We stayed in the area in 2007 and had someone break in to our villa bedroom while we were sleeping. St John police told us they had a lot of trouble in the area at that time. There was some low income housing close by that they blamed. Not sure how it is now.

A couple of years ago we were staying in a villa called Paloma Blanco in the Gift Hill area. We locked up tight before bed, but woke up about 1:00 am by someone in the bedroom going through our stuff! He ran when I yelled at him and jumped up. He had defeated the little "j" type lock on th...

We stayed there several years ago. We were awakened at 2 am by a guy going through our stuff. He was in the bedroom. He had defeated the locks on the sliding doors. He ran out when I yelled at him. We called the police, they came out but found nothing. They told us that breakins in this area happene...

"Bad Neighborhood" as in a rutted dirt road past several run down shacks with abandoned cars sitting around, weeds about waist high, and not too far from some subsidized housing (apartments) which the local police said was the biggest problem with the area.

Just chimin' in. The break in I wrote about was at Paloma Blanca villa. It is in a bad neighborhood. We didn't know that when we rented it. However, the villa management company was Destination St. John and they bent over backwards to take care of us. They moved us to a much nicer villa the very nex...

We stayed in Paloma Blanca on the island back in 07. The first night about 2:00 we awoke to find a guy in our bedroom going through our stuff. I yelled at him and chased him out through the sliding doors. We called the police and they did come out fairly quickly and seached around but of course did ...

We saw a turtle and a shark at Trunk last time we were there.

I read posts all the time about the snorkeling on Trunk being below par due to all the tourists. We agree that the snorkeling might be a little better on other St. John beaches, but we were there recently on a cruise and snorkeled Trunk again. We started off to the right near the rocks and a huge se...

Also, Fromers message board thread that has been going since Aug. 2007 about the issue.

http://www.frommers.com/cgi-bin/WebX?128@@.ef3d85c

Amazing what you can find if you google it. Google "villa breakins usvi st john" and all kinds of stories pop up. Apparently this has been going on for some time. (and in many places) Here's an article from Conde Nast from August 2006

http://www.concierge.com/cntraveler/articles/10388

Lex, I guess we were there on one of the "every other days". We did everything we knew to do to avoid being victimized but were anyway. I don't think anyone needs to get too bent out of shape about this, but everyone should not be naive about the situation either. We were kind of lulled in...

I have posted this before but here goes: We were on St. John last August. We were staying at Paloma Blanca villa which is secluded in the Gift Hill area. We awoke at 2:00 am to find a man in our bedroom going though our stuff. I yelled at him to get out and jumped up. He fled out through the sliding...

Bill, thanks a bunch.

If we caught a taxi to Caneel (to walk over to Honeymoon), can we easily catch one back? Do they hang out there like they do at Trunk?

Thanks for the help.

Thanks for the help! I'm sure we will enjoy wherever we stay.