Best 2010 Island Trips - Islands Magazine

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Wher e i s B l i s s ?

T h e s e s i x l u x u r y g e T a w a y s e a c h c e l e b r a T e

r e a l e x p e r i e n c e s , d e e p e r b o n d s a n d b e T T e r l i v i n g

f o r T h e n e w y e a r . g o n o w . b e h a p p y .

P h o t o s b y J e n J u d g e , J o n W h i t t l e a n d L o r i B a r b e l y

One blissful escape: a villa on

Laucala in Fiji.

34 Janua r y / Februa r y 2 010 isl a n ds . com

Escaping Like a Billionaire B y To n y P e r r o t t e t 1(! when the concierge admits

me into a beachfront villa 10 times the size of a “villa” as i know it, gesturing to light shades made from hun-dreds of snow-white butterfly cocoons and bathtubs carved from polished slabs of granite, i try to feign a billionaire’s nonchalance. Here on Fiji ’s private laucala island, she shows me how the villa — which took the tradition of the Fijian bure, a wood and thatch hut, to glamorous new heights — opens the-atrically onto my own swimming pool and a quiet golden-sand beach. she reveals a designer wine chiller stocked with complimentary Champagne. Yes, with a capital “C.” i remain calm.

Then the moment i’m alone, i let out a whoop of proletarian joy. i pop open the bottle of bubbly, jump in the pool, jump back out of the pool, dash down to the beach and throw myself into my personal piece of the south Pacific. Everything has to be enjoyed at once. i run back to the villa and devour an amuse-bouche of spiced Thai shrimp and fresh cashews, turn on both flat-screen TVs, blast myself with Bach on the iPod sound system and then rush from room to room taking hundreds of photos. at last, i sink in a jet-lagged stu-por onto a daybed under coconut trees.

adjusting my watch to Fiji time, i find it’s only 8:30 a.m. Malcolm Forbes once owned this succulent green piece of Fiji, now a new, no-expense-spared luxury resort. But for the next 122 hours and 35 minutes, it is mine, all mine. and i mean to revel in every second.

Most people might be happy to spend days, even weeks, lounging in their vil-las on laucala. But seductive as that is, i know it wouldn’t be long before i was itching to explore the 7-mile-long island, which from the air had seemed mysterious and wild, ringed by a halo of pale-blue reef. after all, laucala isn’t just any billionaire’s refuge.

if a history of private islands is ever written, laucala will feature promi-nently. Forbes, then the planet’s rich-est man, purchased it for $1 million in 1972, and its otherworldly beauty became part of pop mythology. The world watched with envy every winter as he flew his jet, the Capitalist Tool, to Fiji’s main airport, nadi, then changed to his light plane, the Capitalist Tool II, to reach laucala’s airstrip. Forbes kept the facilities rustic: a basic house for himself, plus seven guest bungalows. Yet Hollywood stars such as Elizabeth Taylor arrived frequently for fabulous

Fij i = L auc a l a Isl a n d

With a history of billionaire owners, this newly updated private island has perhaps the best scenery and service that money can buy.

w h e r e i s b l i s s ?

36 Janua r y / Fe brua r y 2 010 isl a n ds . com 37

beach parties. The flashy billionaire kept a yacht for circumnavigating the island and a Harley-davidson for touring the rough roads at high speed. He grew to love laucala so much that he asked his family to bury his ashes here. When he died in 1990, Forbes’ family did as he wished.

since then, the island’s ownership has passed to another billionaire, dietrich Mateschitz, creator of Red Bull. dated Forbes-era buildings were razed. “For me, privacy is quality,” the publicity-shy Mateschitz once explained. He turned laucala into the ultimate south Pacific retreat: 25 luxury villas, five restaurants, a spa, a horse stable and an 18-hole golf course. Opened just a year ago, the resort is a self-contained world, with an organic farm, a grandiose working jetty, air hangars and more. Once revived, an old coconut plantation will produce oil and cosmetics. laucala boasts the big-gest swimming pool in the southern Hemisphere, with a glass, above-ground lap pool that lets passers-by view swim-mers gliding back and forth as if in an aquarium. Crafted from native wood, thatch and twine, laucala’s unique, sometimes mildly eccentric structures echo the surrounding landscape.

“Money is not an issue at laucala,” says Maja Kilgore, a German who now man-ages the resort with husband Thomas. “if something needs to be done, we do it.”

luckily for me, that principle extends to helping guests responsibly delve into nature. One day, i hop on a Jet ski that belongs in new York’s Museum of Modern art and bob around the island, watching turtles skim the coral alongside me. The next day, i board a dive boat that sports the curved seats of a 1930s pleasure craft on italy’s lake Como and polished tanks like gleaming silver

bullets. it carries me to an underwater world that seems to have been tended by a celestial gardener. i explore the coral-encrusted rim of a shelf that drops into an eerie darkness 1,800 feet deep while brilliant tropical fish, white-tipped reef sharks and barracuda idly nose by.

laucala has seduced me. i love this new world in which light aircraft carry guests from Fiji ’s main island and shiny land Rovers whisk them to their villas. But surely some relic survives


The Forbes era has led to an even

richer present, with the resort’s

new villas, cuisine and spa treatments

featuring the natural treasures

here in Fiji.

from the wild and crazy 1970s. “no, there’s nothing left from the Forbes days,” Maja says with a shrug. Then she ponders. “Well, almost nothing.”

after a bit of cajoling, Maja drives me up a steep, meandering laneway into the rainforest. We pull up in front of a plush double villa with 360-degree views of the voluptuous island. Far below, the south Pacific seems so clear you can almost see the turtles nosing their way through the reef ’s coral canyons. “This was the site of Forbes’ house,” she says.

“They say it was the view from this spot that convinced Mr. Forbes he should buy laucala.” The original structure has vanished, but we stroll over to a grove of coconut trees and a cracked marble memorial embedded in the earth. Below the name Malcolm stevenson Forbes and the dates of his birth and death, it reads, “While alive He lived.”

i carry that sentiment back down to my villa, where more Champagne is already there on ice. | l auc al a .com

1(!The resort is a self-contained

world that echoes the surrounding

landscape. Laucala has seduced me.

38 39Janua r y / Februa r y 2 010 isl a n ds . com

water next to me, “this is awesome!”The exclamation points are every-

where. This trip is exceeding my half-joking goal: to take the ultimate father-son trip. That’s why here on the coast outside Port antonio, we’re staying in a treehouse in a jungle of f lat snails and green firef lies. That it’s a two-story luxury treehouse, one of only five carefully tucked among the trees at the eco-minded Kanopi House retreat? icing. That the man-ager, Carla, has two sons — nicknamed Beenie Man and Bounty — who are showing Vic more than i can about the joys of being a boy? Pure awesomeness.

Tree-diving is only the beginning

Swinging from the TreehouseB y C h r i s Ta u b e r

Ja m a ic a = K a nopi House


Kanopi House’s five treehouses are wrapped so fully in the Jamaican jungle that they’re invisible from the air, the road and the water. Yet father and son can look out and see more than ever.

1(! he steps off the tree branch into the air. From teeth to toes,

he’s radiating the giddiness of a kid doing something his dad told him never to do. “Hold on tight, Vic,” i always say. But today in Jamaica, it’s “Jump, Vic!”

He plunges 10 feet straight down from the almond tree. His arms pin-wheel, his legs flail. He makes no effort to brace for impact except to tilt his smiling face toward me. splash! Up twice as high in the tree, the two dread-locked Jamaican boys cheer; then they follow Vic with their own jumps into the lagoon, feinting ninja moves all the way from the overhanging branches down to the cool water. “dad,” Vic says, treading

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bring sweet loving.” Beenie Man and Bounty, with Carla, are supposed to be on the raft behind us. But they don’t sit. One minute, they’re Jamaican water-bugs, flitting in and out of the water alongside us. The next, they’re bolting along the banks like gazelles, sprint-ing across breadfruit-size stones faster than i can run on pavement.

Rebbo lets Vic play gondolier, but all he really wants to do is whatever the

today. From the lagoon at the base of Kanopi House, we all hop into a boat for a quick scenic ride along the shore, past alligator Head, Monkey island (“You have to be a monkey to climb there,” Beenie Man says knowingly) and dragon Bay. When we motor within 15 feet of a snorkeler, Bounty waves and yells, “Hi, daddy!” Without raising his head, the snorkeler waves back with the hand not holding the spear gun. Bounty says he’s looking for our dinner: fresh parrotfish. “Whoa,” Vic says.

He’s still thinking about that as we hang out in the “living Room,” an over-size, no-walls treehouse. it’s a gathering place for plantain breakfasts, fish-fritter snacks and afternoon paper airplanes. That last one is not an official offering; it’s my idea. in all other ways, Beenie Man and Bounty are putting Vic’s Boy scout handbook to shame. But when it comes to knowing how to make the

“Glider 3000,” i can finally show them something. all three boys race around the living Room launching planes. amazingly, none (planes or boys) fly over the balcony into the banyan trees. But a few flights do veer. From the steps leading up to the living Room, we hear,

“What is this on the roof of the kitchen?!” Time to get in the car. We’re about

to become Caribbean Huck Finns. a winding drive inland through the Blue Mountain foothills leads to the Rio Grande — and Capt. Rebbo’s bamboo raft. Vic and i take our seat for the four-hour glide down the river, follow-ing the old banana route from planta-tion to port as Rebbo sings, “When Vic is a big man and he has a girlfriend,

brothers are doing. and at this moment, they’re darting upstream to a boulder for some mini-cliff diving. i know he won’t be able to swim against even the gentle current, but i grudgingly let Vic jump in. Carla says, “let him learn to be tired with a bit of danger.” Beenie Man and Bounty see Vic swimming hard but not getting closer. They tell him to get on the bank, then they help him navi-gate the rocks and find a shallow spot in the river where he can make his way to the boulder. Much jumping ensues. The three boys’ smiles are all the same.

When we parents call them back to the rafts as the light gets dusky, Beenie Man says, “Vic, come with us.” He looks at me, i nod, and he walks away. Fifteen seconds later i hear Vic tell them: “i’m gonna go with my dad.” Most awesome thing ever.

in the living Room that night, stuffed with fish and exhausted by everything, Vic conks out on a white chaise. i pick him up for the walk back to our treehouse, holding on tight. | k a n o pih o use .co m


The no-walls, social treehouse

known as the Living Room is ideal for a break after an

all-boys day with Bounty, Vic and

Beenie Man.

1(!The three boys’ smiles are all the

same. In the Living Room, exhausted

by everything, my son conks out on

a white chaise.

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1(! “so, what are the rules?” My mom gives me that look only

a mother can. “i thought you knew.” Playing croquet was my idea, but i assumed my mom would know how. We settle on our own rules: smack-ing balls around the manicured lawns, attempting in vain to get them through the tiny wickets, whacking each other’s balls into oblivion when they collide. Finally, i declare her the winner.

We’re here to celebrate her birthday, and i want to make it special. While i was growing up, she threw me count-less birthday parties — roller skating, slumber parties, really whatever i wanted. i always felt great, indulged.

Delighting in Her Happy DayB y L o r i B a r b e l y

“Maybe these girls — with their color-coordinated outfits and luxurious agendas — will also channel

the restorative.”

Cambridge Beaches show-cases classic

Bermuda, from the dining to the high tea to the sands,

sounds and scoot-ers that make the island so inviting.

B e r m u da = C a m br id ge B e ac h e s R e s ort


“Tea?” i offer here on British soil. Mom has other ideas. “Coffee?” sure.

We follow the wandering path through the precious pink cottages of Cambridge Beaches Resort and arrive at the main house. afternoon tea (or cof-fee) is served on the wicker-furnished sun porch, overlooking the infinity pool. The only thing that feels out of place in the room is us. a tiny cucumber sandwich ends up on the floor. Mom dissolves into laughter as i glance around, secretively placing the delicate sandwich into my linen napkin.

as we walk off the scone calories, we come across a red floor-to-ceiling wall inscribed with hundreds of names.

“Who are all these people?” she asks.as if on cue, Richard, the general

manager, appears in Bermuda shorts. “These are our repeat guests,” he says. “One has been here 88 times.”

i’m not sure if we’ll make the wall when, an hour later, i’m yelling, “Paddle harder!” Our kayak is drifting with the wind away from the coastline we’re try-ing to hug. Mom wanted to take out a kayak. My shoulders now throb as i dig in, trying to keep us on course.

“i’m paddling as hard as i can!” she yells back. This doesn’t feel like a party.

Then we round the point and see the beach we were sunning on earlier. i don’t dare tell her i liked that better; i’m afraid she’s thinking the same thing. But she paddles with the wind now. “This is nice,” she says, and suddenly, i feel great again. Who’s indulging whom?

Too tired to embrace the luxurious formality of Tamarisk, the resort’s signa-ture restaurant, we eat on the beach, the perfect reward for a hard day of relaxing. The waiter serves our freshly grilled fish as the sun sets. Mom asks, “Think we’ll ever have our names on the wall?”

i hope so. | c ambridgebeaches.com

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1(! on capri’s clifftops above us, Emperor Tiberius made his

home away from Rome. Possibly struck by vacation boredom, he threw victims to their deaths down into the sea. almost 2,000 years later, our travel amusements have changed. as my wife, Marvel, and i float in a classic wooden gozzo just off-shore, the only bodies we want to throw into the sparkling water are our own.

We do agree with the emperor on the best way to hopscotch along the italian coast: a sailing ship. Ours, the Wind Surf, is just out of sight around a bend in Capri’s limestone shore. at 600 feet long, the five-masted Windstar Cruises flagship was built as the world’s largest sailing vessel. Compared to the average cruise ship, Wind Surf, with its 300- passenger capacity — not 3,000 — is downright intimate. We didn’t want a cruise as a destination; we wanted the right ship to take us where we wanted to go.

Two days into our weeklong voyage from Rome to island to coast to island to coast to Rome again, i’m feeling pretty smug about our choice. Had we not shanghaied ourselves onto the Wind Surf, we’d be on a mass group excursion overwhelming a port with the stink of

cocoa butter and shopping sweat. instead , we’ve already anchored off the stunning island beaches of ischia, and now we’re euphoric

C a pr i = Wi n d s ta r C ru ise


Sailing Into ∏rue Blue

B y Ji m S c h u l e r

The five-masted Wind Surf sailing

vessel takes in the majesty of Capri during a quietly elegant island-

hopping cruise off Italy’s coast.

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with relaxation having sailed to Capri. Our next island port, Corsica, will require a full day’s sail. With wind and engines, our top speed is just 15 knots, about as fast as a breeze. Fortunately, that’s not strong enough to topple le Plateau de Fruits de Mer, the tower of lobster, mussels and other sea-food, served on the star deck. and it shouldn’t jostle the 10 masseuses in the onboard Windspa either.

This gozzo we’re on seems faster, but still in the Wind Surf ’s spirit of serene exploration. Christian, the smiling teenager whose father owns the boat we’ve booked for this Blue Grotto Tour shore excursion, maneuvers the gozzo in and out of the shore’s small grottoes with a hummingbird’s precision. He keeps one casual hand on the tiller, a prehensile foot controlling the throttle. Wind and waves push the gleaming wood hull within inches of the rocks, but it never touches. Christian sees me catching my breath and grins.

“We will go to the small blue grotto,” he says to distract me. i’ve only heard of the famous Blue Grotto, the cave that attracts a line of boats wanting a peek. “it’s just as beautiful, but no crowds, no wait. What do you think?” He already knows the answer.

soon we pass under the shadows of the Faraglioni, the famous rock formations that thrust out of the water like the tips of a giant trident. Then Christian steers us up to a tiny opening in the cliff that, like its larger namesake, captures and reflects sunlight so that the water inside glows like an incandescent sapphire. Marvel and i raise our sunglasses, test-ing the surreal color, and then gasp again.

Christian points out sites that have been spotted, interpreted and reimag-ined through 2,000 years of tourism, and we feel like we’re discovering them with our own eyes. “look,” he says, ges-turing at a large gray rock perched on a cliff. “an elephant — do you see it?” and farther along the coast he pulls the boat up to a rocky shelf at the bottom of a stone stairway leading into a shallow cave. “Up there,” he says, pointing, “is a stalagmite like the Madonna.” But we don’t need the symbology to be awed by the geology. Or any more reason than the Faraglioni in the distance to under-stand the archetypal pull of this place.

We tune out everything but the here and now. The sun is high and hot, the water clear and blue. Christian anchors the boat in a small bay. “le sirenuse,” he says, pointing out the home of the sirens, whose songs lured sailors into the rocky shores. Odysseus, already behind schedule, wanted to listen but not visit, so he ordered his crew to stuff their ears with beeswax, set a course and tie him to the mast. Bad choice.

it’s better when you’re out sailing to give yourself over to the sea, i think, as we throw ourselves in. | windstarcruises.com

The blue grot-toes famous and

not, fresh seafood served at sail, and excursions off the beaten paths and

waters — all of it adds up to one

happy cruise.


1(!Our top speed is about as fast as a

breeze — not strong enough to topple

the seafood tower.

1(! my wife may selflessly say otherwise, but women have

expectations on a wedding anniversary. i know she daydreamed of a lush isle where she could plunge into crystal-line seas erupting with outlandish fish, emerge onto a secluded deck beneath flame bursts of bougainvillea blossoms, and gorge on lobster and flutes of duval-leroy. so i brought her to amanpulo, where the reality is even better than the dream. This private island resort adrift in the Philippines stirs in silky kimono robes, at-your-beck massages and a two’s-company floating bar. We wake each morning in our hilltop bungalow to sweeping views over a collar of blaze-white beach bathed in coral hues of dawn.

and i can say i did it all for her. if there’s a better place in the world

for reigniting deep affection, i can’t picture it. Even the transfer from Manila, a one-hour charter on a twin-turboprop dornier, was exhilarating, knifing like a high-dollar assassin t hroug h mig ht y cumu lonimbus crackling with lightning, then diving perilously close to the blue sea before skidding down a spit of gravel. Then there’s the golf cart, issued on arrival to negotiate the tiny island’s web of dirt roads. a BMW X6 it’s not, but there’s real sport in pushing the buggy’s two-wheel tipping threshold.

To calm both of us, there’s the Thai pressure-point reflexology session and gata coco scrub. We get the treatments and totter from the spa in a sedated state of stupefaction. Of course, the experi-ence was all that — the Philippines is a country obsessed with hospitality the way the swiss are consumed by privacy and the French are beset by cheese.

We ask for a private breakfast, and the resort produces an orgy of omelets and buttery croissants, blazing fuchsia dragon fruit and fresh-squeezed mango juice, all delivered by boat to a secluded palapa and laid out on crisp linen with heavy silver. We call about diving, and when we turn up at the shop a bit later, we find that our gear has been taken from our room and prepped. in the glassy water, blasts of reef fish pop and

Finding Snapper and SparksB y A a r o n G u l l e y

P h i l ippi n e s = A m a n pu l o


burst like underwater pyrotechnics. Friendly hawksbill turtles fin up close for a look, almost as if to fulfill their amiable Filipino obligations.

and then there’s the fishing. Beneath a bruised sky threatening rain, we venture out with two guides who pull fish from the sea like they’re reeling up buckets of water from the ocean. There’s faintly crimson snapper, amberjack that gleam like sabers, escolar shimmering a luminescent black. Out comes a magnificent, glistening grouper as big as my arm. My wife catches a couple of fish too. Meanwhile, i couldn’t catch a baseball lobbed at me underhand, but i’m perfectly content just watching the distant squalls ripple the ocean.

Over dinner that night, my wife presents an unexpected anniversary gift: a foot-long mackerel she caught herself, which the chef has diced into kinilaw, the Philippines’ coconut-tinged answer to ceviche. and just like that, i’m hooked all over again. | a m a n r e s o r t s . co m

The staff delivers what you want be-fore you want it at

Amanpulo, whether it’s dragon fruit in a beach palapa or yoga better than you’ve imagined.

1(!I did it all for her. If there’s a better place in the world

for reigniting deep affection, I can’t

picture it.

50 Janua r y / Fe brua r y 2 010 isl a n ds . com 51Janua r y / Februa r y 2 010 isl a n ds . com

M au i = Hot e l H a n a-M au i


Climbing the Road to HeavenB y A d r i e n n e E g o l f

1(! the hand-painted sign for Huelo lookout caught our atten-

tion before the view. now we can see jungle spreading out from the viewpoint, green swaths punctuated with the reds, yellows and blues from the sign, and we’re happy we stopped — again. We’re 20 miles and one hour into a 52-mile drive down the Hana Highway. My husband and i are still soggy from this morning’s dive at Molokini crater, and our usual post-dive nap is calling. But this is Maui; there’s a lot to see. so instead of rushing to the end of this well-worn road, my husband has pulled over and snapped the camera every time i’ve squealed over a dramatic cliff or a colorful fruit stand. Until a question occurs to him: “What’s at the end?” he asks through a stifled yawn.

“What do you mean?” i reply. “it’s the Road to Hana. Hana is at the end. look! another waterfall!” He pulls over, again.

We don’t realize how much more there is to Hana until we drive over the last of the more than 54 one-way bridges. Our legs are crumpled into car-seat-shaped curls. Our eyes are weary from peering around every corner for a better look. Our stomachs growl, that last pineapple shave ice now an hour-old memory.

Then the road widens. We pass a fire station with one sleepy-looking engine, a primary school with a marquee boast-ing “in the Heart of Old Hawaii,” a bus-tling farmers market peddling bundles of fruit and flowers. The marks of a small island town tell us we’ve arrived, magnificently, in Hana. The queue of

Like a manicured oasis, the Hotel

Hana-Maui spreads luxuriously across

the hills at the end of the Road to Hana. Don’t drive

back. Stay.

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rented convertibles has thinned, dis-persed among turns toward black-sand beaches. instead of high-rise resorts, there’s Hotel Hana-Maui blending seam-lessly into the town. its green plantation-style cottages stand beside the Hana Community Center, the municipal base-ball field, the Hasegawa General store and the local church. so as we unfold from the car and enter the resort’s open-air lobby, we take in the town at once — in all its quaint, quiet glory. at the end of our three-hour-plus road trip, this place is like heaven. and we have a room.

We’re led to an ocean-facing bunga-low, where we learn that a baseball team originally owned the property. Once just a warm destination for spring train-ing, Hana became an annual vacation for players and wives. Over time, six rooms turned into 70 bungalows, but the town of less than 1,000 people stayed much the same. The bellhop leaves us, now decorated in matching kukui-nut leis and refreshed with cool fruit drinks. standing

on the slatted-wood porch, we survey the ocean as a canoe-load of local paddlers passes and a cluster of roosters crows in the distance. The 47 photo-op stops and fruit-stand perusals were only buildup; this is why we drove all that way.

The next day, i open my eyes to the rising sun, as i have every morn-ing since arriving on Maui. Except this time there’s no alarm to switch off, no tour guide waiting for us, no schedule to keep. as the light floods our room,

we sip organic dark-roast coffee and eat banana bread and fruit from nearby Ono Organic Farms. The grounds are quiet, not just because it’s dawn, but because everyone here is enjoying the same peaceful start to the morning.

By the time the sun has risen fully, we’ve made our plans for the day — hike to Waimoku Falls, picnic at Hamoa Beach, stop at the town center to mail postcards and browse the shops. it’s a full agenda, with plenty more miles to log and plenty more photos to take.

We stand up from our lounge chairs, ready to break the morning’s spell. But first, we stop and look around: a group practicing yoga poses in the eastern-facing Wellness Center Pavilion just up the hill. a couple strolls hand in hand on the lawn below, and unseen birds fill the coconut palms with a song. “Maybe one more cup of coffee?” my husband asks. i collapse back in my chair and hold up my cup for a refill. When you wake up in heaven, even Maui can wait. h o telhanamaui.co m


Black sands, big rooms and open

land that begs you to explore — yes, this is an island where you can

find bliss.

1(!We take in the

quiet, quaint glory. At the end of our

road trip, this place is like heaven. And

we have a room.

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Best 2010 Island Trips - Islands Magazine