We booked for two nights in February in January. I contacted them via email and they said they were sold out. Then I found some rooms available through an online site. We booked a standard room on the hill. Reviews said they were probably nice and not a problem.

The Room:
- Little to no view. What we did see was brush and rocks
- Ants everywhere
- Spider jumped into toilet on first morning that caused a splash!
- Good fan right above bed (two twins pushed together)
- Not worth the money we paid for it

The Staff:
- Very directive and we were frequently told how to comply with their rules and ways, versus how they could help us have a more pleasant vacation
- We felt like a burden to them?!?!
- The staff made sure my husband wore pants to dinner, not shorts, but then there were others there in their shorts!
- Not cohesive or helpful

The Ammenities:
- the beach is nice with palm tree shading
- the water taxi is very helpful for going to English Harbor
- we did not get in the pool
- the restaurant is overpriced for the quality ($18 for a greens salad)
- onsite shuttle was nice, the hill really is quite large and requires an escort

Other:
- The entire island is just very expensive and unfriendly
- Consider the hidden expenses = $30 taxi to/from resort, $10 taxi to English Harbor, $10 taxi to nearby church, $6 for bottled water

We would not stay there again.

We stayed for a week in January 2007 at the wonderful Inn at English Harbour and will go back again.

Located in the South West of the island, away from the larger hotels and reported crowds of the North near the capital St John (avoid when the cruise ships come to town), in the Dockyard national park.

Upon arrival you enter through a security check point where the reception, bar and main restaurant are, at the top of the hill, together with a few hillside rooms. The tennis courts, gym, swimming pool, beach front rooms (one minute from the beach) and beach bar (on the beach) are at the bottom of the hill – a five minute walk or 30 seconds by the hotels courtesy chauffeured car. There are four standard beach front rooms and these are…..on the beach; however, they have not been decorated for at least 20 years and are more ‘traditional Antiguan’ (part of their charm).

The check-in procedure is all fairly painless and staff quite helpful – if you’re in need of an alcoholic drink having survived the airports slow passport control and the pot holed roads, now is a good time to visit the bar as from here, you can see the grounds, beach, beautiful views and layout of the buildings below before heading to your room. If you’re staying at the bottom of the hill, you’ll be taken in the car to your room – don’t decline this and offer to walk down with your bags, it could be the end of your holiday after pulling various muscles etc.

We had a standard beach front room (on the beach) and when we’d got over the shock that we think we’d paid extra for 1980s décor, 1960’s electrics and ill fitting ‘sliding doors’, we quickly relaxed and ended up loving the room (no television in these rooms, great). Open the sliding doors and sitting on your private terrace, sand, sea and wonderful views…the room comes into its own. When everyone else heads off to their accommodation, you have the beach to yourselves and can watch the sun go down in peace and quiet.

We did ask to see the other beach front rooms (the one minute from the beach ones), and these have recently been decorated and are shown on the hotel website. They looked clean, smart and very comfortable and we’d have been very happy staying in one.

The hillside rooms are probably just as comfortable; however, slightly more planning is required around your getting back up the hill and I’d imagine you could feel you’re staying at a different hotel from the guests at the bottom of the hill. The views are, however, wonderful, and for the sake of a one minute car ride, it’s not too much to put up with!

In between the beach front rooms (one minute….) and the beach, is the pool – a good size, clean and…..wet!

The beach bar serves breakfast, lunch and snacks until late afternoon. I’m not sure why they don’t serve drinks in the evening as it’s the perfect spot to sit back and relax. The food is pretty good and occasionally ‘outsiders’ in the know, come for lunch.

Back up to reception and the main restaurant again, serves pretty good food. If you were stuck at the hotel and couldn’t go out, you would definitely survive. Dinner is on the terrace overlooking the harbour and we found that after around 9pm, the restaurant and bar were almost empty. I think it would have been great if there was a little more atmosphere in the evenings and perhaps at other times of the year there is.

We hired a car and recommend guests do similar for at least two days. The roads are appalling and I can’t imagine too many speeding tickets are handed out in Antigua, I think we made it into fourth gear once; however, there are some beautiful and deserted beaches, 365 so they say – we visited Darkwood beach and shared the most idyllic white sand as far as the eye can see with four other people. Approx journey time was 30 minutes. There’s a pretty run down shack serving food and drinks but I did hear that bus loads of people can turn up, take a photo and leave…
Driving tip - make sure you remember where you turned off roads and if it was by a church, remember what it looked like as there are many churches…they do not have any road signs in Antigua! We found that the locals all shouted politely when we took a wrong turn, which was helpful.

A trip to Harmony hall is great for lunch – about 40 mins away and situated to the East of the Island. Good views and lovely food.

Most trips start in the North of the Island – an hour from the hotel – our holiday rep tried to sell us a round the island boat trip and when we realised it would be shared with 100 other people, we decided it wasn’t for us. I believe you can hire a private boat but this obviously costs.

Shirley heights appears in all the guide books and suggests you go on a Sunday night when the steal band plays, rum punches flow and hopefully you get to see the sun set. The views are wonderful and the music gets better and better – linked to the amount of rum punches you’ve had. HOWEVER, perhaps it was the time of year, but every tourist on the island had been shipped in on the Sunday; we went back again on a week night and had the place to ourselves, without the band.

Nelson’s dockyard is $10 by taxi or free during the day via the hotel water taxi. There are a few shops for the basics and of course the historic buildings.

The restaurants at the dockyard all vary in appearance, but not price…roughly £60 / $110 for two people. The food is very good and we tried a number of restaurants – all quite busy and you may need to book. Catherine’s is a good for lunch. For a beer, try the rasta shack (or not…). If you’ve seen the boats, ships, yachts, gin palaces in St Tropez, France, the very same boats are moored here, so on their days (weeks?) off, the crews fill some restaurants.

The only bad point I can think of is the hotel beach was ‘invaded’ by at least 10 people during our week long stay (not all at once) – they moored up on our jetty, enjoyed our beach, our bar and swam in our bit of sea…I felt they should have paid for the privilege like me!

My wife and I stayed for a week from 2nd September 2006 for our fifth anniversary and had a wonerderful time at the Inn.

We were upgraded to a suite by the pool and were made to feel very special by an outstanding group of employees.

Overall the hotel is very different from the large, commercialised resorts, that litter the north coast of the island. Peaceful and unhurried and breakfast was especially good with fantastic views.

A special mention to Gareth and Marco of Happy Tours who took us round the island in a couple of 4x4's. ( They have not been establised that long but we both agreed that it was one of the best trips we have had anywhere in the world).

A fantastic week, in an outstanding hotel, on a great island.

Go there soon!

Alan & Sylvia Parker
Greenwich, London.

Stayed 2 weeks in March 2006. Stay was fantastic. A few tips:- (a) Stay in the "lesser rooms" (they are fine) on top of the cliff by reception - the view over English Harbour at sunrise and sunset is worth a million dollars and by far outweijhs staying in the "better" rooms in the gardens by the beach. (b) Never eat dinner there or stay on half board. The food is way too expensive and often under-cooked. There are at least 12 good restaurants $10 taxi away in English Harbour / Nelsons Dockyard / Falmouth which serve the visiting schooners and yachts - all a lot cheaper, way livlier and give you the Antigua experience. Try - Abracadabra, Trappa's, Last Lemming, The Gallery, Mad Mongoose (for Steak and Guinness Pie), Sports Bar, Admirals Inn and the posh place in the dockyard - all on about a 500m "strip".
Day by day the beach is fantastic - idyllic, pelicans diving for fish, snorkelling off the breakwater, classic tall masted sailboats coming in and out. The guys running the water taxi across the bay to the Dockyard are really helpful and will tour round the bay in the boat if you ask nicely.
A truly brilliant, relaxing, laid-back desert-island type idyll, if you only pay for the room and get your food and drink elsewhere!