The bargain African town that is just like Santorini but without the cost – and has cheap TUI all-inclusive breaks

STROLLING through narrow streets, orange blossom scent in the air, it’s hard to believe I’m in Africa.

Just a short hop from Sicily, Tunisia is often overlooked as a holiday destination but it offers the same draws as many top European countries — for a fraction of the price.

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A 22-minute train journey from the capital Tunis to the quaint seaside village of La Marsa costs just 30p.

With a typical Tunisian earning the equivalent of £300 a month, the cost of living is much lower, making this an affordable holiday hotspot.

The charming town of Sidi Bou Said could easily be mistaken for Greece’s Santorini, but a three-course traditional Tunisian meal is £10 at its best-value restaurant, Café Restaurant Chargui, and a night’s stay at quaint bed and breakfast Boufares is £15.

The town offers stunning ocean views, and its streets are lined with immaculately painted white buildings, with doors and window shutters all the same shade of blue.

Moncef Battikh, our guide from Tunisia’s tourism office, tells us: “The doors are small but the houses inside are large.”

It also sums up Tunisia — a country the size of England.

And Tunisians are keen to welcome us in.

I receive my first invitation to a Tunisian home on the plane, where a kindly woman used broken English to spark conversation before drawing images of her favourite Tunisian foods and listing places to visit on a napkin.

Tunisia’s Ottoman-inspired architecture often features colourful studded doors.

But here, in built-up cities, windows are rarely seen from the outside, historically to protect women from prying eyes.

Instead, the sun blasts down into beautifully decorated central courtyards with windows and doors opening into the surrounding rooms.

The same is true for the city of Nabeul.

Here, I visit the 400-year-old Dar Abdelhak Lassoued, an olive oil farm run by three local sisters.

Their grandmother planted all 150 olive trees on the site.

We sample the extra virgin olive oils, learning how a good one gives off a strong spicy taste as it runs down the throat and can be used to treat colds.

Standing in the courtyard, which seems to soak up the warming sun, the sisters also show us the traditional way to brew Zhar — distilled bitter orange water.

Zhar means “home”, and the orange trees’ white blossom pods emit a sweet perfume that runs through the air.

The distilled water is often mixed into soaps and other beauty products as well as Arabic coffee, or given to guests as a perfume to rub on their hands.

Colourful gardens

Make sure to sample some history as well as olive oil when you’re here too.

Tunisia’s rich soil has earnt it the title of the “basket of Europe”, with Romans taking produce to feed its population in Italy after settling here.

The country now features the ruins of entire civilisations.

There are 27,000 archaeological sites here, and most are still buried.

At Thugga — Tunisian for high cliff — the ruins of a Roman-occupied city remain so intact it’s comparable to Italy’s Pompeii.

Huge temples dominate the skyline, and the streets offer visitors the chance to imagine life as a Roman citizen.

Among the buildings uncovered were baths, known as Hammams, a brothel and a market, in which you can still see where each stall was divided by walls.

When you’ve finished exploring, head to Dar Ejdoud restaurant which sits a kilometre below these hillside ruins.

Here we feast on lentil soup served alongside baskets of traditional Tabouna bread — a pitta-like dense dough cooked in fire and lightly sprinkled with delicious herbs. Next come bowls of green salad, harissa, and hot chakchouka, made with tomatoes and onions, followed by a huge plate filled with couscous, fries, a harissa vegetable medley and an aromatic, crispy chicken escalope.

Food really is a highlight of any visit here, and no place whips up traditional Tunisian grub better than Dar Zaghouan.

It’s almost a couple of hours drive east of Thugga, but it’s worth the journey.

The restaurant’s owner Skander Zeribi has spent the last 20 years transforming what was once empty arable land into a paradise.

After a stroll through colourful gardens surrounded by peaceful birdsong and the faint smell of food cooking in smoke, we sit down for a meal at the three-star boutique’s restaurant.

After the Tabouna bread and lentil soup comes the most colourful plate I’ve ever seen.

It has six petals filled with various salad bits: tomato, pepper, spicy harissa and a dark molokhia sauce in the centre.

The highlight is the brik, another traditional dish, made up of tuna and egg served inside a triangular pastry parcel.

Next comes a giant plate of Tunisian pasta called nwaser, with a square of tajine, which is like a quiche.

It accompanies a lamb gargoulette cooked in a clay pot for 45 minutes.

When the lamb falls apart, it releases a fragrant aroma of rosemary and lemon.

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For something a little less extravagant, the town of Testour is famed for its cheese-making and pomegranates.

And at popular shop L’Artigianno, you can buy one kilogram of its famed mozzarella for just £5.

That certainly puts the supermarket shops to shame back home.

Just make sure you bring an empty suitcase so you can cram it full.