My travel tally for 2017 went something like this: No less than 16 trips, 12 countries, 24 destinations, 57 hotels, and roughly 90,000 miles.
Many people can beat those numbers (maybe you’re one of them), but as someone who has the distinct professional pleasure of scoping out the next great vacation spots before everyone else gets there, I’m lucky to say that even my business trips were to places that left indelible impressions.
There was the Balinese-style resort with the elephant rescue center in northern Thailand—a place I’d long dreamed of visiting and writing about. There was a lightning-speed trip to Mumbai—a place I didn’t imagine I’d fall in love with but did—and hard. There was even an exhausting week spent racing around Paris with the flu, made infinitely better by the incredible staff at Rosewood’s newly-restored Hôtel de Crillon, who graciously stocked my room with get-better notes and silver tea sets piled with honey and lemon.
Every place I visited, from Puerto Rico to Zambia, was remarkable in some way, shape, or form. These are the five I still can’t shake.
5. St. Barths
Sometimes you just need a few days to veg on the beach and recharge. But when you’re married to someone who hates laying out in the sun, planning that type of lazy, Vitamin D-centric trip can be a near impossibility. Enter St. Barths, which satisfies on barefoot beach vibes without ever feeling boring. Here, it’s more popular to rent an open-air Moke jeep and explore the island’s 14 separate beaches—our favorite was the remote, mangrove-flanked Gouveneur—than to stay holed-up in your resort. Of course, the resorts are cossetting places to return to, whether you’re watching windsurfers swoosh through the breeze from the year-old Le Barthelemy, whose rooms have Hermès bath amenities, or having a toes-in-the-sand lunch at Eden Roc.
How to do it yourself: Following the storms of 2017, St. Barths is still recovering. Some 90 percent of its hotel rooms are still offline, but that doesn’t mean you can’t go. Local villa specialist Wimco is back in action, as is the charter airline Tradewind Aviation, LLC which gets you there sans yacht.
4. Napa Valley
Only two weeks before I was scheduled to leave for a girls’ getaway to California wine country, fires started blazing around the Silverado Trail. From her home in Oakland, my best friend could see (and smell) plumes of smoke burning a few dozen miles away. Yet, by the time we pulled into St. Helena’s new Luxury Collection hotel, Las Alcobas, the only discernible sign of what had happened were the many handmade billboards lining Highway 29, all expressing thanks to local firefighters who had kept the damage (relatively) in check.
The good vibes were impossible to ignore: Menus featured special dishes or by-the-glass wine selections benefiting the handful of wineries that had suffered damage; locals beamed to welcome visitors; even my therapist at Meadowood’s extraordinary spa was ecstatic to see her community springing back to its feet. The quick comeback was remarkable, and with tourism an important part of the local economy, feeling we were helping the cause made every indulgence worth it.