Dear Mr Ampersand: Where can I disappear for 10 days?

Dear Mr Ampersand,

I’m desperate to disappear. Not forever - just long enough to remember who I am. I want silence, salt air, something barefoot and remote, but with comfort and a good wine list.

Where in the world can one vanish… but beautifully?

Yours,
Overstimulated in Tribeca

Dear Overstimulated,

Disappearing well is an art.
Not the theatrical kind involving a change of name and a burner phone, but the more civilised variety: the strategic vanishing, known only to your PA, your therapist and whoever’s feeding the cat.

You’re not alone. I, too, sometimes long to be nowhere recognisable, where shoes are optional, eye contact is meaningful and the algorithm loses your scent.

And I know just the place.
Not that I should tell you.
But I will...

It’s called NIHI, and it sits quietly on Sumba - Indonesia’s “Forgotten Island.”

I use the word quietly with purpose. Despite frequent appearances on lists with titles like World’s Best Whatever, it remains gloriously untouched by fuss or flash. No glitz, no noise and no monogrammed spa robes - just wilderness, wonder and weather that works with linen.

You’ll sleep in a thatched villa carved into the hillside. You’ll eat fresh fish and mango under a sky full of actual stars. There’s a stable at the far end of the beach, and yes, you can ride into the sea at sunset like a character from an extremely tasteful perfume advert.

The Spa Safari, meanwhile, requires a walk through coconut plantations, village farmland and waving fields of green, until you reach a remote clifftop villa where breakfast, infinity pools and therapists await. It’s not indulgent. It’s restorative theatre.

Your partner can surf Occy’s Left, a legendary wave that breaks like a secret. You can hike, swim, read or - best of all - do absolutely nothing at all, which at NIHI is a perfectly legitimate activity.

Flights to Sumba are easier than they used to be - commercial routes from Bali are regular, and for those who prefer drama, there’s always the helicopter.

But don’t let the ease fool you. Once you arrive, the outside world fades fast.
You’ll reset not because someone told you to, but because everything unnecessary gently falls away.

This is not a “retreat.” It’s a return.
To silence.
To space.
To yourself.

Yours,

Mr Ampersand

If this has stirred something in you - some soft, flickering urge to vanish tastefully - you may begin here: ampersandtravel.com/indonesia

Think jungle-fringed villas, surf breaks for the soul, and wilderness served with breakfast on a cliff.

Some places change you. NIHI simply quietens everything else.