Ah, the wisdom of crowded beaches. TripAdvisor's latest user poll on the best strips of sand in Europe has caused quite a stir – with Bournemouth in at number four, ahead of anything France, Italy or Greece have to offer. Top of the flip-flops (sorry) is Olu Deniz, a perpetually rammed picture-perfect promontory on Turkey's Aegean coast, followed by Icemeler, a hotel-lined crescent beach 100km up the coast, and package holiday favourite Puerto Alcudia in Majorca.

To be fair, Bournemouth beach is lovely. It should be – the seven-mile strip of sand has received almost £11m in investment over the last few years, including the construction of an artificial surf reef at Boscombe that doesn't really work. Yet while Bournemouth's PR team will be doing cartwheels, savvy beach-lovers will be taking note – the unwritten rule of beach-hunting is that the more people who know about a beach, the worse it is.

Want my tips? Hunt for Irakli beach on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, home to tortoises, off-shore dolphins and the occasional nudist, or the wild beaches of the Albanian coast, where the roads are too pock-marked for the big hoteliers to venture down. At both, you'll have miles of sand and crystalline sea to yourself. Just don't tell anyone.

But, go on, risk spoiling it with crowds and tell us about your perfect European beach...