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St. John, USVI

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lazydeac

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I am looking at planning a trip to St. John and wondering if anyone has any tips on accommodations or other recommendations?

Planning on taking my family, so we probably need 2 bedrooms if possible, and a private pool would be awesome. Willing to consider a resort but not sure how cost effective that would be since there aren't many on the island.

If anyone has experience with planning a vacation there - let me know!
 
It's been almost 15 years, but we just rented a condo at Gallows Point, just above Cruz Bay - no pool.

Sister's family has stayed at Caneel Bay, but I think it's a bit pricey.
 
I'd second the Westin. We stayed there for 8 nights last August, though in just a hotel room, not a villa. Aside from the Westin and Caneel, most everything else is a rental, so I'd check VRBO, HomeAway, AirBNB, etc to see if something there meets your needs for price and space. The west end of the island around Cruz Bay is the most developed and therefore where everything is centered. There are some good places scattered around other areas, but for groceries and choices in restaurants, Cruz Bay is where to go.

Our favorite beach was Cinnamon Bay. They have bathroom and shower facilities and a small store and snack bar place that rents chairs and stuff for watersports. We spent two entire days there just sitting. It was fantastic. That being said, you can just hop to a different beach every day and have a blast. A Jeep is a must unless you are staying at the Westin, where taxis are always available. Taxis are basically old F-350 pickups or flat-bed trucks with benches on the back. It was $5 a head each way to and from Cruz Bay from the Westin.

Depending on your numbers, we took a day tour to BVI on http://www.piratespenny.com/. They have two boats, each limited to 10 people so it isn't a ridiculous booze cruise, unless you and your 10 make it one. We stopped at The Baths, Cooper Island for lunch, and then The Soggy Dollar Bar. it was a great trip. You need passports of course, but you also need them to fly back to the mainland U.S. from St. Thomas (surprisingly).

We also took a snorkeling trip and sunset cruise through http://blacksailsvi.com/, both of which were awesome. They aren't affiliated with a resort, they can do whatever they want. It's very laid back. I'd highly recommend them.

We also did a Reef Bay Hike through the Friends of the Virgin Islands National Park (http://www.friendsvinp.org/news-a-events/event-calender/reef-bay-hike). You can do the hike without the tour, but if you do it on your own, it's an out and back that is all downhill on the way out and all uphill on the way back. Doing the organized tour, you only hike it one way (downhill) and then a boat picks you up and brings you back to park headquarters, and you get to see the south side of the island from the water on the way. Well worth it, and plenty of families on the tour. Not a strenuous hike when you are only going downhill.

Mr. Pipers Jeeps https://www.rentajeepstjohn.com/ were great, just be sure to book as soon as you know your travel plans.

We had good food and/or drinks at the following, in no particular order. This is in no way an exhaustive or authoritative list.
De Coal Pot http://decoalpot.com/st_john_location
Cafe Roma http://www.stjohn-caferoma.com/
Vie's Snack Shack https://www.yelp.com/biz/vies-snack-shack-coral-bay
Skinny Legs http://www.skinnylegsvi.com/
Sam and Jack's Deli http://www.samandjacksdeli.com/
Starfish Market (for groceries) http://www.starfishmarket.com/
The Beach Bar http://beachbarstjohn.com/
 
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Make sure you visit Fish Tails in Red Hook, family that owns it is from Tenn/Fla and good lordy if they don't know how to make some good food there.


Stayed at Pt. Pleasant last year for my honeymoon on St. Thomas and I can't complain at all with the service there. The staff was great and the room we had was very nice too, great views. But having said that we both loved St. John when we went over there and Tortuga. Honestly they're all close enough you can stay anywhere and have a blast I would suggest renting a Jeep or something, its fun being able to go do your own thing and explore
 
If you do rent a Jeep, be careful driving. They are US cars with the steering wheel on the left, but you drive on the left side of the road. So half US half Euro, which is pretty damn confusing, especially because they have several roundabouts and the tourists can't figure out which way to go in them because entering from a clockwise direction on the left side, but the locals and taxis come barreling through. Luckily the speed limit is 25 or so wherever you go, so not too much at risk.
 
Had a terrific meal at Extra Virgin Bistro in Cruz Bay last week. Honeymoon Beach is a nice beach, but gets overrun with tourists on catamarans in the afternoon. Pretty good snorkeling in the area between Turtle and Caneel Bays - saw multiple conchs, one in a very cool grouping of sea fans and brain coral.
 
Wow. We did a week in St. John 9/24-10/01. Might be the prettiest and coolest place I have been. We were in the height of the hurricane season so prices were down and there were no crowds. However, a few of the restaurants and shops also close during that time. We bought trip insurance but had great weather and no issues.

We rented what might be the nicest, most perfect rental house I have ever seen. We had 4 couples and the house had four master bedrooms. Take a look at casalafamiglia.com and drool. It overlooks Klein bay on the south shore. The place had everything we needed - snorkel gear, beach bags and beach towels, kayaks on the beach below, sonos sound system, and absolute top of the line everything - fixtures, appliances, infinity pool, hot tub, etc. etc...

Split between four couples it was no more expensive than renting a house at the beach here...

We rented two jeeps from Mr. Piper's Jeeps - Erin Piper was awesome all week - he helps the owner manage the place and helped us with issues with the wi-fi and when the water was out one morning.

We took a boat trip to the Baths, to Diamond Reef off Great Camanoe island for great snorkeling, and to Soggy Dollar on Jost van Dyke for lunch and painkillers. We had the boat to ourselves and had a great time!

We cooked in a couple of nights. Food prices were weird - some things really expensive (milk = $8/gallon) but some things were really reasonable (gorgeous ribeyes were only $10/lb).

We went to the Fish Trap restaurant one night (very good but not awesome), we went to the Longboard one day (very cool vibe, great food - we loved it) and we went to Morgan's Mango one night (totally awesome and highly recommended - food, service, atmosphere, all great). We drove over to Coral Bay one day and had lunch at Aqua Bistro - it was very good. Skinny Legs was closed, unfortunately. We also drove to the top of the island where there is a place called Cafe Bordeaux which has a ridiculous view of the whole island and area - but it was also closed. They apparently invented the Dirty Monkey cocktail - like Soggy Dollar invented the painkiller... That was an exciting ride, by the way - the island is so mountainous and the roads are steep and very winding...

The beaches were ridiculous! Each more beautiful than the last. The great part was trying a different one every day. Some days we essentially had the beach to ourselves - it was surreal sitting on one of the most beautiful beaches in the world and looking around and seeing nothing but nature and beauty! Trunk Bay might be the most beautiful beach I have been on - we did have the advantage of perfect weather that day. It also has some decent snorkeling - though none of the snorkeling on the island is as good as we saw at the reef from the boat. Maho bay was gorgeous and serene - the most calm of them all. It has no coral but tons of sea grass - which the sea turtles love. I saw so many sea turtles when I was snorkeling that I got tired of looking at sea turtles! We also spent a day at Francis Bay and at Cinnamon - all equally beautiful. Each person in our group had a different favorite beach.

It is really cool that the beaches are primarily in the national park - which means you get free facilities like bathrooms, picnic tables, grills, etc. Trunk Bay had a shop and a little grill where you could buy lunch (it was pretty good) and other stuff you might need for the beach. Some of the other beaches have facilities and shops and things but lots of them were closed for the season.

We did about a 30 minute hike out to Waterlemon cay at the eastern side of the north side - where they say the best snorkeling on the island is. We snorkeled around the little cay and it was the best we saw - but not amazing. We had fun!

For beaches, the best plan is to go to the beaches farthest from Cruz Bay on days when the cruise ships are at St. Thomas. The tourists from the ships that come over to St. John usually stay pretty close in.

There is a lot of hiking on the island. We did a great hike out to Ram's Head one day - on the southeastern end. It goes past a salt pond which was cool. Out at the end you are on about a 100 foot cliff. The wind was blowing off the ocean, up the cliff and hitting us at about 50mph, I would guess. Really cool. There was a beach out there that was all rocky with huge waves rolling in. The beach was covered with little sculptures that people had left. Everything from simple stacks of rocks and corals, lots of little people statues, words spelled out in coral pieces, etc. etc. It was very surreal. It felt very spiritual. Unexpected and totally cool!
 
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