So, here we are. Nine posts in, and we have finally reached the point where this whole story began.

We are officially on our way to Croatia…

I did warn you we would take the scenic route.

We’re all packed—and, in fact, have been for the past week. I wanted everything sorted in advance so we could focus on George and his birthday without running around at the last minute trying to remember what we had inevitably forgotten.

Packing, however, was a mission in itself.

Sure, I’ve been on the swinging scene for longer than I would probably like to admit. I’ve done my fair share of parties, club nights, weekends away and swinger holidays.

But this one felt different.

SpicyMatch does an excellent job of building the anticipation and excitement while still not giving too much away.

The entire island is hired for two weeks and divided into two separate five-day, four-night stays: Week One and Week Two.

We were booked onto Week Two.

At this point, I was armed with precisely three pieces of information:

1. When and where we needed to catch the boat to the island—which wasn’t particularly helpful when it came to packing.
2. Clothing was optional, except at mealtimes.
3. Four of the nights would have different themes: Enchanted Forest, Cirque Bizarre, Steampunk and Glow Crazy.

The themed outfits weren’t mandatory, but they were all part of the experience—and if I was doing this, I was doing it properly.

When it came to packing, my first port of call was working out what I already owned.

I would never willingly admit this to Paul, but I have a frankly excessive collection of lingerie and bikinis. So, I started by rummaging through it all to see what could be repurposed for each theme. Once I had established what I already had, I headed to SHEIN to fill in the gaps and pull the outfits together.

In my opinion, dressing for themed nights in the swinging world is much easier for women than it is for men. We simply have far more options.

The most important thing, though, is dressing for yourself. Wear something that makes you feel sexy, but also something you’re actually comfortable in. There’s no point looking incredible if you’re going to spend the entire night pulling your outfit down, hoiking it up or worrying about whether your arse looks weird.

For men, it can be a little more difficult. There are far fewer options, and sometimes the choice seems to be:

Shall I wear my smart black boxers…or my other smart black boxers?

As a small but important side note: men, always wear a decent pair of boxers.

If a woman has dressed to the nines and is standing there looking incredible, the last thing she wants is a man stripping down to his oldest, most comfortable underwear—complete with a hole in the waistband. It’s not the vibe we’re going for.

I sent Paul a selection of outfit ideas for each theme, ordered everything and prayed to the SHEIN gods that it would all arrive in time.

It did—with a whole week to spare.

We were officially sorted.

I had also massively overpacked.

I took:

• Shorts and T-shirts—which never got worn.
• Around twenty bikinis—of which approximately four pairs of bottoms were worn, each for a maximum of a couple of hours.
• Four possible outfits for every theme—despite already knowing exactly what I planned to wear, because obviously I might have changed my mind.
• A different outfit for dinner every night—despite not making it to dinner on a single occasion.

I packed so many accessories that it looked as though I had raided my local Claire’s, along with more condoms and sex toys than any two people could possibly need in one week.

But I was prepared.

We had a 6 a.m. flight to Croatia, which meant George was staying at my mum’s the night before.

George loves staying with my mum. In fact, he seemed to think it was part of his birthday present—a full week of sleepovers at Nan’s house.

I know holidaying without your child can be controversial, but George certainly doesn’t miss out. He has three foreign holidays of his own this year. I also genuinely believe that part of what keeps our marriage strong is that Paul and I still actively date each other. We make time to remember that, as well as being Mum and Dad, we’re still a couple.

I dropped George’s bags at my mum’s when I picked him up from school, brought him home, made his dinner and then did the Scouts run.

After Scouts, I took him back to my mum’s—stopping at McDonald’s for a McFlurry for each of them on the way. I gave him a huge hug and kiss, gave my mum a hug and then left.

I had a brief moment of mum guilt on the drive home.

But before I had even reached the driveway, the music was blasting and I was officially in holiday mode.

Our original plan had been to throw something in the oven and get an early night.

However, a week earlier, I’d received an email from our favourite restaurant, Hawksmoor. It was celebrating its twentieth birthday and, for one night only, offering a special set menu at its original 2006 prices.

We all know I love a birthday celebration.

We already had childcare, so it almost seemed rude not to book it. Like fate, really.

I ran into the house, jumped in the shower, put on minimal makeup and threw on an easy Monday-night date dress—a little black number with my Superdry denim jacket. Fun, flirty, cute and casual.

Because it was a Monday, Hawksmoor was also offering £5 corkage if you brought your own bottle of wine. Paul grabbed a bottle of 19 Crimes red from the wine rack—which, in my opinion, is top-tier supermarket wine.

From walking through the front door to being changed and back out in an Uber took exactly twenty minutes.

It was official: we were child-free, on holiday and heading to our favourite restaurant.

The whole atmosphere in Hawksmoor is amazing. It’s a genuinely lovely restaurant and the staff are brilliant, but it still feels relaxed. It isn’t stuffy or pretentious in the slightest.

The special menu was three courses for £35 per person.

To start, I had the scallops, while Paul chose the potted beef with Yorkshire puddings.

For our mains, we both had the rib-eye and shared chips and the most indulgent macaroni cheese imaginable. Paul chose garlic butter with his steak, while I had the peppercorn sauce.

For dessert, Paul ordered the sticky toffee pudding and I had the salted caramel Rolos. I even saved him my last one.

The Rolos were amazing, but Paul definitely won the dessert round. I am still thinking about that sticky toffee pudding and will absolutely be ordering it the next time we go.

The conversation flowed. We talked about what we wanted to do on holiday, where we were in life and how everything was going.

Some of my favourite nights are the simplest ones: good conversation, good food and good wine.

When the bill arrived, it came to less than £100—including the tip—for three courses, a rib-eye steak each and a bottle of wine in one of our favourite restaurants.

We felt as though we had secured the bargain of the century.

We were having such a lovely night that we decided to stop at our favourite bar for a cocktail before heading home.

When we arrived, it was closed.

Perhaps that was fate intervening again because, let’s be honest, we were already in holiday mode. It was never going to be just one cocktail, was it?

Instead, we jumped into a black cab and headed home.

It had been the perfect night before our holiday—and the bottle of red and three-course meal meant we were tucked up and fast asleep before 9 p.m.

Which was useful, considering our alarm was due to go off five hours later.

Before we knew it, the alarm was going off and it was time to get moving.

Morning showers, teeth brushed, a quick cup of coffee—and then our taxi arrived.

The journey to Manchester Airport was quick. We had a completely uneventful bag drop, made our way through security, wandered around duty-free and eventually found somewhere for breakfast.

We began with our traditional early-morning airport drinks: black coffee for Paul and a lager for me.

I’m sure you have all realised by now that Paul is infinitely more sensible than I am.

To get everyone into the right mood and headspace, SpicyMatch had set us a selection of challenges to complete during the journey.

Take a nude while travelling.

Have your partner wear your underwear as a bracelet.

That sort of thing.

Participation was entirely optional, but I am always willing to take part in the fun.

So, I disappeared into the toilets to take a nude and surrendered my neon-pink Primark thong for Paul to wear around his wrist—which he did with pride.

I did try to convince him to lose his boxers too, but men’s Calvin Kleins are infinitely less discreet as a bracelet than one tiny thong.

When we left the restaurant, Paul threw me my favourite kind of curveball.

“I fancy a cocktail.”

Apparently, I had party husband on this holiday.

“Fantastic,” I replied.

Before he had the chance to change his mind, we headed straight to the Fever-Tree cocktail bar and ordered an espresso martini each.

I mean, it was still before 6 a.m. We needed our morning coffee.

Once we had finished our cocktails, we made our way to the gate.

The flight itself was completely uneventful.

Well, mostly.

I may have taken another nude in the plane toilet…

If I did, I promise there wasn’t a queue.

We landed in Split, sailed through passport control, collected our bags and climbed into an Uber bound for the small town where we would be catching the boat the following morning.

Driving through Croatia, I was completely blown away by how beautiful it was. Croatia had never really been on my travel radar, but even without the promise of a sex island and impending debauchery, I would definitely return. It is genuinely one of the most beautiful places I have visited in Europe.

It was around midday when we arrived at the hotel and, as expected, our room wasn’t ready. Check-in wasn’t until 3 p.m., so we dumped our bags and headed to the nearest seafront bar for a couple of drinks and some people-watching.

It was ridiculously hot, so we made our first—and possibly only—sensible decision of the holiday: we ordered a Sprite and a Fanta before moving on to the beer.

The location was perfect and the people-watching was even better.

We started playing spot the swingers, which, when you know what you’re looking for, is a spectacularly easy game.

The Week One guests were leaving the island that day, and we enjoyed watching them arrive back on the mainland—most of them looking considerably worse for wear after four nights of unadulterated indulgence.

There were also quite a few Week Two guests who had apparently had the same idea as us and arrived in town the night before.

We were all in a group chat for the island, so we mentioned that we had arrived and were having a drink at the bar. Before long, a Swedish couple and their female friend came to join us.

We spent the next few hours chatting, swapping stories and getting to know one another until 3 p.m., when our room was finally ready.

That could only mean one thing.

Nap time.

Yes, we love to party—but we also love a nap. We’re over forty now; we need to pace ourselves.

We had been awake since 3 a.m., and there was a pre-island social arranged for that evening.

When we checked in, the room was beautiful. It was enormous, with a bed that could comfortably have slept five people, a huge walk-in shower and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the harbour.

It was definitely a step up from my usual Premier Inn, somewhere to rest your head standard.

One of the couples from the group chat had managed to arrange for a local restaurant to host a group of swingers from all over the world for food and drinks that evening.

So, that was our evening sorted.

When Paul and I woke up from our nap, we decided to have showers and start getting ready.

Somewhere between showering and getting dressed, however, we became a little distracted.

Paul ended up taking me from behind while I looked out through the floor-to-ceiling windows at the beautiful harbour view.

I honestly thought the windows were tinted.

It wasn’t until we had finished that we noticed a boat moored in the marina with around twelve men standing on it, watching us.

They gave us a round of applause.

Luckily, we’re both exhibitionists and found the entire thing completely hilarious.

Once we had recovered from accidentally putting on a live show for the harbour, we finished getting ready.

I wore a white minidress with the Kurt Geiger bag George had bought me for my birthday and a pair of gold Primark sandals. Paul wore denim shorts and a white Bad Religion T-shirt.

We stopped for an ice cream on the way to the restaurant and arrived at around 7 p.m.

We were among the first people there—because apparently different countries have very different interpretations of what on time means.

We’re British. If you tell us to arrive at around 7 p.m., we will be there at 7 p.m.

Probably 6:55, just to be safe.

It turned into a fabulous night. Everyone arrived in dribs and drabs between around 7 and 10 p.m., and the evening was filled with drinks, conversation and people getting to know one another.

There was a Spanish couple on their honeymoon and an American woman who had won the holiday despite never having been swinging before. There was an Italian couple who had been in the lifestyle for years, and a Canadian couple who now lived in the Middle East.

It was a complete melting pot of nationalities, cultures and life experiences—all brought together in the same place with one shared goal:

To have the time of our lives.

I was chatting to one of the women there when she suggested that we all move on to another bar once the restaurant closed.

It was around midnight by then, and I was nowhere near ready to call it a night.

She and I headed down to the bar first and ordered a bottle of Prosecco while we waited for everyone else—including our husbands—to follow.

There was definitely some heavy flirting going on.

We were the only two people in the bar and, somehow, we ended up making out.

It was so fucking hot.

More than anything, I felt completely free.

Before long, I was on my knees beneath the table, pleasuring her while she attempted to continue drinking her Prosecco. I could feel her squirming against my tongue.

Our husbands were the next people to arrive.

“Are you two staying out of trouble?” they asked.

They definitely knew we weren’t.

She returned the favour, and I can honestly say that, before that night, I had never been eaten out in a bar.

At that point, I knew one thing for certain:

This was going to be an incredible few days.

More and more people began joining us. Paul and I naturally drifted into separate conversations, chatting to different people and getting to know more of the group.

Paul had been chatting to a Canadian couple who would go on to become firm friends of ours over the following week. He shouted me over to introduce us.

And credit where credit was due: Paul had done it.

He had managed to find a couple who were both our types.

Hank was fifty, six feet tall, bald and solidly built. Britney was forty-two, petite, ginger and a gymnast.

They were both stunning.

We hit it off immediately and were soon laughing and joking as though we had known one another for far longer than twenty minutes.

When (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life from Dirty Dancing began playing, Britney announced that she wanted to attempt the lift.

I knew at that exact moment that we were going to be firm friends.

She was definitely my kind of woman.

Another woman in the group, Karolína from the Czech Republic, volunteered to take on the Patrick Swayze role.

Britney took a running leap.

Karolína attempted to catch her.

And we ended up with a small pile of women in the middle of the bar’s dance floor.

By that point, it was around 2 a.m., and Paul and I decided it was probably time to return to the hotel.

Hank and Britney were staying at the same place, so they walked back with us, accompanied by a very handsome Black man they had met that evening.

They disappeared into Hank and Britney’s room.

We went back to ours.

We both fell asleep the moment our heads hit the pillows, exhausted and genuinely excited to discover what the next few days on Spicy Island had in store for us.