Villa Amalia

Villa Amalia is a six-bedroom estate set into the hillside above Guana Bay, on the quiet east coast of Sint Maarten. It is built for a large group that wants hotel-level service without the hotel: two full-time chefs, an on-site guest manager, and daily housekeeping all come with the house. It rents as five or six bedrooms, for up to twelve guests.

What Amalia keeps on the property is unusual. There is an ocean-view fitness center, a spa area for massages, and a games room with ping-pong and billiards, so an early riser or a rainy afternoon is covered without anyone leaving the gate. The infinity-edge pool runs out toward the water, with loungers and shade around it.

Inside, the living space is open and full of light, and the terrace does most of the work: morning coffee, sunset cocktails, and the long dinners the chefs bring out. Each of the six bedrooms has its own bathroom, so a group this size never has to queue.

Guana Bay Beach is a short walk down the hill. It is a surf beach, open to the ocean swell and often deserted, where ten people would count as a crowd. Come for the waves and the quiet rather than calm swimming; the pool takes care of the swimming. Water-sports gear and bicycles are on hand at the villa.

Philipsburg, the island's capital, is about ten minutes away for duty-free shopping and the boardwalk. For dinner out, we send guests around to Big Fish at Oyster Pond, a seafood kitchen that has been drawing this side of the island since 2005. Princess Juliana Airport is around thirty minutes by car, across to the west coast.

The kitchen is stocked and the two chefs briefed before you land, so the first dinner is waiting. At $21,000 a week in low season for all six bedrooms, Amalia is the rare house you can land at, unpack once, and let run itself, the surf rolling in below while the kitchen takes care of the rest.