gogojo22
Google
A lovely stay at St James villas in a spacious beach front room with a great view and decent food. A few frustrations along the way. Communication was poor and could improve so many things, and housekeeping needs fixing. ||There are friendly villa/timeshare owners that frequent there and are keen to tell you ‘it’s getting going’ or just ‘getting started’. But we were there for a week of the year and wanted to get settled fast, so the lack of info in the rooms, restaurant scheduling, lack of activity planning and incorrect information didn’t help us settle in quickly.||Having said that we liked the hotel and liked being on the windy beach, with the contrast to the other calm beach just minutes away where we spent the days. We thought the staff were lovely and enjoyed the food.||We’d describe it as a full board type hotel with drinks even though we did all inclusive. No late night snacking either, maybe the coffee shop for cakes or a wrap. ||Pros. |- Beautiful location and friendly staff. |- Food was generally very good, Cocos was our favourite and portion size in there and another restaurant had improved on second visits.|- Our beachfront room was really nice and presumably recently refurnished, with a big terrace to sit on. |- Spacious hotel and grounds, beaches are very close, plenty of room to walk around and find different places. Beach beds and towels easy to find.|- Decent gym. Water sports available. |- Nice coffee shop and friendly staff. Joe Ann (and her colleague) were friendly and made a nice coffee |- Staff- Jamiera made a good stir fry on the oriental buffet and we liked the job the front of house ladies at the Beach Diner, Dockside, 11-11 and Cocos did. Cressida on the Reef bar was a pleasure to talk to. Sylvere was great too. |- Caribbean Beach party was great fun|- Good for gluten free preference if it’s a choice |- Breakfast buffet was really good|- The buffets are decent and better than many, nice food, good variety if you arrive early otherwise the oriental Peking Duck (everyone’s favourite!) becomes roast lamb! ||Cons. |- Running at a basic level, perhaps due to price point, and ‘no frills’?|- Housekeeping let the hotel down (3 star level)- it’s every other day which doesn’t seem enough with sandy and dirty floors, and towels that tend to dry slowly in the air con if you shower more. But also, it wasn’t cleaned well on those days and items not replenished. Our shampoo started half full. The floor was filthy on arrival day and we had to use hand towels to clean our feet (it wasn’t from outside) tables not wiped another day, cups not cleaned etc.|- No drinks in the room even though there’s a big empty fridge, tea and coffee not restocked.|- Basic activity list for the size of the place, with no week schedule |- Rowdy neighbours & their friends on the terrace next to us (6+ people at one point) one was sick on the beach, and another ‘smoking’ (not cigarettes) on the room terrace a few times. Meant our room smelt unless we closed the patio doors and listened to the air con rather than the ocean. The website FAQ says rooms are no smoking. I asked the hotel but apparently they have ashtrays on terraces (ours didn’t) and the hotel said they can’t do anything and can only ask them to consider other guests. I didn’t expect this in a hotel, maybe in a bar or on the beach yes. |Our bad luck.||And you have to laugh…||- Offered a welcome drink that never arrived, asked where it was and it still didn’t arrive|- Offered an anniversary drink at Cocos by the booking team, never arrived |- Asked about where to get daytime ice cream at reception, told it was ‘an evening thing’ |- No lunchtime desserts at the restaurants, except buffet - then we saw ice cream appear later in the week at a restaurant that said it hadn’t got any |- Asked about nuts for a healthy snack, told they can be bought in the shop and ice cream too (Otherwise your snack is always sweet - cake or fruit pot, a small wrap or you could take something from the buffet, or order at restaurants)|- Sausage rolls arrived on the day we left!|- Yoga advertised on website- there was none, then it was 8.30am Friday but was actually 8am. ‘I heard - It’s just starting back!’ No stretch or other similar classes and I missed half a class I’d planned around |- On checkout day our room keys stopped working before leaving time, after we’d paid to extend!||We ate in Piccolo Mondo, it was nice and we had lobster and steak. The venue or meal sadly wasn’t enough to get us back - we would have gone back. We enjoyed Cocos more.||Bars were fine, one seemed to pack up early in the evening, the other couldn’t do pina coladas one evening - a shame if you’re not a daytime drinker and enjoy your drinks in the evening. Cocktail menu may or may not be available…||We would return to Antigua (we’ve been once before and to the Caribbean). This is a nice hotel and lovely location. We rarely do all inclusive and aren’t massive eaters or drinkers but we do like nice food, and I think we just expected a bit more ease, more food variety if we fancied a holiday snack, and maybe more quality if we upgraded. The advertised yoga or even a stretch class were what we expected a few times too, not just one class. ||We really liked the place and had a very good holiday but it needs some work. My 4 star is for the location, the staff being friendly, and the food.
