Barbados – escape to the Caribbean

Had enough of the UK winter? Thinking you might prefer some sunshine, golden sand and turquoise sea? The rest of the nation is thinking exactly the same. All eyes, then, to the all-year-round sunshine of the Caribbean and, in particular, to Barbados.

The beaches are heaven – white sand and turquoise water on the west coast, perfect surfing on the south and east coasts and wild waves to the north. There’s bird watching, water sports, a very long list of excellent restaurants at every price point, impressive shopping in Bridgetown and, of course, lots of opportunities to think about rum.

We started our trip at Colleton Great House (from $325 a night), a rather lovely five-bedroom plantation house (built by a sugar baron) set in seven acres. You can take a room or rent the whole thing. I’m pretty sure you won’t regret either. Gorgeous gardens (which you will share with a family of monkeys), a great pool, charming staff, good food, mesmerising views and an excellent location on the west coast.

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Using it as a base, you can take a safari around the island, visit various rum distilleries (we went to St Nicholas Abbey, which chucks in a ride on its steam train and a stop at Cherry Tree Hill for the best sea view on the island before the rum bit) and, perhaps most importantly, rent a catamaran for the day.

This is, it seems, a compulsory part of the Bajan experience and for good reason. There’s a range of boats on offer but, regardless of the level of luxe you choose, you may find it all so relaxing you end up backflipping off the prow and you will almost definitely find you get to swim with entirely unbothered turtles – and that will be magnificent. Snorkels and rum mostly provided.

From Colleton, we visited Cobblers Cove ($820) a little further down the west coast. If you want old-school, intimate luxury around a 1940s plantation house, this is the spot for you – gorgeous suites set around totally charming tropical gardens and terraces dotted with pink umbrellas.

Here we ate possibly our best lunch of the trip (have the yellowfin tuna tartar) before swimming with bright blue fish on a small reef off the white beach. Very, very special.

Playing dominoes on the beach

For something a little different, you might shift to the south coast and to the O2 Beach Club & Spa ($644). Here things are a little less understated. The colour scheme is not just pink, but pink and orange. The sea is a little more volatile and the beaches more likely to offer you pieces of washed-up coral – choose an Ocean View Junior Suite for a big balcony and a direct view of sand and sea. Then settle in.

This is the kind of hotel that offers activities. Lots of activities. There was dominoes on the beach, conch shell-blowing training, a pool improvement session (balls, not swimming), a kayak outing (sadly cancelled due to higher-than-usual winds) and a class on local card games.

There’s also beach cricket, beach yoga, beach football, beach volleyball, aqua aerobics, live music every night, “barefoot bubbles” champagne on the beach on Sunday nights and afternoon tea in the lounge every day. Oh, and yoga at 7.30am on the sundeck.

We ventured to the spa for a hammam treatment body scrub one morning (utterly glorious by the way), but I’m afraid that was it for joining in. I like hotels with activities, but I also sometimes feel that choosing not to do yoga at 7.30am can be more satisfying than choosing to do yoga at 7.30am.

With that in mind you should know the O2 is all-inclusive – something I didn’t notice until I spotted there were no prices on any of the menus. The food is pretty good, the house red absolutely fine, the rosé rather good (or I drank too much of it – one or the other) and the cocktails regularly delivered to your sun lounger on the beach – or whichever terrace you might choose to take your rum on – are exactly as you might imagine Caribbean drinks on the beach to be.

From the hotel it is a 15-minute walk to The Gap – a kilometre-long strip of bars and restaurants, where your older teenagers can have a beer and listen to live music. Walk down, cab back.

With or without them, you can eat in relatively relaxed fashion by the sea, take the lift up a few floors to an outdoor tapas bar with good views, go full bling at the ninth-floor Oro Restaurant for Caribbean meets European fusion. You have to book this one – but even if you don’t quite get around to it, pop up for the views at least.

I know what you are thinking: sounds nice, but all-inclusive on the south coast isn’t for you (the west coast is traditionally the luxury coast). But the thing is, you might be wrong. The west is absolutely lovely – but that doesn’t mean the south can’t be pretty good too. You might also find that some of your acquaintances are already visiting the O2. We met some delightful readers at Cobblers Cove – but the lobby of the O2 was actually littered with back copies of The Week.