To get to The Saltwhistle Bay Club on Mayreau you fly into Barbados, wait around, then catch a plane to Union Island, and there you are collected by boat.

It can be a long way, so be ready for a less than comfortable local flight from Barbados, and be grateful it is short!! I do feel however that your expectations always rise with the degree of difficulty of accessing your vacation destination

It is the price you pay for classic Caribbean seclusion which is what you get at Saltwhistle Bay.

It is a very small resort, with a most beautiful beach on a very sleepy island.

There are only 10 rooms, which are in stone cottages, built with local wood and stone, well screened by palm trees.

The main reason however that I would choose the Saltwhistle Bay Club is that it is simple, very comfortable, and a real barefoot escape. I personally just love to unwind, to mind my own business, to read, or just to walk on a pure white sand beach and wade in a crystal clear turquoise sea. This is the perfect place to do just that. This place is best described as almost completely undeveloped, so much so you immediately fall into a kind of stupor where it’s difficult to remember the hustle and bustle of the outside world you so recently left.

How many places can you honestly say are like that today?

I just knew instinctively from the moment I arrived off the beach and was greeted by a rum punch, and my suitcases vanished to my room that Saltwhistle was somewhere very special.

Having said all that the bay is a popular port of call for local yacht charters, so the bar is busy if you feel like company.

This is not a cheap vacation, nor is it one for five star cosseted hotel seekers, but definitely a place for people who still regard themselves as travellers and not tourists, for people who research and book independently.