
The first part of your trip will be a flight to the
neighboring island of St. Thomas.
There are several airlines that fly to St. Thomas (STT)
including American, Delta, USAir, Continental, and United Airlines.
In addition, there is now a discount airline that flies to St. Thomas:
Spirit Airlines. You may visit their website at www.spiritair.com.
Once you arrive at the St. Thomas airport, there are at least four ways
to get to your villa on the neighboring island of St. John:
- Take a taxi to the Charlotte Amalie ferry dock, approximately a
ten minute ride costing about $6 per person plus $2-$3 per piece of luggage.
Then take a public ferry to the village of Cruz Bay, St. John,
a 45 minute ride at $11.50 per person with a $2 charge for each piece
of luggage. Once you reach Cruz Bay,
it's only a seven minute taxi ride ($5.00 per person) to your
villa.
- Take a taxi to the Red Hook ferry dock, typically a 35 minute
ride costing about $13 per person plus $2-$3 per piece of luggage.
Then take the public ferry to Cruz Bay, a 15 - 20 minute ride
at $5 per person, with a $2 charge for each piece of luggage.
Again, take the short taxi ride to your villa.
- The easiest -- and not that much more expensive -- way is to make use of
the Westin Resort's transportation package. The Westin
maintains an office in the baggage claim area at the airport.
There you may sign up for this package while you're waiting
for your luggage. For about $110 per person (round trip, for villa guests), they take
care of everything, including seeing that your luggage gets to
your villa. After a very short taxi ride, a private ferry
takes you to the hotel dock, where someone then checks you in
right there on the beach. A bellman gives you and your party a
ride to the villa, and your luggage is brought along later,
usually within 30 minutes. This third option is our recommendation.
- Rent a car at or near the St. Thomas airport, and then drive
to the Red Hook car barge dock at the East End of St. Thomas.
This option can make good sense if it was your intention to rent
a vehicle during your stay on St. John, anyway. The car rental fees
tend to be considerably less on St. Thomas than they are on
St. John. The car barge fee will be approximately $50 round-trip.
When you contact any of the car rental agencies on St. Thomas,
be sure to ask them if they will allow you to take the vehicle to
St. John. Most of them do, but not all of them. The rental agency
will provide you with a map and directions to get you to Red Hook.
We have heard good things about the Budget rental agency, but there
are other good ones, as well. Once the car barge gets you to
St. John, it is less than a one mile drive to the Westin St. John
lobby, where you can check in at the front desk just as any other
Resort guest would. The things to be wary of if you choose to
use this method are 1.) The last car ferry leaving St. Thomas for
St. John departs at about 7:00 PM; 2.) The first car ferry to
leave St. John for St. Thomas departs at typically 6:20 AM.
So, if your flight into St. Thomas arrives later than about
5:00 PM, you might not make that last car ferry to St. John.
For the return
trip, if your flight back to the States departs earlier than
about 9:30 AM, you might not get to the airport in time to catch
your flight.
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© Copyright 2011: Ms. Kevyn Salsburg and Dr. Steven Bass