Arriving at Luttrelstown, I was met by Julia, clad in a ball gown so elegant I initially took her for an asylum seeker from the Georgian night. She ushered me into the drawing room where a flunkey magicked my trademark cocktail, an amalgam of six parts Tanqueray’s gin, one part Noilly Prat, slice of lime, the whole sans ice but as cold as possible. At this point enter, stage left, the Queen of The Netherlands’ butler, no kidding, who proceeded forthwith to straighten my collar. Down in the castle kitchens a chef, flown in from Atlanta, GA, was crafting a six-course feast. I was left for a while to my own devices and for company resorted to twanging a guitar that lay on the sofa. Eventually another person entered the room. He shook my hand, saying “ Hi, I’m Rich” which, I’m afraid, caused me to crack up. I didn’t think he was skint.

It became clear that Trevor White of The Dubliner and I had been invited to pontificate on the food, something we both do rather well, though we say it ourselves. We took it in turn to play Good Cop/Bad Cop for the diversion of guests. The Three Tenors also entertained between courses.

“What’s all this got to do with wine?” I hear you say. Okay, here’s what we consumed: 2001 Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru ‘les caillerets’; 2001 Bâtard-Montrachet, Grand Cru, Dom JN Gagnard; 2001 St Joseph, Cuvée de Papy; 1997 Chateau Lafite-Rothschild. The ensemble was presented by Stuart Smith of Berry Brothers, the man with a theatrically sonorous voice, a baritone version of Hattie Jacques. Stuart also taught us how to pass the port in the traditional fashion, demonstrating with a Quinta Do Noval 40 year old Tawny – “expensive mouthwash” and with a 1963 vintage Warre bottled for Berry Brothers, rare as unicorn’s toenails and still gorgeous after all these years. Greg and the Greifelds certainly made a few of my dreams come true that night.

Finally, I know I’ve raved about Savennières Domaine de Closel Clos du Papillon before but I managed to locate a few bottles of the 1997 vintage at a supermarket in Co Monaghan en route to the wonderful Nuremore. The ‘97, a gold medal winner in Paris, was honeyed, elegant, complex, with nuts, nutmeg, cinnamon all sorts of Christmassy things going on as well as spring flowers on the nose. The finish was bone dry. A substantial mouthfeel, altogether brilliant wine making and refreshingly different and distinctive. I love this style, this wine. It cost e19.19 and was worth every damn cent.

Posted in Wine & Drink. Ireland

A client’s pre-set notions about destination mean nothing to Patrick. He wants to know who you are. What are your passions? What do you want to accomplish? What do you want to happen to your body? What do you want to have impact your mind? The destination is irrelevant. Patrick wants to know how to touch your soul.

Born in Las Vegas in 1963, Patrick was inspired early on by the showmanship of legendary entertainers like Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. The family moved to England where he attended an elite boarding school and was assimilated into British culture in the old tradition. He was also exposed to other cultures during trips throughout Europe. He left school and started his first business at the age of 15. Too young to drive, Patrick’s father drove him from location to location to get contracts for his sales business. Eventually, Patrick set off on his own and landed in Houston.

Whether it’s designing the ultimate family reunion at an Irish castle for the CEO of Nasdaq, or giving the first Americans ever the privilege of a cultural exchange with the descendants of Shaka Zulu in South Africa, each experience is firmly imprinted with Patrick’s magic. Patrick’s “designs” have included dinners with prime ministers and European royalty, arranging an all night party with Sting and his band, coordinating a backstage meeting with Bono from U2 and even staging an actual robbery at gunpoint in front of Bloomingdale’s in New York. A particularly memorable project was a time travel fantasy to the year 1274 where clients were immersed in a simulation of life and the realities of the various socio-economic levels that existed during that time.

Click Here to listen to audio interview

BOSTON (Reuters) - The Italian countryside is the vacation destination of choice for high-flying hedge fund managers who are willing to pay $2,000 to $4,000 per person a day to just chill out, said a travel adviser for the wealthy.

Although managers of hedge funds, the private investment pools for the wealthy, are known for lavish spending and often extravagant tastes, they prefer vacations where they are not fussed over, said Gregory Patrick, who arranges about 35 vacations a year for wealthy clients.

“They like the private estates,” Patrick told the Reuters Wealth Management Summit in Boston on Monday, referring to managers, investors and analysts, who often log hundreds of hours on jets to meet with clients and attend conferences.

For the most part, people who work in the $1.9 trillion hedge fund industry and often earn millions of dollars themselves prefer Tuscany and other areas of the Italian countryside to the Caribbean, where many industry conferences are held, said Patrick.

“When they finally take a week or 10 days vacation, they want to get away and get back to basics. They want the quiet of it all, and Tuscany has been very popular,” said Patrick, chief executive of Houston, Texas-based Dreammaker International.

“They don’t want the hotel or the cruise,” he said.

Private aircraft are a preferred mode of transport and many of his clients eschew conventions, he added.

“‘Let’s do it, let it ride and anything goes’,” he said, quoting what he often hears hedge fund managers tell him when planning vacations.

(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss, editing by Jason Szep/Jeffrey Benkoe)

(Story contains descriptions that some readers may find objectionable.)

BOSTON (Reuters) - When you have huge sums of money to spend, merely staying at a Ritz-Carlton is far from enough.

Top hedge fund managers and chief executives instead prefer to hire someone like Gregory Patrick to create a holiday experience at a private villa that they will never forget — and money is no object. You want five of the world’s best chefs flown in? It will happen. Butlers? No problem.

One American investor, who was on such a trip to Italy, was whisked away by chartered jet for the evening to Vienna with a group of friends to a Sting concert, and after the show, they partied all night with the band.

His wife went on a shopping trip with Italian entrepreneur Laura Gucci, and he and his friends raced a Ferrari, a Lamborghini and several Porsches from Florence to Portofino.

The couple were part of a new generation of wealthy tourists. They want luxurious accommodations and tip-top service but they want something much more — an experience.

Patrick, founder of travel firm DreamMaker International, creates unusual vacation experiences for the rich for a living.

So what is it that the ultra wealthy want when they travel? They may not know it, but often they are looking for experiences they can tell their friends about, Patrick told the Reuters Wealth Management Summit in Boston.

“They are fixated on the story — there’s a lust for the ability to tell their friends what they did,” Patrick said.

They may want adventure, be it skydiving, bungee jumping, or surfing.

“You have to take them out of their element. They want something to take their minds out of the marketplace,” Patrick said.

Having personal staff is key, too. A client visited Spain with friends, and Patrick arranged for several butlers to staff the home at which they were staying. The client and a friend went jogging one afternoon, and when they returned, a butler was at the end of the driveway with a decanter of cold water and glasses on a tray.

“If they had had to go to the kitchen themselves to get the water, it would not have been nearly the same experience,” Patrick said.

Sometimes the experience is staged. A couple was dining at a restaurant in Rome. The woman dropped her napkin underneath the table, and took an unusually long amount of time to surface. The man at the table seemed inordinately happy during and after the experience.

Sitting next to the couple were a group of Patrick’s clients, who saw the whole pas de deux unfold, and couldn’t stop talking about it for the rest of the trip. They didn’t know that the couple were actors and that Patrick had arranged the whole scenario.

“What they perceived to be happening, wasn’t really happening. There’s no limit to what I’ll do to make someone happy, so long as it’s legal,” Patrick said.

One thing the ultra-wealthy do not want when they travel is to rub shoulders with the hoi polloi. Riding on a cruise ship is “out of the question,” Patrick said.

“They’d rather have a red hot poker shoved in their eye.”

All that uniqueness costs money. The experiences typically cost between $2,000 and $4,000 a day per person, but demand is so strong that Patrick is looking at growing rapidly over the next few years to annual revenues of $40 million from $3 million to $5 million currently.

He intends to rent villas in places like Tuscany for longer periods and to hire butlers, chefs and other personal staff on a monthly wage rather than a daily rate. That will allow him to reduce costs and also offer similar experiences to a number of clients.

That may make the experience less unusual, but if the service is good enough, clients may not care, Patrick said.

(For summit blog: summitnotebook.reuters.com/)

(Reporting by Dan Wilchins, editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

We had just finished the starter, a truffle cappuccino, when Bob decided to share the story of his blazer with 27 members of the Greifeld family. And me.

I was there at the request of a man called Gregory Patrick. He called me that afternoon, to ask if I’d like to join the Greifelds.

“We’ve got the best chef in America,” said Gregory. “And we’d like you to judge the meal.”

“Why?”

“Well, we just thought it would be fun to have a food critic at the dinner.”

“That sounds nice, Gregory, but I’ve got plans.”

“You don’t understand. Mr Greifeld wants you to come.”

Gregory started to talk money, and in a few minutes I was so excited that I forgot to cancel my squash game.

So Bob has this blazer. “I’ve had it for 30 years,” he told the crowd at Luttrellstown. “And I’m no happier now than I was then.”

Then Bob started to talk about WB Yeats, the virtue of simplicity and what it meant to be in Ireland, “the land of leprechauns and folklore”.

Bob is the president of Nasdaq, one of the biggest stock markets anywhere. He doesn’t get much time for holidays and this year wanted to do something special. So he hired Gregory Patrick from Tours of Enchantment in Houston, Texas.

The budget for the week was $ 500,000. That included the hire of two food critics, a wine expert from Berry Brothers & Rudd, a medieval theme village with 30 archers and comely maidens, three tenors, the Dutch Royal Family’s butler, four PhD students from Trinity College and a busker called Garry, who Gregory ‘met’ on Grafton Street last Monday.

At the end of night at Luttrellstown I was asked for my professional opinion.

“To be honest,” I said, “I think that food is often irrelevant and this is a perfect example of that.”

“Oh yeah?” said the man beside me. “Well, look at this place. It’s beautiful, right? You’re all having fun with your family. But will you remember what you had to eat in ten years’ time?”

He paused for a moment. “You know, I agree. Back home, we’ve got 400 restaurants, and every time . . .” I didn’t catch the rest of the sentence.

Humbled, embarrassed or both, I silently wondered what it’s like to be that rich. After a minute I realised that the man beside me was tapping me with a packet of sweets. “Starburst?”

The following morning, Bob and his family got up at 4.30am to fly to Edinburgh. For the day. They were playing golf at St Andrew’s and going for tea on the Royal Yacht Britannia.

How do you think they got to Edinburgh? Private jet? No. Ryanair.

“If you can dream it,” says Gregory Patrick, “I can make it happen.”

Trevor White is the publisher of the ‘Dubliner’ magazine

Trevor White

Copyright 2004 Financial Times Information
All Rights Reserved
Global News Wire - Europe Intelligence Wire
Copyright 2004 The Sunday Independent

How’s this for Super Bowl superiority? A $ 548,000 gridiron package that loads more experiences into seven days and seven nights than even Scheherazade could have imagined.

Houston-based Tours of Enchantment holds the key to the package that debuts on e-Bay early this week. The 12-person suite on the 35-yard line at Reliant Stadium on game day and entree to the hot Maxim party seem incidental to the luxuries. They’re dubbing it the “Ultimate Super Bowl XXXVIII Experience.”

This lifestyles-of-the-rich-and-famous adventure begins with travel to Houston and around the state on a private jet, a comfy Falcon 900. Accommodations in a 12,000-square-foot, multimillion-dollar swankienda in River Oaks. Private butler at your disposal. Daily massage treatments in the home. Personal shopping with the Gucci family. A “Taste of Texas” dining experience that travels the state. A gambling jaunt to Biloxi. Two celebrity golf tournaments. Local transport in a limo and a Rolls-Royce. And on and on.

Gregory Patrick, Tours of Enchantment prez, and crew have been working around the clock in recent weeks on less-extravagant Super Bowl packages. But this luxury baby has required months and months of preparation.

Members of B2K, the recently disbanded teen band, have expressed an interest. But no contracts as yet for this rock star Super Bowl experience.

Career moves?

Hold onto your jogging shoes. We hear on the street that there is a grass-roots movement to draft Truett Latimer, retired president of the Houston Museum of Natural Science, as new Parks and Recreation Department director. Not that Roksan Okan-Vick, in the job for 18 months, is anticipating a pink slip. It’s all up to new Mayor Bill White, and we’re not sure that that wind has blown his way before today.

Further fancy political footwork is expected by colorful Jordy Tollett, president of the Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau, the man in city service through several administrations. Detractors are placing bets on how soon he is shown the door.

More Americans in Paris

Gracie and Bob Cavnar, Mission Resources CEO, just bounced back from two weeks in Paris where they revisited his 50th birthday with a moonlight cruise on the Seine. The original Paris bash, scheduled for last April, was canceled due to the Iraq invasion.

On board for dinner - Eileen and George Hricik, Phyllis Childress and Tony Abyad and Gracie’s son Justin Hamilton.

Traveling with the Cavnars - their two toy French poodles, Max and Mimi. Gracie was compiling photos and copy for her book, which has the working title American Poodles in Paris. Yelp.

The pooches were photographed at the Louvre, Louis Vuitton and elsewhere.

Medical salute

Dr. Herb Fred, professor of internal medicine at the University of Texas Health Science Center, celebrated his anointment as one of the nation’s outstanding medical professors in Tony’s wine cellar Saturday night. He was named to the elite list by the American College of Physicians.

Joining Herb and his wife, Judy, were physicians instrumental in the doctor’s career from around the country. Houstonians on hand included Nancy and Dr. James Willerson, Drs. David and Janet Graham, and Susan and Dr. Major Bradshaw.

Pre-Stellar play

Stellar Awards gospel stars shown Friday at a reception honoring Yolanda Adams and hosted by City Councilman Michael Berry and his wife, Nandy. More than 800 guests filled the Hobby Center foyer, including former astronaut Bernard Harris, U.S. District Judge Vanessa Gilmore, Carl Davis, and Mayor Bill White and wife Andrea.

Guests were treated to an impromptu concert by Kirk Franklin, Donnie McClurkin, Vickie Winans, V. Michael McKay, Dottie Peoples and Tonex.

Copyright 2004 The Houston Chronicle Publishing Company

It was not your mother’s charity gala. But no one really expected Saturday night’s Deacons of Deadwood Harley Make-a-Wish Ball to be too typical.

Sure, there were the traditional silent auction, live auction and goodie bag components. But there was also an abundance of cleavage, tattoos (both permanent and play), black leather and skullcaps. And then there were the motorcycles.

A gang of 50 or so Deacons, biker babes and friends, most arriving on Harleys, started the party early at Sam’s Boat on Richmond. At 7:30 sharp, they mounted their road monsters, gunned their roaring, grumbling engines and headed to Rockefeller Hall for the real deal. Motorcycle police, their sirens screaming, escorted the parade.

Despite their tough looks and tattoos, these veterans of Sturgis walk a straight and narrow path during the week. Sam Allen, a securities lawyer with Porter & Hedges, was the benefit honcho. Among his leather-clad cronies were Sam Douglass, president of Equus; Al Arfsten, CEO of Dome Energy Partners; Jeff Roberts of Mercedes-Benz; and Ben Thompson, president of Sunland Engineering.

You get the picture. Bad-boy fantasies fulfilled in off hours by guys of enviable net worth. On this night, they were living the fantasy while raising $ 50,000 net for the Make-a-Wish Foundation.

Novelist Judith McNaught, a celebrity guest, was a bit out of her element in the biker crowd. “I arrived (at Sam’s Boat) in a Bentley, and I’m leaving on a Harley,” she said. “Actually, it’s my first time on a motorbike.”

McNaught was lured to the benefit by her financial adviser Steve Lamb, first vice president with Merrill Lynch and a Deacon of Deadwood. A session with McNaught and an intro to her publisher was one of the auction items.

The crowd filled Rockefeller’s, where the timeline was much like any other fund-raiser, though the visuals were obviously not. Brian Black and his band performed. Guests grazed along heavily laden buffet tables. The bar drinks flowed.

Among the 350 crowding the club were Paula Douglass, Rusty Drake, Lynnie Mattison, Carla Thompson, Steve Sloat, Preston Douglass, and Gregory Patrick of Tours of Enchantment, provider of the single live-auction item - a super Super Bowl package.

“We have only one live-auction deal,” explained benefit veteran and biker Randy Hale.”We don’t want to ruin the party.”

Impossible.

Copyright 2003 The Houston Chronicle Publishing Company

“Sounds like you need a vacation,” Microsoft mogul Bill Gates says as he hands you a signed blank check. “It’s on me. The sky’s the limit.”

Dream on, you say? Why not? Gregory Patrick, founder of Tours of Enchantment, a luxury travel-consulting firm based in Houston, spends his time dreaming up vacations for those who can afford to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars. So imagine for a moment that a billionaire actually did offer to fund your fantasy getaway. What would you do? Go to Club Med? Ride the Orient Express?

“Boring,” Patrick responds. The self-defined “experience designer” insists on creativity, combining his clients’ personality, history, likes and dislikes with an extraordinary level of service — personal butlers, chauffeurs and chefs come standard — to conjure up escapes that only begin with the destination.

Here, Patrick has helped concoct five distinct diversions. Decide which one most appeals to you, then see the box at the bottom of page 9 to discover what a psychologist says your pick reveals about your personality.

1. Whether you’re into photography or gaming, target South Africa to track the “big five” game animals — lion, leopard, elephant, rhinoceros and buffalo — on a safari by jeep, canoe or train. Go native by participating in an authentic tribal ceremony led by the prince of the Zulu tribe, a direct descendent of Shaka Zulu. Then, after dinner with three Nobel Peace Prize winners — Nelson Mandela, F.W. de Klerk and Desmond Tutu, all area natives — retire to one of Johannesburg’s five-star hotels or a fully modernized treetop bungalow.

2.”Time-travel” to an estate near London, where you’ll awake one morning as an English noble and, dressed in custom-made period costume, get swept up in a 1775 murder mystery. Another day brings 1815 and the Battle of Waterloo, re-enacted by more than 300 soldiers as you observe from a hot-air balloon. Last stop is 1907, at the peak of the British Empire, and dinner with actors portraying era icons. All that, and there’s still plenty of time to shop London’s finest boutiques or get whisked off to Scotland to play 18 holes at St. Andrew’s.

3. Want a true New York experience? Be careful what you wish for. Amid a whirlwind week of five-star restaurants and Broadway shows will come a few quintessential Manhattan moments. When your limo pulls up to Bloomingdale’s, for example, a masked mugger dives in to rob the driver. And at a Saturday afternoon Yankees game, the two Brooklyn natives you’ve just befriended generously order hot dogs, pretzels and beer for your entire row … then sneak out and stick you with the bill. It’s all covered, of course; you’re asked only to expect the unexpected.

4. See firsthand how the other half lives when you book a stay at a millionaire’s tropical home. Nestle into Necker Island, owned by Virgin Atlantic founder Richard Branson and appropriately located in the British Virgin Islands. His 74-acre atoll boasts a Balinese-style villa with huge balconied bedrooms, a swimming pool, hot tubs and tennis courts. Spend your days baking on the beach, or take to the sea on a private yacht to swim or fish the warm waters. Later, while enjoying the sunset over a gourmet meal, savor a sudden shower of thousands of rose petals, dropped from above by plane.

5. Make the crowd go wild when you take on your favorite pro athlete or sports team in front of 500 screaming spectators, all hired to chant your name. A hockey fan and a team of friends might fly by private jet to British Columbia to face the Vancouver Canucks in a full-out, three-period game. Hit the showers afterward, then rehash your most victorious moments over dinner with the team. You’ll return home with autographed pictures and bedecked in an official, personalized jersey.
________________________________________
Now — which trip most appealed to you? If you chose …

1. “You’re looking for a thrill — touching the shark,” says psychologist and personality expert Samuel Karson, Ph.D. Safari-goers typically are young risk-takers, individuals who are active, adventurous, bold, outgoing and impulsive rather than restrained or rule-bound. “Risk-takers tend to be carefree and not to see danger signals.”

2. “Time travelers” are intellectuals or history buffs, those who seek adventure through learning and sharing ideas, Karson says: “They have literary and even professorial interests. They spend a lot of time with books; they aren’t typically extroverts.”

3. “This would appeal to someone who likes to be entertained,” Karson says. New York-goers aren’t shy or retiring, but they do like the comforts of big-city life and are constantly on the go. “Thrill, thrill, thrill,” he says. “This is for a passive adventurer. Your participation is relatively limited.”

4. “This trip sounds romantic. It might attract a younger crowd, but certainly the young at heart,” Karson says. Romantics tend not to be tough, practical or realistic; instead, they’re more sensitive and interested in aesthetic beauty. “This is someone who likes to be pampered,” Karson says.

5. “A competition would attract someone who is very imaginative, fanciful and easily seduced from practical judgment,” Karson says. It also might appeal to people who crave fame and don’t mind achieving recognition based on others’ accomplishments. “This is the escapist’s dream.”

Sail the Christina O

It is arguably the world’s most opulent yacht, and now it’s available for corporate groups. When Aristotle Onassis purchased the former Christina in 1954, he turned itinto a floating palace that hosted some of the world’s most famous politicians and movie stars. Recently revamped for more than $50 million, the re-christened Christina O can accommodate 36 passengers in 18 luxurious staterooms, plus the Onassis Suite. Each stateroom has all the comforts of home -and more - including Venetian linens, mirrored walk-in closets, and surround-sound stereo systems with DVD and CD players. The 325-foot-long ship also includes Ari’s Bar [where John F.Kennedy first met Sir Winston Churchill in 1957]; an elegant fireplace lounge; a swimming pool whose bottom rises above the water to become a dance floor; a spa and fitness center; and the main dining room, library, music lounge, show lounge, and children’s playroom. It accommodates parties of up to 100 peopleinside and 250 outside.

Christina O will sail the Mediterranean summer and the Caribbean in winter, and is available for private charters. Contact Tauk World Discovery at [800] 465-2825 or go to for more information.
- Regina Baraban

Up and Away

Space tourism may well be the next big thing in adventure travel. Last spring, Dennis Tito became the first private citizen to travel on an orbital flight. He won’t be the last. Book now for2005, when Space Adventures, the space travel company in Arlington,Va., that orchestrated Tito’s flight, plans to roll out its first passenger suborbital space flights on “reusable launchvehicles.” Participants will attend a four-day flight preparation and training program to perfect such things as their zero-gravity skills and space flight safety procedures, and then embark on a 30 to 150 minute journey to the weightless regions beyond the pull of earth’s gravity.

Space Adventure programs currently available include flights tothe edge of space in the world’s fastest aircraft, zero-gravity flights, space shuttle launch tours, and educational tours to the world’s major space and astronomy facilities. For more information, call [888] 857-7223.
- Regina Baraban

Raft with the Los Angeles Philharmonic

What makes Bill Dvorak’s “Classical Music RiverJourney” different from the typical rafting adventure is the addition of several members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, whose renade participants with the music of Bach, Beethoven, Ravel, and the company founder’s distant cousin, Dvorak.

The trips can accommodate up to 25 people and typically take seven or eight days on either the Dolores River in SouthwestColorado or the Green River in eastern Utah. Four or more concerts are scheduled during the program, including a formal concert finale. In addition, there are side excursions to Anasazi ruins, wildlife viewing, and hiking. Itineraries can be customized for groups.

“The concert halls are the acoustically rich stages of the slickrock canyons and caverns located along each river, or an open-air stage nestled among ponderosa pine and Douglas fir,” says a spokesperson for the company. 
- Regina Baraban

Firewalk

Would you believe that in the past 25 years, more than two million people in Western countries have walked over hot coals of 1,200 to 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit without burning their feet? So says Twain Harte, Calif.,-based authority Tolly Burkan, who has trained hundreds of instructors and corporate groups in the art and science of firewalking.

The question is: Why risk it? “Firewalking motivates people to take an active role in reaching their life and career goals,” says Marnie Craig, a former meeting planner turned certified firewalking instructor in Hamilton, Mont. “The experience gives them tools to help overcome their fears. It is also tremendous for team building because of the strong bonding that takes place among the participants. They walk away feeling energized, exhilarated, and excited about things they were previously afraid of.”

While people are typically terrified at the start, all of the hundreds who have participated in Craig’s workshops have gone through with the firewalk. She says the ideal size group is 25 people in an unpaved outdoor setting, because [unlike concrete] the earth absorbs the heat. Her sessions usually run four to five hours, beginning with discussions on the creative process and transforming fear, and ending with practical instruction on how to walk across the coals.

Burkan offers a two-hour seminar for corporate groups called High Tech Fire. He stresses the importance of working with an instructor certified by the Firewalking Institute of Research andEducation.

- Regina Baraban

Rent a Town

For rent: one quaint Bermuda town, complete with Old Worldcharm, historic landmarks, stocks and pillory, friendly taverns,cobblestone lanes, period entertainment, town crier. Large groupswelcome.

St. George’s, Bermuda’s historic first capital, is underconsideration for World Heritage Site status. Groups can use the town as a real-life “set” for any number oftraditionally Bermudian activities, like pub crawls or candlelight tours of narrow lanes escorted by the town crier. Various 17th and18th century landmarks such as St. Peter’s Church, Tucker House,and the Town Hall are available for private parties. And what more fitting setting for a Bermudian cocktail party than the Deliverance, a replica of a ship built by the survivors of a 1609 wreck?

For more information, contact the Bermuda Department of Tourismat [800] 223-6106, ext. 213.
- Megan Rowe

Get Real

Now you can experience the drama of the Survivor television series first-hand.

The Official Survivor Tour from the Adventure Company Australia, based in Cairns, is set in the same towns where the series was taped. Billed as an “adventure tour,” the eight-day program includes guided camping, biking, canoeing, and hiking in Australia’s Queensland territory. On the seventh day, participantsconduct a tribal council and select the individual most likely to survive.

Los Angeles-based Reality Incentives offers an eight-day stay on an island in northwest Fiji for up to 24 participants. Split into two teams, group members are equipped with a survivor pack that includes bedding, some food, utensils, and other essentials for managing a week on a tropical island. Guided by locals, participants try their hand at rappelling, a ropes course, navigation using a compass, exploring underwater caves, and survival techniques. The natives teach the group about Fijian culture, including how to catch fish and locate edible plants.

“What we see when they come out of the week is a group that is molded more strongly together and that becomes more united when they get back to the work environment,” says Max Kruse, vice president of sales for Reality Incentives.
- Megan Rowe

Commune With the David

No work of art reflects the splendor of Florence, Italy, more vividly than Michelangelo’s David. The enormous statue resides in the city’s Galleria dell’Accademia: It’s the crown jewel at the end of a long entrance hallway lined with four other Michelangelo sculptures. “The David is what everyone goes to look at, but they usually have to wait hours in  line,” says Barry Wolpa, vice president, field promotions andcommunications, GE Financial Assurance in San Rafael, Calif. When he brought his annual Leading Producers incentive program to Florence, Wolpa could think of nothing more special than treating the 236 attendees to a private cocktail reception at the foot of Michelangelo’s masterpiece.

Enter Giuseppe Lepri, president of Florence-based destination management company Newtours, a member of Global Events Partners. In order to take over the space for a corporate group, Lepri needed permission from both the Italian government and the museum’s director. He set up an event which “people will talk about forever,” says Wolpa. Qualifiers and their guests sipped champagne and nibbled on elegant hors d’eouvres in the long entrance hall, then were welcomed to David’s rotunda by a duo of harpists. After ample time to explore the rest of the museum, they sat down at the foot of the statue for a 20-minute lecture on Michelangelo by a local university professor.

“Everyone was awestruck by the experience of having a private party with the David,” says Wolpa.

- Regina Baraban

Live Like Royalty

Anyone can check into a hotel, but only a privileged few canindulge in the lifestyles of the rich and famous. So says Gregory Lee Patrick of Tours of Enchantment, a Houston-based international incentive house.

Patrick has a roster of roughly 750 private chateaus, castles, and mansions throughout the world not available for public rental. He staffs them with waiters who place satin pillows under ladies’ feet when they dine, and famous restaurant chefs who cook gourmet cuisine. A one-to-one staff-to-client ratio ensures that a customer’s every whim will be met.

“Imagine that as your attendees are sipping cocktails around the pool, they watch the 2000 Olympics aquatic ballet perform,” says Patrick. “And that’s a minor event.”

If your qualifiers live in a major metropolitan city, the program can start 10 days prior to the trip, with 24-hour personal concierge service for everything from expert packing to taking the dog to the kennel.

Some estates can accommodate up to 60 people; large groups can take over multiple homes in a given setting.

For more information, you can call [800] WHY-DREAM?, e-mail gp@gregorypatrick.com , or go to www.DreamMaker360.com.
- Regina Baraban

Ride the Blue Train

Any interest in a once-in-a-lifetime incentive experience? If so, South Africa’s Blue Train may be just the ticket. After an overnight stay in one of Cape Town’s luxury hotels, groups transfer to Cape Town Central Train Station and enter the Blue Train’s special VIP lounge.

Once aboard, each passenger is directed to one of 32 deluxe suites or six luxury suites. As the train pulls out of the station, the butler comes by to explain the suite’s amenities, including television, telephone, air conditioner, and [in the luxury suites]CD and video players. All suites come with private baths with gold-plated fixtures.

There is one butler assigned to every four suites, and he is available 24 hours a day for just about anything. While his guests are at dinner, he prepares the suite for a comfortable night’ssleep. And what a dinner! Even the most casually clothed gentlemen are eager to don the required jacket and tie for the privilege of dining at Blue Train Business Manager Kishore Seegoolam’s tables, where local oysters and game are served on bone china and South Africa’s finest wines are poured into cut crystal.

For incentive groups wishing to do business while traveling, the observation car, offering panoramic views of the passing landscapeas the train travels along its journey, can be converted into a conference or meeting venue for up to 25 guests. A dedicatedon-board conference facilitator is available throughout the journey. It may be hard, however, to concentrate on business at a breakfast meeting while the gold and diamond mines of Kimberly glide by the window. 
- David Erickson

Get Your Sea Legs

Incentive attendees can have a great time learning to sail and also come away with skills that will help them excel inthe workplace.

The Offshore Sailing School integrates sailing lessons, exercises, and races into incentive programs. To help novice sailors get their sea legs, the school uses specially designed teaching boats that won’t capsize or sink and that allow the instructor to take control.

Teams of four or five take turns working the sails or skippering the 26-foot vessels out of one of several ports that include Captiva Island, Fla.; the Florida Keys; St. Petersburg, Fla.; Tortola, the British Virgin Islands; Newport, R.I.; Liberty Landing, N.J.; Chelsea Piers, N.Y.; Stamford, Conn.; and Chicago.

Doris Colgate, who co-owns the school with her husband, Steve, says more corporate groups are opting for an at-sea experience because it is not as physically demanding as some team building activities can be. “Anybody at any age can get on a sailboat.”

For more information, call [800] 454-1700.
- Megan Rowe

Take Over the Hotel

The basis for a great incentive travel program is this: Give your qualifiers a fantastic experience to brag about when they get back - and make sure it’s an experience that they could never buy off the shelf.

When Dick Gaeta of Premier Incentives of Marlboro, Mass., locked in the 208-room Hotel Europe Killarney in Ireland a year and a half in advance for top producers of Boston-based CGU Insurance, privacy was a key attraction. “Guests don’t have to worry about going into areas they shouldn’t; they feel like the resort is their home,” he says.

When guests checked in, they had a reception in a chandelier-lighted tent in front of the hotel on Killarney Lake. A fireworks display over the water showed the company logo in a burst of color and light. After the reception, attendees boarded boats in front of the hotel for an evening cruise around the lake. “It would have been difficult to put the company’s tent on property and have the docks filled with our boats if there were other guests in the hotel,” says Gaeta.

Some properties are more amenable to takeovers than others. Here is a list of major chain properties that groups can buy out in their entirety. Of course, if you don’t see the one you want, it never hurts to ask. National sales office numbers are included, and guest room counts are in parentheses.
- Jennifer Juergens

Hilton Hotels Corp.

[800] 321-3232
Hilton Lake Lanier Islands Resort, Georgia [216]; Pointe HiltonResorts, Phoenix [563-suite Squaw Peak, 585-suite Tapatio CliffsResort]; Hilton Waikoloa Village, Big Island, Hawaii [1,240];Hilton Lake Placid Resort, New York [179]

Hyatt Hotels & Resorts

[800] 543-1818
Hyatt Regency Maui Resort and Spa [815]; Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress [750]; Hyatt Regency Cerromar Beach [506]; Hyatt Regency Scottsdale Resort [493]; Hyatt Regency Lake Las Vegas [496]

Loews Hotels

[212] 521-2000
Loews Coronado Bay Resort, San Diego [440]; Loews Le Concorde, Quebec City [424]; Loews Miami Beach Hotel [800]; Loews Philadelphia Hotel [585]; Loews Ventana Canyon Resort, Tucson [398]; Loews Portofino Bay Hotel, Orlando [750]; Hard Rock Hotel, Orlando [650]

Marriott Hotels, Resorts and Suites

[800] 626-3614
Marriott Orlando World Center Resort & Convention Center [1,503]; Lodge at Sonoma - A Renaissance Resort & Spa [180]

Sonesta Hotels & Resorts

[800] 477-4556
Sonesta Beach Resort Key Biscayne [290]; Sonesta Beach Resort Bermuda [400]; Sonesta Beach Resort & Villas Anguilla [100]; Aruba Sonesta Beach Resort [556]

Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[800] 325-3535
Westin Rio Mar Beach Resort & Casino, Puerto Rico [694]; Westin La Cantera Resort, San Antonio [508]; Wyndham International Hotels & Resorts [800] 996-4016; The Boulders Resort, Carefree, Ariz. [160 plus 50 villas]; Wyndham El Conquistador, Las Croabas, Puerto Rico [918, plus 90 casitas]; Carmel Valley Ranch, Carmel, Calif. [144]

Copyright 2001 by PRIMEDIA Business Magazines & Media Inc.
“All Rights Reserved”

Most people buy homes where they need to. Celebrities buy where they want to–and they frequently buy more than one. Then, rather than leave their extra dwelling empty most of the year, some stars rent them out to ordinary folk. Ordinary folk, that is, who can afford them. For the jaded traveler who wants to escape the humdrum and hoi polloi, what could be more perfect than a week or two under a celeb’s roof, eating with a celeb’s flatware, sleeping in a celeb’s bed? “Once you’re there,” says Palo Alto, Calif., real estate developer Christopher Treble, 60, who took wife Nancy to Jane Seymour’s English manor house for her birthday in 1996, “the world we live in just doesn’t exist.” From Seymour’s Tudor splendor to Robin Leach’s Caribbean hideaway, herewith is a sampling of some surprising vacations alternatives.

JANE SEYMOUR’S MANOR HOUSE St. Catherine’s Court, Bath, England $ 21,000 a week Nine bedrooms, six bathrooms, two kitchens, private chapel, music room

Special Features: Croquet lawn, tennis courts, stables, guest membership in Beaufort Hunt and Cirencester Polo Club (Prince Charles is a member of both)

Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell slept here. So did Johnny Cash. So, perhaps, did Henry VIII, who is said to have bestowed it on an illegitimate daughter in the mid-16th century. What Henry thought of the place has been lost to history, but for Dallas oil-industry consultant Tom Mitchell, 61, a two-week stay there in the summer of 1997 with wife Cynthia and a group of friends was a sojourn in a bygone time. “The house has a ballroom, so we had dances with a string quartet,” he recalls.

The English-born, L.A.-based Seymour, who bought the 14-acre estate in 1983 while filming the Jamaica Inn TV movie there, stays at St. Catherine’s for a few weeks each summer and at Christmas, renting it out the rest of the time. “The upkeep is horrendous,” she says, “and rather than getting a government grant to maintain it, we decided to rent it.”

Most who stay at St. Catherine’s are Americans, says estate manager Beverly Lee. Though Seymour’s personal possessions are locked away, “while guests are here, they’re living in her home, looking at her pictures, just as she does.” The presence of a staff–and a hefty security deposit–ensures that guests are on their best behavior. So far, only one has posed a problem. British rocker Robbie Williams, who stayed there last year, tried to pass St. Catherine’s off as his own on MTV. Worse, says Lee, “he turned the croquet lawn into a soccer field.” Obviously not to the manor born.

MICK JAGGER’S ISLAND PARADISE Mustique, The Grenadines $ 15,000 a week Six living pavilions, games pavilion, pool, pond, Jacuzzi

It’s not easy to get to, unless you have a yacht, and there isn’t much to do, unless you have pals among the island’s ultra-rich denizens. Plus, arranging a stay at Stargroves, the island hideaway Jagger bought in 1980, can take a while, since the leasing agents have to track down the elusive rocker to get his personal approval of every prospective renter. And, of course, Jagger and family have first dibs on the best weeks.

Once you get there, though, the hassles are over. Guests (the villa sleeps 10) have the run of a Japanese-themed piece of paradise right on pristine Macaroni Beach. “The appeal here,” says Jeanette Cadet, the villa manager, “is total privacy, plus security and excellent food.” That’s because the rental includes a cook and a chauffeur who will double as a bodyguard. “Having people come through keeps the staff on its toes,” says Gregory Patrick, who runs Houston’s Tours of Enchantment. Perhaps most important for the deep-pockets escapist, says Wendy Wachtel of the renting agency VillasoftheWorld.com, “It doesn’t scream Mick Jagger. It screams tasteful rock star’s vacation home.”

JULIO IGLESIAS’S MEXICAN MANSION Acapulco, Mexico $ 52,000 a week Six bedrooms, swimming pool Special Features: Yacht, limo, fishing boat, masseuse, nutritionist on call (Placido Domingo is a neighbor)

The velvet-voiced Spaniard actually owns three Acapulco homes and rents out two. The smaller, cozier one is in a hilly section of town. The other, Las Brisas, on a hillside overlooking the bay, tends more to the spectacular. “He has an infinity pool,” says Dave Odom, a sales manager with a Houston financial-services firm, who took five of his top employees and their spouses to the compound for a week in April 2000. “One side of it spills over the side of the mountain like a waterfall.” And, he says, “There were three maids, two cooks, a house manager and a bartender. I kept thinking Julio has a pretty good life here. I don’t know why he ever leaves.”

During their stay, Odom, 43, and his wife, Jill, slept in the master bedroom. “Every time I crawled into that bed,” he admits, a little sheepishly, “I kept thinking about the song that Julio recorded with Willie Nelson, ‘To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before.’” But if guests are hoping for dish–other than the kind served at lunch and dinner–they’ll be disappointed. “The ladies who cleaned and cooked spoke only Spanish,” says Jill, 43, “so it was a dead end for gossip.”

ROBIN LEACH’S GARDEN OF EDEN Jumby Bay, Antigua $ 65,000 a week (Rates lower off-season) Seven bedrooms, eight vegetable gardens, sunken library with 50-inch video screen, four guest cottages

Special Features: Fully equipped kitchen, outdoor shower among the rocks, souvenirs from Leach’s travels as host of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

Those lifestyles of the rich and famous can sometimes be much simpler than one might expect. At the multimillion dollar Casa di Sogni D’Oro (The House of Golden Dreams), says Leach, “We go out to the garden every night and pick dinner. We have almost every fruit and vegetable.” For those who might be fatigued by all that manual labor, there’s a chef to handle the cooking–along with three gardeners and a housekeeper. Leach was filming a 1986 Lifestyles segment when he discovered Jumby Bay, an island just off the coast of Antigua in the British West Indies. The exterior of the Casa, an Italianate villa completed in 1991, has been distressed to make it seem much older. “I don’t use this home as much as I’d like,” says Leach, 58. “A house needs life in it.”

RANDY TRAVIS’S HAWAIIAN HAVEN Lahaina, Maui, Hawaii $ 8,400 a week Four-bedroom main house with two guest cottages, gourmet kitchen Special Features: Pool, Jacuzzi, gym, Zen rock garden

There’s a lady from Canada who spends Christmas here. “She books a year in advance,” says country singer Randy Travis’s wife and manager, Elizabeth. “We have Christmas decorations put away for her.” The Travises stay there once or twice a year. “I love the property because it’s so private,” says Randy. And there are signs of Travis everywhere, from photos on the wall to his cookbook in the kitchen. There’s also the autograph tree. “It’s a rubber tree,” says property manager Mack Downing. “People scratch their signature on a leaf. The scratched area turns white and stays that way forever.” Well, almost forever. “One guest,” says Elizabeth, “stole the autographs of my husband and Chuck Norris.” Is nothing sacred?

For more photos of these celebrity homes, go to www.people.com or AOL (Keyword: People)

Copyright 2001 Time Inc.