My family & I (2 adults a 2 yr & 4yr old) just returned from a 2 week stay at the St James Beach club with Virgin Holidays. We thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience and have to advise any family or couple on this location.

We had the all inclusive deal staying in a superior room in papaya block. The accommodation was more than satisfactory with excellent AC, which is definitely needed. In general, with one or 2 exceptions, the staff were very friendly, accommodating and over all pleasant. They were particularly good with the kids. (Mr James, Carlene, Pearl & Troy, all from Cocos to name just a few)

The kids club was good & had structured timed activities that meant you can schedule the little ones time away, and even on an evening, open until 2200 if you fancy one dinner alone as we did!

The beach on our side had seaweed on it (it's only nature!), but I have to say, the landscaping staff were cleaning frequently, and the kids loved both the beach & the ocean, which incidentally is a great refreshing temperature in the nice weather.

In summary, as we did, I trust you will make up your own mind on this resort and not be fully taken in by the negative or positive reviews received. However, I am more than happy to offer a glowing testimony to our 2 weeks stay in a very good, sunny, friendly & accommodating atmosphere.

One final tip, take USD $ and don't bother with the ECU (Caribbean $) as everything is priced in USD $, and the calculations on exchange rates made by the vendors varied from a 'finger in the air' point of view!

Nothing much new to add here - the previous comments from other guests pretty much cover the problems we experienced. Funny (well, not literally) to read the comments from others and in my mind constantly thinking, "yep, the exact same thing happened to me!". If you're doing research before booking, let me warn you - the people posting negative experiences here are not exaggerating!! Went for my honeymoon, envisioning a tropical paradise and was terribly disappointed with the result. For the amount of money you're going to spend, I'd highly advise looking elsewhere. Let me put it this way - when you check out, they hand you a guest questionnaire to fill out. They conduct a random drawing of the questionnaires and if you're selected, you win a free week at the resort. My wife and I decided not to fill out the questionnaire for fear that we might win the drawing and have to return.

October half-term visit to St James' Beach Club proved very satisfactory. The watersports and tennis facilities are good and mostly inclusive (e.g. the HobieCats are free and an initial waterskiing lesson for the inexperienced is also included). One side of the resort is on a lagoon, the other side has a beach out to sea. The lagoon beach is a wee bit 'shingly', but not unpleasantly so.

We found the food to be excellent. There are three restaurants in the AI package, although the choice on any given night is usually from one or two. The fourth restaurant on the resort is available but not included in the AI package. Service generally good and very pleasant.

Downsides? We're in the detail now, but the bathroom looked a bit tired, with leaking (when on) shower taps and poor quality finish generally, but not to the extent that you don't want to go in there. However rest of room spacious and fresh. Cleaning every day to an excellent standard.

By way of comparison, we took a car round to Dickenson Bay (e.g. Halcyon, Sandals) and thought that this was a very poor location by comparison, despite being on the Caribbean side. The only superior beach we came across was the spectacular beach at Jolly Harbour, but we weren't so taken with the hotel there (cursory experience of course).

So yes, we REALLY rated the experience overall. It's great when the actual experience outstrips your expectations. Well done St James'.

We just returned from 5nights at StJames Club and my only complaint was the terrible wine and horrible margaritas I had to go to town to buy my own wine. We stayed in a room on the ocean side which was so nice to just walk out on the beach, alittle seaweed in the water but not a big deal to me. The service was slow but I guess I didn;t expect the best for the price. If you are a runner the roads were fine to run on.