On Richard Branson's private island, Max Anderson finds a resort where Nusa Dua meets Noosa.
Let's do a word-association test. When I say "billionaire's private island" and "$7900 a night", what sort of picture comes to mind?
However wild your imagination, I'd stake the personal fortunes of Richard Branson and Brett Godfrey that your mental snapshots look nothing like Makepeace Island.
The $7 million resort on Makepeace Island has Noosa River views and Balinese styling.
In July, the cashed-up cohorts opened their heart-shaped island on the Noosa River to the public. With a minimum of eight people (and a spare eight grand) or a maximum party of 22 (and a not inconsiderable $14,990), the island and its 11-room retreat is yours for a night. The cost includes staff, chef and everything you can eat; alcohol is extra.
Makepeace Island is one of Australia's most expensive single-ticket accommodations. Once called Pig Island, the 10-hectare patch of gum trees and mangroves sits in the broad, estuarine waters of the Noosa River. Small fishing boats buzz past it and from certain vantage points you can see riverbank holiday homes and even the busy car-ferry that lies upriver.
The island has been occupied by a reclusive old woman named "Shotgun Hannah" Makepeace, coteries of hippies and an artist. In 2003, the Virgin boss and the then-chief executive of Virgin Blue bought the island and, after much argy-bargy with the council, spent more than $7 million importing the fabric (and in some cases, actual pieces) of a Balinese resort.
Yes, a Balinese resort. When you step off the 10-minute boat ride from Noosa Marina, your mental pictures of the billionaire's hideaway are torn to shreds: no Bond villain's Piz Gloria, no high-tech Taj Mahal, no glass edifice that lifts from the mangroves at a touch of button.
I'm surprised because it is so very familiar. There are thatched roofs, great slabs of hardwood and lofty coconut palms. There is a two-storey, open-sided wantilan (communal space) that looks down on a lagoon pool of the purest china blue. And all about are signature Balinese touches putting the Nusa Dua into Noosa Queensland, including stone Hindu sculptures, brightly coloured silks and Javanese day beds.
I'm doubly surprised because - well, how to put this politely? If an Australian entrepreneur had gone to Branson and said, "I'm building a $7-million resort in the Lake District and the Brits are going to love it because it's in the style of a Majorcan hacienda," I suspect he might have had something to say.
The billionaire co-owner says Makepeace is a paean to the good times the owners have enjoyed in lives past. But is it a misstep? It's hard to say because when they built it they weren't second-guessing a market, they were building a getaway for themselves and senior Virgin employees.
As Branson said: "We've never run our properties like a hotel. You run them like you're coming to somebody's home - which is effectively what [this] is . . . The advantage of an island is you can party as hard as you like without complaints from the neighbours."
So they wanted a place to kick back and play up - and clearly it has been used for such. Instead of an uptight shimmery-shiny resort, this place has been lived in and pre-loved. It's languid, open, comfortable - in fact, before you know it, Makepeace is working some sly magic.
The breezy Balinese structures, many located at the end of elevated timber walkways, lend themselves perfectly to the semi-tropical climes.
The best-placed Makepeace residents find themselves in either Branson's Bali House (a four-room building with separate decks and en suites) or Godfrey's smaller, elegant two-room retreat. Some central accommodation loses out on the riverine views but the fixtures are all showpiece quality with lots of polished stone, carved wood and some funky bathroom amenities.
Yes, there's a paucity of excess (except perhaps for the extraordinary bath in Godfrey's bure, hand-hewn from a solid boulder), but there's nothing missing that the hedonist should need: egg-shaped wicker lounges suspended over the pool, a hardwood bar that is longer than an airport runway and four-poster beds with copies of the Kama Sutra on bedside tables. Don't worry, it is more wry humour than tacky tantric, though it soon becomes clear that this was a bolthole designed to be the antidote to the boardroom.
Naturally, there's the tennis court, the theatre room and the 15-person spa, but there's also the "aircraft carrier". It's a steel barge (presumably left over from the build) that is loaded up with music, booze, food and a fire pit before dutifully chugging around the starlit island while guests do some water-borne partying.
Barge shenanigans aside, it is all well screened by vegetation and, as your coterie gets into the swing of indulging and being indulged, you soon forget that the real world isn't terribly far away.
The island staff are, for want of a better word, brilliant. They're affable, accessible and imbued with Queensland outdoorsiness: ask them about the fishing and they know exactly where to drop a line or trap a mud crab. They have a knack for being in the right place holding the right bottle at the right time.
The manager, Nick Jones, is also the resort chef and he acquits himself superbly on my visit, completely unfazed by cooking for a dozen visitors (not to mention the knight of the Virgin realm, who was hosting at the time), with big Queensland ocean fish being given some subtle Asian treatment.
Guests can easily avail themselves of local attractions, including the restaurants of Noosa Heads or the seemingly endless sand highway north to Fraser Island. But given the clientele being pitched to, one suspects marlin fishing and diving the southern extent of the Great Barrier Reef will also be in demand.
At the end of the day - indeed, at the end of an $8000 day - there is a simple truth that will probably become evident to those who occupy Makepeace. Whether you're a billionaire, multimillionaire or a plain old millionaire, you don't need a Bond villain's hideaway to unwind; a little well-tailored privacy on an island you can call your own will do just fine.
Max Anderson travelled courtesy of Makepeace Island.
FAST FACTS
Getting there
Virgin Australia flies to Sunshine Coast Airport from Sydney (from $99 one way) and Melbourne (from $145 one way). Noosa is a two-hour drive north of Brisbane or 30 minutes from Sunshine Coast Airport.
Staying there
The entire Makepeace Island resort can be occupied on an exclusive basis from $7900 a night (one to eight guests, low season) to $16,890 a night (22 guests, high season). This includes breakfast, lunch and dinner daily, non-alcoholic drinks, transfers from the airport to Noosa Marina, river transfers to Makepeace Island, a cruise dinner, non-motorised activities (kayaks and hobie cats), water-skiing and fishing using the island's tinny. See makepeaceisland.com.
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