Fresh water works wonders for a relationship. The sheer smell and sound of the stuff washes away the workaday world and makes couples, well, act like couples again.
To that end, a trio of this country’s best resorts. Sea, lake, and river bind them together – just like they will you and your significant other.
- Point Clear, Ala. is one of those perfect places in the sun: unsullied and serene. Reigning over the Mobile Bay enclave is the Grand Hotel Marriott Resort, Golf Club & Spa. Secreted on 550 secluded acres overlooking the bay, the hotel is a Gulf Coast granddame – decidedly unlike most of the resorts that dot the shore. The Grand is an unapologetic romantic, a member of Historic Hotels of America. The golfing is great, the seafood fresh, and the guestrooms gorgeous. Sail, fish, bike, and love in one of the most extraordinary settings you’ll ever see.
- Mackinac Island, Michigan is home to another Grand Hotel, one that’s held the allegiance of lovers for decades. The setting for the film Somewhere in Time with Christopher Reeve, Jane Seymour and Christopher Plummer, the island retreat is iconic. You ferry over to Mackinac, shedding your automobile before the voyage. You also shed the real world, and assume a slower, more languorous pace. The National Trust for Historic Preservation named it One of a Dozen Distinctive Destinations. Dine, have a glass of wine, and then sit and rock on what’s perhaps the world’s most famous front porch. No two of the resorts 385 rooms are the same.
- Great films get shot in places like the Grand, and Washington State’s mystic, mist-shrouded Salish Lodge & Spa. It’s arrayed above Snoqualmie Falls, one of the most majestic settings imaginable. That’s why it was where Twin Peaks was shot. There’s lots to be said about this lodge. The Bedrooms are bodacious: wood floors, oversized whirlpool tub for two, wood-burning fireplace, goose-down comforters and featherbeds.
The Gulf of Mexico, Lake Michigan, Snoqualmie Falls – three timeless destinations, three extraordinary hotels.
Story by Jerry Chandler
(Image: jenster181)
