The 339-room PGA National Resort & Spa in Palm Beach Gardens will complete a $5 million renovation at the end of December. All guest rooms will be lightened and brightened, and new marble foyers and halls, plus new granite bathroom countertops will be added. All five 18-hole championship golf courses will feature new putting greens and practice bunkers. And a Don Shula's Steak House, famed for its Angus beef steaks and wood-paneled sports-bar ambience, has opened on site.
Meanwhile, the world-class spa at PGA National (with the opening of the Bramham Institute, it has become the only teaching spa in the nation) offers 140 treatments, from cellulite contouring to Thai massage to aromatherapy. Or for seasoned golfers just off the links, how about a hand and arm "facial" designed to exfoliate, rehydrate, and diminish pigmentation on that ungloved, sun-parched hand? The spa has 19 massage rooms, six facial rooms, four wet treatment rooms (why not try a marine algae body wrap or a Moor Mud treatment?), and two hydrotherapy rooms. The spa's signature "Relaxing Waters of the World" is an outdoor pool collection whose mineral contents mimic, for example, the salts of the Dead Sea and the Salies de Bearn in the Pyrenees.
The resort's on-site restaurants complement the spa by offering a up to 25 percent of menu choices designated "spa cuisine," meals that are low in fat, cholesterol, and sodium. The Citrus Tree restaurant's entire menu is spa cuisine. --Barbara L. Brewer
Florida Keys & Key West Tourism Development Commission Jessica Fileger, sales manager (305) 296-1552 Fax: (305) 296-0788 www.flakeys.com
Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention and Visitors Bureau Maureen Lupo, national sales manager (954) 765-4466 Fax: (954) 765-4467 www.sunny.org
Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau Chuck Martinez, sales contact (305) 538-3000 Fax: (305) 539-3113 www.miamiandbeaches.com
Palm Beach County Convention and Visitors Bureau Benny Baez, vice president, marketing (561) 471-3995 Fax: (561) 471-3990 www.palmbeachfl.com