Going slightly off-topic but not really -- getting ready for the travel booking site to go online (hopefully tomorrow??) has me staring at travel sites, Air Canada, Westjet, Expedia ... Airmiles for flights (funny joke!). We're thinking of St Lucia because hubby read that there are Chocolate Plantations?!?!?! I'm lost in the confusion of resorts i know NADA about & wondering if there anyone has been and has suggestions. OR if not which resort chains would you recommend to the very confused Duck?
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We stayed in St. Lucia in 2013 at Coconut Bay Resort. The resort was nice enough, but we chose it mainly for the kid-friendly aspects (kids' club, small waterpark with a few large slides and a lazy river). There is an adults-only section, but I don't know that it would be my first choice without kids. I think there are nicer resorts for adults, but probably at a higher price. We mostly ate at the buffet (easier with small kids), but there were several table service food options. IIRC you needed a reservation for the specialty restaurants, but they were included and not restricted. Might have only been open for dinner though. The resort is just off the end of the runway of the main airport; it's not exactly busy by major city standards, but around mid-afternoon each day there are a number of departures as the morning arrivals turn around to go back where they came from. It's kind of fun to lie on the beach and watch the big jets take off directly overhead, if you like that sort of thing. Lots of overseas flight crews at the buffet.
We spent one day exploring the island. It's very small and you can easily drive around most of it in a day. Roads are good, for the most part, but watch the hairpin turns at the tops of very steep and very high cliffs, without so much as a guardrail in sight. I'm neither a anxious driver nor afraid of heights, but those turns still made me a little nervous. Lucky they don't have winter. There are some very nice views along that stretch though (the costal road between Castries and Soufriere). I recall seeing banana plantations, but no chocolate that I noticed. Doesn't mean they're not there though! We spent a short while at Diamond Botanical Gardens, which is a nice spot (again, if you like that sort of thing). If I hadn't had kids along we would probably have done some snorkling and might have tried to climb the Pitons (requires a guide, but they're easy to come by), but that was a non-starter with little kids.
The weather was typically Caribbean. Usually sunny and highs in the high twenties, but there was generally a noticeable breeze off the water at the resort. It was actually a touch too cool for my liking, but I'm a heat-lover. This was in March, but I don't think the weather varies a great deal.
The only other all-inclusive I've tried was Dreams Punta Cana in early 2009. We went for a friend's wedding. Of the two, I would say that was the nicer resort. Nice beach (but it was so windy on most of our trip that you wouldn't really want to be on the beach, unless you like being sand-blasted), HUGE buffet with lots of choices, and again, several specialty restaurants. The food there was definitely a couple of notches above Coconut Bay, IMO. But again, the target demographic is mainly families. And if you're looking to spend much time off the resort, I would recommend St. Lucia over the Dominican Republic.
Good luck!