Beat your budget: Take your teens to Turks & Caicos beaches

By STEVEN McELROY

PROVIDENCIALES, Turks and Caicos — Lined up like chiles charring on the grill, our family of five takes the sun from a row of the beach equivalent of Barcaloungers. So comatose from the heat and the mesmerizing tickle of the sea's breeze, we barely note the activity around us.

Somewhere far, far away children giggle with glee, the waves whoosh on the sand, sails whap in the wind and paddles splash the cobalt water beyond. There's plenty of noise to stir us, but we're so relaxed not one of us can muster a movement. Suddenly, my youngest son, Nick, sighs the tiniest complaint, "I'm hungry, Mom."

I'm so far ensconced in dreamland that I can barely comprehend his words. Time passes and I sense him reaching for the cell phone that I was given when we first arrived. From the far regions of consciousness I hear

electronic beeps as he touch tones a number. Just as I wonder vaguely who he might be calling, he says, "Hello, Hilario. Can you please bring me a calzone?"

Instantly, we five spring to life. "And a mai tai," I say. "A sandwich," says my daughter. "Some sushi," says my eldest son.

Nick translates our chatter to Hilario, while the rest of us exchange embarrassed glances. You see, we're spending five days at Beaches Turks & Caicos, an upscale all-inclusive resort, and Hilario is our butler. Hence the cell phone. Just press a code, and he appears

We're not used to having a butler. But Hilario comes with the extra-large suite we chose to stay in so we can spread out and manage not to kill one another while we attempt to have a family vacation. And Hilario's cool — not like those formal, stiff-upper-lip butlers from Agatha Christie mysteries (though he did greet us upon arrival wearing white gloves).

Hilario's a wry, funny fellow from the Philippines with a most infectious grin. When we arrive, he whisks us away for private check-in (after our Beaches indulgent welcome of champagne and a cold wet wash cloth). He appears with cheese trays before we realize we're hungry, escorts us to dinner, unpacks our bags (only Nick takes him up on that), makes our bubble baths — and ensures we aren't disappointed with our stay.

But how could we be disappointed? To toast our bodies in this nirvana of a site, to wriggle our toes in sugary sand and gaze out to a veritable sea quilt of blue hues would be enough. But Beaches Turks & Caicos manages to enhance its location on Providenciales' Grace Bay's 12 miles of beach by inducing an element of fantasy that titillates even the most jaded vacationer.

Created by Butch Stewart, the man behind Sandals Resorts, Caribbean high-end, couples-only getaways, Beaches was born from comments Stewart received from people who wanted to vacation with their kids. It seemed that people sought a place that welcomed children, while still providing something luxurious and capricious for work-weary adults. And Beaches does just that — it's a Huck Finn world of a magical retreat, where kids roam in recreational, sensory overload heaven. (And adults relax the old-fashioned way — with a cocktail and book on a hammock near the sea.)

Empowered at Beaches Turks & Caicos, kids don't feel like they've tagged along on somebody else's vacation. They don't have to skulk about whispering or lurking in corners while adults have all the fun. Rather than a prescribed kid's club where kids are sequestered away out of sight, here kids roam the vast grounds and swim in the six pools, often unaccompanied by adults and often in packs of new friends they've made at the soda swim-up bar, at the bottom of the water slides or at the teen disco. Hungry snackers help themselves to self-serve ice cream, cotton candy, popcorn, pizza and sodas. Small Sesame Street fans swoon over Elmo and Cookie Monster who appear for character breakfast, story time, baby-sitting and cookie baking sessions. Older children move like human tornados through the resort, attempting to experience every activity at least once before they are pulled kicking from Beaches at the end of their stay.

My own children's days pass in a frenzy of activities. Each day is a dance card filled with suitors in the form of things to do. They take sailing lessons and graduate to such expertise that they captain their own craft and dart through the waves far from shore, waving only when they see me wringing my hands from the beach.

They paddle kayaks, windsurf, play beach volleyball, snorkel and sweat through muggy games of tennis. My daughter spends an entire morning getting her hair braided in the spa. Everyone takes a diving refresher course and joins the twice-a-day dives to underwater canyons, shipwrecks and coral reefs. (The Turks and Caicos has the third largest coral reef system in the world and is considered one of the Caribbean's best dive sites.)

And sometimes they actually come home to roost with us on our beach chairs, resting between activities, taking the time to talk about things that had slipped their minds at home.

All that action makes for some boundless appetites. And my teenagers can eat — just ask their dad, who pays a king's ransom for our grocery bill. What they love most about this place is the unfathomable fact that they can gorge all day long, eat myriad types of food (there are 10 diverse restaurants) in tremendous quantities and of the quality they have come to expect from being born and bred in a foodie's paradise like Austin.

Even more titillating to all of them, especially to Nick, is the puzzling fact that "we don't have to pay." We explain to them that all-inclusive does not mean free but that for the sake of convenience, we have paid a sum in advance that includes absolutely everything.

Still, as they traipse across the resort for French pastries, towering plates of sushi, pizzas from a wood burning oven and Tex-Mex cuisine, I become convinced that my children have single-handedly chewed and digested Beaches' food budget for 2007.

They waste nothing and devour everything.

Our last morning, we linger at the beach, snorkeling and absorbing our final rays of Caribbean sun. At last, we force ourselves to head indoors to pack.

Hilario has offered to help, but we decide it's time to learn how to do things ourselves again. When we reach our taxi, we find Hilario has loaded our bags inside, but he's nowhere in site. Though we're running late, Nick refuses to climb inside the car. He seems to be waiting for something.

Suddenly, Hilario speeds around the corner, grinning broadly and balancing a tray above his head.

"Hilario," says Nick. "Thanks! You brought me a calzone!"