of departure.

Each of these is a starting point — not a package, not a fixed schedule. Your advisor reshapes it entirely around you.

The Alpine Chalet
01
The Alps · Zermatt & the Engadine

The Alpine Chalet

A chalet taken whole — chef, ski host, driver — so the household gathers in one house instead of a floor of hotel rooms. The tree indoors, the mountain at the door, and children who ski back to it.

Designed to your pace Enquire
Christmas Above the Arctic Circle
02
Tromsø & Finnish Lapland

Christmas Above the Arctic Circle

For the years the children are exactly the right age — reindeer, huskies, and a sky that performs after dinner, from a lodge held for your family and no one else's.

Designed to your pace Enquire
The Staffed Villa Fortnight
03
The Caribbean · West Indies

The Staffed Villa Fortnight

A house with a full team — chef, butler, driver — held for ten to fourteen nights, with the beach below and the New Year arranged in it.

Designed to your pace Explore the Journey
Curated Journeys

Where Christmas goes

Five places, ordered by how quickly each one closes — the snow first, then the islands that suit a family Christmas.

Zermatt
Zermatt · The Chalet Christmas

Zermatt

A car-free village under the Matterhorn, with chalets let by the week and staffed like small hotels — the Christmas that ends with everyone skiing back to the door.

Designed to your pace Explore
Aspen
Aspen · Booked Furthest Ahead

Aspen

The shortest distance between an American winter and real snow — and the festive week that commits earliest of all, often a full year out.

Designed to your pace Explore
Tromsø & the Arctic
Tromsø · While They Are Young Enough

Tromsø & the Arctic

Reindeer, huskies and a sky that performs after dinner. The version of Christmas that only works for a few years, and is unforgettable in them.

Designed to your pace Explore
Turks & Caicos
Turks & Caicos · Space and Calm Water

Turks & Caicos

Flatter, quieter and built around one extraordinary beach — the island families choose when the water is meant to be the point.

Designed to your pace Explore
Punta Cana
Punta Cana · Held Longer

Punta Cana

Availability that lasts further into the autumn than the smaller islands, and houses built for the whole party rather than for two.

Designed to your pace Explore

Access, not availability.

In the festive fortnight, availability is not a listing — it is a phone call. The houses that matter are committed to returning guests, released quietly, and recovered from cancellations that move within hours. Forty years of relationships is what stands between the two.

St Barth

A hillside villa released back to us the week it was given up, and held for a party of ten before it reached a single listing.

Impossible to search — we made the call.
Turks & Caicos

A beachfront house for fourteen nights over New Year, opened by the manager rather than the market.

Impossible to search — we made the call.
The Caribbean

A chef briefed in November on what the children actually eat, so that the 31st needed no discussion at all.

Impossible to search — we made the call.

None of these were on any itinerary. Yours won't be either.

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Common Questions

Questions, answered.

Tighter than the Caribbean, in practice. Chalets are let by the week and the best are held by returning families a year ahead, so what appears late is usually a cancellation rather than an opening. Worth asking, and the answer comes quickly.

Above the Arctic Circle, while they are still the right age for it — Tromsø and Finnish Lapland give you reindeer, huskies and the aurora. Skiing rarely repays a party whose youngest is under six.

It divides on what the days should look like, not on budget. The Alps put the whole party in one house with something to do at the door; the Caribbean puts them on one beach with nothing that has to be done at all.

Ten to fourteen nights. It absorbs the travel days at both ends and leaves the middle genuinely unhurried, which a seven-night week over the holidays does not.

The best houses commit in the spring, and returning guests hold many before they are ever offered. For a specific villa on a specific island, April or May is the difference between choosing and being allocated.

Because an advisor opens what no platform can sell. Online platforms list what's already public — the same rooms and flights available to everyone. A Forest advisor opens what isn't: private after-hours access, the host who answers because they know us, pacing built around your life, and logistics that stay invisible. Over forty years we've built the relationships that turn 'impossible' into 'it's arranged.'

It begins with a conversation, not a quote. A dedicated advisor learns how you want to feel — not only where you want to go — then designs a journey around you and reshapes it freely as your plans evolve. There's no fee for the initial consultation and no obligation.

Discretion is built in. We work quietly, share nothing, and arrange private transfers, exclusive-use stays and after-hours access so you're never on public display. For clients who require it, every detail is handled under strict confidentiality.

Still Deciding?

Let a human help you choose.

Tell a private advisor how you like to travel and they'll point you to the right starting point — or design something entirely new.