Hotels in Tonga

Tonga is a chain of more than 170 islands across four main groups, and the only Pacific nation never formally colonised, still ruled by its own monarchy. Life moves slowly and Sunday is genuinely observed: shops close, flights stop and villages fill with church singing that ranks among the finest choral music anywhere.

The headline experience is swimming with humpback whales. Tonga is one of a very small number of places where regulated in-water encounters with mothers and calves are permitted, from roughly July to October, and Vava'u in the north is the centre of it. Vava'u is also a superb sailing ground, with sheltered anchorages and charter fleets. On the main island of Tongatapu, the Mapu'a 'a Vaea blowholes fire seawater along several kilometres of coastline.

Tonga is rebuilding from the January 2022 Hunga Tonga eruption and tsunami, and tourism has resumed, though infrastructure remains modest and inter-island flights and ferries can be irregular. Build slack into any itinerary that involves island hopping.