Here goes my trip report trip for my visit to St. John (May 27 ? June 3). We (my husband and I ages 35 and 33) arrived in St. Thomas at 3:05 and were able to catch the 4:00 Charlotte Amalie ferry. I had read previous accounts of the ride over being choppy on this route. However, ours was smooth the whole way and was a wonderful way to start our vacation.

We stayed at the Estate Lindholm for 7 nights and thoroughly enjoyed our time there. For those of you who are not familiar with Estate Lindholm, I will give you a brief synopsis. It is a small property (11 rooms in several different buildings) situated at the edge of the Virgin Island National Park right up the hill from Cruz Bay. The rooms are nice sized and contain a small refrigerator and microwave. Our room (Mingo) had two twin beds upstairs and a queen downstairs. We had a good sized balcony overlooking Cruz Bay along with a view of St. Thomas and an amazing sunset. The room was very basic but extremely clean. However, the best thing about Estate Lindholm is the gardens on the property itself. Every morning we enjoyed a complimentary continental breakfast outside by the pool with the other guests. The owners were present in the morning to greet the guests and give suggestions for things to do. Estate Lindholm also has a small pool and an honor bar for cokes, water, mixed drinks, juice and beer.

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In our seven days, we visited beaches, snorkeled, kayaked, hiked, visited the British Virgin Islands, rented a car for two days, took a sunset sail, ate and drink. Here is the low down on it all.

Beaches ? Salomon (yes, there were a few naked people, but most everyone had their clothes on), Honeymoon (great sunset viewing), Hawksnest, Salt Pond, Trunk Bay and Gibney?s Beach. I wasn?t that impressed with Salt Pond, but I loved all the others.

British Virgin Islands trip ? we took a day powerboat trip with New Horizons II. The boat sat 16 - luckily there were on 12 on our trip. (I think 16 would be a little tight). It cost $120 each (not including tip or lunch) for the day trip to the Baths, lunch on Marina Cay (sp?), snorkeling on Iguana at Monkey Cove (awesome) and spending about an hour or so on Jost Van Dike around the Soggy Dollar. Bar area. The guides (Linda and John) were great host and extremely informative. We really enjoyed the trip ? not because we went to really cool pleases but just being on the water and seeing the sights.

Sunset Sail ? Trisel II out of the Westin dock. Rusty, the owner, built the trimaran (sp?) and took us out. I don?t know anything about sail boats, but this one was fast. Basically, we left from the Westin, and Rusty saw a few boats in the distance that he wanted to say hi to. Then we sailed up the north side of the island pretty far and turned around and came back. Again, we really enjoyed seeing all the views and being on the water. If you are looking for a fancy sun set sail with mixed drinks and shrimp, this is not the trip for you. However, if you want to talk with a local, go really fast, pull your own beer from the cooler and munch on some pretzels, you may enjoy this trip. He only takes six out at a time (there were only three of us on this trip).

Kayaking ? Three hour trip though Arawak Expeditions. We started out by the Beach Bar (the two of us were in one boat, and our guide was in another kayak), went to Honeymoon and then over to a small Cay and snorkeled. It was a good time, but for the price ($40 each plus tip), we should have just rented a dinghy and went exploring on our own.

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Viewing of Sunsets ? We watched the sunset every night (quite amazing). One evening, we went to the Maho Bay Camp, got a drink and watched the sunset from their pavilion. Another night, we walked down to Honeymoon beach to view it. Once we were on the Trisel II and the other nights were on our balcony at the Estate Lindholm,

Car Rental ? Hospitality car rental in Cruz Bay. It?s located across the street from the Adventure Island Tours (or something like that) booth. By the way, we booked our boat trips through Trevor at Adventure Island Tours. He is very knowledgeable and quite nice. Back to car rental. We rented some kind of Suzuki with four doors and a hard top for $55 a day. Worked fine and made it up all of the big hills. We took the car to drive to some north side beaches, check out Coral Bay, to drive all the way to the end of the East End road and down to Salt Pond. The views on the East End are quite spectacular. I strongly suggest checking it out if you have the time.

Internet usage - Of course we had to check work emails, so we did so at Connections and at the Everything store. The connection at Everything seemed faster.

Restaurants - Of the restaurants that we ate at, none of them were overly impressive. We thought the following ones were good ? Café Roma, Sun Dog Café, Lime Inn, Beach Bar, Shipwreck Landing, Morgan?s Mango, Skinny Legs and Woody?s. We did not particularly care for Mongoose or Chilly Billys..

There were a few things that I wish we had done such as renting a dingy, snorkeled at Waterlemon, hiked Reef Bay and Ram?s Head hike and brought less luggage. Since I plan on returning to St. John, I will just have to wait until then.

All in all, it was a good trip, and I will be happy to answer any questions.

BTW, I typed this doc on word and then transferred it here. Obviously, the "?" listed in the report are errors. I should learn to proofread before posting.

Oh well. Have a great day!!!

Excellent report. Thanks for taking the time.

I'm curious about Arawak Expeditions. Their website make the bike trip and kayak trips look very good. Are you suggesting to rent a dingy and row it around St. John to the various beaches? That is, can you row from Cruz Bay to Trunk Bay without exhausting yourself?

THanks,

MM

MM - the dingies are motorized, so you can zip around, and I believe that the cost is approx $70. We saw them all over, and people seemed to enjoy them.

I think that the 6 hour kayak trip goes to cooler places that you can snorkle, but we didn't want to go on that long of a trip.

jcb, What a great trip report. It also is very helpful to see the prices of things. I have never been to St. John but am looking into it for November and wanted to ask you if Estate Lindholm is near a beach?

Would you stay there if you went back to St. John? My husband and I are the same age as you and are torn about staying on the beach or near the beach.

Also, do you think renting a car for the day is enough or do we need to rent one for several days? We basically want to relax on a good beach and love to snorkel and hike.

JenniferW - Estate Lindholm is about a 10 - 15 minute walk to Honeymoon Beach via one of the National Park Trails. This trail is completely downhill which of course means you have to walk uphill the entire way back (not too hard), or you can catch a cab from Caneel back home. From Honeymoon, you can easily walk to Salomon and Caneel.

Yes, we would definitely stay again at Estate Lindholm. We liked the grounds and the location. It is about a 10 minute walk down the hill to town (the opposite direction of the beach). We would walk to town and catch a cab back for $6 total. We walked back from town to Estate Lindholm twice (once via the street up the BIG hill and once via hiking trail - steep as well).

I would rent a car for approx 3 days in order to see all of the north side beaches, check out the views and to get to some good hiking spots.

By the way, I forgot to mention there is no sales tax in St. John (freaked me out), but there is a tax on the hotel of 8%.