ya'll know how to have a good time!
ya'll know how to have a good time!
Saturday I managed to get up late (well, 8 am) and miss my walk with the Aunties. Disappointing but I blame it on the jello shots. Since I am generally a non-drinker, even something as benign as 5-6 jello shots can cause a wicked head-ache. NOW I remember why I am a non-drinker. This day is somewhat blurry but I do remember having a porch full of people for lunch and ordering a bunch of lobsters and other food. All around a perfect day – minus the headache.
One of the best parts of our trip was having Kia the dog be our porch mascot (see picture) every day. After the first day (Thursday) they visited, she sensed (via the leftover Doc’s chicken) that we loved her and she was always welcome. Steve and her would stop every day and visit us while they were on their beach walk- apparently she insisted on it (see note about Doc’s chicken). She is one smart dog and quite the Ambassador. Everyone would stop by and see her every day she visited. She’s irresistible. It made us dog owners feel a little bit guilty about cheating on our dogs back at home, but again, she IS irresistible. We teased her owner Steve about how he was just the avenue of transportation for the true star. You should see her riding on his motorbike! That is one cool cocker spaniel/Dachshund mix.
Tonight was the Guest Appreciation Party in the lobby and they had drinks, appetizers and a band. It looked like a lot of new people had checked in. The lobby was completely full. Everyone seemed to enjoy the food and the punch was very potent (I was told.) We only stayed for a short time but the band played for a while and we even enjoyed it more from our own perches on the porch until it was time to go to dinner. That evening we headed over to the German Bar for dinner. The sausages with sauerkraut and the pizza were delicious. Also, the side of fried potatoes that they serve were so simple but yet so yummy. Reminded us of the pan fried potatoes we had as kids. Friendly service along with a reasonable wait time for our food made for a good dinner all around.
Later that evening we ended up having quite a crowd on the porch and it ended up part dance party, part comedy club again. Too funny for words. I believe this is the night that TogaNY came by and introduced himself and said hello. I just had to give him a shout out because he has the most incredible family. I had a chance to talk to his wife at the pool and she is as young looking in real life as in the pictures on his TR (someone commented on how it was hard to tell the teens from the mom!) We had an “all teen boys ARE the same” moment about our kids at the pool that left me grinning. I really enjoyed watching all of them having a lovely time all week. What great parents with great kids. Tonight I was extra careful to not stay up too late in order to not repeat my laziness from this morning, I was fast asleep by midnight.
Sunday I was up early for my walk and had a great time sharing the previous two nights exploits with my “Aunties”. Calm seas were back and I really enjoyed our walk this morning EXCEPT for on my way back, Mr. High Priest tried to speak to me again. I asked if he had become enlightened over the past couple days and if not, than not to bother me. He was not happy with this response at all but left me alone after I made it clear he was not to speak with me. On all subsequent walks, he just glared at me from a distance. In no way did I ever feel threatened by him – only a minor annoyance.
I believe this is the day that I met Michelle and Courtney from Virginia Beach and also Tony from Detroit with his friend and Aunt. Both groups are frequent visitors. I swear all the coolest people hang out in Negril, and specifically Treehouse. I spent half the day almost every day just listening to people’s interesting tales of how they ended up there. Better than anything on tv or radio for sure! I think we must have had lunch at the hotel or not at all because I have absolutely no memory of it whatsoever. Kia, again, was star of the porch. I swear I have more pictures of her than sunsets or food this trip.
Based on how the clouds were, we decided that this would be a great 3 Dives night. We all managed to get ready in time and get a ride up there. All the way up the sunset was awesome and I swear, just as we walked out to the cliff area, it went behind a cloud and was gone for good! Lucky for us that 3 Dives has such great food, worth the trip even without a sunset. The wait wasn’t too terribly long (probably just seemed longer because of the “fire eater” guy who kept trying to put his hands all over me.) Really annoying. He then tried to convince me (to no avail – I would have hitchhiked alone on the West End Road first) to get a ride back to the hotel with him after the show. Apparently, he is a regular fixture here and I was told that Pauline uses him as a driver but I would NOT get in a car with this guy. I felt molested by the time we were done talking to him. Then while we were eating dinner he started to bother 2 other women tourists sitting at tables closest to the cliffs and they moved to a table by the road to get away from him. This was right before he changed into a leopard loin cloth and started screaming like a banshee. We did our best to just eat and not encourage him too much because there were only 2 or 3 other tables filled and he seemed to focus on us A LOT! I have seen several of these type of performances down here and I must say that this was the saddest of all. His entire act consisted of only 3 different “moves” and a lot of screaming. After his 3-5 minutes “show” he came over and was collecting tips. I gave him 4 dollars US and asked him to move on - the smell of kerosene from him was unpleasant while trying to eat. (He would just stand there and stare at us while we were eating with his tip jar.) Thankfully a bus load of people showed up with several kids and he started his “show” all over using the new people as his foils. In his defense, these people really seemed to enjoy his act and participated fully with him. In my defense, he hadn’t tried to accost all of them over by the cliffs earlier like he had me. He just wanted to “feel” me he said…LOL!
What an awesome dinner though. JY ordered lobster and for about $30 got 2 whole split lobsters. They were huge. The chicken portions were large also. We all had leftovers. Kia was going to be happy the next day! I must mention that I love the callaloo here too. Back “home” for another night of porch dancing, the last call was around 11:30 or 12:00 as usual.
thanks for this report
Feb.1 - 16 Xtabi
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Monday was a “normal” Negril morning, up for my walk and then breakfast with the rest of the group. Guests were coming and going and it seems like every morning we were seeing someone off that we had partied with. Noone wanted to go – EVER. LOL! We were really sad to see our neighbors Will and Marissa go (they had been frequent porch guests) and we were hoping we would get new neighbors that were cool with our parties. I warned them it was there fault for leaving if we got un-fun people next door.
After checking on supplies, I decided that another run to Hi-Lo was in order to get us through the week. Wow – did we go through the Red Stripe, Guinness, Heineken, Tings, and Watta! We must have set a new personal record. It was another lovely day at the beach. Our new neighbors moved in and they had the cutest toddler. I know, not very conducive to the party scene but the young couple from San Francisco who were traveling with the Mom of the man were very cool and fun. The daughter was a little princess in her own right. She was always prancing around in her sunglasses and fancy shoes. We told them from the beginning to let us know if we were too loud or disturbing them in any way. They assured us that they appreciated us having fun on vacation and we weren’t a problem for them. The Grandma has a house in MoBay so they were only staying a couple nights at the beach.
Everyone just hung out and took it easy most of the day and – not sure why- but I cannot ever recall what we did for lunch – almost any day! Most days it was a combination of Allan’s jerk, Norman’s patties, etc. I do remember that something made me think of Ice Cream and the fact that I hadn’t noticed the Ice Cream Guy on the beach at all this trip. I inquired around and was told he still does work the beach but I was much too impatient to wait so my friend Gesla who had stopped by to visit was enlisted to drive JD and myself to Devon House. Not sure why ice cream tastes so much better in JA, maybe it’s the unusual flavors – grapenut, crunchie munchie, peanut – or the fact that you have to eat it so d*a*m*n* fast or it will melt all over you, but I always enjoy it like a child here. Everyone, including Gesla, who had the Stout ice cream (???who knew??- Is this popular with Canadians? Lol) agreed that the ice cream run had been a great call.
We had decided earlier that tonight would be the night that 8 of us would go to Kuyaba for dinner. After a very nice sunset, we called the shuttle at Kuyaba. I couldn’t get a straight answer as to how long it would be before we would be picked up so after we waited for a while, Gesla insisted on driving us over in 2 groups. All of us made it over and all the Kuyaba 1st timers loved the grounds and the setting. Since we have so many animal lovers in our group, everyone went nuts over the kitties. I know that some people complain, and the staff are NOT FANS of the cats – but we love them and are just trying to figure out how to help them get fixed so they don’t keep procreating. I realize that the best thing for the cats would be if there weren’t so many of them. If someone has the answer, let me know how to help because I would like to be part of the solution. We ordered a bunch of appetizer’s to share, and as always, the sesame camembert and the bacon wrapped shrimp were standouts. I always order the Mountain Pepper shrimp (an appetizer) with a side of jasmine rice. See picture! Everyone else loved their pork kebobs, chicken kebobs, seafood pasta and salads. Best meal of the reach although on this trip it was a very difficult award to give – SO MANY GOOD MEALS! Negril has upped their game in the food department. I live in San Diego and travel to many top food destinations but I have to say that between the ambiance and the flavors of the food, Negril has moved closer to the top of my list than ever in the dining department. First time ever I can honestly say – not a bad meal the entire trip.
This evening was much of a re-play of the previous nights, 8 to 10 people hanging out, listening to music and laughing. Even our new neighbors from 2 doors down – Bob & Nancy from North Carolina (?) stopped by for a few drinks and dances. We ended up naming them Mr. and Mrs. Mensa because they could sing all of Bohemian Rhapsody – every word. Our threshold for being Mensa members may seem a little low, but YOU weren’t there at the time. It seemed absolutely brilliant. Especially since Geri and I had been humming (not singing) about 2/3rds of every song that came on for the entire trip. (Well, not me really – just Geri but I was trying to make her feel better by saying that.) A couple of days later we had to re-evaluate Mrs. Mensa’s Mensa membership when she jumped off the cliffs at Rick’s. Not sure those two items are conducive with each other.
Also, a lunar eclipse happened tonight (Tuesday morning) at about 2:30ish but darned if I didn’t fall asleep around 1:00. I was SO close! It was much talked about the next day and I was bummed that I missed it. Luckily since it is part of a tetrad of lunar eclipses over the next 2 years, I’ll have another chance in August. At least that is how I consoled myself about the whole thing.
What a brilliant report.
It seems you have created your own home away from home, and adopted plenty of new family lol
Glad you didn't jump off the cliffs!!
FYI - I would NEVER, ever jump at Rick's, or off anything else for that matter! I am afraid of heights..
It never fails that on every trip - this trip is not an exception - there are multiple other guests that are walking around with huge red/blue/purple welts and bruises that they earned jumping from even the lowest spot at Rick's. This trip not only the former Mrs. Mensa sported one but also another female neighbor had a sizable one. This in addition to the guy who was beaten up pretty good and told the story about how he had jumped the first time and his wife had missed the "shot" so he went up and did jumped again and - you guessed it - she missed the shot AGAIN! At least he was laughing about it!
This is something that, in my observation, appeals mostly to either young people or drunk people (or a combination of both.) I am seldom either of these things anymore. LOL
Enjoying every word & picture - keep it coming
PS - haven't seen the ice cream man since Dec 2012, but we've been further down the beach since then...
I hear you on the heights thing. Wading is much more fun.
I always enjoy watching the jumps though, just because it's so terrifying to me that people dare to do it lol!!
Mu hubby has done it many time, more fool him!
Fun report.
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