Is sand gravity a choice? Trip report 2014

[freebirdny]

Well, we didn't want to come home but didn't have a choice. The hotel wouldn't let us stay for free, the restaurants wouldn't let us eat for free and the airline wouldn't give us an open ended free ticket home. Sigh...oh well. We had a truly wonderful week in Negril. Stayed at Idle Awhile, our fourth time, and loved it as always. I don't have to tell you all what the beach is like there but I will say it anyway - incredible, beautiful, peaceful, relaxing, healing, wondrous. Anyway....we spent a whole lot of time doing nothing. On our second day my husband said "I think I'm just going to let the sand gravity take over today." As if that's a choice!!!! We traveled from Sunday to Sunday this year for the first time. The travel was fairly uneventful. Our flight in was on time, plane was full but we were the only ones going through customs and immigration so very quick. The flight home was delayed. The plane was fully loaded and captain had just announced that we were actually going to be able to leave a little early so everyone fasten seat belts, etc., which we did but then we sat there and sat there and no take off. You could see people gathered at the front of the plane. Uh oh, that's never a good sign. Captain then announces that they can't get the door to the plane locked (ooops) but not to worry there is a manual override so we shouldn't be delayed much more than twenty minutes or so. Okay, these things happen. Fortunately the air conditioning was left on. About half hour later captain comes back on and informs us that they still can't get it locked and are calling for maintenance crew, but there are two other planes with problems ahead of us (????, two other broken planes?) so we may have a bit of a wait and may have to evacuate the plane. Shoot!! About another twenty minutes go by and the announcement comes on that the maintenance crew is there but they have to wait for the paperwork to get there from the terminal. Oh no, waiting for paperwork in Jamaica, this is not going to be good. Several more minutes go by of watching people at the front of the plane. There is a man seated a few rows behind me that has been loudly complaining the entire time. Now in my opinion this only makes the wait more difficult and also does absolutely no good whatsoever. After awhile he gets himself pretty geared up and gets out of his seat and marches up to the front of the plane. There you can see him waving his arms and being very animated with the co-pilot (he thought it was the pilot but it wasn't). After a bit he comes storming back down the aisle and announces to those of us in the back third of the plane that he has spoken to the pilot and that they can't fix the problem and they're going to evacuate us all. Lots of conversing over this statement and people actually start to pack up their belongings in preparation for being evacuated from the plane. The two women seated next to me and my husband all looked at each other and just sat back. We'll wait for the official word if you don't mind. Not five minutes later the captain announces that the door is closed and locked and we may be able to make up some time in the air so we probably won't arrive more than an hour late. Guess that guy felt a bit foolish! And that's exactly how late we arrived, one hour. Not too bad at all. Rather arrive home an hour late than arrive in Negril an hour late.
At Sangster Airport our driver was there to meet us and off to Negril we went, catching up with him during the ride on what had been going on since last year. As I mentioned this was our fourth time at Idle Awhile. We love this property. The staff recognized us and we them and it felt like visiting old friends! This trip was particularly lovely because there was such a great group of people staying there for the week. I love how a feeling of community springs up at Idle Awhile because of the wonderful staff and because it is such a small and intimate resort. There were several families staying there this year and we so enjoyed watching their interactions all week and getting to know them. There is a couple who stays here every July for two weeks and we recognized them from last year and became reacquainted with them. Every day it was like meeting up with friends as we all talked about various places we had been to and things we had done. Where we had dinner the night before and what our plans for the day were and just hanging out with them on the beach where conversations would swirl around and carry out into the water. If someone wanted to buy something from a vendor then that vendor would often become part of the conversation as well. We were never hassled or bothered by any of the vendors (although we have been on past trips) and of course recognized many of them from past trips. The fruit lady of course was a daily visitor and I will post some pics of her later. We bought patties on the beach from the pattie man (whose name I can't remember) and pastries from Anthony who we had bought pastries from last year. My husband had two massages from Sandra who operates next door at Charela and we bought some jewelry from Jimmy and his beautiful daughter on his weekly visit to Idle Awhile where he sets up a table for the day. Jimmy is a wonderful jeweler and has some unique pieces and what I really get a kick out of is that Jimmy color coordinates his table set up so that all his blue jewelry is together, all his green, etc. He is meticulous about this!
The people who care for the beach at Idle Awhile take great pride in the cleanliness of their beach, the beauty of it and in assuring that everyone has the chair set up they want. Eric is there so early every morning and works all day setting up chairs, raking the beach, cleaning up the plants and always with a smile. He and my husband had many conversations during the week. Aaron is the lifeguard and also helps out setting up the chairs and distributing towels. A few extra dollars assured that we had beach chairs right under the tree every morning and believe me nobody else was going to sit in those chairs, Eric and Aaron both kept an eagle eye on them. But if we weren't going to be around, we let them know.