Like vanilla pudding, it's easy to swallow, digest, and forget.
Written: Jun 13 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: biggest pool in the Caribbean - large enough to swim laps
Cons: beach erosion; high-end rooms are far away; very white; "couples only" means heterosexual couples only
The Bottom Line: If you must do an all-inclusive vacation, Sandals St. Lucia delivers a good value. However, it's "Caribbean Lite," cleaned up and made bland and easily digested for American tourists.
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| kboo's Full Review: Sandals St. Lucia Golf Resort and Spa |
Maybe it's that so many people work so many crazy, stress-filled jobs, that every once in a while you want to be babied. I am all for being pampered-- in short doses. Give me a massage, and I'm rejuvenated. Take care of my elemental bodily needs (eat, sleep, etc.) in a comfortable way, and I'm happy and satisfied.
As grownups, we forget about the things that irritated us when we were children- not being able to choose what's for dinner. Not being able to drive. Being on someone else's schedule. We only remember the warm, cuddly aspect of it.
Sandals, like other upscale all-inclusive resorts, tries to bring you the good parts of being the baby while trying to avoid the less memorable experiences. It does a pretty good job but by the end of a week, well... it got boring.
Getting there
We left Newark during a major ice storm. Getting to the airport was harrowing (the car we'd reserved in advance called us at 5:00 a.m. saying they weren't coming). Our 7:00 a.m. charter flight with Air Jamaica covered Sandals and Club Med resorts in St. Lucia and Antigua. We barely made it to the airport (running on ice covered sidewalks, taking a PATH train to Newark, waiting for a cab, and taking a local Newark city bus, running some more), and surprisingly, the flight left on time. We made it; others did not.
Lesson #1: Carrying large pieces of luggage on a city bus is not the best way to make friends. If you book directly through Sandals, as we did, make sure you have a number where you can reach a real person in case something happens (like the occasional ice storm). We didn't, and probably got 15 more gray hairs worrying about whether we were going to miss our flight.
Needless to say, since it was a charter flight, it was FULL! (Aside: Who thought up 3-3 seating on aircraft anyway? Who travels in groups of 3 or 6? Sometimes I want to try requesting a middle seat on a flight just to see the agent's reaction.)
Upon arrival at the airport, we were taken in a minivan for the drive across St. Lucia to the resort. Our driver pointed out sights along the way and also offered a pit stop for us to stretch our legs, since we were crammed with our luggage in a little tin box for nearly two hours, up, down and around the winding narrow roads... To be fair, the roads are in very good condition compared to other islands I've visited; there's just lots of hills and turns.
Lesson #2: Bring dramamine and take it before you get in the van. Have short legs and small bags. Take pictures from the van as you are driving because this is the most you're going to see of the island until your return trip to the airport.
When we arrived at the resort, we were given a little welcome punch, a package of toiletries - shampoo, conditioner, soap, and aloe vera gel - and a brief orientation to the resort. We were then taken to our "upgraded" deluxe room.
Rooms and physical facilities
Sandals calls itself the "World's Most Glamorous Resort." While the rooms were orders of magnitude better than our room at Club Med, I still don't see what is so glamourous about having a standard sized, garden view room on the ground floor right next to a major staircase and next to a utility closet. Come to think of it, it doesn't seem so "upgraded" either.
(The room did have a four-poster king sized bed, a small seating area and a dresser. The bathroom was on the small side, but all was clean and we had a little garden patio as well.)
Lesson #3: Unless you plan on staying in your room having mad hot [fez] monkey sex all the time, it probably isn't worth paying for the upgraded rooms. We were in our rooms from about midnight to 8 am, and the majority of that time was spent sleeping. Also, the nicer suites and villas, with the plunge pools, etc. are about a mile from the center of the resort.
The resort is sprawling, stretched along bluffs at the edge of the sea. There is even a shuttle bus that runs within the resort because of the distances and the hills. The central complex includes two hotel wings (where our glamorous upgraded room was), most of the restaurants, the huge pool, the sports desk and the spa.
The pool claims to be the largest in the Eastern Caribbean, and it comes complete with a cheesy gazebo atop a "rock" with waterfalls into the pool. It's all shallow enough to stand up in- the lawyer in me tends to think this is related to the cost of insuring against drownings of very drunk honeymooners. To its credit, it is almost 50 meters long, long enough to swim some decent laps to work off all the food and drinks.
Lesson #4: Finish your lap swim by 10 am, or do it in the pre-dinner sex hour from 5-6pm. Honeymooners don't like it when you bump into their floaties as they practice tanning and balancing a drink on their stomachs. They don't even like it if you splash them just a teensy weensy bit, never mind that they are floating in the middle of a big swimming pool...
To its credit, the grounds are well kept up although there are parts of the hotel that show some age- salt air is very hard on paint, and it seemed like they were always touching up some part of the place.
Beach erosion: We were told that the week before we arrived, there was a big storm that carried away much of the sand on the beach, and the waves and current were too strong for swimming from the beach. Instead, we were directed to the other Sandals resort on St. Lucia, the Halcyon for beach activities. At the St. Lucia resort, they were trucking in sand and shoring up the retaining wall. Given the clarity of the water while diving and the wide and calm beach at Halcyon, I wonder whether the erosion is just a result of the currents in the area.
Activities
There are lots of sports available, but even in January I found it too hot to do much on land.
The 9-hole "executive" golf course was short and rather damp since it rained briefly almost every day. Clubs are free, but you are required to have a cart and a caddy and you are supposed to tip the caddy (but not the cart), so it's not really free anyway...
Dr. kboo made me play tennis with him until I feigned heat stroke and a wrist injury. You'll be happy to know that there is never a wait for a court because it is too hot to play anyway.
Water volleyball-- bah! A sport for wimps! I only do water sports where you can't touch the bottom of the pool.
Scuba diving was good- two tank dives every day kept us occupied every morning except that day we took a "break" from diving to play tennis. The equipment is new and the instructors/dive masters are excellent. While conditions always vary, the water was quite clear and calm. My only complaint is that they didn't push the envelope at all as far as the diving went- we saw lots of pretty stuff, but we didn't go to too many different dive sites, and I think they underfilled our tanks because our bottom time at 50-60 feet was always barely 30 minutes.
Sailing and windsurfing were also available at Sandals Halcyon; Dr. kboo liked to tilt the Hobie Cat until I screamed we were going too fast. He also windsurfed some, back and forth, back and forth. I don't know where he gets his energy.
Lesson #5: Don't sail around the little island you see in the distance. The guys who work in the beach shack get a little mad when they can't see you.
Dr. kboo and I also tried the water bikes, those 3-wheeled contraptions you see in all the ads. We spun our big plastic wheels in a foot of water for about 10 minutes before deciding this was too much work. Ditto with the kayaking -- my arms were still sore from tennis.
Spa: DON'T BOTHER! Dr. kboo and I decided to get an hour-long "couples massage", where we were in the same room together. Our masseuses chatted and giggled with each other the whole time, and there was no real rhyme or reason to their massage -- just desultory rubbing as an afterthought to their conversation. They charged us $90(US) per person for the massages which were booked every hour on the hour; given the time it takes to turn over a room, everybody got about 45 minutes of actual massage for an hour's appointment.
Every day, there are activities poolside and elsewhere in the resort, listed on a big board at the activities desk. Guests earn points toward their very own pair of mini leather sandals "necklaces" that are the ONLY Sandals souvenir that you cannot buy at the gift shop. Some activities are surprisingly fun- I busted a gut at the "Newlywed Game" and the goofy party games night. Unlike the games at Club Med, these are not overtly sexual, or if they are "sexy," you're only facing your significant other.
Lesson #5: Don't go to the Newlywed Game thinking you're going to win because you've been married for more than 5 years. You won't. All those real newlyweds are sickly-sweet in love and know all about each other.
Lesson #6: Before you come in last place in the Newlywed Game, do not tell people how long you've been married. Better to pretend that you got married to the wrong person while you were totally wasted at your bachelor/ette party in Vegas and you lost your real fiance(e) in the big pool at the Bellagio.
If you really, really want a pair of your own mini-sandals, the surefire way to get them is to volunteer to make a fool of yourself at the weekly Talent Night. It helps if you have a skill, but really nothing much is required, other than a thick skin.
Food and drink
The main restaurant, Pavilions, steps into the pool and has a spectacular view. The food is buffet style and not bad. After a few days of this, however, the Pavilions started to feel like a gilded cage. I didn't travel to another country to have yet another American-style buffet.
There is entertainment every night at dinner, and the steel drum bands are worth listening to-- until they start playing "My Heart Will Go On (Love theme from 'Titanic')."
Another good choice for breakfast and lunch is Les Pitons, an open-air, a la carte, Caribbean-influenced restaurant. Probably the most authentic restaurant at the resort, we found ourselves having a quiet, private breakfast here almost every day.
La Toc, the French restaurant, is the best restaurant at the resort if good food is what you're looking for. Reservations are hard to come by, though, and we were only able to eat at La Toc once during our stay.
Lesson #8: Restaurants that require reservations fill up quickly. Even though it seems unduly geeky, it's a good idea to sit down with the concierge and make all your dinner reservations the day you arrive. You can always cancel if you change your mind. Restaurants that require reservations are: Les Pitons, La Toc, Kimono's, and Armando's. Reservations are not needed for lunch.
Kimono's is much like a stateside Benihana's, where you sit around an open griddle and the chef entertains and cooks for you. There is something a little bizarre, though, about seeing a Caribbean chef making Japanese stir fry, and it is just stir fry. Also, you know how the Japanese chefs tend to flirt and joke a little with the customers, by flipping shrimp tails onto peoples' plates or making fancy little lemon slice sculptures? Our chef at Kimono's didn't do that-- either he was just a chef-in-training or else he'd been accosted by some jealous new husband one too many times in the past.
Most surreal of all, however, is Arizona, the outdoor Southwestern restaurant (reservations not necessary). It's sort of like being in a St. Lucian spaghetti western. In addition to its iceberg lettuce salad bar, baked beans, burgers and ribs, one of the bartenders acts as a greeter, dressed up like a cowpoke and calling out such inanities as, "Howdy li'l lady!" and "Y'all come back!" in a Caribbean accent.
Kboo, you gave it 3 stars. Why don't you recommend it?
I like being able to do my own thing, when I want, and exploring my surroundings. Although there are excursions every day, they cost extra and often conflicted with other activities that we wanted to do. As a result, we felt too constrained.
While the people we met were fun and nice, we didn't necessarily meet or interact with anyone we wouldn't have met anywhere else in the U.S. And it is a little weird to be in a place where 98% of the people there are white honeymooners between the ages of 25 and 32 and all the women look good in bikinis (yet none of them went topless).
There was no beach at our resort, because of the erosion.
Although the resort was nearly full, with hundreds of couples, every guest we met was American, and I saw one or two non-white couples. Just a little creepy. Everybody at the resort knew who we were in a very short time. Don't get me wrong, the guests were very friendly, but it was just too homogeneous.
But, most importantly, Sandals does not welcome gay couples. This policy is kept fairly quiet, and I don't think they explicitly ban gay couples, but I found out after our trip that Sandals doesn't exactly encourage gay tourism. I actually did read in print once from a Sandals representative that they didn't want gay couples at the resorts, and I have yet to see anything else that indicates they've changed their policy.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
kboo
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Location: New York, NY
Reviews written: 130
Trusted by: 283 members
About Me:
De-fezzed in two topics. Ask me if I care. Hey, what happened to my picture?
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