Iririki Island Resort & Spa: The Vanuatu resort with its own swim-up casino

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This was published 7 years ago

Iririki Island Resort & Spa: The Vanuatu resort with its own swim-up casino

By Sue Williams
Iririki Island Resort & Spa.

Iririki Island Resort & Spa.

The chips are down, and so is my luck. The croupier at my blackjack table smiles. Is it with glee or sympathy? It could be either; she's won the last 18 of our 20 hands. I only have a few dollars left for our final game but, despite the odds, I'm not too worried.

After all, I can feel the sun warming my back, see it glinting off the rippling turquoise surface of the Coral Sea all around me, and am enjoying the sensation of the warm waves lapping around my knees. What? Ah yes, I forgot to mention.

I'm on a tropical island in the tiny Pacific nation of Vanuatu that has its own little casino that, on good days – and let's face it, most of the days are good here – can be extended out into the sea.

Iririki Island Resort & Spa.

Iririki Island Resort & Spa.

Forget the swim-up bars that allow you to order a drink without leaving the pool (although this place has one of those too). Shun those gimmicky swim-up rooms of the Caribbean. This is special: the world's first swim-up casino outside of Vegas, with a blackjack table set out regularly in the shallows to allow seasoned punters to play while keeping their cool in the water, and clueless first-timers like me to have fun and barely even notice that they're losing money.

A great idea? You bet. It's a novel pastime at the newly refurbished, and just reopened, Iririki Island Resort & Spa, a holiday village on its own island, a three-minute ferry ride from the waterside capital Port Vila.

For Vanuatu, an archipelago of 83 volcanic islands just a three-and-a-half-hour flight from the east coast of Australia, is a country of many surprises.

Iririki Island Resort & Spa's swim-up casino is a novelty but it also offers a wide range of more traditional tropical holiday pastimes.

Iririki Island Resort & Spa's swim-up casino is a novelty but it also offers a wide range of more traditional tropical holiday pastimes.

A few weeks ago, for instance, it was named the fourth-happiest country in the world by the international Happy Planet Index, which measures each nation's sustainable wellbeing. It was beaten only by Costa Rica, Colombia and Mexico. Ten years ago, it even topped the chart.

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It's also the holiday home of Australians such as Cate Blanchett and breakfast TV guru Adam Boland, two people with redoubtable taste.

In the weird and wacky stakes, it does pretty well too. At the airport, one of the very first sights to greet you, apart from a local band serenading your arrival, is The Very Big Beer Bottle advertising the local Tusker brew in pride of place in the middle of the baggage carousel. Soon after, you'll discover Vanuatu is also the only place in the world to have an underwater post office, where snorkellers and drivers can post special waterproof postcards in a box in three metres of water at the marine sanctuary of Hideaway Island.

Even more bizarrely, the nation has among its people a group, this time on Tanna Island, who worship the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip. He visited Vanuatu with the Queen in 1974 and ever since they've believed he was the descendant of a Tanna spiritual ancestor, and is their modern-day messiah. Tony Abbott's veneration has nothing on theirs.

Yet much has changed recently on Vanuatu. After Cyclone Pam smashed into the country in March last year, many of the resorts and attractions were forced to close down for repairs, and airlines suspended flights while the buckled airport runway was fixed.

At Iririki, however, the Australian owners decided, rather than simply to patch up the damage, to close the resort down for over a year. They completely rebuilt much of the accommodation and the facilities, and made many new additions, the fun little casino with its soundproof karaoke room and its watery blackjack table among them.

Relaunched in May this year, now it's so shiny and new, there's only one element missing: the guests.

The word has still to get out that Vanuatu is back, bigger and better than ever, says one of Iririki's managers and the creator of its new casino, Melburnian Bernie Millman. "The cyclone had one positive effect in that it's made us all really improve and revamp everything here," he says. "The tourists will come back, we're confident of that, it's a true tropical paradise. But we're often not so good at telling our story."

At the picturesque infinity pool next to the bar and restaurant, with its open-air terrace looking out over the ocean, there are only two couples sitting sipping cocktails. Over on the other side of the island, the big four-tier pool with its cascades, bars and café, has just one woman sitting sunning herself in the shallows, drinking from a fresh coconut.

And at the resort's brand new spa, I'm one of a handful of customers. I choose whether to sit in one of the armchairs for a manicure or pedicure, with glorious views over the pristine rainforest to the sparkling water beyond, or to have a massage.

I opt for the latter and, after mentioning to the masseur, Junior, that I strained a muscle in my back the week before and it still really hurts, he takes one look at me, prods my back and then tells me the problem is that my hips are out of alignment. Five minutes later, after a few guided movements, he tells me I'll be right. And, astonishingly, I am.

He, it turns out, is also a fully qualified physiotherapist who trained in Adelaide. I simply can't resist visiting him every day of my stay.

Yet while Iririki is a great place for one of those fabulous holidays where you have spa treatments then sit by the pool with a good book or on the veranda of your beachfront faré catching the breeze and watching the boats go by, there's also plenty to do.

At Snorkellers' Cove, a five-minute walk from the main restaurant, markers show the best route out to catch the most intricate coral formations, the most brightly coloured fish and the best chance of catching a sight of the island's resident dugong.

By the four-tiered pool, there's a games room with table tennis and snooker tables, all of which can be wheeled out into the open air, as well as a kids' club with a full-time entertainer who is a champion hip-hopper. There's a full array of watersports too, including kayaks, catamarans, paddle boards and an introduction to scuba diving, as well as beach volleyball and soccer, and a surprisingly well-equipped gym.

In addition, there are regular cultural activities. Sam gives us a demonstration of the best way to pick a coconut, and a demonstration of all its uses, stripping its husk with his teeth. There are dancers, singers, live music every evening in the restaurant, a Melanesian traditional feast one night and a special Polynesian night another with dancers and massive seafood platters.

The resort has its own gardens from which much of the fresh organic fruit, vegetables and herbs come, and its own solar plant coming online soon. There are nature walks all around the island – as well as bikes to ride and buggies to summon.

Tours and attractions off-island can be booked through Iririki's guest services desk. The sunset cruises are always popular, as is turtle-feeding, trips to the active volcano on Tanna, ecotours kayaking down quiet rivers and village visits with greetings by the local chiefs. Thrillseekers have quad rides, horse-riding, the zipline through rainforest, abseiling down through the Cascades Waterfalls, jetboats and jetskis.

Fishing is another popular activity, but how hard can that be? On my first day, a school of about 50 tiny fish leap out of the water being chased by a giant Coorong which somehow mistimes his attack and ends up landing on the beach, not far from the barbecue.

I'm hooked, and in so many ways. Back at the water blackjack, by the time I ask for my final card, my hand adds up to 15 and I hope against hope it won't be more than six, to bust that magic goal of 21.

Briefly, I see a seven of diamonds before a sudden breeze snatches it off the table and into the water. I'm elated. But then the security man keeping watch on the proceedings paddles over to where the plastic card is floating, picks it up and wipes it dry. I'm done for, but I just can't help joining in the laughter.

TRIP NOTES

MORE INFORMATION

www.iririki.com

GETTING THERE

Air Vanuatu has direct flights from east coast Australian cities to Port Vila.

STAYING THERE

Iririki Island Resort & Spa is from $330 per night, with a variety of accommodation available from island to waterfront farés and deluxe family villas. Reservations: (03) 9326 6579 or hello@iririki.com

Sue Williams travelled as a guest of Iririki and Air Vanuatu

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