Allure to St. John Review

[dixieva]

This is an interesting thread. We have always gone over to St. John on our own. How much did the excursion cost and how long did the trip take to go over? I have to say this is one of the few times I've heard someone say they were glad to be docked at Crown Bay instead of Havensight!

 

 

We actually prefer to do St. John on our own because the Red Hook Ferry ride over is not rough water and the RCI excursion ferry over is usually rough. I tend to get seasick so much prefer the calmer water. I guess we have been lucky to get our own taxi from the dock to the ferry since we have 5 to 7 people who cruise together and do excursions together.

 

Thanks for doing this review of St. John. It has been a few years since I was there and it's nice to see the pics.

[LA_CA_GAL]

Well, we get back to "The Creek". Time to sniff out a bar.

 

Remember that blue building I mentioned earlier?

 

Well, here we are in the Driftwood.

 

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

So far, menu looks great. $1.00 beers!:D

 

I hit the motherlode.

 

Being extremely thirsty, to get started, I order two beers. Mom gets a beer, and the others go for coke.

 

Our waitress returns with the 3 beers.

 

Notice how crowded the bar and restaurant are:

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

OK, I have two beers, decide to take a couple of pictures.

 

Here is a view looking at our dock:

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

I am now finished my 2 beers, time to order another. But, the 2 cokes have not arrived.

 

I go seeking our waitress, and inform her we have not received the 2 cokes we ordered, to which she responds, "they're coming":confused:. To which I respond, bring 2 more beers with them.

 

Now, we only have an hour and 15 minutes until our ferry leaves, so, we forget about ordering food as we figure we do not have enough time.

[LA_CA_GAL]

6 or 7 beers later, time to head to the ferry. One more picture of the Driftwood or the Lumber Yard:

 

 

Here comes our ferry:

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

As you can see from this picture, there were a couple of ferries at the dock. Seems that some on our ferry thought that the other ferry was nicer, and wanted to go back on that. Crew was trying to do head counts, and basically threw their hands up in the air, said to everyone, get on one or the other, we are leaving.

 

 

When we got back to the ship, some that used the other ferry were a little disappointed, our "not so nice" ferry had a bar, theirs didn't.:)

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

We had enough sun for the day, so, on the ride back we opted for a shady spot on the lower deck:

 

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

On our way:

 

 

[Life is Good Cruising]

Enjoyed your pictures and review, thank you.

[LA_CA_GAL]

Had to take a picture of this little girl:

 

 

Here is a good example of a craft heading into the wind, notice Havensight in the background:

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

 

The crew and a tourist:

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

Random pix:

 

 

[LA_CA_GAL]

OOOPS.

 

One more picture that of the inside of the ferry that I forgot to post:

 

[TravelerThom]

I am now finished my 2 beers, time to order another. But, the 2 cokes have not arrived.

I go seeking our waitress, and inform her we have not received the 2 cokes we ordered, to which she responds, "they're coming":confused:. To which I respond, bring 2 more beers with them.

Now, we only have an hour and 15 minutes until our ferry leaves, so, we forget about ordering food as we figure we do not have enough time.

Well, that is about it for our excursion to St. John.

You might conclude that I wasn't thrilled about our experience with Trunk Bay, and you would be correct. The beach and water were nice, but the lack of service and the service that was there was poor, to put it mildly.

A lot of wasted time there.

... It was a good learning experience for our 17 YO DS. He got to experience government services and socialism in action.,.

I appreciated hearing about the ferry directly from Crown Bay to St. John. Seems to me that the service you experienced on St. John from a private establishment was not any better than from the "socialist government" beach. Why less of a rant about that? Preconceived ideas perhaps? I think the service you received on St. John had more to do with "island time" than socialism.

[mivama]

Did you do any snorkeling in Trunk Bay?

Did you take a taxi from the dock? If so, how much was it and about how long did it take?

 

Thanks so much for the pictures and review! This is exactly what we were hoping to do on our cruise next February. Looks like a much easier way to get to St Johns if the water is calm.

[LA_CA_GAL]

I appreciated hearing about the ferry directly from Crown Bay to St. John. Seems to me that the service you experienced on St. John from a private establishment was not any better than from the "socialist government" beach. Why less of a rant about that? Preconceived ideas perhaps? I think the service you received on St. John had more to do with "island time" than socialism.

 

I do not think I was ranting. I was just providing my experiences at St. John. I found the service at both the beach and the bar poor, and I said so.

 

I do not think it has anything to do with island time. Trunk Bay I believe is a typical government run operation. Like all government operations it has no accountability. It is what it is. They can run it poorly, or they could run it with exceptional service. Either way, it has no effect.

 

OTOH, the private run establishment and waitress work for profitability. Their poor service cost that profitability. Good service, and we order four dinners. We spend more money. Waitress gets paid in percentage of the tab in gratuities. She makes more money.

 

Therefore, the difference in poor service affected the private establishment in the money that would have gone into their pockets, whereas the poor service at Trunk Bay had no effect whatsoever on their operation.

[LA_CA_GAL]

Did you do any snorkeling in Trunk Bay?

Did you take a taxi from the dock? If so, how much was it and about how long did it take?

 

Thanks so much for the pictures and review! This is exactly what we were hoping to do on our cruise next February. Looks like a much easier way to get to St Johns if the water is calm.

 

We were planning on snorkeling, however, the time it took to get chairs was too much, and renting the snorkeling gear would have resulted in us spending the majority of our time waiting in a line.

 

The only transportation that I saw were the open air taxis. They usually cram about 20 people into them, not a bad ride, only about 15 minutes to Trunk Bay. I think the cost was $6 per person.

 

If I had to do it again, I would probably see if I could hire some kind of private driver for the day (I do not even know if that is possible).

[Ocean Boy]

We were planning on snorkeling, however, the time it took to get chairs was too much, and renting the snorkeling gear would have resulted in us spending the majority of our time waiting in a line.

 

The only transportation that I saw were the open air taxis. They usually cram about 20 people into them, not a bad ride, only about 15 minutes to Trunk Bay. I think the cost was $6 per person.

 

If I had to do it again, I would probably see if I could hire some kind of private driver for the day (I do not even know if that is possible).

 

We usually rent a jeep when we are on the island so we can drive a round and do things as we please.

[LA_CA_GAL]

We usually rent a jeep when we are on the island so we can drive a round and do things as we please.

 

That sounds like a plan for next time.

 

Think I might give that a shot.

[TravelerThom]

We usually rent a jeep when we are on the island so we can drive a round and do things as we please.

Three years ago we (two couples) rented a jeep from Budget in Havensight, drove to the Red Hook car ferry, and were on the roads in St. John within two minutes of docking. We did this because it was the easiest thing to do. Much to my surprise it turned out to be the cheapest. Group taxi rides for four to and from Red Hook, plus round trip taxi ride to and from Trunk Bay on St. John would have cost more than the Jeep rental plus gasoline. With the Jeep we went to several beaches plus Annaberg Sugar Plantation plus other stops. What really surprised me that we (vehicle and passengers) went round trip St. Thomas - St. John for $40; the ferry was $6 per person per ride so would have been $48 (2*$6*4) without a vehicle! I have not priced things in the last two years, but still surprised that easiest equaled cheapest.:)

 

Thom

[TravelerThom]

... I found the service at both the beach and the bar poor, and I said so.

I do not think it has anything to do with island time...

Yes, you definitely indicated that there was poor service at both locations. Yet only one of these experiences rated pejoratives beyond poor ("It [Trunk Bay] was a good learning experience for our 17 YO DS. He got to experience government services and socialism in action"). In context I certainly felt that "socialism" was pejorative, or did I misread that and you were actually giving a compliment?

 

So what learning experience did your DS have at the bar? Did he get to experience private business and capitalism in action? What did you learn from the bar experience?

 

The message I would have gotten from these experiences is that employees without incentive tend to slack off. Even if they do have financial incentive (and I agree with you that the bar waitress had financial incentive), island time can trump incentive. If your bar experience was not an example of island time, how do you explain it?

 

I do think that given sufficient incentive, such as that of owner/operator entrepreneurs, things do tend to run much more on time. I think we may be in agreement that entrepreneur incentive can be a good thing in many cases, and turning the umbrella concession over to private business is probably a good idea (but your experience with a private business on St. John didn't seem to work very well).

Edited July 30, 2014 by TravelerThom

[LA_CA_GAL]

Yes, you definitely indicated that there was poor service at both locations. Yet only one of these experiences rated pejoratives beyond poor ("It [Trunk Bay] was a good learning experience for our 17 YO DS. He got to experience government services and socialism in action"). In context I certainly felt that "socialism" was pejorative, or did I misread that and you were actually giving a compliment?

 

So what learning experience did your DS have at the bar? Did he get to experience private business and capitalism in action? What did you learn from the bar experience?

 

The message I would have gotten from these experiences is that employees without incentive tend to slack off. Even if they do have financial incentive (and I agree with you that the bar waitress had financial incentive), island time can trump incentive. If your bar experience was not an example of island time, how do you explain it?

 

I do think that given sufficient incentive, such as that of owner/operator entrepreneurs, things do tend to run much more on time. I think we may be in agreement that entrepreneur incentive can be a good thing in many cases, and turning the umbrella concession over to private business is probably a good idea (but your experience with a private business on St. John didn't seem to work very well).

 

I have to go look up the word "pejorative".

 

I will then get back to you.

[Folk Singer]

Great photos. Wish we were there.

[RedHeadTexan]

Thanks for posting a great review and helpful insights.

 

Lisa