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Tidal suites: Luxury beachfront lodgings
At these top spots, sand is the only thing between your room and the water
 Turtle Inn Placencia Belize’s Turtle Inn Placencia features cabanas with bleached palapa roofs ten steps from the water.
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Petit St. Vincent, The Grenadines
Here's a place where you could easily spend your entire vacation between your room and the beach. The 113-acre private island is home to 22 cottages, and numbers 6 through 11 are steps from the water. Each ultra-private stone cottage (sans TV and phone) features a wooden sundeck, living room and bedroom. You can beckon staff using a flag system: Hoisting yellow signifies you want something (piña coladas, a picnic set up on the beach, sunscreen), while red means "Do Not Disturb." Eat. Sleep. Beach. Repeat.
Book: Cottages 6 to 11
Rates: From $635 in low season ($960 high)
Contact: 800-654-9326; www.psvresort.com
Cabañas la Conchita, Tulum, Mexico
Step into your cabaña from the sandy courtyard and turn the clock way back. Candles sub for electricity (6 p.m. to 10 p.m. only), and you won't find a TV or air conditioning anywhere in sight — just back-to-basics living 20 paces from the water's edge with a solar-heated shower, a comfortable bed with voluminous mosquito netting and a patio hammock for listening to the slip slap of the surf. Everything else you need — drinks, eats, water sports — is a short walk away along a gorgeous beach.
Book: Cabaña No. 1
Rates: From $110 including breakfast in low season ($160 high), cash only
Contact: 888-582-9848; www.differentworld.com
Bucuti Beach Resort, Aruba
A stay at the Euro-chic, 104-room Bucuti Beach Resort will put you on the white sands of Eagle Beach, the low-rise alternative to Palm Beach. You'll want one of the 36 oceanfront Tara Beach Suites, which have up-to-date amenities, kitchens, living rooms and primo views. If you get thirsty while sunbathing, simply plant a handy flag in the sand, and a bar attendant comes to take your order. Now that's what we call service.
Book: Tara Beach Suites
Rates: $375 in low season ($495 high)
Contact: 011-297-583-1100; www.bucuti.com
Cape Santa Maria Beach Resort, Long Island, Bahamas
You're practically sleeping on the sand at this charming Long Island gem. From the 20 one-story bungalows it's a hop across the boardwalk to the resort's private beach (which, by the way, is 4 miles long). Each one-room Bahamian-style unit has a private veranda, air conditioning, coffee maker and minifridges; larger parties can book a two-bedroom condo (ask for a bottom-floor unit in these two-story buildings). The Beach House restaurant provides a superb sunset-watching perch.
Book: Bungalows
Rates: $235 to $595 in low season ($325 to $795 high)
Contact: 800-663-7090; www.capesantamaria.com
Emerald Palms Resort, South Andros, Bahamas
First you have to get yourself to funky Congo Town airstrip; then head north to the village of Driggs Hill. By then you know you're someplace way, way off the beaten track. Emerald Palms, in a grove beside a beach that goes on for 5 miles, has been around for years but is now blossoming under new management. Its 22 motel-like cottages line up in two neat rows at right angles to the beach, so only two rooms and two oceanfront villas let you step directly onto the sand. A backwater the location may be, but the accommodations are kitted out with refinements like canopy beds, marble floors and whirlpool tubs.
Book: Oceanfront one-bedroom villa or Rooms 101 and 102
Rates: From $395 in low season ($495 high)
Contact: 800-504-1794; www.emerald-palms.com
InterContinental Presidente Cozumel Resort Spa, Cozumel
The 63 Beachfront Superior rooms and Reef Suites Deluxe at this recently renovated five-star resort offer direct access to la playa, as well as amenities like flat-screen TVs, coffee makers, outdoor shower areas and private terraces with loungers, gliders and hammocks. The 1,400-square-foot reef suites are more expensive, but for snorkel fanatics these rooms also offer primo entry to the National Marine Park.
Book: Beachfront Superior rooms and Reef Suites Deluxe
Rates: Beachfront rooms from $307 in low season ($542 high); reef suites from $847 in low season ($1,308 high)
Contact: 888-424-6835; www.ichotelsgroup.com
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Turneffe Island Lodge, Belize
You want escape; you get Escape. For starters, you can only get here twice a week, Wednesdays and Saturdays, and only by boat, a 35-mile trip. (You could, of course, charter a helicopter, but that's not quite in the spirit of such an eco-oriented, idyllic spot.) Picture a circular cay, 14 acres in all, with an expanse of sand larger than a football field at one end, a tropical copse at the other, and somewhere among the sea grapes and palms a 12-room, eight-cabana resort. There's no TV, no radio, no phones, no Internet, and your shower is heated by solar panels. Fishermen and divers love Turneffe, but so will romantics who don't mind fish talk or family-style dining — there's all day for billing and cooing and hoping Saturday and Wednesday never come.
Book: A cabana
Rates: From $864 in low season ($1,000 high), including meals and a few extras
Contact: 800-874-0118; turneffelodge.com
The Reef Resort, Grand Cayman
Most of Grand Cayman's sites and activities are on the island's most popular stretch, Seven Mile Beach, but over on East End Beach, the Reef Resort enjoys exclusive frontage on 1,600 feet of isolated, sandy white shoreline. All 110 suites (42 more will open in July) have beachfront views, and those on the first floor of the three-story hotel deliver max beach exposure. The simple but elegant resort was renovated in 2004, adding a second pool and palapas on the sand. Studios, one- and two-bedroom units come with premium facilities like kitchens and Jacuzzis.
Book: A first-floor suite
Rates: From $205 in low season ($290 high)
Contact: 888-232-0541; thereef.com
La Samanna, St. Martin
The 81 rooms and suites here are top-drawer elegant, the bluff-side restaurant is drop-dead romantic, the grounds are a floral kingdom, and Baie Longue, on which this legend is perched, really is long. The owners, Orient-Express, have just installed estate-wide Wi-Fi, a new infinity pool, beach cabanas and a beach lunch bar. What more could you want? Easy beach access, of course. Guests in the four-story Main House have great views, but it's a bit of a hike to the beach. Savvy sand lovers check in to ground-floor suites tucked among the sea-grape trees, just 20 paces from the turquoise bay.
Book: One-bedroom Suites A12, A14, A20, A22
Rates: From $1,095 in low season ($2,100 high)
Contact: 800-854-2252; lasamanna.com
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