This is a great place to vacation.
Very family friendly.
Infact if looking for a place without kids by the pool this may not be your place to travel.

Very safe location to travel, the resort has it all.

We were extremely dissatisfied with our experience at the Westin St. John. Having spent many nights at other Westin properties over the past several years, we had grown accustomed to a high level of service as well as cleanliness.

We noticed a pungent smell coming from the supply closet on our second or third day and notified the staff. The door knob and lock to the supply closet were also missing, so the room was constantly left open so that anyone or anything could enter the room. From what we could tell, the maintenance department did something to take care of the smell.

We were awakened one night during our stay by a strange noise coming from the cabinet which housed the refridgerator and minibar.. When I opened the door to the cabinet a rat (yes, a rat)jumped out and ran into our bathroom. We were able to close the door before it came out again. We called Maintenance, who showed up quickly. The gentleman went into the room and didn’t see anything. We asked him if there were any holes in the wall he noticed and he said no. We were unsure of where the rodent exited, but upon our inspection of the bathroom in the morning discovered a large hole behind the toilet where the pipes come out of the wall. From the location of the bathroom, it seemed like this area backed up into the supply closet. Obviously, this was a very unsettling experience on many levels. First, our family was very startled by the event and was unable to sleep the rest of the night. Second, we wondered how long the rat was living in our room because we had heard this sound other evenings, but brushed it off as something else. We notified the front desk in the morning and were told that we would be given a $50 credit for the food we had disposed of for fear it was contaminated. We let them know about the hole in the bathroom and asked that it be fixed, the refrigerator be pulled out to ensure there were no other rodents lurking the cabinet, the room be cleaned thoroughly, and the mini bar snacks removed from the room entirely. The rat had eaten a granola bar and knocked around everything else. We were going to be gone on a boat trip, so we let the staff know they had all day to get this done. When we returned at 4:30, we found the door to room one of our two rooms wide open and no one was anywhere to be found. Nothing was stolen from either of the rooms, but we were very upset by the breach of security as well as the feeling that perhaps another rodent could have entered our rooms. In addition, we found the mini bar in room 1617 exactly as the rat left it. None of the food had been removed nor had the refrigerator been pulled out to make sure no other rodents were in the cabinet. We went to the front desk to complain again and were told by the staff member that she would have someone fix it as soon as possible. We waited another hour and no one arrived, so we went to the other desk by the beach and spoke with a gentleman who sent someone to remove the refrigerator and mini bar snacks. There are many more details to this story, but suffice it to say, we had to literally beg for this problem to be rectified and no one on the staff seemed to really care which led us to believe this is a commonplace occurrence at this hotel.

A number of things about this entire experience have really disheartened us about Starwood management and service:

• The cleanliness of our room was poor at best,
• Most of the staff we spoke with didn’t seem to care whether or not the problem was resolved to our satisfaction.
• On numerous occasions we asked to speak with a manager and were told he was in meetings and would get back to us. We never heard from the manager or anyone else for that matter. At every turn, we had to contact the staff numerous times before we got some action.
• On our way to the front desk to discuss this problem, we stopped a maintenance worker and relayed the story to him. As we were doing this, a number of maintenance executives were inspecting the property. One of them heard that we had a rat in our unit and he just turned and walked away. He was more concerned with picking up fallen palm branches from the grounds.

After spending several hours talking to staff that didn’t seem to care, we were finally given one night free. Never mind the fact that the rest of the nights we spent in your hotel were quite restless.

This incident was obviously the most disturbing of our vacation, but there were a number of other things we noticed about this particular Westin resort that seemed less than up to the expected Starwood experience:

• The beach restaurant staff was nearly impossible to track down. At the Cayman Island location, they are ever-present and always ready to take your order. We had a good experience with one employee on our last day named Jayme. We found her to be attentive, responsive and caring.
• The concierge staff is also the staff who hounds you to schedule a timeshare appointment. This sets a bad tone. People want to be able to ask the concierge for help without being expected to spend 90 minutes listening to a sales presentation.
• Housekeeping rarely completed cleaning and replenishing supplies each day. On numerous occasions, we didn’t have bath mats or robes. We got turn-down service only one of the 7 nights we were at the hotel.

This is the first vacation we felt like we couldn’t wait to get back home. If we could have changed our flight, we would have. Usually, we are wishing we could stay a few days longer.

We will never visit this location again and there is no way I could ever recommend this resort.

After spending 4 tranquil nights at a condo in Coral Bay, we decided to splurge & relax at the Westin for our last 2 nights in St. John. We figured after all the driving & exploring for the 1st half, we would just sit on Westin's beach & enjoy cocktails, food & being pampered without so much as lifting a finger.

Check In: When we checked in at 4:30 PM, we were told that A) the room that we requested was unavailable & claimed they were giving us an upgrade instead & B) the room they were putting us in was not ready for us. The villa did end up being quite nice - it was a loft with a full kitchen, 2 bathrooms & washer & dryer, but our argument was that it was across the street & nowhere near the beach when we booked a beachfront room. This ended up being a blessing in disguise later on when we realized how unrelaxing the beach was. Also, for the inconvenience caused, we got dinner on the house at Beach Cafe that night. The food was terrible - thank God it was free.

The grounds: were very well maintained, the staff were incredibly nice - but don't take the "family resort" claim lightly. There were TONS of kids there. I honestly felt like I was in Disneyland. I love kids, but not on my vacation. If you're with your significant other & want a quiet, relaxing vacation - this place is not for you. If you're looking for a place to vacation with your family - the Westin is definitely great for that.

The beach: Is terrible comparatively to the other beautiful beaches on St. John (I know I sound like such a cynic, but I'm being quite honest). You're in the harbor with many boats & I swear you can see the glimmer of oil on the water. The sand looks like it's from a sandbox, not white & powdery like Trunk, Honeymoon or Cinnamon. The chairs & umbrella's came in handy at 5:00 when we came back from the real beaches & wanted a cocktail - but other then that it's not much more then a playground for the kiddies.

The food: as I said was not good at all. You can go to Zozo's or La Tapa 5 minutes away & have an amazing dining experience at the same price. (Another great dining experience in Coral Bay was Sweet Plantains....delicious!!!!!)

Traveling: RENT A CAR!!!!!! I know some people say that you don't need one - but it was the best money we spent on the trip. We're explorers....and we wanted to see as much as we could on the island which you cannot do without a car (a jeep in particular). We hit up 2 beaches per day & snorkled & hiked as much as we possibly could. St. John is beautiful, but most of the beauty is off the beaten path a little bit (you can visit the popular places like trunk in a taxi or on a tour, but honeymoon, saltpond, lamshire etc...you need to hoof it on your own). Trust me - it's SO worth it to rent a car. You won't regret it!

Overall, the Westin may be great for some people but if you're looking to relax with your honey - check out Caneel Bay Resort (we ate lunch there & it looked nice) or rent a condo off of VRBO.com (which we did in coral bay .... it was amazing & CHEAP).

We returned to the Westin St. John, after several years and this time with two young children, for one week. The hotel is very much as we remembered it, which for us is a positive since we enjoyed our first stay. We were much more resort-bound this time, and spent most of our time at the pool and the beach. The beach is not great but was clean and has some fun floats for kids. Considering the Easter break, the crowd was manageable and we were always able to find chairs; service was more than adequate. Our room was also adequate - it hadn't been renovated but was in decent shape and had a mini-refrigerator that was very handy. (We were told that the rooms haven't been renovated because more buildings will be converted to ownership villas.) Everything was clean and in working order. We ate at the Beach Bar restaurant 3 nights - it wouldn't have been our choice but one of our kids was sick - and it was relatively reasonable with average to better than average food and service. They also have a more reasonable bar menu but you almost have to know about it to get it. Other highlights were daily activities for kids and the playground. There is a good supermarket and drugstore nearby. We've stayed at many comparable resorts, including Westins, and we really like this hotel because we love St. John. I like the proximity of the resort to town - there are also taxis to town and the beaches so you don't have to rent a car every day. It's good for families who want to park at the resort, as we did, or to use as a base to tour the island.