In the Valentine’s Day issue of this very section in 2006, I wrote about a romantic week in the most romantic place I could find with the most romantic partner I had at the time — me. We had a delightful time together, and as I wrote then, “There was not a single other person that could make my picture complete.”
I’d been assigned to check out Kamalame Cay, the then semi-secret resort on a private 96-acre island off the northeastern side of Andros — a massive, largely unpopulated island in the Bahamas. Knowing that the cay is only reachable by barge from Andros — on which there’s precious little of what you’d call tourist infrastructure — I came prepared to take solitary meals in my villa, avoiding ostentatiously happy couples flaunting their irritating togetherness.
I ended up finding true love — with Kamalame. After a warm greeting and the keys to a golf cart to zip around the island, I retired to my own breezy octagonal villa right on the beach, with its stocked refrigerator and mysteriously self-replenishing jar of homemade cookies. I felt like a college kid on vacation (lucky kid!), roaring around the cay on golf-cart jaunts, bonefishing, lolling on every chaise on the property, including those by the crystalline freshwater pool.
Most buildings on the property, from the West Indian-style wood cottages to the Great House, are indoor-outdoor affairs — though each of the villas is quite secluded from the little road that connects them, so you can feel perfectly comfortable jumping naked into the ocean from your room. Have you ever felt more attracted than usual to a traveling companion simply because of the exoticism of your locale? It happened here: Spending time with me was fantastic.
Andros is not a place where you’ll find rocking nightlife. Unlike Nassau, there’s no super-resort; unlike Eleuthera, you won’t run into Lenny Kravitz jamming at a dive bar; unlike Harbour Island, you won’t run into half the fashion industry on holiday. You will find scrubby, windswept landscape and some jungle. There’s the odd conch-salad joint where you can crack open a Kalik and hang out with the local dive masters, but since everything is included at Kamalame — and it’s more accommodating and more beautiful than anywhere else on Andros — you’ll want to have your conch salad here and enjoy your solitude.
It’s no accident that traveling to Kamalame Cay feels like visiting a friend’s private estate. Owners Brian and Jennifer Hew (a Jamaican couple living in Florida who had sailed around the Bahamas looking for their perfect spot) built the resort as part of an agreement with the government to acquire the land and construct a private home. To buy their pristine piece of beach property, they were forced to create a resort — in the middle of nowhere. Kamalame Cay, which was born in 1995, feels every bit like visiting their airy home that sits at the mouth of the island’s creek.
My little affair with Andros didn’t end in 2006. I returned to the island a number of times, to dive over the wall of the “Tongue of the Ocean” — the 6,000-foot-deep abyss that curls around Andros (in which the US and British navies test submarines). I visited Red Bays, where Androsians still weave intricate baskets by hand and harvest sea sponges. I tried my hand at batik in the Androsia factory, which produces the wildly colorful fabrics you’ll find all over the Bahamas. I jumped into the blue holes for which Andros is famous.
After a few years away from Andros, an invitation came to join some friends on a birthday-party retreat to Kamalame Cay. Unable to resist the charm of the birthday girl, my memories of the place or my curiosity (I’d seen offers on Jetsetter; had it become a slick commercial enterprise?), I immediately booked my ticket.
Mercifully, the changes are minimal — but meaningful. After years of being managed by hotel pros who might have been efficient but didn’t thoroughly understand Andros, the Hews’ son, David, returned from several years in London to run the place. Now as general managers, he and Michael King bring with them the kind of old-school gentility native to consummate entertainers — plus updates: Molton Brown amenities, chic pops of color, an expansion of the kitchen and a terrific wine program (on an island that still depends on the “grocery boat”). The overwater bungalow spa — with its part-glass floors and picturesque cupola still under construction when I’d last visited — now runs a sophisticated program of Naturopathica treatments. What you now experience is the same laid-back island languor I’d found before, run with Emily Post-like precision. In other words, expect familiar chatting with the staff — at the same time they’re making a meticulously crafted cocktail, serving left-to-right like clockwork and anticipating things you didn’t even know you needed.
As for the solitude? I’ll take Kamalame alone or with a crowd of convivial birthday celebrators. It doubles beautifully as a private sanctuary and as a party pad. Either way, next time I go, I’m still looking forward to that naked morning dive.
Info: Rooms from $407 and one-bedroom villa suites starting at $1,085 during high season, kamalame.com. Le Air operates two daily flights from Nassau to Andros Town for approximately $100 per person round-trip.