Caitríona Balfe on Her Favorite Hotels, Country Retreats, and Phone-free Escapes Around the World

In a new adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, Caitríona Balfe steps into a landmark role. Here, the actor shares how filming and motherhood have shaped her travel style.

For more than a decade, Irish actor Caitríona Balfe inhabited the Scottish Highlands as Claire Fraser in Outlander, the series that established her as one of television’s most compelling leading women. When the show finished filming in 2024—after eight seasons, 101 episodes (including one directed by Balfe herself), multiple awards, four Golden Globe Best Actress nominations, and the development of a devoted cult following—it could have felt like the end of an era. Turns out, it was just the beginning. 

“I thought that once you’re out of the TV schedule, work comes in peaks and valleys, and you just have more time,” Balfe says, smiling with a raised eyebrow. But she hardly let the dust settle before diving right into new roles—like Mrs. Dashwood in Sense and Sensibility, a new film adaptation of the Jane Austen novel by English director Georgia Oakley, out this month. 

Balfe is used to a fast pace, having spent much of her adult life in transit—“though I never left Ireland until I was 17,” she tells me, explaining that when she was growing up in the 1980s, during the country’s recession, travel overseas simply wasn’t in the cards. Instead, summers were spent in Donegal, in the remote northwest: family beach trips along the windswept coastline, “of which I have the greatest memories.” Then Balfe was scouted by a modeling agency, and her world expanded overnight.

She lived almost permanently out of a suitcase for the better part of her late teens and twenties, traveling from Tokyo to Milan, Paris to New York. Japan in particular—where she spent three months on one of her earliest assignments—proved a baptism by fire. Not speaking the language, and armed with little more than small maps with handwritten directions to find her way to 6 a.m. jobs, she quickly learned to be independent. “I was thrown right in at the deep end,” she recalls.

Acting brought a different rhythm. Instead of flying between destinations every few days, she was staying in them for months at a time, absorbing their seasons and routines. Of course, with Outlander, Balfe became inextricably linked to Scotland. From 2013 to 2024, while filming the show across Perthshire, West Lothian, and Fife, her connection with the landscape evolved. These years spent among lochs, forests, and Munros—a term for Scottish mountains over 3,000 feet—rewired her relationship with nature. “I don’t think I realized how much that gave me,” she reflects. “Now I really crave it.” 

That appreciation for landscape has been furthered by two of Balfe’s most recent projects, both released this autumn. Alongside Genden Phuntsok, Tom Hiddleston and Willem Dafoe, she stars in Tenzing, the story of Nepalese climber Tenzing Norgay and the first successful ascent of Everest, in 1953. In some retellings of the historic climb, Norgay was referred to as just “the sherpa,” when in reality he was a full member of the British team—one of the most experienced on the expedition, in fact. The film also asks bigger questions about what adventure looks like today. 

“There’s such a reckoning happening within the climbing community about what it means to conquer Mount Everest,” Balfe says. “A line in the film explains how, within Nepali philosophy, it should be approached the way ‘a child climbs into a mother’s lap,’ but you see Base Camp now and it’s like Fyre Festival.”

For Balfe, returning to Nepal—which she first visited 25 years ago as a young backpacker—became unexpectedly personal. “My part [in Tenzing] takes place where the women are, which is not up the mountain, so I was based in Kathmandu for three weeks. I discovered these incredible coffee shops and yoga studios and beautiful design stores run by young Nepalis,” she says. 

My dream holiday is going to Donegal in the summer with friends, staying in a little hundred-year-old farmhouse on an island.

Closer to home was the filming of Sense and Sensibility, which unfolds across Kent, Dorset, and the wild openness of Dartmoor National Park, in Devon. “People always ask, ‘Why do another Sense and Sensibility?’ But I think every generation gets to meet these stories where they are,” Balfe says. She adds that the new film doesn’t take anything away from Ang Lee’s 1995 version starring Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet, and that Oakley’s adaptation “has such a unique artistic vision that this feels completely its own.”

On that shoot, Balfe found herself immersed in a version of England that felt elemental: wind sweeping across the moors, blackberries ripening along hedgerows, rain arriving without warning. The main characters’ home, Barton Cottage, became one of the film’s emotional anchors. “The whole production was like this poetic hug, earthy and grounded,” Balfe laughs. 

Instead of the bodices her characters have worn, Balfe is dressed in the latest fall fashions for the Travel + Leisure cover shoot at Estelle Manor in Oxfordshire. On a perfect June day, with the sun shining, the roses in full bloom, and the glorious Neo-Jacobean house looming in the background, we sat down to talk about her globe-trotting work, and how she balances travel for filming with personal trips.

This hotel is pretty fabulous, isn’t it?

I’ve been a few times now. It’s beautiful, obviously, but it also works for families. My son absolutely loved it, although he wasn’t happy that children were only allowed in the pool for three hours each day! Once you have children, your priorities change. I’m always trying to find somewhere that has a separate bedroom and living room, so we can put him to bed and not be stuck sitting in the dark. Open-plan suites just don’t work. And then sometimes with a villa, I just want to be able to call down and get room service.

Do you have favorite hotels elsewhere in Britain?

When we were in Scotland, we used to go to Gleneagles Hotel. Then there’s Inver, on Loch Fyne, which is tiny but incredible. You’re off-grid with no TV, no phone reception. I love that they leave a record player and a cocktail for you in your room. My husband and I went there when my son was one. We were only away for 48 hours, but it felt like a whole week. 

So do you miss Scotland?

I mean, I don’t always miss the weather, but yes, I really do.

You’re based in London now. What do you think about the hotels?

I don’t think you can beat Claridge’s. Recently I was doing a press junket there, and then it just so happened that our boiler broke at home. So then we had to stay for two nights, which was really such a trial [laughs]. For pleasure my husband and I go to Somerset quite a bit. We got married down there, actually. It’s so beautiful, especially around Bruton. We’ve been to Babington House a few times. And I love the Newt in Somerset—the rooms, the food—but it’s very hard to plan, because I feel like it’s always booked up so far in advance.

What about farther afield? Which parts of the world are you drawn to? 

One of my best friends is Mexican, so when I lived in the U.S., I would visit her in Puerto Vallarta. And I loved to stay at Careyes and Cuixmala. Then my husband and I went to the Amalfi Coast a few years back and based ourselves at Monastero Santa Rosa Hotel & Spa, which was gorgeous. We’ve been going to the quieter side of Ibiza for the past couple of years, around Santa Gertrudis de Fruitera. I just love the central square in the village, where the kids can run around and you can sit and have lunch. There’s some lovely shops, too. We’ve tried Mallorca as well—we stayed in Deià, which is absolutely beautiful but not so child-friendly.

Has becoming a parent changed the way you travel?

My son’s a really good traveler. When he was very young, we had to go to Los Angeles a lot, and he’s fantastic on a plane. I’ve managed to avoid the iPads up to this point, and he’s really good at reading and playing games. Though he did mainline TV on one of our last long-haul flights.

Do you still enjoy the act of traveling itself?

Airports have gotten less and less fun, but I see traveling as my alone time. I love getting on a plane with a good book. I never use the Wi-Fi. I don’t want to connect, and I don’t understand people who do. That’s your one moment.

And what’s something you always pack after the passport?

Books. I don’t always read. They go in anyway though, with great optimism. And a swimsuit. If I can get a dip somewhere, that’s a huge recharge. I was filming in Spain over the summer. It was so hot and we were in full costume, so it was like an endurance test. When we wrapped, I raced to get in the water, and just lying in the sea for 10 minutes was all I needed to reset. And when I shot The Housekeeper [an upcoming adaptation of a novel by Rose Tremain] in Cornwall in March, it was in the script that our characters should go for a swim. Everyone was saying, “You don’t have to—it’s going to be too cold!” But I did it. It was freezing, but the best rush of adrenaline ever. 

Do you seek out adventure? 

My life can be quite hectic and work is full-on, so I’m a real believer in recharging the batteries. I like the cultural aspect of travel—going somewhere, checking out the museums, trying the food. That’s more important to me than throwing myself down a mountain. 

What places are still on the wish list?

I’ve wanted to go to Mongolia for the longest time. Bhutan, too. I feel like so much of the world has become so homogenized that it’s hard to feel like you’re somewhere really special and different. My husband and I have been to Iceland a few times, and we really want to stay at Eleven Deplar Farm. And Blackberry Farm, in Tennessee, is also calling to me.

What does genuine rest look like for you now?

There’s always somebody trying to get hold of me, but if I say, “Look, I’m away for these dates,” the phones generally stop. My dream holiday is going to Donegal in the summer with friends, staying in a little hundred-year-old farmhouse on an island. The kids can run around. I can switch my phone off and have three or four days. If I can find a yoga instructor who’ll come to the house every day, I’ll be so happy. If I can get a chef, too, that’s perfect. I really don’t want to have to think about what I’m feeding everybody! 

A version of this story first appeared in the October 2026 issue of Travel + Leisure under the headline “Lady of the House.” Hair by Christina Heuwagen. Makeup by Kelly Cornwell at A-Frame agency. Manicure by Ami Streets. Production by Town Productions.

Via: Travel + Leisure