PLACES I LOVE

I am very fortunate to have ended up in some gorgeous spots for one writing reason or another.  I will share my favorites with you here, slowly but surely.

*

Hacienda Petac outside of Merida in the Yucatan, Hacienda Petac is a private home that is available to rent.  It has a spa and all meals are included in the price.  The colonial hacienda was in ruins when architect, Salvador Reyes converted it into a modern sanctuary.  My husband wrote a poem while we were there.  Ceiba Tree, Petac, Mexico.  It ended up in The New Yorker.

*

Locanda Rossa outside of Capalbio in Maremma, Italy.  It’s an old hospital converted into a spa by three female lawyers.  Maremma is in southern Tuscany, area of the Etruscans.

*

Capofaro on the island of Salina in the Aeolians, birth place of the winds.  When we were there we experienced three glorious wind storms, a scirocco, a maltemi and the two together.  Stromboli and Lipari and Panerea and Filicudi rise from the sea like gentle gods, all around.

*

Pardini’s Hermitage you can only get to by sea.  It’s on the Island of Giglio off the Tuscany coast.  A boat from the hotel picks you up at the port and ferries you to the inn where you are fed exquisite food and allowed to relax, hike, read, swim, to lie on a chaise perched in the rocks, beneath an umbrellone.  When I was there a dashing Italian man in his sixties admonished me to never tell any Americans about the spot lest it get overrun and ruined.  Oh well.  Or, Shsh!

*

The Inn at Mama’s Fish House on Maui, intimate and far away from the big, generic hotels, on the Hana Highway just outside of the surfing town of Paia on the beach.

*