We were expecting something more luxurious.... this resort was run down and did not meet our standards at all! Villa we stayed in needs renovation DESPERATELY, food was awful ...this was the first vacation that I actually lost weight!

St. James Club is the worst hotel that I have ever been to!

As a group of 13 (3 families in total) we were very disappointed with our Christmas/New Year stay. We paid a significant amount of money to stay at what we thought was a 4 star resort. We found this resort to be very, very over rated.
We had taken the choice to pay for the premium room upgrade - this should have given us a beautfiul sea view from our balconies (5 rooms in total). We found our view was of a building site! In fact during our 3 week stay there was a lot of building work going on over the entire resort. Even on Christmas day!!. The main restaurant the Rainbow Garden was closed for the first week. This put a big strain on the remaining restaurants. We experienced long delays to be seated at our dining table. We were given no prior warning from our tour operator about the building work or closure of the main restaurant.

The food was bland and uninteresting. All menus seem to be on a rotation basis. Even though we had paid for the all inclusive we chose to eat out!! (It was that poor!) Try and get a drink - no chance. What exactly did we pay for?

Our bathrooms were in a disgraceful state - cracked tiles, stained baths, brown bath water, broken sink and even blocked toilets!! They couldn't have been any worse.

Many of the staff were very grumpy and unhelpful. We decided from day one to leave a tip at each meal. I don't know why we bothered their attitude just got worse.

We found many of the so called planned activities were cancelled at the last minute. So you would turn up and wait until you realised it just isn't going to happen.

I have travelled to many places and found this to be the worst I have experienced.

To sum up the St James Club is over priced, over rated in the brochures, tired and lacking in good service/food. DON'T GO!!!!!!!!

My husband, my 3 year old and myself have just returned from our trip to Antigua where we stayed for the second time at the St Jame Club. We still love this hotel and most of the people we met were actually people who keep returning to this place because they enjoy it a lot. We did not meet anyone there who did not like the hotel.
We stayed in a large nicely decorated room which was perfectly located with view on the beach. It had a large bathroom and 2 double beds. On arrival we found in our room a big plate of fresh fruit, drinks including free bottle of Rhum. The staff was friendly and always ready too help. They provided light bathrobes and more than plenty of towels. The only thing we did mind a bit is that is was very humid but that is from the weather I guess and perhaps we should have used the aircon (which was working well) more to dry the air, but anyway you get used to it...The grounds of the hotel are well maintained. The gardens are beautiful. They are many watersports (hobbie cat sailing, kayaking, waterski..) to pick up from even if you are not on an all-inclusive. Beside they have 4 swimming pools. Contrary to another reviewer,we found the paddling pool for kids- you have to look for one of the pool located in the villas area. It is next to another pool which also nice to be in with children (0.9m deep). They also have an "adult only" pool which is made of several level with small waterfalls, quite enjoyable...
We did not stay all- inclusive because we prefered to rent a car (better to book from the UK), although expensive, so that we could go the restaurants in the English Harbour area which has a very nice atmosphere. We also bought food at the english harbour small supermarket. You can request a fridge for your room on arrival so that you can store the food..
Also having our own car meant we were able to enjoy several times the Half Moon Bay (15mns drive) which has a beautiful , dreamlike beach, and English Harbour whith its wonderful yachtsand Nelson Dockyard, plenty of character.
Regarding restaurants at the hotels , we enjoyed an evening at the "coco bay" with delicious food with the special atmosphere around the pool. The food at the other nicely presented restaurants was OK although the price quality ratio was perhaps not so good.
We used the kid club a few times. The staff was very friendly and our daughter enjoyed it.
I would definetely recommend again this hotel, due to its wonderful location, extensive grounds (includes 2 beaches , tennis courts....), childfriendlyness and exclusivity. I have not seen any other hotel which match this one in Antigua. It is perhaps not the most luxurious hotel (no expensive marble) but is certainly very nice and and definetely deserve its 4 star status.

After reading some of the reports we were a little worried. Generally the resort was nice, lovely location but not the nicest beach on the island, the lagoon was very safe for our small children and they were more than happy to play in the sand, the windier beach was a little cooler but our kids didnt like the seaweed. We were staying in a Villa which was fantastic, couldnt fault the accomodation at all. Have to agree that the staff didnt seem the friendliest staff we have ever met, we just put it down to being a caribbean thing. My main problem was the food, quite hard to feed small children a relatively healthy varied diet for a week let along 2 weeks (unless you are happy with chips every day) and quite often for adults there didnt seem to be much choice. We didnt go to the expensive restaurant but there didnt seem to be much difference in the food in any of the other restaurants, just a change of location. The buffets were the best and they only had those on certain days. The kids pool was nice and seemed to attract lots of the kids.

So all in all a good resort, food let it down for us a bit, Villa accomodation fantastic. Kids Pool nice, beaches OK, but worth getting out and about a bit as there are a lot better beaches.