Astonishingly, nine out of every ten Brits holidaying in Spain this year will have got there on a no-frills airline like easyjet or Ryanair. The percentage for most other European destinations isn’t far behind. And with the budget airlines’ charge for checking in a suitcase ever rising, an increasing number of holidaymakers are taking just what will fit into a cabin bag with maximum dimensions of 55x40x20cm. Ryanair also imposes a 10kg weight limit whereas easyJet allows any weight ‘within reason’.

Ryanair has been especially tough on slightly oversize bags, sometimes creating lengthy departure gate queues as passengers with a cabin bag bulging beyond the max argue with staff then desperately extract enough to slim the bag.

If no-one has yet coined the phrase cabin bag anxiety, it’s time they did. But what the extortionate bag check-in charges do mean is that it’s worth investing in a cabin bag that makes the most of what you’re allowed. Luggage specialist Antler has come up a bag specifically designed for that purpose. It claims the Duolite is the lightest, most durable case it has ever produced. Combining a hybrid ABS and nylon material with a frameless construction, the Duolite is super lightweight, with the cabin case weighing in at just 2.1kg. With dimensions of 55x35x20, it meets most airlines’ cabin bag size limits (but always check before flying).

A weight of 2.1kg probably doesn’t mean much to most people, but we’ve been trying one out and the first thing everyone says is, “Isn’t it light?” The second is that  it nevertheless feels well made and strong in a high-tech sort of way, and the third is that it wheels along very easily. So although it has a recommended retail price of £89 (the lowest discounted price we saw online was £84), that could be a worthwhile investment. Our only reservation is that its width of 35cm is actually 5cm, or a couple of inches, less than most airlines allow, so you aren’t quite maximising the allowance. Having said that, the structure of the case intrudes very little into the internal space, which can also be expanded slightly by undoing a zip-fastened gusset extension to give a depth of 23cm if the airline isn’t being too strict. The bag has one zipped external pocket, and comes complete with a TSA padlock (which can be opened by security staff without having to break into the case).

For those trips where a cabin bag just isn’t enough, Antler does two matching suitcases of similar construction. The medium case (67x44x30/33cm) weighs 2.5kg, with a rrp of £105 and the large (74x49x33/36cm) weighs 2.9kg with a rrp of £109. With excess baggage charges of up to £40 per kilo, the two kilos or so saved compared with a typical case could almost pay for these cases, which all come with a 10-year warranty. Further details and stockists at www.antler.co.uk

EasyJet’s winter schedule, running from 31 October through to March 2011, is its biggest ever, offering more than 11.5 million seats across 230 low fare routes.

The no-frills airline has more than 80 new routes this winter, with a host of sun destinations including Cyprus, the Canary Islands, Egypt, Morocco, Tel Aviv and Turkey.

In 15 years, British company easyJet has created one of Europe’s key transport networks, operating on 45 of Europe’s top 100 routes, with 19 bases across 28 countries, and a fleet of 182 aircraft. This year it will have carried 50 million passengers on over 500 routes between 119 airports in 29 countries. It’s the UK’s largest and Europe’s fourth largest airline by passenger numbers. In 2009, the airline carried 28 million passengers in the UK and 46 million in total.

In recent research by flight search engine Skyscanner there are some differences between the actual cost and value of a holiday in comparison to what people generally perceive for certain holiday destinations.

Skyscanner asked around 1,500 people several questions about how they view different holiday destinations around the world. The first question asked was to note whether a country in a list of 30 was ‘cheap’ or ‘expensive’. Sweden, Norway, Switzerland and Denmark topped the list. However, research into the actual cost of holidaying in each country revealed that, the priciest hot-spot was actually France.

Brazil was perceived to be just outside the top ten cheapest places to visit, when in actual fact it was the fourth most expensive, along with Russia as the fifth, which was also viewed as a cheaper destination.

When it came to asking people about the cheapest places, the perception was a lot closer to the reality with respondents correctly identifying places such as Thailand and Morocco as some of the cheapest.

According to the price research the most budget-friendly countries currently are Cyprus, Greece, South Africa, Dominican Republic and Morocco.

Results changed however, when the cost of flights were incorporated into the mix, long haul destinations made for more expensive destinations in total, such as New Zealand shooting from the top ten cheapest destinations, to one of the top ten most expensive!

I’ve put the whole research below to help you make your own mind up about where to go on holiday if budget is a factor:

Easyjet aircraft picture by Flickr User slasher-fun

EasyJet is expanding the range of destinations served from Bristol Airport with the introduction of a larger aircraft, the new 180-seat Airbus A320.

This enables medium haul routes to be offered to destinations such as the Canary Islands, Crete, Cyprus and Turkey.

Flights to Cyprus are introduced from tomorrow (Wednesday) with Crete, Dalaman and Bodrum starting in July, bringing the network up to 42 routes.

More than two million holidaymakers are set to travel this Easter weekend.

Spain is the favourite country for people going abroad, with the Canary Islands – and Tenerife in particular – the most popular, according to ABTA.

Egypt has continued with its recent popularity and Tunisia and Turkey have also sold well.

Snow sports attract enthusiasts to Geneva to access the Alpine resorts of Switzerland, France and Italy.

Paris, Amsterdam, Dublin, Milan and New York are the top five city break destinations.

People are travelling to the Channel Islands and cottages in Cornwall, East Anglia and the North of England if they are staying in the UK.

ABTA chairman John McEwan said: “Easter is the traditional curtain raiser to the summer and I am delighted to see that hundreds of thousands of our customers are taking the opportunity to take a well earned break both here in the UK and overseas.”

Following our article on Cyprus in Holiday Villas Magazine, we’ve done a few searches on the web to identify a couple of other articles.

First, up, direct travel have provided a list of top ten things to do in Cyprus, including the historic mosque of Hala sultan tekksi, the city of Famgusta, and a walk through the forests of Limassol and Machairas.

Hari Nair writes in his blog about a trip to Cyprus, and posts some pictures of the trip, and Cyprus Informer has a checklist for people renting a villa in Cyprus.

To search through a range of villas in cyprus and beyond, head to our main site, Villaseek Holiday Villas – that has a wide range of villas and apartments available direct from the owners, and many of these properties have availability calendars, so you can see if the villa is available to book for the weeks you’re intending to travel to cyprus.

Tom K

In this article from Issue 68 of Holiday Villas Magazine, Ron Toft turns his back on the beaches and bars of Cyprus to follow the tourist trail celebrating the Greek goddess of love, Aphrodite.

In Search of Mighty Aphrodite

It was an uncomfortably hot day –
somewhere around 35°C – as the
sun’s rays blazed down on us from a
cloudless, cobalt sky. But after a 30-
minute climb up the dusty, pebble-
strewn track, we eventually reached
the top of the hill above stunning
Lemesos Bay on the south coast of
Cyprus, and there, all around us,
were what we had come to see: the
remains within ancient Amathous of
the sanctuary of Aphrodite – the
Greek goddess of love and beauty,
and the divine protector of the
delightful Mediterranean island on
which, the myth has it, she was born.

Amathousis is one of the highlights of
the cultural trail comprising 36 sites,
including 11 museums, associated
with and celebrating Aphrodite.
The first traces of a sanctuary on the
acropolis date from around 800 BC,
when Phoenicians settled in
Amathous. Another important date
on the Amathous timeline is 22 AD,
which was when Rome allowed the
Temple of Aphrodite – then one of
the island’s three most important
temples – to retain the right to offer
asylum.

Aphrodite worshippers were driven
from the temple when Christianity
was established at the end of the
fourth century AD, after which it was
repaired in the fifth century and used
as a church for 250 years until the
site was destroyed by Arab raiders.

By far the most striking
archaeological structure is a colossal
stone vase – dating from the seventh
century BC and weighing 12 tons –
at what was the entrance to
Aphrodite’s sanctuary. Originally
there were two of them – the other
is now on display in the Louvre in
Paris. It’s thought that both vessels,
quarried from the north cliff of the
acropolis, held water used in
purification and other rituals
associated with Aphrodite.

One of the sites worth visiting as
much for its natural beauty as for its
connection with the goddess of love
is Petra tou Romiou– the
legendary birthplace of Aphrodite
15 miles east of Paphos. A series of
rocks jutting out from the sea, Petra
is where Aphrodite is said to have
emerged from the briny foam…

You can read the full, illustrated article in our online version of the magazine.