This resort is laid out perfectly for your preference. If you want to participate in activities and listen to music all day, go to the main pool. If you want to sit and read or relax, you can go to the quiet pool. The activity directors were great and very energetic and participated actively in most of the activities. The restaurants were all good and offered a variety of dishes. Make sure to take the advertised excursion from sandals (I thing it was $35). It is a blast and you may see whales/dolphins. All of the banana drinks are very tasty.

Overall, the resort was a good place. Many of the staff were very helpful and extremely friendly. If the customer service a the restaurants and bars were better then I would surely give the resort a much higher rating. That being said, there were two evenings where we walked out of the restaurants due to slow service. One evening in particular was the evening of the "Soon Come Back" dinner. This was our third trip to a Sandals resort and we would normally go to the dinner, but my wife was sick that evening, so I chose to go to dinner was some friends we met there. It took us close to 1.5 hours to even receive our soups/salads and the soup was ice cold by the time we got it. Disappointed was an understatement & we spoke with concierge service regarding this issue. They immediately righted their wrongs in this by offering us a free breakfast in bed the next morning. That would have been great, except that food turned up cold as well.

Besides those two issues, the staff at the beach bar seemed slow at times even when it wasn't busy. While I don't believe these two issues would prevent us from going back, we did not feel we received that exceptional customer service that we were accustomed to while staying at a Sandals in Jamaica and Antigua. We will surely go back to Antigua & Jamaica again before attempting St Lucia.

Also, as a side note, the stay at 1 play at 3 can be very beneficial, especially if you stay at Halcyon. There are fewer restaurants at Halcyon, but you are able to book reservations at a few of the restaurants at Grande and La Toc, something we took advantage of one evening.

As usual with other Sandals resorts, take advantage of the free water sports...the staff there were great and made it more fun than usual.

I am going to cover the other two peoples opinion first and then I will tell you about my experience. St. Lucia is a wonderful place-and in St. Lucia you will find security to paramount. It is better than some of the nicest hotels I have stayed in my life (and I have been to a few). The security is top notch. I will say in order for you to be in property, you MUST have your membership card on you, otherwise, they can have you arrested. Long story short for Essie. Don't be on a Sandals Property unless you have the permission to be there.

Allow me to tell you about my experience. This was for my Honeymoon with my wife-We bought a Butler Room. You arrive from your transport-as soon as you are (if you have a butler, your butler will come and get you). Our Butler's name was Willard. He was tall, professional, and kind. He took my wife and I to our room that was gorgeous and had a view of the sea from our room and private patio. After showing some paperwork and getting it signed, he gave me a red cell phone. It was a direct line to him that if we wanted anything, we should just call two presses of the green button and bam-we were set with whatever we wanted, or whatever we needed. Our Morning Butler was named Silveria, and she was fantastic. She's a more business casual kind of butler, and you have to get to know her-but once you do-I promise you she is a class act with the dedication to back it.

For the next 10 nights I was in heaven. I also had the opportunity to meet Roland Charlemange, the Head Butler of the resort. He came and met with my wife and I the very next day just to introduce himself. One of the great gentlemen of the world to meet as a person, and I promise you a friend for life. Whether you have a butler or not-That man introduced himself to random guests and said if they needed anything to talk with him and let him know. I saw it as well as my wife.

I even had an issue regarding my Laundry. This is no joke-Roland, on his day off-went to where laundry was being done, and tried to follow up with my laundry problems. I have worked in the customer service industry for years-I have never, ever, been as impressed as I was with Roland and his butlers. They just don't care about the job, they care about you as well. You can't buy that quality in people.

As for the food-It was top notch in all three resorts in St. Lucia. and there was a festival on Fridays in which you can go up there to drink and have local St. Lucian Food. Green Figs and Saltfish is good. (St. Lucian banana and Saltfish-It is kind of like Tuna Sandwiches) Sunset Pool at Halcyon is the place to be. The quiet pool is a bigger pool, but the action is at the sunset pool. Make sure you are there to check it out. The activities are great and a lot of fun-you don't have to participate. The Staff follow the St. Lucian Mantra "No Pressure, No Problem". They really mean it.

Most people probably won't get a butler room. If you do-it is well worth the investment. It was worth every penny and then some. But if you can't or don't want it-you have access to the concierge, in which they have 2 working from 7am-10pm at night. If you need help with anything or you have a problem-they are the guys to go to. They bust their hump to rectify a situation or help you with it. They might not always be able to give you what they want, but they will work hard to at least meet you half way.

Also I should tell you this-Say you like Sandals and you want to come back-but the back of your mind is racing because your wallet is empty-They have a program called "Soon come back" and there is a desk next to the concierge. They have prices and promotions weekly on rooms for you to enjoy that is up to 65% off the website on ALL of their properties. You can get a week for little as 2000.00 USD. So definitely keep that in mind when you do this the first time. The next time will be much cheaper. Should warn you that the offers on that program are while you are staying on the property. So if you like it, make sure you have 400 USD just in case you want to do it again and again.

I will tell you Halcyon is the smallest of the 3 sandals resorts. If you like big and busy with a Las Vegas Feel-then go to La Toc or the Grande St. Lucian. But if you want to be in an Intimate place with your loved one, make friends for life with the staff, and have great food and drink without having to worry about anything. Then the Halcyon is for you guaranteed.

This was to be a wonderful 35th anniversary! We were deeply disappointed. I have stayed at another Sandals in Jamaica, but after this experience will never stay in another. Our friends from England, who travel the world and have stayed on many Sandals properties) were deeply disappointed. I will say that Ruth, the front desk manager, did try her best. But most of the problems I believe were beyond her. When we went to the beach bar upon arriving we were refused service because the bartender had to catch a bus. It was 10 minutes before closing. The food was fabulous but the service poor. The beach was not of white sand as depicted in the pictures. The room was clean but in need of an updated floor. I do believe that this is high season and two cabanas could not be used due to replacing the roof. There was always a shortage of beach or pool chairs which caused one to get up at 7 to insure a chair. Beach chairs did not appear to be cleaned of sand. The resort is located off of what appeared to be a major road. Do not expect anything remote. Yes, and sirens could be heard thoughout the day and evening. The clerk at the activities desk gave us incorrect information which could have resulted in missing our helicopter and flight to the states. We paid extra for ocean view. We saw the ocean through the beach bar and restaurant and part of it leaning against the raiing. I did contact Sandals and I do not feel they did enough to satisfy what was to be a wonderful trip. Yes, I did speak to couples who loved it. But I also spoke to others who were not satisfied with service, beach and quantity of food.
We also visited the French restaurant at Le Toc but had to run to catch the shuttle as their service was very slow. I read in the reviews where one couple was given a "dismal" room and asked to be moved. Why should a resort of this caliber even offer a dismal room?