If anyone is thinking of coming to Rodney bay for a lovely beach, then don’t! We arrived yesterday, thought we would spend a day on the beach, walked there about 5 minutes away. It was absolutely rammed, couldn’t even see the beach! I’ve never seen anything like it, was so disappointed. The people were arriving by the dozen, as two cruise ships had docked. Have visited many countries all over the world, this is by far one of the worst!!!

We have just left the reduit beach at Rodney bay today after stopping off from marella cruise. On arrival we were looked after by Chantelle who made sure we had everything we needed. Lovely rum punch and beer bucket brought to our lounger. We were looked after very well from arrival until we left.

Nice beach, but I have experienced much more beautiful Caribbean beaches. I realise it is a public beach, but the entrance via the road has a lot of litter, mainly beer bottle tops. I've seen tourists smoking and then putting cigarette buts in the sand. WHY? The beach restaurants are good, but expensive. Rodney Bay itself has a nice vibe about it.

The trip up to Rodney Bay is a rough 1.5 hrs over some pothole filled winding roads with locals who have no issues in jumping out to pass even when they have no idea what is coming towards them. Each town has some type of construction, detours and traffic, so don't believe you will be able to hop around this island and see things easily. We had a car, but kicked out on some things just because we didn't want to fight the drive time. Rodney Bay is a beautiful bay, but the sand from the in town side was course and we didn't use the beach there. Pigeon Island was great and the hike and views from Ft. Rodney and then Signal Hill (same area for the $10 entrance fee) were wonderful. Signal Hill is a climb/scramble over rocks and only for the fit person. Ft. Rodney most could do, but the last uphill part would be a challenge for some, so you may have to settle for the lower lookouts. All beaches in St. Lucia are open to the public and there is a free beach just outside the entrance to Pigeon Island with a food/drink place and chairs. We actually paid the $10 each a couple of days to go back into Pigeon island and use that beach since it had plenty of shade trees. The gate area also rents lounge chairs here for $3. Prices were in USD. Best eats were at Elena's Italian/Pizzeria where you can get a combination of things and gelato (ice cream) with a view of the marina and Amici's which was also had pizza and seafood. Amici's is more in the town area near one of the Massey's grocery stores. Naked Fisherman we thought was up on the cliff overlooking the water, but was a small on the beach (in the sand) place down a long flight of steps. No cover at the tables, so if it rains which it did frequently you get handed an umbrella. The food was good, but not what we expected. Judging the way most people were dressed (nice), I assume they were taken back some as well. We did a dive and drive with Scuba Steves. Nice boat ride down the island to Anse Chastanet dive location then Soufriere town. Concept seems good, but getting handed off to a cab driver (dedicated to us of course) after being soaking wet from diving then being taken to a nice restarant with out any means to hose off wasn't nice. I think I needed more dramamine for the ride back than I would have for the boat. I know this is a Rodney Bay review, but overall I was surprised St. Lucia was a more impoverished island than I thought. Not sure why given number of tourists and the larger restorts. If you are an animal person the sight of very thin stray dog's and cats will tear at you. We brought a bag of dog food, left it in the car and dumped it around as needed. Some beautiful parts of the island and it is in the Carribean, so no doubt lovely water, but for our group I would say this is a one and done.