Bathing Suit / Hat

Two years ago, my friend Bailey brought me on a trip to Cancun on hotel points, so when the Ritz-Carlton, Amelia Island invited me and a friend for a visit to the lovely little island off of Florida, I returned the favor and brought her with me for a gloriously luxurious and relaxing long weekend.

There’s something so special about traveling with a girl friend and Bailey and I travel particularly well together. We caught up about life and had discussions about so many interesting things that our husbands would just never want to talk about (from our favorite denim brands to body image issues to how to handle money in our 30s). We wanted to eat the same things and do the same activities which make the weekend easy breezy and just a whole lot of fun.

Here are a few of the highlights and few of my favorite looks from the trip:

Bag / Sunglasses

The Beach

The property is located right on the beach so every morning after breakfast, Bailey and I would take an hour-long walk along the water where we caught up on life in a deep way, broke a little sweat, and soaked up some much-needed Vitamin D. While it wasn’t hot enough to swim, we enjoyed the long and pristine beach to the fullest.

Dress

The Spa

My absolute favorite part of the trip was my experience at the spa where I enjoyed their famous honey butter wrap. The therapist applied a honey, sea salt, coconut oil scrub that removed my dead skin, followed by a soothing warm hydrating body mask. While I was wrapped up with all of that goodness soaking in, the therapist gave me a warm hair scalp conditioning treatment (my hair has never been so soft), a scalp massage, and paraffin treatments on my hands and feet. As if it couldn’t get any better, all of that was followed by a 50-minute massage. I left that spa feeling like absolute mush. It’s two days later and my skin has never felt so soft!

Romper / Clutch / Necklace

The Food

The restaurants on the property were spectacular, especially our Top Chef-like culinary experience at Salt. We enjoyed the Chef’s Adventure Tasting menu, four courses with wine pairings that was a special and unique meal to say the least. My favorite course was a “steak and eggs” dish where we cooked our own center-cuts on a 400 degree block of salt and topped them with tiny quail eggs and three dipping sauces. We also loved the hotel’s fish restaurant, Coast that made a top notch lobster roll and treated us to some amazing breakfast buffets.

The Photo Concierge

I’ve never seen this before at a hotel but The Ritz had a photo concierge service where guests could hire a photographer for family photos, engagement photos, or, in my case, blog photos. I worked with Alissa who took all of the pics in this post. We had a blast together and she made the whole thing so easy. The quintessential “blogger laughs” in these photos were real because we couldn’t stop laughing during the shoot!

Shop my looks:

Photos by Alissa Williams. Thank you to everyone at the Ritz Carlton Amelia Island for providing us with a lovely weekend!