Westin St. John Resort & Villas

On two separate trips without my husband, I was treated very poorly. On the most recent trip to St. John, I booked everything under my own name, but the reservation was still tied to my husband’s name, and I was refused boarding on the ferry. I had to beg just to be allowed to travel with my friends. It was frustrating, time-consuming, and incredibly humiliating. The staff here act as if they’re doing you a favor rather than providing service. I witnessed several employees scolding guests, which was shocking and unprofessional. While the resort itself is beautiful, the lack of warmth and hospitality from the staff has left me with no desire to return.

This is the first time we have stayed at a Westin resort. It is also the first time we have been to St John. To be completely honest, we are more than underwhelmed. The resort needs a lot of updates. The rooms are worn. The pool area is gross. The water is filthy. No outdoor showers or places to clean off after going to the beach so the pool is full of sand. The three bedroom unit we were in had construction happening on the unit directly above us. The noise started at 8 am. They hit a pipe and caused one of the bedrooms in our unit to flood. They sent an engineer over to assess the damage. We were moved to a different villa at 9 pm. We were told it would be the same type of three bedroom villa. It was not. The second bedroom had a smaller bed and was so tiny you could barely turn around. The bathroom door was off the hinges. The room was dirty. They told us we were told we were lucky to have a place to stay. Less than 12 hours later when we asked to go back to the old unit to get something left behind, we were told housekeeping already prepped it for the next guest. When asked about the water damage, the front desk just shrugged her shoulders. The phones in the rooms do not work. There is only one AC thermostat for the entire unit. The bedrooms are hot. You need a cab to go almost anywhere. Westin has its own cabs which is handy. Getting around to get food or go off the resort is costly. We are only three days into this vacation and it feels like a mistake. This feels nothing like a 4.5 star resort.

Well what a disappointment…. As another reviewer said, “they oversell the place and you leave disappointed “. From check in to check out- it was that. There is no luxury here. The staff does not go beyond their expected duties, the concierge is never available (always at lunch or in a break). The restaurant is slow, with low quality food and hours that no one seems to know (are they open today or not?)…. This is not the experience I expect From a Marriott property- we won’t ever go back. Our next visit to St John’s, we will stay at a vrbo.

Overall, we are having a great time. It is very relaxing. But this is definitely not a level quality of Westin. As an example in our room there used to be a glass shower door. They left the hinges and installed a shower curtain. That’s just not Westin style. When we arrived, we were too early for check-in. This wasn’t a problem. We were shown to the fitness center to change our clothes and then they took our luggage into storage while we went and used the pool. When our room was ready two of us went to the front desk and the agent, started handing me all of our luggage. I practically had to convince the front desk to have someone bring our bags to our room. This is certainly a nice resort and lots of people are having a great time. The beach is bay as they all are on the island. It has soft waves and is really beautiful. There are lots of boats out in the bay, and there is a ferry dock here as well. The room is fantastic and we love having a two bedroom villa. It also has some maintenance issues, but we are all very happy with the room and beds. The food is a particular problem. There are three options for food on the resort. The beach restaurant serves your typical American beach food like chicken tenders , burgers, quesadillas, noodles with marinara you can order these by phone and they will deliver it to you to your pool chairs as well. We wish there was some more Caribbean food options. There is a deli/convenience store up by the lobby. They have salads, deli meat, sandwiches, tons of bottled beverages and they make hot pizza to go. Third option is a fancy restaurant called lemongrass which has entrées at around $50 apiece and only 11 reviews and all of them are three stars so we didn’t check that out. I see a lot of families here bring coolers with food with them. This is because it is predominantly a vacation club with owners and condos. The nearest market is a 20 minute walk. You can stock your fridge there with steaks to cook on the barbecues, breakfast food, and your own alcohol. But this is very pricey as well. The taxi situation is a flat seven dollars per person to/from resort/ town. And you can get a taxi for $10 per person to go to some of the beautiful beaches. So as a family of five anytime we want to go in town to dinner it costs $35 in each direction. The pool is large and has a beautiful design. It has a lot of maintenance issues, including black/green stuff (algae/mold?) growing on silicone and pieces peeling off into the pool. On our first day here, it was slow at the hotel. There were no managers on site. The front desk staff seemed unhappy to be at work. We had just traveled all night to get here and we were exhausted and the check-in instructions and things that she said she was required to tell me was like a straight 20 minutes of her nonstop talking at me. And then, of course she tried to get me to go over to see the vacation club concierge to get their spiel. There are a ton of iguanas lounging around at the pool and under the beach chairs waiting for food. On our first day here they got so bold as to jump up on our chairs twice. There was also a lot of iguana poop on the pool deck. Some of these iguanas were 3 feet long. They were at least 15 to 20 of them on our first day. There were a lot of children that were afraid of them. And there were no managers or any staff that cared. Summary, there just seems to be a big difference between the rates they are charging and the value. The staff are unhappy, so they’re obviously not getting paid well. I have barely seen any maintenance crew. Who’s getting rich here? I’d like to see Westin making investment into the town to upkeep the lights, streets and schools. The taxi situation sucks but that might be government controlled. I would never come back but we met two families who said they come back each year. Maybe they paid a lot less than I did.

The place is beautiful! Very big property. If you stay in the hills, you will need a shuttle if you are old or out of shape. Pool is beautiful and so is the beach! Definitely will be back with my family!