Luxury holidays in Long Island

East of the Big Apple, Long island is as diverse as they come with 125 miles of green farmland, vineyard-flanked villages and world-class beaches within its remit. The skinny isle is known best as a vacation playground for city-slickers, many of whom spend their summers in the high-society enclave of the Hamptons, on the island’s South Fork, where seaside charm is alive and well with old-school movie theatres, historic inns and roadside farmer’s stalls selling punnets of fruit and veg. But there’s more to this pretty peninsula than blue-blooded beach breaks and clapboard cottages. At its far end, in the likes of Shelter Island and Montauk, flashiness and fame is disguised by flip-flops and hoodies, while its lesser-travelled North Fork has been described by some as ‘the Brooklyn of Long Island’ thanks to its plentiful wineries and microbreweries and up-and-coming gastro scene.