The slender midnight black Hilton pen waiting on bedside tables juxtaposes both the expansive Emerald Tower rooms in which they are found as well as the great expanse of the resort’s outdoor, beachfront courtyard with multiple pools, hot tubs, a restaurant and bar, and hundreds of lounge chairs laid out amidst a smattering of colorful umbrellas beckoning resort guests to sink down and…simply inhale the salty ocean air. The stretched horizon parallel with the ultra fine quartz sandy beach steps away is an extra gift, gravy, a bonus, the ultimate Cracker Jack prize for all of your hard work during the year.
The Hilton Sandestin Resort on Miramar Beach in South Walton is the gem in Florida’s emerald coast crown. It’s a place to become unwound, to recharge your batteries, to escape reality and remember why you fell in love with your mate many moons ago. The Hilton Sandestin is an spacious, luxurious, seaside spot to get away with friends, to leave it all way, way, way behind. The pens there waste nothing, they take up as little space in your beachfront utopia as possible.
The pen you’ll use to jot down your room service order, the order you’ll hang outside on your door handle in the moments just before you turn in for the night, is a delicate flower of a writing instrument that’s both present in your grasp but also barely there at all. It’s the physical incarnation of the worries, thoughts, cares and complications of your everyday life back at home — there but not there, fleeting, pushed aside while you decompress at the Hilton Sandestin. So go ahead and get the extra side of bacon and the crumb cake muffin, you’re on holiday after all, in one of the most serene spots in America — the calories don’t count in a place where the pens are this slim and the sun rises up over the Gulf of Mexico right out your patio window.
Take the Hilton pen with the silver belt around its waist to Seagar’s, order the shrimp and grits and a beefy steak to share, savor every morsel, and then use the pen to write a thank you note to Chef Dan Vargo and his staff because this will have been one of the greatest meals of your life, enjoyed during one of the prettiest and most relaxing hotel stays you’ll ever experience.
*OWTK was included on a Mancation press trip to the Hilton Sandestin in November of 2016. The pen was complimentary in my room, as it is in all rooms. The opinions expressed above are honest and unbiased, as always.
