Simon Calder's Holiday Helpdesk: What do you know about company we're considering for our anniversary trip?

Every day our travel guru answers your travel questions

Q We are putting together a wedding anniversary trip to Seychelles and Mauritius and are thinking of booking with Destinology. Do you know this company, and are they alright?

Name withheld

A Destinology is a flourishing luxury tour operator based in Bolton. It was founded in 2004, and despite the UK economy’s past few dismal years it has grown strongly through offering expertise, good customer service and keen prices. The company is particularly strong in the Indian Ocean, the Gulf and the Caribbean. All the evidence suggests that your anniversary trip will be in good hands, but in travel it is always worth shopping around – you might want to consider other high-end specialists such as Black Tomato, ITC Classics and Scott Dunn, as well as bigger firms such as Kuoni and Abercrombie & Kent.

Destinology, like its rivals, offers ATOL protection. In addition, it also has a Travel Trust Fund to provide further safeguards.

One extra piece of advice from me: because of the cancellation of London-Seychelles flights by both British Airways and Air Seychelles, air links to this part of the Indian Ocean are tricky and you will probably end up travelling via the Gulf. Given this, you might want to consider instead a Dubai/Mauritius or an Abu Dhabi/Seychelles combination instead. It would probably end up significantly cheaper.