St. Thomas nice beach for family

[Ilona]

Hi, we (a family of 4) will be on the Pearl in January (cruising St. Thomas, Tortola, Samana ...)
Are the beaches walking distance from the ports? What's the nicest and closest beach in St. Thomas? Is it a must to see Trunk bay? Thanks for all your recommendations.

[peter l]

Hi Ilona. Trunk Bay is beautiful and offers some great snorkeling as well as an opportunity to visit a beautiful spot. Magans Bay is another great spot with a beautiful well protected beach. I have not snorkeled there. You can take a bus round trip very reasonably and pay an entrance fee and enjoy for as long as you want. I'm sure there are others that have their favorites spots; you'll certainly enjoy the island whatever you decide to do.

Peterl

[penny3333]

Hi Ilona, there aren't any beaches in walking distance from the dock in St. Thomas. I, too, highly recommend going over to Trunk Bay. However, if you want to stay on St. Thomas, there are some nice beaches. Magen's Bay, Coki, and Sapphire are the 3 we've been to. There is good snorkeling at Sapphire, if the wind isn't blowing too hard. Coki and Magen's both have snorkeling, too. Trunk Bay is just amazing, it is one of the top 10 beaches of the world. If you use your "Find" feature in the upper left hand corner and type in St. Thomas or Trunk Bay, it will pull up all the posts made about both places. Jim also did a great post in the FAQ section about getting to Trunk Bay. Best wishes!

[denjoker]

We've been to most of the beaches but prefer Sapphire - never too crowded and great off the beach snorkeling - as mentioned previously - can be windy. Cab used to be about $10 per person each way. We'll be returning mid Jan on the Dream - can't wait!

[Dwayne]

I like Sapphire Beach too if I'm not going to go over to St. John. Magens Bay is also a nice family beach. The snorkeling isn't good there though because of the lack of rocks, coral, and other natural fish attractors. Then again, if you are not going to snorkel it is truly beautiful, and you don't have to worry much about stepping on the rocks etc. It can be a lot less windy than Sapphire Beach.

Click here for the taxi rates on St. Thomas.

Dwayne

[poormom]

All the beaches mentioned are beautiful. I know you asked about ST. Thomas, but PLEASE do an excursion through the cruise line in Samana. It is a crazy place. You will be bombarded by literally hundreds of very aggressive people trying to get you into a scary little rickshaw on the back of a motorcycle. Most of them don't speak English. They have one person who makes the arrangements and off you go. We got to the beach and the hawkers wouldn't leave us alone. They even tried to get us to give them our towel. The saddest, most impoverished place I've seen. A good day to stay on the ship and enjoy the empty lounge chairs.

[Cortney]

My husband and I went to Coki Beach a few years back on the recommendation of Sonny, one of the veteran posters here. It was the most amazing snorkeling we've done to date!