Beautiful island, decent condo
Submitted: May 6, 2012
Stayed: March 2012
First of all, I want to say that we had a wonderful week-long vacation in the virgin islands. There is plenty to see and do, particularly if you enjoy being out on the water. We found St. John's to be a more lush and natural island and preferred to spend our days there while calling St. Thomas home for the week.
This condo on St. Thomas is in a nice location because of the proximity to Red Hook and the ferry terminal. However, the beach is a bit dilapidated and the resort itself has seen better days. Getting from the condo to the beach (or anywhere else) is a long walk down a steep hill, which makes the return trip less than desirable. The condo pictures are accurate, but they don't show enough detail to know that there are some items that need attention, such as: shower door comes off the hinges when opening or closing, air conditioner is very noisy and screen door has holes, and the bed creaks noisily. Moreover, what concerned us was that the back patio smelled like sewage, preventing us from spending any time with the patio door open. We ran the air conditioner constantly while we were in the condo but tried to spend as much time as possible out and about. About mid-way through the week, the unit suffered a mosquito infestation which was enough to make us move to the Marriott Frenchman's Reef. We called to notify the property owner of the concerns we had while we were there.
Kathy was very nice and helpful with giving us recommendations of things to do while we were there. This unit is a decent "home base" for a very fun and adventurous vacation, but leaves something to be desired.
Owner's Response: A few points of clarification are needed for any vacationer planning a trip to our unit in St. Thomas.
First of all, the "dilapidated" resort the vacationer mentions is not our complex but rather the Sapphire Beach Resort--we own a unit at Sapphire Village. We cannot speak to the condition of another complex. We know that Sapphire Beach is beautiful and continues to be rated highly on most any travel website.
Secondly, we did have a serious one-time issue during this vacationer's stay with the on-site sewage treatment system but we only learned about this 2 days after the vacationer called us to say they had moved to another condo elsewhere. (Our property manager indicated that the sewage system never had issues but for 2 days last month the staff worked round the clock to remediate the problem.) As owners who take pride in our unit and complex we always want to know if there is a problem when it occurs and not days later. We would have gladly refunded their payment if we had been called.
Helpful votes: 8/8
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