Parrot Cay Resort in Islands

Parrot Cay in the Turks and Caicos has established itself as the northern Caribbean's pre-eminent private island, wrapped in sweeps of sand and peaceful seas featuring the region's best spa and haute cuisine. Typical of COMO Hotels & Resorts, its owning company, Parrot Cay combines nature's 1000 unspoilt acres, including organic gardens and a mile-long powdered beach, with luxury details which are subtle, contemporary and cosseting to the extreme. It's a place to escape the world, to rediscover the softer rhythms of long days, easy nights, and the salve of peace. Accommodation, in clean whitewash with chic teak finishing, ranges from 42 airy rooms with gardens and verandas, to beach-side villas, some with private pools. The aesthetic is pared down but unerringly sleek, featuring four-posters wrapped in soft cottons that billow with the breeze. On the virgin hinterland beyond Rocky Point, find a newly-opened complex of three villas, rented together or separately. Here, the infinity pool is large enough to compete with that turquoise smudge lying at the heart of the resort, flanked by cabanas with alang-alang roofs.

But it's not just privacy which Parrot Cay affords. It attends to guests needs at a deeper level, courtesy of COMO Shambhala Retreat. Newly expanded, COMO Shambhala now hosts an even greater number of internationally-acclaimed teachers, specialising among other things in yoga and nutrition. 2005 sees the first Pilates dedicated retreat led by New York's leading Pilates expert Daniel Loigerot. Instruction takes place in an open-air pavilion overlooking the island's wetlands where tall egrets wade noiselessly through the shallows. Also come for Asian-inspired, complimentary therapies including massage, Ayurveda and sophisticated facials, delivered by professionals.

Executive Chef Anna Rossel serves casual lunche ons and dinners at the Lotus Poolside Restaurant and fine dining in the Terrace restaurant, which features Mediterranean-style cuisine with an Asian flavour. Guests can also relax in the Bar with blissful views over the infinity-edge pool and the unspoilt Caribbean. A COMO Shambhala menu is also available. COMO Shambhala cuisine focuses on energising and organic foodstuffs. This emphasis on raw ingredients (more easily digested as well as richer in living enzymes, vitamins and sea minerals) is combined with pan-Asian influences. Coupled with cuisine which is fresh, organic and remarkably varied, you will begin to understand Parrot Cay's promise to help guests melt into a simpler state of complete, deep and satisfying relaxation.

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