“Girl Next Door” and Playboy Playmate Bridget Marquardt reveals how she maintains her perfect bikini curves while hitting the world’s hottest beaches for a new Travel Channel adventure series.

Cooped up with a bevy of buxom blondes and sultry brunettes in the Playboy Mansion since 2002, E!’s “Girls Next Door” co-star Bridget Marquardt, 35, worked overtime to stay centerfold-perfect. She dutifully hit the palatial estate’s gym, and also stayed slim and trim by taking to the love shack’s backyard trapeze. But after seven years of comfortable bunny life, Hef’s longtime live-in leapt at the chance to shed her fluffy trappings, suit up in a string bikini, and flex her reality-TV muscles as the host of her own Travel Channel show, “Bridget’s Sexiest Beaches.” The adventure-centric series takes its scantily clad star and viewers to exotic coastal locales at sand-covered hot spots from Venice, Calif., to Jamaica.

It’s Marquardt’s first starring role. Ebullient, high-energized and camera-ready with a masters degree in communication, the stunning three-time Playboy cover girl and former UCLA broadcast journalism student smartly knows she relies heavily on her well-toned curves to put her at the top of Hollywood’s heap of host-worthy hotties. And she works hard to maintain her amazing physique.

Fresh from her recent mansion exit (she’s still set to appear in “Girls”’ sixth season this summer), the well-traveled Marquardt shares her secrets for keeping a taut, sexy beach body. Whether in the gym, on the shore, near a mountain or holed up at home, the busy star (who’s also producing “Beaches” and the upcoming horror flick “The Telling”) and born-and-raised California girl is never short on ways to pull a rabbit out of her hat of workout tricks.

Muscle & Body: “Beaches” is a natural fit for you. Has it allowed your adventurous side to come out?

Bridget Marquardt: It’s so much an adventure. We’ve done cliff jumping, hiking, volleyball on the beach, jet skiing, weight boarding. It’s been very cool. I’m getting my workout in, and I’m doing my dream job. What more could a girl ask for?

M&B: Is Hef supporting you in branching out?

BM: Oh, my gosh, Hef is so supportive. He got teary-eyed, telling me he was so proud of me and so happy for me.

M&B: How do you maintain a perfect beach body?

BM: I do a lot of different types of workouts. Now I’m doing trapeze bungee jumping, and it is amazing. It’s kind of Cirque Du Soleil style, where I have the trapeze bar but I’m attached by bungees. Three minutes of the bungee trapeze is the equivalent of walking a mile. It’s intense. I do it for about a half hour at a place called Hollywood Aerial Arts in L.A. And here at the mansion, we set up a trapeze right in the backyard. It’s not bungee, but I’m able to get all of my strength training. I do shoulder shrugs, I hang upside down on the bar and do abs, which I’ve gotten really good at. They’re very impressive. [Laughs]

M&B: Your schedule is hectic. How do you find time to work out?

BM: On the first leg of the trip, we barely had time for me to do a workout at all. When we got back I said, “That is not working for me. I cannot host a show called ‘Bridget’s Sexiest Beaches’ and be gone for three or four weeks eating and drinking and not being able to work out.” So on the second leg of the trip, they made it a point to either give me a later call time or finish early enough so I could get a workout in. It’s made a huge difference.

M&B: I’m sure you’re showing off your toned curves on the show.

BM: Oh, I’m almost always in a bikini or tiny little shorts and a sports bra. If I’m in a club, I’ll wear a dress. But it’s all about being sexy and fashion, so it’s rare that I’m covered up.

M&B: What’s your favorite exotic cuisine?

BM: [Laughs] Pizza is my nemesis. It’s my favorite food ever, and nearly everywhere — especially in Spain and Croatia —pizza’s huge. I had it probably five times a week. That’s dangerous!

M&B: Despite your diet and your travels, you manage to keep your workouts effective and varied.

BM: I try to keep it varied. My workout of choice would always be trapeze, because there are different things you can do when you’re doing that. I do trapeze for about an hour and 15 minutes to an hour and a half. When I work out at the gym at home, I try to keep it to usually an hour — maybe 45 minutes on the elliptical rider and then 15 minutes of abs and stretching. Jumping rope is more like a half-hour workout. I take about 15 minutes to do 500 jumps. If I throw in abs and 1,000 jumps, it’s about 45 minutes. It’s not something you have to do all at once. I usually do, like, 100 jumps, go answer a couple of e-mails, then come back and do another 100 jumps. You can’t do 1,000 jumps straight. I’m in pretty good shape, but I can do only maybe 300 at once and then I need a break. Once you build up your heart rate, then let it go down, then build it up again, that’s great for you.

I’ve also found that stretching is important. Sometimes when I can’t get in a workout, if I just lay down on the floor or bed in the hotel room and just stretch a little bit, I feel so much better.

M&B: Are you a fan of cardio?

BM: I feel that cardio is the most important thing you can do. If your abs and other muscles are all toned and there’s blubber over them, you’re never going to know it. Also, it’s the hardest part to do because you have to have the energy for it. Working out is definitely something you have to make part of your life and pencil in and motivate yourself to go out and do.

M&B: What has been your favorite adventure so far on “Beaches”?

BM: We went jumping off the cliffs in Croatia. It was so amazing. The cliffs were beautiful and we could see the endless, dark blue Adriatic Sea. It was a real liberating feeling. I’ve seen it in movies and magazines, and I hoped I’d do it but never knew we were going there.

On the Turks and Caicos islands, the sand and water is the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. The water is this gorgeous turquoise color, and the sand is not only white, it’s soft and powdery — it feels like talcum powder. It’s made from coral. I got to ride horses in the water there. We were in the water up to our knees. The horses were running and swimming — they loved it.

The sea trampoline is another great workout. It’s a water trampoline that you swim up to out in the ocean where it’s deep enough to do flips off of it. Then you swim back to it and do more jumps and flips.

M&B: What advice can you give women — and men — to achieve the best beach body possible?

BM: Don’t give up. Once you start seeing changes in your body, it gives you that confidence you need. Not only does [working out] help you physically, but emotionally, too —so get to the gym. And if the gym doesn’t work for you, you just have to experiment. Go hiking, do the stairs somewhere, jog at the beach. Find what works for you and what you truly like to do. Just starting the process will make you feel so much better about yourself.

M&B: You make working out sound fun.

BM: It should be. When you have to force yourself to go the gym or start a diet, you can’t maintain that your whole life. You have to make exercising fun so you can do it for the long haul.

Chris Mann is a writer and editor of the pop culture webzine Retroality.TV.