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Heavenly Splendor
01/01/2010
HEAVENLY SPLENDOR AT THE JW MARRIOTT IHILANI RESORT & SPA
KO OLINA, Hawaii –You speed there on the freeway, 25 minutes from the airport, 35 minutes from Waikiki. You peel off the exit ramp, bank into the big turn and suddenly something happens – everything is emerald green with hillsides of brilliant bougainvillea. You stretch out toward the shore, sigh deeply as you ease into the manicured lawns and golf greens, the waterfalls and lagoons of Ko Olina Resort. It's like jetting to another island, a place where time is hushed, no longer rushed.
In all the vast lush oasis of 640 acres, there is one hotel, the JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa. The hotel presides over a championship golf course, a yacht marina and a blue Pacific shoreline scalloped in seven magnificent coves.
Each of Ko Olina's four coves has a golden sand beach smiling on a turquoise lagoon, an embrace of lava promontories and a guardian reef at the entrance. They are the four finest swimming beaches on Oahu. The ocean on this undeveloped side of the island is clear as a song, the home of dolphins that leap and spin in the gentle waves. The grinning cetaceans are so common, tour boat skippers offer a money-back guarantee if you don't see one. In eight years, they've only had to pay up twice.
For landlubbers wanting to get up close and personal with some of the Island's sea creatures, the JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa offers guests the opportunity to feed, touch and interact with sharks, sting rays, sea urchins, starfish and other marine life in the resort's saltwater Hawaiian ponds. The interactive programs educate as well as delight as participants wade into the ponds' shallow depths and encounter the ponds' inhabitants. Don't be surprised if you receive a friendly kiss from a stingray, or a welcoming and gentle slap upon your legs as it passes.
When the breezes blow in from the ocean, blizzards of fragrant white plumeria blossoms snow on the golf course. Flower showers are one of the game's hazards. The course also has seven holes with water hazards, and to get from the eleventh hole to the twelfth, you pass beneath a waterfall. Fleets of black swans swim in the brooks and play in the cascades, emerging in the sunlight dewy and damp, as if gilded in silver.
This hint of magic and illusion is everywhere, and it restores the urban-weary soul to a state of wonder. The Ihilani Spa enhances the mood with its offerings of traditional Hawaiian healing and rejuvenation treatments -- ancient lomi lomi massage and an island floral herbal wrap. The honored practices of Asia are incorporated in neuro-emotional therapies. You may try tai chi or a Ihilani cool ti leaf wrap. European spa treatments are also featured.
The sense of taste is celebrated in many ways at Ko Olina. JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa's signature Azul restaurant features unique and creative cuisine prepared using fresh herbs and vegetables specially grown for the resort. Fish is caught off the magnificent clear blue Hawaiian coast, and delivered fresh daily. Because this is the rural side of Oahu, the farms are only minutes away. It doesn't get much fresher. The hotel's Naupaka Terrace has a daily breakfast buffet and serves American luncheon and dinner favorites along with critically acclaimed Hawaii regional cuisine. The otherworldliness of Ko Olina really blossoms at JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa's traditional Japanese restaurant, Ushio-Tei, built around a serene Japanese courtyard garden. While the food is authentic, and reflects the finest culinary heritage of Japan, it is translated into a unique dining experience, even for those who have never ventured so much as a sushi, or sampled the lacy delicacy of shrimp tempura.
Just down the shore from the hotel, a couple of coves away, the Paradise Cove Luau erupts nightly in a great feast of traditional Hawaiian food mixed with heretical but delicious American fare. A spectacular Polynesian revue is staged during dinner. The pageantry and games recall a time when kings and queens walked this land and outrigger canoes by the hundreds set out to sea for fishing and sport.
Keiki Beachcomber Club, the children's program focuses the fun around a different theme each day. Activities are centered on art, nature and culture. Every child gets cookies and milk sent to the room at night. In the Hawaiian tradition, each child is recognized as a special gift, a rare and beautiful flower.
JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa at Ko Olina is on the most Hawaiian side of the island, where the culture is strong and the elders pass their stories, song and dance to the next generation in daily acts of grace. Resort guests notice immediately the warm aloha shirt hospitality, the friendliness and smiles from every member of the JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa associates.
Local crafts people and musicians come to share their talents, singing and strumming ukuleles by the poolside or weaving leis in the lobby.
JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa has fine restaurants, activities, sports, and even shuttles to Honolulu's shopping malls and Waikiki Beach. And yet, it is a destination complete in itself, an island within an island, where the sky each morning is pale pink and the seven lovely bays murmur from their sleep, stirring in gentle waves. Almost all the rooms have ocean views that look out on coconut palms, the shimmering sea and the ruffle of coves. Sunsets are dramatic tangerine extravaganzas serenaded by hundreds of birds gathered each evening in the trees. And then the avian cacophony settles into soft night breezes and a canopy of stars. The name Ihilani means "heavenly splendor." It's easy to understand why.
The JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa at Ko Olina is an award-winning resort that fronts the first of four lagoons on Oahu's sunny western shore. Part of the 640-acre Ko Olina Resort & Marina and offering the island's most complete resort experience, the hotel features luxuriously appointed rooms; relaxed Hawaiian elegance; gracious, warm personalized service; secluded beaches; professional tennis courts; 18 holes of challenging championship play at Ko Olina Golf Club; and a variety of restaurants showcasing unique and distinctive international cuisine. Heralded as the "Best Luxury Hotel" and "Best Place to Get a Massage" in the islands by readers of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, the JW Marriott Ihilani Resort & Spa is home to NFL's crème de la crème during the annual all-star Pro Bowl game in Hawaii.
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For More Information, call (808) 531-0244:
Bernie Caalim, Senior Vice President or
Sumithra Balraj, Senior Account Executive
McNeil Wilson Communications
1001 Bishop Street,
Pauahi Tower, Suite 950
Honolulu, Hawaii 96813
E-mail:
bcaalim@mcneilwilson.com
sbalraj@mcneilwilson.com