Sankha Guha: Man About World

Can money buy you love? American Express clearly thinks it can. It has come up with a list of the Ten Best Romantic Retreats for 2004, which should, in the interests of accuracy, carry the sub-title "For investment bankers, lawyers

and Russian oligarchs only". After much conscientious research, Amex suggests that love might bloom while exploring three of Africa's most famous game reserves, ensconced in the "sheer luxury of Crater Lodge, on the edge of the Ngorongoro Crater rim" - on a seven- night holiday costing a mere £6,200 per couple. Or while enjoying a "full-on tented experience" in the sand dunes of Dubai, where each "traditional Bedouin" suite is equipped with its own private pool - at nearly £5,000 a week. Amex love is a many splendoured thing - and splendour don't come cheap.

To be fair, not all its suggestions are stratospherically expensive, but they are entirely predictable. Most of the rest are glam beach locations with a pick 'n' mix of the following : "turquoise waters", "white sands", "lush greenery" and the inevitable spa offering "oriental therapies". How crashingly dull. Romance in these circumstances seems a requirement of the brochure small print - a contractual obligation, rather than a thing of passion and fireworks. "Did the earth move for you darling?" "No, sweetness - but I'll get housekeeping to fix it."

So for couples with a more adventurous cast of mind I have come up with a few alternative romantic destinations:

Habana Riviera Hotel, Cuba

The Riviera is the distillation of all the glamour and exotica of Cuba. Built in 1958 by the New York mobster Meyer Lansky as a casino hotel, it is the best example of the Miami deco style in Havana. For many years it remained intact in its decaying Fifties glitziness - though, judging by the latest pictures, it has suffered a clumsy refurbishment recently. However, enough remains to evoke its glory days.

The Mafia built it, but the revolution used it - in the Sixties the casino served as a hall for Communist congress sessions - and there are pictures of Fidel and Che at the apex of their guerrilla cool in the lobby. The swimming pool with its tiered diving platforms was featured in the Cuban cinema masterpiece Memories of Underdevelopment - set during the cataclysmic 1962 missile crisis, and rated by Derek Malcolm among the 100 best films ever made.

On my first visit to Havana in 1989 with Communism collapsing all over the place, so was the hotel. The plumbing, the electricity, the air-conditioning and the lifts were all in crisis - and my room was on the 19th floor. Breathless in the humid heat after staggering up the stairs, through the open windows I could see the stormy Caribbean battering the breakwater below. Walls of spray four storeys high crashed on to the hotel, and swept decrepit old Cadillacs and Buicks across the four lanes of the Malecon like toys. The Havana skyline twinkled weakly in the gloom - and the 20th century seemed to be holding its breath. I had everything but the girl. Even so, if there is a more romantic place on the planet I have yet to find it.

Everest View Hotel, Shyangboche, Nepal

Reaching the hotel is an adventure in itself. Guests fly in on flimsy six-seater planes up the Dudh Khosi valley, slowly becoming aware of the colossal scale of the mountains on all sides. Stunned into silence, they realise the plane is heading for a sheer wall of rock interrupted by a tiny patch of meadow that serves as the airstrip. No fairground ride can match the heart-stopping thrill of landing at Shyangboche.

The adrenalin rush of arrival combines with the thin air to produce a natural high. Your senses seem heightened, the outlines of the mountains are crisper, the colours more saturated. The Japanese-run Everest View is clean and efficient - the rooms are sparse but comfortable and it is the only hotel in the world that I know of with hot and cold running water, and oxygen on tap.

The Everest View Hotel is in Guinness World Records as the highest hotel in the world (13,000ft), but that factoid will seem trivial as you stand humbled before mountains that are more than twice as high. From the terrace on a clear morning the south-west face of Everest (29,035ft) is visible behind the mighty ridge, running across from the fourth highest mountain Lhotse (27,940ft) to Nuptse (25,726ft). Lara Croft would be swept off her feet.

Hua Hin, Thailand

For many the sine qua non of romance means a tropical location. Forget the obvious charms of the Phi Phi Islands or Krabi - both in Thailand (and both selected by Amex) - and head for the country's oldest seaside resort, Hua Hin. The Thai royal family has a palace here and, unlike most of the newer resorts, Hua Hin is an established fishing port with a life of its own beyond tourism.

Stay at the Sofitel Central - built around the elegant 1923 colonial style Railway Hotel, which played the role of the Hotel Le Phnom in the film The Killing Fields. But the real star attraction of the town is the fabulous seafood unloaded on the main jetty and served practically wriggling at the waterfront restaurants on stilts, or in the night market from makeshift cafés in the gutter. Impress your partner by ordering Jurassic era horseshoe crabs or other sea creatures never seen at the local chippie. If food be the music of love, gorge here.

Holkham Beach, North Norfolk

You don't have to travel to the ends of the earth to find the best beaches. Three miles long and half a mile wide at low tide - the powder white sands of Holkham stretch from horizon to horizon. True there are no swaying palms in this very English landscape but that is no loss. There are no man-made edifices either to distract attention from the forces of nature - sky, sea, wind, water and land all combine to present a stark ballet of the elements which change with the seasons.

No surprise that it has attracted film- makers - and fans of Shakespeare in Love will remember the lone figure of Gwyneth Paltrow walking on the vast sandy expanse in the closing shots. The real wonder of Holkham is that I have never seen the place crowded - it seems to expand to accommodate even the busiest weekends of the summer. There is always room to breathe and to let your thoughts drift with the tide. Holkham is as romantic a beach as you will find anywhere, and it is on our doorstep. Holkham costs, but at £2.50 to park your car, you won't be needing your Amex card.