Hayman Island and a paradise that's two perfect

JENNY Stevens joins the queue of couples beating a path to the northernmost island in Queensland's Whitsunday Passage: the luxurious and romantic Hayman Island.

Recouperate ...Hayman's new-look retreat rooms, where you can enjoy a spa or garden rainshower, are cool and stylish.

NOAH would have approved of Hayman Island.

Not that there's anything biblical about the northernmost island in the Whitsunday Passage, except its natural beauty.

No, what Noah would have loved happens every day when the island's cruiser pulls up and, with a few exceptions, the guests walking down the gangplank do so two by two.

Couples.

Honeymooners.

Young parents escaping for a luxury break.

Empty-nesters rediscovering the joy of being only two.

I was thinking this on the boat to Hayman Island as it made the one-hour transfer from Hamilton Island airport. The honeymooners were obvious; the young parents looked like a weight had been lifted from their shoulders; while the empty-nesters just kicked back and watched the young ones with a knowing smile.

Then the whole Noah analogy went out the window as an American family, with well-travelled teenagers in tow, boarded, ignored the champagne on offer to every guest and began to play a vigorous game of cards.

In luxury travel publications, Hayman Island is portrayed in five-star adjectives. It's certainly won everything in the luxury and romance categories over the years and is a member of The Leading Hotels of the World. But it's neither just a honeymoon island, nor an island where only the rich stay and play.

Just near the marina and its water sports department is Hernando's Hideaway creche and the original island schoolroom, still in use today by the employees' children. At the other end of the resort, on level four of the Lagoon Wing, are the luxurious, themed penthouses where exclusivity reigns under the watchful eye of the butlers.

Then, in the middle, is an exquisite jewel, the Beach Villa, melded from two of the original beachfront rooms into one stylish and very private whole. It comes with enclosed garden, glass-sided bathroom with a pedestal bath fit for a royal soak, a tiny tropical garden and outdoor rainshower, indoor and outdoor daybeds, entertainment deck, plunge pool and your own piece of Whitsunday beach. And a butler, of course. The only drawback is that other island guests occasionally find your little paradise and can't help but walk back and forth at water level, for a better look.

There are less expensive options: Palm and Pool rooms, which have either tropical garden or pool views over the enormous Hayman pool, and Lagoon rooms overlooking lily-filled ponds or another free-form freshwater pool and the beach.

But hidden in the thick tropical foliage, behind the original 10 single-storey beachfront rooms, are 16 retreat rooms, which must be the island's best-kept secrets.

On a resort map, they'd look like second-best offerings, as they're on a winding path behind the beach rooms, with limited outlook over the beach 10m or more away.

In reality, they've had a wonderful makeover which, to my mind, made them more attractive than many of the other, more expensive rooms.

The current resort was built in 1987 and some of the property is showing signs of maturity. The owner's response has been to tackle a gradual refurbishment that doesn't turn it into a building site.

The retreat rooms are narrow, but deep with a seamless flow from footpath and tropical garden, through the sitting and bed area, then bathroom with spa and garden rainshower. In between it's cool and stylish – all polished woods, daybeds and king bed swathed in crisp, white cotton.

Hayman is a deceptively large resort, with 244 room choices for sleeping, dozing, splashing or watching the yachts beating their way through the channels as you sip another tropical cocktail and plan which restaurant you will dine in that evening.

And plan you will, as Hayman's food is very, very good and, to do justice to the menu, you may need only a light lunch or a late brunch.

The seafood buffet in the contemporary, beachfront Azure restaurant, where breakfast is served each day, is superb.

Or forget that you thought the wild ducks cute, as they waddled through Azure from the beach looking for handouts (despite a strict no-feeding rule), and order the Peking-style duck from Oriental. Dinner on the verandah overlooking the pond, with rustling bamboo and waterfalls as dinner music, is wonderful.

I wasn't there for the weekly Chef's Table in the main kitchen, with a six-course menu and matching wines, nor for the Chef's Bench, with its tastings (for couples or threesomes) from that night's a la carte menu, but they are popular, so book ahead – as you should, too, for treatments at Spa Chakra, which is often booked out, despite the numerous treatment rooms and plunge pool, sauna and steam room.

It's all those couples, you see. When they're not taking romantic picnics on deserted sand spits, or seaplane flights over Whitehaven Beach, they're booking couples' rooms in the spa or in the timber pavilions by the beach, for massages – for two, naturally.

The writer was a guest of Creative Holidays.

The Sunday Telegraph