Leaving soon! Logistics of day trip to St. John on our own

[michelleorick]

We booked a last minute trip leaving in 3 weeks. We are trying to decide on an excursion while at port at St. Thomas and the ship offers a tour of beaches at St. John (via Celebrity). In the ship offered tour you get to spend only about 1 1/2 hour at Trunk Bay and spend the rest of the tour briefly visiting the other beaches. So.... we wanted to spend more time at one beach for relaxing, swimming, and snorkeling. For those who have done this on your own- what are the logistics of taking the ferry over to St. John? I have the two schedules- is there any pros/cons in choosing to leave from Red Hook or Charlotte Amalie? Also, once you arrive at St. John where do you dock in relation to the National Park? Do you take a cab to get there? Specifically we were interested in Trunk Bay but how spread out is everything? Are there any other areas you would suggest? We would like to spend about 3-4 hours at one place so we aren't traveling between sites all day. How is the snorkeling at Trunk Bay? Also, getting transportation back to the ferry? Any suggestions are appreciated. Normally I would have more time to plan but would love to hear from those who have done this on their own. Thanks to all- Happy Cruising. MO

[michmike]

We did this on our own in November, but had the advantage of being in St Thomas until 11pm so didn't feel any time constraints. A lot will depend on how long you are scheduled to be in St Thomas. Don't have the ferry schedules here in front of me but I do know that the Charlotte Amalie ferry doesn't run as often as the Red Hook ferry and I believe that the last trip back from St John on the CA ferry is 4 pm.

 

Basically you just take a taxi to red hook(about a 30 min trip from CA) , catch the ferry over to St John (takes about 20 min) and then get a taxi from there to trunk bay (10 min or so). You can find prices for all of that and the ferry schedules by scrolling thru the boards here, but it is all relatively inexpensive.

 

I would caution you to allow AT LEAST an hour from the time you get back to Red Hook to get to the ship. While it isn't all that far, at certain times of the day traffic can get very congested. I'd actually be more comfortable allowing 90 min. Again, that is from the time you get back to Red Hook, not from the time you leave St John.