Exmoor Lockdown Diary 31 - Please Forgive a Bout of Pure Escapism

I’m sorry about this, but on my 31st day of lockdown (33 actually, but I didn’t start this diary for two days) I am going for pure escapism. Last autumn I was fortunate enough to revisit one of the favourite places on the planet - I realised then that I was extremely fortunate to do so. I realise that even more now…

Perhaps it has something to do with the landscape - few places on Earth are as dramatically picturesque as South Western St Lucia where 2500-foot mountains rise straight out of the clear blue waters of the Caribbean Sea.

Then there’s the fact that the people who run the twin Jade Mountain and Anse Chastanet resorts have been working for the family-owned concern for a long time. They are highly trained, know what they are doing and have won countless awards.

But maybe the underlying reason why the two resorts are often named in lists highlighting the top 10 tropical hotels in the world is because there’s a blend of all these things and a lot more besides. 

For example, both the neighbouring resorts - perched on their steep hillside above an azure bay - meld effortlessly into that remarkable landscape. Both feature open-sided suites or ‘sanctuaries’ as they are called at Jade - which mean that this landscape is part of the room you stay in.  The vertiginous rainforest is as much part of your stay as the four poster bed...

Few hotels can boast such a thing - even in the tropics - but then, few hotels were the dream of the architect who planned them, owns them and whose family runs them.

It was architect Nick Troubetzkoy who designed the resorts in this scenic corner of St Lucia which began to be regarded as a holiday designation in the 1970s when the Caribbean was waking up to the idea tourism.  It’s easy to imagine the scenario… Take a picturesque fishing village nestled above its own white-sand, palm-strewn, beach under some dramatic looking mountain-scapes. Find another white beach tucked away from town just around the corner and erect some holiday villas in the steep rainforest just above the seaside coconut palms.

Add a beachside restaurant and begin training bright and friendly local people to work at the resort. That way, you are getting the combination right from day one.  You have a dream landscape, second to none - and you have the all important local element which allows your resort to have that laid-back Caribbean feel.

Then you use some of the land you own to start a farm where all the veg, herbs, fruit and flowers used at your resort can be grown. That means training and employing more local people. 

The plan goes so well, you build a second resort higher in the rainforest. And because you are going to all the trouble to do this, you may as well design it yourself, seeing that you are an award-winning architect. In fact, you may as well make it to be like no other hotel in the world - seeing that it is your dream and you are paying for it. 

Why not make each suite a sanctuary, which has its own infinity pool stretching out towards that fabulous view? Why not erect the building to be like a natural cliff rising out of the rainforest so that each and every suite can share that view without anything getting in the way? So what if each sanctuary requires a bridge to reach it - you can tell guests that the beginning of that bridge is the start of their escape into paradise. 

Which is exactly how it is. I know that because I have been lucky enough to stay at Jade Mountain on a couple of occasions over the past 10 years. Indeed, I was there just a couple of weeks after it opened and still remember how my jaw dropped when I entered one of those sanctuaries and saw the capital M-shaped twin peaks known as The Pitons reflecting like a capital W in the interior infinity pool.

My in-built “wow-ometer” went into the red back then - and it was still doing so 12 years later when I stayed at Jade Mountain recently. You can never fail to be wowed by that view and by the fact your sanctuary has no outer wall to get in the way of the panorama, There’s just fresh warm tropical air - and you can swim from your bedside out towards those twin mountains and reach the edge where you can look 400 feet down to the beach below. 

No wonder this place never fails to feature in listings naming the most beautiful hotels in the world. No wonder big name celebrities flock to stay here.  No wonder some of them never venture out of their sanctuaries during their stay - which is easy to do as each has a dedicated butler who will look after their every need. 

View from a villa at Anse Chastanet

In 40 years of travel writing, I have never seen a place like it. Jade Mountain is special in so many ways. It serves amazing homegrown food. The staff - most of whom are local - are among the best trained, polite and friendly you’ll encounter. Everything from the sheets on the four-poster to the art work, to the estate grown chocolate in the sanctuary fridge, is top of the range. 

But to be honest, if you got rid of all of that and were just left with that infinity pool stretching out into the sky and ending in that view - then you’d always mark out this place as being a cut above the rest. 

And it literally is above Anse Chastanet. In altitude, I mean - but some would say in desirability. I wouldn’t. Yes, Jade is a lot more expensive. Yes it has butlers, infinity pools and the like. But I like Anse Chastanet just as much. 

There is something more homely and more intimate about this older resort on the lower slopes, much closer to the sea and that fabulous beach. In your individual villa (they are separate and all different in shape and size) you feel like you are part of the rainforest as opposed to hovering above it. 

You can hear the night noises which all tropical forests boast and the Caribbean waves lapping on the sand below. You can sit out on your veranda or lie in bed (because the accommodation also has an open wall feature) and feel like some Somerset Maugham character gently sweating in the heat of a Caribbean night, sipping wine or rum under your fan and allowing a cooling breeze to bring the night scents into your dream world. 

For that, in essence, is the short description of a stay at either Jade Mountain or Anse Chastanet. You find yourself in a tropical dream world. One which has been carefully designed do that sea breezes keep you cool rather than air conditioning. The Troubetzkoys employ some 600 mainly local people and they spend time and money schooling them and caring for their welfare. 

Spend any time at Jade or Anse Chastanet and you quickly begin to think this is how all Caribbean resorts should be, as opposed to some of the big chain owned places which are about as environmentally sustainable as a gas guzzling V8. The Troubetzkoys have designed and built one of the most beautiful resorts in one of the most beautiful places on the planet, and they go to great lengths to run their paradise sustainably and sensibly. 

For example, apart from growing their own fruit and veg and making chocolate from their own cocoa trees, they even pay local fishermen to catch the invasive lion-fish which are destroying Caribbean reefs and all their indigenous life. The twin resorts then stage special lion-fish dinners, which is a good thing because this unwanted pest happens to be delicious to eat. 

No big chain-owned resort would ever do that. But then, big corporations are notorious for ignoring localness at any level. 

All of which is why I say that if I had the opportunity to visit the Caribbean just once on a single, special, holiday, then I’d have no hesitation in recommending Jade Mountain or Anse Chastanet . When it comes to location, location, location, this place ticks every box going. 

FACT FILE

I stayed at both Jade Mountain and at neighbouring Anse Chastanet as a guest of the Troubetzkoy family. For more information visit https://www.jademountain.com