Saint Lucia in September?

[Rhone Man]

My impression of St Lucian diving has always been nice sites, but little marine life.

St Lucia itself is pretty, but does have a bit of a crime problem, so you are best staying in a resort.

 

[The_Ghost]

There are some neat excursions, but the "drive thru" volcano is a little over hyped. Since it's a sulfer volcono it stinks very badly. I did like a complete tour package, which took me to the botanic garden/water fall, volcano, snorkel. Was fun, they gave us free booze all thru out the trip. I also won the drinking contest so i got the most amazing tshirt(haha)

The zipline thru the rainforst I heard was amazing, but I didn't bring any tennis shoes so I couldn't do it. A couple said they saw a huge python sun bathin on a branch was they went thru the trees.

@rhone not sure what you mean by marine life. If you mean fish, ehhh there was plenty of fish to see. Not much coral.

Not sure on the crime, but I know we walked 50 ft from the docks to a bus to get to the gardens. We were bugged and begged by kids to give them a dollar. Drove us thru a town...looked a little rough. If you got high enough all the views were very cool.

Like I said, the island was fun, just the resort was lacking. I'm sure if I stayed at a diffrent resort I would have had a better time.

 

[ColoDale]

Right about Castries. It is a bit seedy in places and I definitely wouldn't walk around the same at midnight with my wife. Passing thru and day shopping is when we were in Castries.
I also thought marine life was on the sparse side but it could have been the time of year and that a hurricane had passed 3 months earlier. Lot's of very small fish (frye?), trumpetfish, ballonfish, scorpionfish and lionfish but nothing large (one reef shark seen below at depth which disappeared quickly). It wasn't terrible.
St. Lucia has been checked on the dive list as done. Onwards and downwards.

 

[MOTU]

Take a look at Ti Kaye. Beautiful small resort. I agree not much big marine life there, but I love to shoot macro "little critters" so I don't miss the big stuff too much.

 

[Ray and Pam]

Too late for posting this but Ti Kaye is closed for renovations or something in this September, Anne Chastenet? is open though.

 

[Fernie]

Can anyone recommend a great resort for St Lucia that has diving nearby,but also great value.I am used to staying at a RUI/princess resorts. Any dive operators that someone could recommend would be great!

 

[ColoDale]

The best diving in my opinion is on the southwest part of the island and if you want to be close to it then I would stay from Marigot Bay and to Soufriere.
While there are dive sites around Castries and Gros Ilset in the North, I have found that these sites are not as good.
Of course, all of this depends on what you deem as good diving.

I am not familiar with the Princess resorts but from what I can tell these are around $100 per night and are large properties with many rooms and buildings
I am not sure what you mean by value. I am assuming decent properties but cheaper as opposed to opulence and butler service that you consider a value.
The resorts that I know of in St. Lucia of large size are significantly higher priced than the Princess resorts in Mexico and the Caribbean. Generally I think lodging prices are higher priced in St. Lucia as compared to, at least, Mexico for comparable properties.

There are many smaller hotels and what may be called resorts/plantations in the same price range, as I think you paid, in the area (Marigot Bay to Soufriere or close to them). I don’t have any recommendations for these but there are quite few. I would definitely put time into researching the smaller hotels.

I would not stay North (like Castries or Gros Islet) although there are larger hotels there. Nor would I stay far South, like Vieux Fort. They are far from the diving on the Southwest side not to mention that I think Castries (downtown) is a dump.

Also, there are two international airports - at Castries and Vieux Fort. Depending on which one is used, it could shorten or lengthen your ground travel time significantly to and from your hotel.

 

[CaliDenna]

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