- Trident Hotel welcomes with a sense of serenity.
If you are looking for a destination wedding location that will mark you as a trend-setter—a pioneer, almost—you might want to think about Port Antonio, Jamaica.
Building on a legend that grew out of the 1950’s, when just about everyone in Hollywood visited (usually at the invitation of actor Errol Flynn, who owned his own hotel here), this now sleepy area on Jamaica’s northeast coast—where the Blue Mountains tumble down to some of the prettiest, most pristine beaches on the island—is experiencing a rebirth of hotel hipness.
The private cove at Trident Hotel is where to start looking for AWOL guests.
It started a few years ago with the opening of the seven-room (three of them in one private villa) Geejam Hotel, which is as much house party/recording studio as mountain hideaway. Alicia Keys, Bjork, No Doubt, and Snoop have all checked in, and Grace Jones famously wrote in the guest book, “I came. I saw. You conquered me.” And the hipness continues to grow, with the addition of two more properties to the newly formed Geejam Collection.
The first of the properties, the Trident Hotel, is almost Balinese in its minimalist, upscale, serenity. Each of its 13 rooms (which are really villa-like suites, as we discovered during a soft-opening visit), looks out on a private slice of sea. The restaurant, Mike’s Supper Club, features regular sessions where local musicians sit down with their instruments and at the Ferrari-red piano. If you can’t find someone who has gone AWOL from scheduled wedding events, the first place to look for them is on the private beach at the sandy, secluded cove a few steps from the rooms. The only thing we’d change, if we were going to use the lawn by the pool for an event space, would be to ask that the sculptures of sheep be removed to a less prominent location. After all, you want your guests to focus on you.
Trident Castle, once a private home, allows you to invite up to 400 guests to your wedding.
A seaside path away (past the helicopter landing area), the Trident Castle appears old-money enough that it wouldn’t look out of place among the mansions of Newport, Rhode Island. Which is a good thing, because it isn’t really a castle, but was originally a private (40,000 square foot!) residence whose construction didn’t begin until 1979. Although the Castle is not yet entirely refurbished, possible event venues are everywhere, from the little chapel on the expansive grounds, to terraces overlooking the sea, to the grand, high-ceilinged Main Hall.
As an indication of how serious Geejam is about weddings, they’ve got a range of packages for each property, beginning with The King & I renewal at the Trident Castle, for $1,299 for up to five people. But they’ll listen to anything you propose, including a royal-worthy extravaganza in the castle for up to 400 guests.
When you want to make a grand statement about your wedding, consider the Main Hall.
After our visit to Port Antonio, we concluded that a gathering of 400 would go against the spirit of the area, not to mention that there probably aren’t enough hotel rooms within easy driving distance. But if we did have a big crowd, we’d ensconce the bridal party and closest guests in the Castle’s eight bedrooms, and spread out other guests among the rest of the Geejam Collection and other local accommodations.
Have we mentioned, as all travel writers seem obligated to, that Port Antonio is the birthplace of jerk chicken, and that part of the 1988 Tom Cruise film Cocktail was filmed here—at a restaurant/bar by a natural pool called the Blue Lagoon, that Geejam plans to have refurbished by this summer?
Those points duly recorded, the main drawback to Port Antonio, and the reason it has remained relatively untouched, is it’s not the easiest place on the island to get to. A local airstrip can handle small charter planes, but other than that you have to go by road 120 miles along the north coast from Montego Bay, or 55 miles over the Blue Mountains from Kingston. But not such a huge challenge, perhaps, for pioneers.
To contact Geejam’s wedding team call 1-876-633-7100 or -7200 or weddings@geejam.com — Bob Payne
The main hall at Trident Castle, dressed up for a wedding
