Ocean Drive Articles

The summer of 2004 saw a renaissance in rock 'n' roll that was spearheaded on both sides of the Atlantic by two very dynamic bands that reached back a few decades and let loose with debut albums that were at once anthemic, danceable, possessing of legitimate melodies and emotive, lyric-driven songs. That both were fronted by young men in their 20s who took their musical cues from the record collections of their older siblings (and in some cases, their parents) didn't matter. These were songs (and albums) that brought to mind British groups and artists of the '70s and '80s such as Queen, David Bowie, Elton John, The Smiths and The Cure.

Recently, I traveled to French Polynesia and received a crash course on everything I could ever wish to know about the Poe Rava (Tahitian for "black pearl"). While on this rather luxurious fact-finding mission, I cruised the atolls and inlets of Bora Bora and two of its neighboring islands aboard a yacht, experienced five-star luxury at one of the most sumptuous resorts in the Pacific, and got a topnotch education to boot.

Recently, I spent a week at Palmilla in Los Cabos, Mexico, and words from a song ("Flawless") by the Ones kept racing through my mind. Words like "grand" and "grace" and expressions like "beck and call" and "leaving nothing to be desired" perfectly summed up my stay at a resort that had only popped up on my radar when One&Only Resorts reopened these classy coastal casitas with an ultra-VIP 50th-birthday gala for John Travolta last February. Apparently, they'd just purchased the resort and then threw $80 million toward sprucing up what was already considered a top-notch getaway for those in the know (going back to the '50s when it was a favorite for the likes of everyone from Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower to Ernest Hemingway).