First Time Trip Report from a Long Timer, Base Camp - Treehouse

Great trip report. Thank you for posting

Friday morning and Tom and Geri leave at 7. I bring them coffee and we promise to visit each other back home in our different cities in California.
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I head off for my last walk with Aunties. They at least confirm that they ARE coming back next year as renters to their place so at least I can hold on to that. It’s not the final walk ever. We hug goodbye and say see you next year, and mean it. They will be heading back to cold weather in Michigan tomorrow. I at least have warm San Diego ahead of me later today, I tell myself as some sort of last day consolation. I turn back to walk the final walk (of this reach) and have THE final breakfast and see JK and JY off.
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I am the last one to leave and I have 1 and ½ hours after they are gone to get rid of all of the decorations and extras that have been left. I leave final tips in thank you notes for key staff that have gone out of their way to make our trip special. Kia and Steve stop by to say see you til next time – goodbye seems so harsh!

JoJo shows up and it is time to head for the airport. We stop at Bloody Bay and I say one last farewell to the kids and friends that I have there and then head off.

Another guy, Michael jumps in and is going to take the ride with us. He is a friend of JoJo’s and very funny. We are laughing back and forth and before we know it we are in the stretch between Green Island and Lucea when we see a Police Roadblock on the road. They have us pull-over and ask JoJo the standard question about having anything illegal in the car. JoJo says no but then says “Oh- I do have a knife.” This gets everyone’s attention, not just the cop asking the questions. He asks where it is and JoJo says it is in the pocket on the driver’s door. He asks him to get it out but when JoJo goes to get it, it isn’t there. The officer has JoJo get out of the car and searches him. He then gets Michael out of the car and searches him.

Now it is my turn. It is a male officer so he obviously didn’t body search me but he had me get my purse out and he searched it as I explained I was on the way to the airport. I actually pointed out several pockets that he missed while searching my purse and this brought an ever so slight smile to his face as he checked them. After finding nothing on us, he had myself and Michael wait at the back of the car with the other officers. Turns out they are pulling over all white plates, no red plates. I watch this for a while as the other officer searches the vehicle with JoJo’s help. They never did find the knife but they did find two pairs of scissors. When they asked JoJo what he uses them for he responded “cutting ganga”. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. The whole thing seemed too funny to me.

After not finding the confessed to knife or anything else and confiscating the offending scissors we were on our way again. The whole incident probably only took about 15 minutes but it seemed like A LOT longer. I gave JoJo trouble about his “false knife confession” the rest of the way. Luckily because of it being Good Friday there was no construction traffic in Lucea and very little regular traffic in MoBay so I still made it to the airport in plenty of time.

I went and got my boarding passes (no line at AA) and then headed to the Club MoBay check-in. I was so glad that I had signed up in advance for this. The Immigration line was very long yet I just was whisked through to a very short line and made it through with no problems or questions in about 5 minutes. This was especially welcome because of the delay getting to the airport and the fact that my nerves were more than a little frazzled from the PoPo experience. I headed off to the lounge where I enjoyed sushi, sandwiches, and other snacks while I waited for my plane. Met a nice couple in there who had just come from Ochi and they were super interested in hearing about Negril. Actually ended up giving them the Contact Info for Treehouse and they are going to check into it for their next reach.
The plane was a little delayed causing some concern for making my connection in Dallas. I also got to sit next to quite a character (not in a good way necessarily) on the plane. He had very interesting opinions about everything and even my headphones, book, and pillow w/ me fake sleeping on it, would not deter him from sharing all of them with me before the plane touched ground in Dallas.

With my Global Entry I didn’t have to fill out the Declaration Form or go through any lines in immigration. So easy. Luckily my bag was one of the first ones off in Baggage Claim (apparently Global Entry helps with this also I was told.) I was able to get through Customs with just my card, dropped off my checked bag and headed for the other Security Gate. There were a bunch of people with very tight connections so they kept diverting them over to the TSA Pre-checked & First Class line and neither line was moving very fast. I finally got through and managed to get one of the Limo carts (they work for tips) that actually drove me all the way over to the C Terminal which was like MILES away. There is even an elevator at one point that he drives the whole 6 passenger cart into. I made it to the gate with 10 whole minutes to spare. I’m not sure I would have made it had I had to walk to the Skylink and then ride the Skylink and then walk to the gate. Thank you Airport Cart Limo service in Dallas. I finally made it home around 9 pm local time San Diego.

PS I was home less than a day before I bought my first items for my next trip in August. LOL! I know YOU ALL understand.

PSS Snakes & Breaks – Home for less than a week:
2 huge (non-poisonous) snakes in my house
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Plus +
1 fractured finger bone at hand growth plate on son
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Plus +
1 broken down car (picture too boring to upload.)

EQUALS =

WHY did I leave Jamaica????????

Ha! Those snakes! Yikes...

What a great report...thanks for sharing.

Your welcome. It's actually cathartic to write these things! Helps with the PVSD - Post-Vacation Stress Disorder!

Thanks everyone for reading...next reach is in August so..... When do we start the August Roll Call?????

Nice trip report, although several times it gave me the creeps, lol, anyway august roll call, I am usually on that for ATI , Dream weekend festivities!

Beautiful California King snake in that first photo! We had one of those that lived for 15 years...

Great trip report, thanks very much!

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Originally Posted by Z-Corn

Beautiful California King snake in that first photo! We had one of those that lived for 15 years...

Great trip report, thanks very much!

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I don't mind any of the King or Gopher snakes - NOT a fan of the rattlesnakes (none this year yet, many every year!)

I would prefer all of them outside, as they are not pets. LOL! Really I would like to know how they are getting IN my house. I have cats and would think that would deter them (but maybe it is luring them...)

Regardless of the snakes, I feel I should get back to Negril soon so that I can hone my TR skills!

Thank you so much for the TR and I'd say that your TR skills are just fine :), but if you feel you need to hone them, well, so be it...

Sweet report! FUN~FUN, and more FUN~~that's the way to vacation!

Finally I got a chance to read this, great report, but did you have to name that driver jojo ? :) ;lol

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Originally Posted by jojo p

Finally I got a chance to read this, great report, but did you have to name that driver jojo ? :) ;lol

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OMG - I know after you PM'ed me I realized my "mistake" of naming him "JoJo".

Everyone - I swear - the name JoJo in my trip report is a complete alias and is in no way related (that I am aware of) to Boardie jojo p. - LOL

I would quite literally poop my pants if I saw one of them in my house.

Cool trip report and great pictures!! What a fun group!:D

News Flash
Suite A is being renovated with larger fridge next week
Your wish is my command!
FYI
Gail Jackson

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Originally Posted by mmtripoli@earthlink.net

As many times as I have been to Negril, I have never written a trip report. What do you call one of these, when a long timer writes their virgin report? Gotta be a name for it… Anyway – I’ve been going down since 2000 and this is approximately my 23rd trip. In previous trips my traveling companion has kept a journal to keep track of all the things we did and all the people we meet but on this trip, unfortunately, she was sick in bed the first 4 days of our trip so I am going to try to re-create this from a very fuzzy memory.

I left San Diego on the AA 10:30 pm overnight flight to Miami. Smooth sailing so far. I landed in Miami and had a 3 hour layover. Flight is under 5 hours long so barely enough time to even doze off after take off/ landing time. I’m an Admiral Club member so I made my way to the Club. Guess what? Not the closest one to my gate so they have me go to the OTHER Admiral Club. No problem. Club is very nice – pretty busy for 6:00 am. Have a great shower room set up. Sign up at front desk and when it is your turn, they announce your name. Only complaint is that you only get 20 minutes for your shower. How can a chick be ready in 20 minutes? It still felt great to clean up after flying overnight.

Another smooth, on-time flight into MBJ. It was so great to see the Club MoBay rep waiting for me at the end of the walk-way. A couple of planes were coming in at the same time –it turns out my friends’ JetBlue flight from New York was late and got there just as we did. I was getting ready to walk-up to the Immigration Booth when I hear my name being shrieked at a very high decibel – Tom & Geri (yes-male/female, non-mouse, human couple with those names) have arrived with their Club MoBay rep. After a stern talking to from the very serious Immigration Agent about Silence being required in the area, I swore to her that those people were crazy and I’d never seen them before in my life! She didn’t buy it but let me through anyway – with a smile. Down to baggage claim where the rep grabbed my 70 pound bag as if it were nothing and brought it over to the Customs Agent. One question and I was through. Yay! In the past, when I have brought such heavy bags down, I have had to go over to the “dreaded tables” where they have unpacked everything, asking who I had brought down things for. I only bring extras down for kids (toys, shoes, clothes, toothbrushes, backpacks) so they have never charged me duty for anything. Hint- to help avoid the whole search in the past, I have taken off the tags marking my bags as “heavy” before I even get near the Agents.

Off to the Arrival Lounge to hang out until Tom & Geri make it through and to wait for my friend to arrive to pick me up. I will call him JoJo to protect the innocent (and not so innocent further along in the TR). I thought it was pretty funny when they called him to see if he was at the Airport and he said he was in Redding, I responded that it meant he had just left Green Island probably – knowing him. The ladies at Club MoBay thought it was hilarious that I was calling him out on his tardiness. Tom and Geri arrive and we enjoyed a couple beverages and a bite to eat before we headed out to our separate cars. They had made other arrangements because I was scheduled to get in after them. Off to Treehouse for both of us. Always love the ride to Negril – makes me nostalgic. The sights, the smells, the air…Everything about it makes me smile.

When we arrive at Treehouse, it is just like returning home – but better! Wow, all the upgrades look great! The front office people –all of them come over to say welcome back. Jermaine is there with that great smile to take me to my regular spot. We drop off the luggage and then I have JoJo run me to Hi-Lo. Even there, all faces are familiar. Andre and Omar run off to get my usual cases of everything. It seems like I buy a lot of booze for a non-drinker. LOL! Store seems a lot bigger with all the alcohol now conveniently located right near the door now that the Western Union is no longer inside. Genius marketing at work here…
I then head back to the hotel to unpack, unwind, and decorate while waiting for 2 of the roommates (JK and JY) that are arriving later in the afternoon. So this is the deal with our decorations (we get asked a lot about them). We are old and cannot remember any of our trips from any of our other trips (we stay in the same room every time also) so every reach we pick a “theme” such as butterflies or luau and decorate the walls of our porch with the theme. This time it was “Vacation Princesses” and we had all sort of Disney Princess stuff hanging everywhere. Oh, and don’t forget the x-mas lights. Yes, we are truly running out of theme ideas. The fourth roommate was arriving the next day and since the day after that was her birthday we crowned her the “birthday princess” for the trip. Again, we are in our 40’s, 50’s, and 60’s. Not exactly the most mature group of people for this age range, I must admit… I am out enjoying the beautiful sunshine, saying hello to all of my much missed friends at the hotel – Moses, Budda, Dawn when I hear the voices of my friends just arriving! Yay! Let’s get the party started. They took a look around and were very surprised to see the “Adults Only” hot tub! My friend JK loves to hot tub so she was thrilled with the addition. We were all starving by this time so I decided to treat everyone to a delicious chicken from Chicken Lavish. A quick call to Doc, he heard my voice and started to repeat my usual order – everyone cracked up! I told him I had a few more people to feed and the order was in! We were all enjoying the start of the sunset when Doc shows up with more food than I’ve ever seen him deliver. It was also the quickest delivery I have ever had in JA. It was piping hot and wonderful! Doc hung around and we got caught up on all the things that had gone on since I’d seen him. As other people have mentioned, Doc ALWAYS has an opinion on everything and is not shy about sharing them! We love it! Eventually, maybe 2 hours later – we had finished eating and he got a call that he needed to head back to the restaurant. Best fried chicken I’ve ever had in my life. Sorry mom and grandma. JK was feeling worse and worse as the evening wore on so even though she is usually the night owl, she went in early too. We were all tired that evening but I still managed to stay up until midnight (that’s late for me!). Please don't do the math because it's only 10 pm in San Diego so I shouldn't be too impressed with myself! It's hell getting old...

Looks like I didn’t take any pictures the first two days (duh!) so I promise to have some from after that in the report.

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Originally Posted by gailnegril

News Flash
Suite A is being renovated with larger fridge next week
Your wish is my command!
FYI
Gail Jackson

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This is TOO COOL but quit telling everyone - It's already hard enough for me to get my dates! LOL (I will call Cynthia for my April in Suite A trip for 2015). Already booked Suite B for August...will be happy for the extra shade closer to the big tree!!

Honestly - this just proves, again, that Ms. Jackson is one of the hardest working Owners in Negril (probably the planet but I don't want to seem like I am exaggerating - i'm not!)

Thanks again - can't wait to see it!