St. John on our own from St. Thomas

[lysolqn]

Trying to decide whether to take a shore excursion to St. John (from St. Thomas) or do it on our own. We're five adults, a 4-year old and an infant, and can do it on our own or take the Princess excursion for $69 per adult, $55 per child.

 

The shore excursion will cost a total of $400, with minimal hassle regarding transportation to/from and while on St. John. That includes an open air tour of the island and a short time to wander through town on our own. We're not beach people so not spending time at any of the beaches is not a problem.

 

If we do St. John on our own, we'll need two taxis to the ferry from the Crown Bay pier, the ferry ride over, a tour of St. John, the ferry back and two taxis back to Crown Bay. To make our decison we'll need to know,

1 - Cost of a taxi from Crown Bay to the ferry?

2 - Cost of the ferry round-trip from St. Thomas to St. John?

3 - Cost of a van or open air jitney around the island?

 

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

[alphakitty]

The "taxi" is an open air jitney....a truck really, with bench seats. They hold many people so you will only need one for all of you. The cost is around $6.00 pp from Crown Bay to the downtown ferry at Charlotte Amalie. The ferry ride from there is $10 pp adult one way. ($3.00 children) There is a ferry from Red Hook that is $5.00 pp One way and $1.00 for children. Red Hook takes longer to get to by taxi and the taxi ride would be more.

 

You can get more specific info at www. v i n o w . com. No spaces ..that site gets bleeped for some reason here. Taxi rates, ferry schedules, etc are all there. Hope it helps. :)

[lysolqn]

Thanks for the info you provided.

Just checked v i n o w .com (Yup, they blanked it out the other way!) and determined that round-trip transportation from Crown Bay, St. Thomas to/from Cruz Bay, St. John will be about $184 for all of us. If someone is kind enough to post what we can expect to pay, per person, for a tour of St. John, we'll be able to decide whether to go with a ship excursion or try it on our own.

[alphakitty]

I believe when we went in February the ship's excursion to St. John was $48 pp. This did not include an island tour on St. John, just a trip to Trunk Bay and snorkeling.

[jmo1]

Crown Bay is close to the airport and car rental companies, so why not rent a car big enough for all of you. Budget has minivans for less than $100 per day including taxes and fees. Hertz is the only company that I know of that does not allow their cars to be taken to St John. The car barge over to St. John is about $50 round trip, including occupants of the car. That's a total of about $150 for everything. Looks like a deal to me.:)

[The Islander]

If someone is kind enough to post what we can expect to pay, per person, for a tour of St. John, we'll be able to decide whether to go with a ship excursion or try it on our own.

 

Sightseeing Tours: 2 hours - One passenger $50; two or more passengers $25 per person. 3 hours - One passenger $70; two or more passengers $35 per person.

 

--Islander