Your calls always answered within 5 rings.
Thank you again darling Helen and team.
The hotel was perfect and in a great location. Lovely breakfasts
Holiday was great. Five star service
Ray my consultant was very helpful. He found us a 4 star hotel where we wanted to be. We had a good room and although the hotel did not have tea making facilities when we asked they provided us with a kettle and cups for the duration of our stay.
Superb service once again.
Yet another amazing holiday arranged by the wonderful Elliot
Very helpful and thorough
Commend Louis on his first class service. Exceedingly helpful, patient and professional. Many thanks to him and his team.
Samuel Jalloh looked after us very well. He provided a personal and tailored service.
Kylie is an amazing travel manager - always goes the extra yards
Secrets Lanzarote is a superb resort with all facilities included on the one site. Lanzarote does need investment and updating when compared with other sites in Puerto Del Carmen and Costa Teguise. Overall, the holiday was a success and I'm ready to go back in 2025.
I appreciated the final confirmation phone call from you the day before travel. I will definitely be using you again.
As always everything went according to plan and the hotel recommended was superb
Nice people and very helpful. Great hotel and excellent food.
Hotel needs update. On the whole good location. Clean rooms. Great breakfast.
Will use again
Flight going out delayed due to weather and delayed by 1 hour coming back. Vueling are not an operator I would wish to travel with again.
Excellent service for the past 30 years from your company. Congratulations to Helen Jones who's my contact
You were brilliant when I was driving you mad changing my flights.
The flights were good and on time plus plenty of room on outbound flight
Hotel very basic but clean. Last time I ever use easyJet
Jet 2 was disappointing
Very good as always
As usual Jerry has been absolutely fantastic keeping us really well informed. Thanks for everything.
Thanks for another great holiday.
Brilliant as always
Everything went to plan, thank you.
Sadie was VERY helpful when the return flight was delayed
Booked through Jack again. Excellent service and highly recommend
Dylan is super helpful, always a pleasure to call him for flights
Stepping on to Rockley Beach for my evening swim, I spot a young lifeguard finishing his shift. He walks out on to the platform of his yellow lookout tower, locks the door, then drops the key through the open window.
Five minutes later, his replacement arrives, sticks his hand through the window and - wham - he's in.
This little scene tells you everything you need to know about Barbados's laid-back south coast. Historically, this stretch of the island has been considered inferior to the West - or 'platinum' - coast, which is studded with mega-villas belonging to the likes of Cliff Richard and Wayne Rooney and ultra-fancy hotels such as Sandy Lane, where Simon Cowell enjoys cream teas served by gloved staff.
But the south coast is having a deserved moment, part of a palpable fresh energy that's sparked a surge in numbers from younger, less affluent visitors keen to leave their hotel compounds and explore. Which is super-easy on an island that's only 21 miles long and 14 miles wide.
New hotels are springing up with a more youthful vibe than their grand, staid West-coast equivalents. I'm staying at The Rockley, a four-star hotel designed for 'travellers with an adventurous mindset', whose unpretentious and quirky feel is inspired by European boutique hotels.
The entrance is flanked by a huge yellow grandfather clock, with no hands, because - as Terina, who checks me in explains with a grin - 'time stops at the Rockley'. My suite (there are 49) has a glorious beach view, a kitchenette and is decorated with vibrant rugs and cushions adorned with Bajan slang words such as 'liming' - hanging out with friends and family - and 'lickrish' - loving good food.
Engaging in both these activities is easy.
From the Rockley, it's a minute's walk to the newly-constructed boardwalk that hugs the coast all the way to Bridgetown. With hummingbirds flitting around my head, I pass fishermen perched on the seawall, families strolling and joggers sweating, before arriving at Tapas, one of the south coast's most popular restaurants, for a shrimp curry.
To make life ever simpler, Tapas (along with other popular local restaurants) is part of The Rockley's Dine & Sign programme. This means you don't even need to produce a credit card at the end of the meal - just sign a chit that's added to your final hotel bill.
I'd happily spend a week pootling from The Rockley to the beach (the hotel provides vouchers for free sun loungers - though umbrellas cost an extra £3 a day) to Tapas and back again, but we hire a car for a day's touring. It's cheap, although the downside is that the satnav works only in Mandarin.
The upside is you can easily find your way by following the bus stop signs, which are marked either 'to city' - that's Bridgetown - or 'out of city'. A morning is long enough to work our way up the wind-battered east coast where waves are for world-class surfers but the bleached sands are unmissable.
As you head north, horses and cattle graze (with egrets on their spines) on rolling green fields that remind me of the West Country. At the island's tip we admire the bubbling and swelling Atlantic (whales are frequently spotted here, but we're unlucky) before turning south down the West coast to see if we're really missing anything. We stop for dolphin (don't worry, in Bajan this means Mahi Mahi not Flipper) and chips in Holetown, a cluster of cutesy clapboard houses that happens to boast a vast branch of Cartier.
It's hard to check out the beaches, even though they're all public, because they're blocked from view by the walls of mega-mansions. But we do manage to check out Sandy Lane's strip of sand (FYI the pathway is bang next to Rihanna's house). We don't see Simon Cowell but we spot a lot of lookalikes turning scarlet on padded loungers.
Back at Rockley Beach, families bask in the sea as the sun descends into the water. Tourists sip Banks beer on their loungers, while locals enjoy a lively card game under the branches of a Casuarina tree. Frankly, Simon, Cliff, Wayne et al can keep their West Coast. They're the ones missing out.
First published in the Daily Mail - November 2024
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