Candelight dinner at Sandals Emerald Bay
DAY THREE — No we’re not at the buffet at Bahama Bay or the dip-your toes in the sand Barefoot Restaurant. We’re not at the fancy Italian Il Cielo or the Drunken Duck pub. Our butler Greg Raymond who is from St Lucia has escorted us to our private candlelit dinner.
We’re sitting at an elegantly set table for two in a private “tower” overlooking Sandals Emerald Bay pool which incidentally is the largest zero entry pool in the Caribbean. The fire pit—yes the pool has a fire pit—reflects light.
We’re being served a special candlelight dinner. We could have had it on the beach (too windy) or the Wedding Gazebo (taken) but this is a perfect locale. Champagne and wine are poured. We’re relaxed. Our young waiter in white gloves tells us he wants to get an MBA in the United States.
We’ve pre-chosen the menu (plus the conch fritters I asked our waiter to add).
So we have pulled pork and sweet potato beignet and marinated Bahamian conch salad, followed by smoked marlin salad, cream of carrot soup, roasted Jerk Chicken and lobster, ginger crème Brule and bittersweet chocolate parfait.
The food was good but better was the ambiance—just the two of us, the gentle breeze, the ocean, the pool. Perfect. The waiter gave me a rose at the end (my valentine flowers?)
The thing about the adult resort is there are plenty of opportunities for couples to make it special, no matter what your age. And that’s nice.
“It’s nice to get away as a couple and not be mom and dad. You need that,” said Bill Randolph, here with his wife Ana and two other couples from New Hampshire while their two kids are cared for by family. “We get up when we want and go get served breakfast. We’re not making the breakfast! We’re like kids again.”
Lorry Gregoire, here with her husband Chris on their first adult getaway in more than a decade, likes that “the answer to every question is no problem. Everyone is so friendly. I love that I don’t have to worry about the kids. They are safe with family.”
“There are no nos here, just yeses,” adds her friend Kate Kirby.
She and her friends now have resolved to alternate winter vacations with their six kids with adult getaways like this one.
You never feel crowded here—not on 500 acres with a mile of perfect beach. You don’t have to fight for beach chairs either, not with two expansive pools and the beach to choose from.
Now all we have to decide is where to spend our last morning.
“It’s nice to regroup as a couple,” says Bill Randolph, “You need that.”
Absolutely.
NEXT: On to the Atlantis Resort