The acclaimed travel writer Paul Theroux says in USA Today, that travel destinations that make you happy are “places where there's fulfillment, good food and enough of it, good weather, families intact, and a sense that they don't have a desire to look for something elsewhere.”

He makes a list, including:
Maine, with one of the world’s most dramatic coasts;
the Orkney Islands with their Neolithic settlement and fresh fish;
the colours and multidimensional artistic sense of Bali;
Costa Rica where happiness is related to simplicity;
Egypt and its thousands of years of culture;
the welcome, the food, the weather and the huge variety of travel opportunities in Thailand;
Malawi, specifically hotel-lined Lake Malawi, perfect for tourists who also want to see animals in the wild;
Hawaii, which is where Theroux actually lives, where “each island has its own character, its own sense of pride”;
Sicily with its wine, weather and the great city of Palermo;
and finally the little-known Trobriand Islands near New Guinea, liberating with its welcome and without the people wanting anything in return.