Island hopping: Caribbean spa travel guide

Jamaica: Ritz-Carlton Golf & Spa Resort Rose Hall

The spa at this montego bay resort is among the most polished and professional in the Caribbean. The locker room attendants were incredibly attentive--bringing me water and cool cloths in the steam room, then returning after ten minutes to take me to the cold plunge. And the therapists are well trained, both in executing and in explaining treatments.

The lengthy menu draws heavily on local plants and June Jacobs products. The signature Sugarcane Body Scrub (60 minutes, $135) is the most popular nonmassage service, according to spa director Samantha Telesford, though the Tropical Enzyme Body Polish (60 minutes, $135) is gaining. It's a scrub with lemon sugar granules, a wrap with papaya and pineapple enzymes, a grapefruit bath, and an application of citrus lotion that smelled great and left my skin soft.

Aesthetician Trecia Lunan didn't just follow the script but looked closely at my skin and suggested I swap the Ocean Elements Facial (75 minutes, $165) I'd booked for a Collagen Lifting one (75 minutes, $165). It was the right call: After the treatment, in which she used Academie Scientifique products and a cloth collagen mask, I looked unusually well-rested.

The 8,000-square-foot spa is what you'd expect from a Ritz-Carlton--neoclassical looks, blue-and-yellow color scheme, mahogany furniture--though it's leavened with rattan furnishings and bright flowers. Nice touches: high-thread-count sheets on treatment beds and warmed towels provided after the bath portion of the body polish. Treatments can also be given oceanside.

The 427-room resort is textbook Ritz-Carlton, too. The scale is grand, the grounds manicured, and the style traditional, though guest rooms are spiced up with vivid colors and geometric-patterned rugs, and food options with a "jerk center" on the beach along with the more formal restaurants. Service, too, generally meets the company's high standards, so its fans should feel at home here--Perhaps that (and the golf course) is why the resort does a booming weddings and conventions business. --A.A.

Rates $195-$2,500
Reservations 800-826-9430
Website www.ritzcarlton.com

Jamaica: Round Hill Hotel and Villas

The architecture at this old-school Montego Bay resort is colonial Jamaican--it was once a pineapple plantation and opened as a hotel in 1953--but the vibe is Nantucket South: old money, refined taste, nothing showy. The floors are mahogany rather than marble; the lighting, lanterns rather than chandeliers. Ralph Lauren has a rental villa and a home of his own here--probably because he was so at home with the resort's aesthetic--and he designed the Piano Bar and some of the guest rooms. The resort consists of 36 traditional hotel rooms, all oceanfront, and 27 two- to five-bedroom villas that hug the bougainvillea-splashed hillside up from Round Hill Bay. Most of these have glorious private pools, and all have part-time staff.

But the spa, added in 2002, feels like an afterthought. Built in an 18th-century guesthouse, it's a ten-minute walk from the rest of the resort. On the plus side, this means the spa pool is quiet--a boon as the villas attract many families with young children. But its seven treatment rooms aren't so much understated as undecorated, with plain white walls, no plants, and ghetto blasters on the floor. They're actually three larger rooms separated into smaller ones with partial walls and curtains--the setup reminded me of a hospital room. Your best bet is to book one of the four packages ($125-$260) that include a hydrotherapy treatment, as these are done in a lush outdoor space with the hydrotherapy tub, a rain shower, and a massage table.

The products and treatments are Elemis, but my therapist didn't seem to have undergone the usual Elemis training. She couldn't tell me anything about the products she used for my Exotic Coconut Rub and Milk Ritual Wrap (60 minutes, $100), a scrub with ground coconut followed by a wrap with Elemis's milk bath. She kept trying to twist my chin-length hair into Princess Leia buns but didn't place a bolster beneath my knees and failed to check in with me during the treatment or let me know when she was leaving the room. It was all the more surprising because service in the rest of the resort was so polished. --A.A.

Rates $550-$3,700
Reservations 800-972-2159
Website www.roundhilljamaica.com

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