Kevin and Celia Bennette have been together for 15 years and have three young children Max, Luca, and Sophia. The family flew to Saint Lucia on a ‘Big Bennette Break’, and what was intended as a holiday turned out to be the trip of a lifetime for all of them!
The age-old mantra, “work hard to play hard,” has never felt more pertinent than in the last 12 months. Like so many parents, my wife and I have been caught up in a frenetic flurry of balancing full-time jobs with family life, and all the demands that come with that. Fortunately, the hard work has paid off, and to mark my latest promotion we decided to treat our family of five to a ‘Big Bennette Break’— and it certainly was bigger, brighter, bolder, and better than any of our family holidays that have gone before.
Deciding where to go was a relatively easy choice for us. My wife, Celia, is something of an avid travel reader, and can be found most nights perusing the world wide web in search of worldwide destinations on her phone! Time and again she has elbowed my ribs and flashed me images of the sun-kissed shores of the Caribbean, and more often than not, those same images are of one place in particular — sunny Saint Lucia.
And yes, I can confirm that this saintly island was nothing short of heavenly!
So we turned those static small screen images into a lively reality. We packed our bags, rounded up the kids, and headed off in pursuit of this Piton-peaked paradise. Aside from the stunning resort that had every imaginable activity and catering option available (a huge plus when you have three very different yet very strong-minded kids to appease), the diversity of the island itself was also simply staggering.
The skies are blue, the landscape is green, and the sands are golden. The local smiles charm, the weather warms, and every day paves the way for a new adventure! We honestly couldn’t have hoped for more from a holiday and the kids have done nothing but talk about it ever since, which itself is magical as we know we’ve made memories that will stay with them long into adulthood. I guess that’s what’s so special about Saint Lucia, it transcends time and place as it lives long in the minds of those who share in it.
Our eldest, Max, has discovered a deep love of the ocean following his swims and snorkelling most mornings, and Luca (the most outdoorsy one) was right at home in the natural pools of the Sulphur Springs. Meanwhile, Sophia, the youngest of our Bennette brood, fell deeply in love with the sweet treats that greeted us on our chocolate tour and now fancies herself as something of a chocolate connoisseur. Going horse riding on the beach altogether proved fun for us all, and the kids had found my clumsy dismount extremely entertaining.
For Celia and I, so much of our enjoyment came from seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces every minute of every day, plus their genuine enthusiasm for immersive experiences afforded us both some much-needed downtime. We didn’t need to entertain them, the island did that for us, which left us free to just be in the moment, and best of all, just be together.
