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All Around Jamaica March/April
2003...Day 1
by Liz Maher
I must say ahead of time,
that I can't tell everything. Some stories must not be told, and
some need to be told over a beer, in person. But I think there are
enough stories here to make this worth reading anyway….
Day One, Wednesday (Airport-St. Mary)
We were so ready for this
trip. Two weeks in Jamaica…a first. That, and no kids this time.
We'd planned some of the trip ahead but left many of the first few
days open to whims. This was the trip I'd wanted to do for a long
time…almost all the way around the Island, in a car.
We arrived in MoBay on time, blah, blah, blah
and immediately found our rep from Vernon's Rental Cars, who met
us at the airport in MoBay. We signed a few papers (OmiGod, how
much do we owe you if we mash this car up???) and we were on our
way. Now I was leery about renting a car but it was all my husband
P wanted for the trip so I arranged it. After much research we chose
Vernon's/Fun Holiday. Good recommendations and they gave us a nice
internet discount on a new Toyota Corolla with AC and the works.
About 5 minutes out of the airport I turned to P and thanked him
for making me do it…I felt so free! Heading east from the airport
we stopped at Ironshore to grab some gas and a road map and stopped
again for some coco bread (oh yummy….) and drinks at a roadside
stand somewhere before Falmouth. From a guy in the shop, we got
the first run of the question we'd get asked a lot this trip - "What
do you think about the war?". Seems to me most Jamaicans I
meet love to talk and so do I, so it works well, we had a nice chat
and were on our way.
P was driving like a champ. He's driven in Jamaica
before but not for years. 10 minutes in the car and he's waving
the route taxis over to pass him, beeping like a Jamaican and handling
the left-side driving thing remarkably well. As Carolyn Barrett
would say, he's earning his PhD (pothole dodger). The windows are
down, Irie FM is blasting from the radio, we're in Jamaica and all
is well.
Until Falmouth.
P heads to the left to avoid a pothole and catches
a different one hidden in the vegetation at the roadside. Flump,
flump, flump….you know the sound of a tire going flat, don't you?
We pull over and P surveys the situation, opens the trunk and has
the spare on in about 5 minutes. I watch and wonder why I'm so happy
to be having a flat. We're back on the road feeling very broken
in. But we do think we ought to get the tire fixed soon because
we could hit another pothole and now we have no spare. So we drive
on until Runaway Bay, there's a light rain now. We see a "TYRE
REPAIR" shop and pull in. The very friendly guys there agree
to fix it for $500J (just under $10US) and so they pop off the tire
and we see it has already been patched 2-3 times. Hmm. OK, one more
patch. While he works on the tire, we hang out in the "office",
actually a very large shipping crate, you know, like 2 rooms big.
It's raining and we have some more nice chats while we wait. Finally
it's done and we head off….we want to get to our first stop, Castle
Garden in St. Mary (about 40 minutes east of Ochi, between Port
Maria and Oracabessa), before dark as we have never been there before.
By the time we hit Ochi, it's dark (except for
the many lights of Ochi itself, of course….that's a big bright town
for sure, high rises and everything) so we just resign ourselves
to finding the place at night.
I saw my first real sidewalk in Jamaica in Ochi,
it runs along the road from Dolphin Cove and Dunns River Falls into
town. Turns out it's not really a sidewalk, it's the "One Love
Trail" meant for people to use to walk/bike, whatever, between
those attractions and downtown. Only one small section was washed
away, pretty nice.
Libby, a friend who lives in Castle Garden and
had booked us in the cottage we stayed in, had given excellent directions
and we found the right road off the main. The main road thus far
has been great…only a little construction before Ochi and otherwise
smooth (well except for that pothole). This road to the cottage
though, is a different story. What Libby refers to as "the
nice flat part" is only a slightly less washed out, pothole-marl
mess than the rest of the "villa road". We do about a
mile an hour, looking for the gates to the home we are staying at,
dodging potholes we can only see with our headlights. It is quiet
around here, no lights, only a few people back at the main. Now
here is where I have a story that you need to ask me about should
we ever meet over a beer :) .
We do arrive at (as Libby wrote in her directions)
"the large iron gates" finally and head up. We meet the
owner of the "big house", Richard Sinclair (Hurry! Hurry!).
He's very sweet and shows us our cottage. The house the Sinclairs
live in was built by Bob and Rita Marley. It's huge and very modern,
tons of verandahs and a pool, on 11 lush, jungly, sea-view, rolling
acres. The property is beautiful….gorgeous views from many points
and paths, thoughtfully cut through the jungle for walking. There
is also a huge recording studio with a killer rooftop deck, a house
for the staff, a few storage buildings and our cottage. Richard
plans to add 4 or so cottages to rent, that's it. Our villa/cottage/house
was originally built for the studio musicians to use. It has 4 bedrooms,
a kitchen and living/dining area, a back patio with orchids hanging
down off a trellis overhead and a wonderful verandah that runs the
length of the cottage on the sea-facing side. We had booked only
one room ($75 including breakfast at this time) but no one else
was staying there so we had the whole cottage to ourselves. The
cottage is called Dream River Villa, by the way and Libby and Chef
(Libby's husband Chef is an excellent driver and guide as well as
a super-nice guy, more on them later…) have a web page about it
(and take reservations for it) on their web site at www.sealawncoralbeach.com.
We were pretty beat by now, but hungry and eager
to see what was around, so we went towards Oracabessa, to Dor's.
It is probably a beautiful place, we could hear waves crashing on
the cliffs, Negril west-end style, but it was too dark to see. We
had steamed fish with okra and veggies which was all they had at
that hour. It was great for me but P isn't a huge fish fan (a huge
PHISH fan, yes, but not in love with sea critters unless they have
shells). We laughed about that "final icing on the cake of
the day (so we thought at the time) and headed back.
The whole Sinclair family was home now and we
enjoyed meeting everyone. Intelligent and outgoing children and
Mrs. Sinclair was very sweet. We went up to the cottage ready to
fall into bed, we were exhausted. Key in first lock, no problem.
Key in second lock……uh oh. It seems I have accidentally locked a
lock on the bedroom door that we don't have a key for. Down to the
main house we go and explain. Richard returns with a bag of keys
he found in an attic that the Marley estate had given them with
the house…maybe 50-60 dusty keys in all. One by one, he, P and Mrs.
S, try each one while the kids and I play marbles on the floor.
All keys now tried and failed, P suggests and implements a somewhat
cruder method of entry and with no damage to the door, we're in
at last.
The cottage does not have A/C but being high on
a hill overlooking the sea, has great breezes and a powerful ceiling
fan and we were more than comfortable with a light blanket. Richard
believes A/C is unhealthy so it won't be added. Screens were being
added but frankly, even with me being the mosquito magnet that I
am, I was not bothered by bugs at all there. It had been dry for
awhile and the same breezes that cooled us apparently kept the bugs
away too. We collapsed on the bed, listening to the sounds of the
country…a dog here and there, the odd time-of-day-confused rooster.
I don't think I was awake for 5 minutes.
Hopefully tomorrow won't have quite the drama
and excitement that today had….we were planning to head to Port
Antonio tomorrow but we're starting to like it around here….
Photos from our trip are at http://gallery.hookahheads.com/gallery/albup08
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