Ocean club - Executive Travel: Ocean Club, Paradise Island, Nassau, Bahamas

South Florida CEO, Dec, 2002 by Johanna Marmon

With its intimate guest rooms luxuriously appointed with four-poster beds, Mahogany any floors and oversized Jacuzzi tubs, it's hard to imagine that the Ocean Club -- tucked away paradise on Paradise Island in the Bahamas -- is the sister property of the splashy pink-and-coral Atlantis, a Vegas-inspired/compound bedecked with sea-themed sculptures, fake Mayan ruins, gigantic aquariums-and a flashy casino. But that's the very beauty of the private, 106-room Ocean Club. It looks and feels like it's from another time and place entirely -- and is entirely unlike any other resort in the Caribbean.

An hour away from the hustle of South Florida on Chalk's Ocean Airways' seaplane, guests are delivered into the very lap of luxury as soon as they enter the resort's British Colonial main house (actually a restored mansion formerly known as Shangri-La). We felt the stress of the previous week's work begin to trickle away as soon as we were offered a warm hand towel upon check-in; by the time the afternoon's complimentary champagne and chocolate-covered strawberries arrived in our oceanfront room via the nattily dressed butler, it was gone completely. Of course, lounging by Ocean Club's magnificent pool all afternoon, drinking ice-cold Kalik beer -- with breathtaking views of the property's sprawling gardens modeled after Versailles -- didn't hurt either.

But perhaps the very best thing about Ocean Club -- besides its newly remodeled Balinese-style spa, which offers a full range of services -- is its new restaurant, Dune, nestled atop a sand dune overlooking the emerald-colored ocean. Conceived by New York restaurateur Jean-Georges Vongerichten, we were extremely impressed by the quality and composition of the food there. In fact, the restaurant was so good that we passed up eating dinner anywhere else during our stay -- and it only took one bite of the chef's seared grouper with basil mashed potatoes and fall vegetables in a rich tomato broth to convince us.

Speaking of food, ordering room service for breakfast is an absolute must for guests staying at Ocean Club. Fluffy omelets with rosemary-flecked roasted potatoes and supremely eggy French toast arrived promptly at our room at the times we requested -- along with a copy of The Wall Street Journal and a press pot of steaming hot coffee. During our stay, we spent lazy mornings dawdling over breakfast on our veranda, relaxing in the pristine-white Egyptian cotton robes the resort provides, savoring the salty ocean breezes that ruffled the palm trees.

After mornings like those, the only stress comes with the knowledge that the day -- and the inevitable sunshine -- is wasting away. So it's either back to the pool for another day of tanning, or perhaps to the resort's 18-hole oceanside golf course, a short shuttle-bus ride away. You can also play tennis on one of the resort's clay courts, or perhaps take in a massage or some other spa service. Staff members are on-hand to arrange any offsite excursion you might want to take, but we were happy strolling Ocean Club's grounds and sitting on the sparkling beach -- where energetic cabana boys eagerly set us up with lounge chairs and downy white towels.

All of this pampering prepared us for our vigorous nighttime session at Atlantis' $10 roulette table -- where we managed to turn $50 into $650 in a mere two hours. We picked up a couple of Cuban cigars and headed back to our room -- where we were lulled to sleep by the gentle waves coming ashore.

Ocean Club, Paradise Island, Nassau,

Bahamas. 1-242-363-2501; Fax 1-242-363-2424. www.oceanclub.com. Room rates start at $450 per night in season, double occupancy.

Intimate Paradise: The private, 106 room Ocean Club is all about refined elegance, from its four-poster beds and mahogany floors, to its Balinese-style spa, to the tantalizing food at Dune, the resort's new restaurant.