The evening after my husband and I got married at San Francisco’s City Hall, a stranger stopped to chat with us as we wandered back to our hotel. The man, who could tell we’d had a Big Day (our outfits were a strong clue), offered joyful congratulations, then directed some marital advice to the groom: “Always ask her, ‘How can I help you? How can I help you? What do you need from me?’” I swiftly dismissed his words at the time—the counsel seemed better suited to, say, an airline steward than a new spouse—but 10 years later, it seems more knee-buckling than any Cyrano de Bergerac-ian verse.
If my husband may not have completely metabolized those words of wisdom, Joan, my Exclusive Resorts concierge, embodies them. A month before our family trip to the Caribbean island of Nevis, Joan emails me: “Please let me know how I can help you?” She offers to stock our villa’s fridge with groceries, organize activities, and book excursions, water taxies and airport transfers. The promise is that when you vacation with Exclusive Resorts, which is basically a private country club for those with wanderlust, leisure will never be compromised by logistics. And when I read Joan’s love letter (I mean email), I realize that someone assuring me I’ll have nothing to worry about basically feels like a seduction at this point.
This brand of sweet talk comes at a price. Joining the club starts at $175,000 (USD) for a 10-year membership, which is not inclusive—everything about this company is exclusive—of accommodations. Members are expected to travel 15 to 30 nights year, which hardly seems a burden under these sublime conditions. What they get in exchange are keys to the kingdom, access to 400 of the world’s most exquisite vacation homes (even at peak times) in 75 destinations, along with a team of private chefs, concierges, yoga instructors and dream-fulfillment trip planners all working to “future-proof” your holiday.
In my experience, the beauty of travel is in the romance of the surprise encounter, the unexpectedly life-altering meal, the sunset you happen upon out of nowhere. But in the anxiety-addled aftermath of the pandemic, uncertainty has taken a reputation hit and predictability is the new luxury.
It used to be different. In in the early aughts, I wrote about a travel-concierge company that specialized in bespoke experiences: for an all-white yacht party in the South of France, staff were asked to locate a dozen albino peacocks within 24 hours. The company miraculously sleuthed a pale dozen in Geneva, and the same day, said Swiss peafowl were strutting on deck. If luxury was once this kind of preposterous excess, it now comes in the form of ease, worrylessness the ultimate extravagance.
Despite all of Joan’s future-proofing, I could not have predicted the profound impact of the intense colour and lush beauty that awaited us at aptly named Paradise Beach. Nevis is the petite, quieter sister island to St. Kitts and feels like a tiny Hawaii. Christopher Columbus sailed by the island in 1493 and named it “Nuestra Señora de las Nieves” (Our Lady of the Snows) after the snow-like clouds beshawling its conical volcano.
“When I first arrived, I thought: This is Treasure Island!” James Cabourne, owner of Paradise Beach Resort, tells me. Cabourne, whose blue eyes match the shade of his breeze-ruffled linen shirt and the ruffled waters beyond, is also executive chairman of U.K. film production company Nevision. (Note “Nevis” in the name.) “Every holiday should feel like a story, a film,” he continues. “When guests arrive, and the gates open at Paradise Beach, it should feel like the curtains opening at the cinema. Then the jungle swallows you up, the path leads you to the beach and the sea is the stage.”
Indeed, everything here does feel discreetly staged in service of a stress-free, feel-good storyline. Upon arrival at our sprawling thatched-roof villa, with a wall of sliding glass doors opening onto our private pool, I feel the curtains closing on my own, let’s call it, rocky relationship with reality. The villa is replete with outdoor showers (yes, plural) and accoutred with beams hewn from local cinnamon trees. Clouds slide lazy as pool floats across limpid blue skies. A pathway leads from our pool through a fantasia of flame trees and pink oleander, Chinese fan-tail, foxtail and coconut palms, of which there are at least 50 different species. Hummingbirds career through the heliconia, their satiny chest feathers iridescent in the sunshine as a soft breeze ushers bougainvillea petals across gecko-touristed paths.
Luxury, at an ER property, is about space and privacy and quiet: there is more beach per head here than anywhere else on island, including the neighbouring Four Seasons. “Rush slowly,” is the Nevisian credo—only the vervet monkeys seem in a legitimate hurry, traversing our roof in the early mornings, presumably en route to breakfast in our voluminous mango and avocado trees.
We spend our days lounging and swimming and debating whether to swim in the sea or the pool in the morning or the afternoon. At one point, while relaxing on what feels like our private ribbon of beach, my husband says: “This is the kind of place James Bond lounges before he gets the call from M16.”
Despite the promises of “future-proofing,” nothing is organized beyond joy. There are guest appearances: resort chef Jack Boast, who moved to Nevis from London’s Michelin-lauded Galvin La Chapelle, takes my 8-year-old son, Leo, for a spur-of-the-moment snorkel. Chef Boast was going spearfishing, looking for snapper for tonight’s sashimi. Instead, he and Leo find sand dollars and starfish. Later, he treats us to a spontaneous pizza-making apprentissage using what the resort claims is the island’s only wood-fired oven. He confects a delicious flatbread dressed with paneer, shaved cauliflower, pomegranate seeds, coriander and lime zest. (Leo requests a less fanciful creation.)
But the most memorable plot twist involves a love interest. Upon arrival, we are warmly welcomed not only by ER staff, but by a local dog. “She lives across the street but comes to Paradise every day,” Joan tells us. Who can blame her? Cue the montage: She joins us for walks on the beach and lounges with us by the pool; Leo frolics with her in the surf and shares smoothies with her at the bar. It’s the kind of intimate relationship that could never bloom at a corporate hotel where local animals would not be allowed to wander freely. Leo decides to name her Petal, after the shape of her velvety ears and for the flowers forever festively bouncing, like her, down our garden pathway. It occurs to me now that I hardly even noticed other tourists at the resort; it felt like our own private idyll. Petal is the only other guest I can recall.
The magic trick, here, is how at home we felt. We even had our own pet! Too at home, almost. I could never have anticipated the degree of heartbreak involved in our departure. Watching Leo bid farewell to his new dog friend on the beach is a scene I won’t soon forget. I feel newly grief-stricken just thinking about it now. We were never quite ready for our movie—which somehow went from Treasure Island to Love Story—to end.
Since our (excruciating) departure, we keep fantasizing about a sequel, in which we return to Paradise and reunite with Petal. You do never know what the future holds. Surely Joan can assist.
Olivia Stren travelled as a guest of Exclusive Resorts, which did not review or approve this article.
