March 2018 - In Love With the People

[mbrennan5]

Friday morning we fell into our groove of taking our time at breakfast while conversing with Bill and Robin on the mostly empty restaurant patio. They mentioned being interested in checking out YS Falls and Pelican Bar, but I told them I wasn’t into the idea due to the drive time. (I did mention Mayfield/Calico Jack’s as alternative’s). I mentioned that we’d be doing the One Love Bar Crawl and gave them some background info and told them we’d be picked up at 1:50pm but they said they didn’t seem super interested. After a lazy morning on the cliffs we decided to head to Quality’s Sea Breeze for lunch. It seemed like a place that a lot of people in the know recommended.

To quickly backtrack, when we had been driving from the airport I asked Linston to help me better understand the route taxi system. I had a decent understanding of the concepts… a red plate vehicle has a set route, traveling along either the Boulevard (beach) or One Love Drive (cliffs) before circling the roundabout and retracing it’s route. This is a set rate of $1.50 per person no matter how far you travel towards or away from the roundabout. I asked for more guidance on how to ensure I got the route taxi rate and what the customs were. He broke down a few things for me. Stick your thumb out like you’re hitchhiking. Clarify before getting in that this is a route taxi and tell them where you want to go. If you want to go direct from the beach to the cliffs then make them an offer. For two people they would only be making 600J if they were getting route rates during that time, so offer 800J and see if the driver will do it.

We headed out the gate at Tensing Pen and crossed to the other side in front of Shark’s. Within 30 seconds an old sedan with a red plate rounded the corner and I stuck my thumb out. The driver pulled over and I said “route taxi, 300J to Quality’s”. The driver mumbled and nodded and we climbed into the back since the front was occupied by an older woman. We dropped her off just up the lane and waited for her to come back out of the house with money for the cab fare. Once they were settled up we continued back up the West End into town. As we drove I was looking around still trying to get the lay of the land. When I noticed that Canoe was approaching I should have said something as I was pretty sure that Quality’s was nearby on the map, but I figured the driver knew where we were going. As we approached town I mumbled to my wife that we I had ****ed up and we were headed to the roundabout. The driver did not stop but instead asked us where we were going as he circled back. I told him I thought he heard me but he said he had not. Once we got there I gave him a 500J bill, to which he responded that I owed 600J because we had taken the route down and back.

I later asked Linston about this interaction and where I had gone wrong. He said this was the driver’s way of screwing me out of money. Although I sounded halfway like I knew what I was talking about when I got into the taxi, the driver noticed that I did not know where I was going when we approached the destination. I asked Linston “so really the key is to know when to tell them to let you out”. “Ya mon”. Out of curiosity I asked if I could have told the driver to **** off when he asked for more money. Linston said yeah I could have and the driver wouldn’t have pushed back.

I see why they call it Quality’s See Breeze. The stand is across the road from the ocean but with an unobstructed view and breeze. We stepped inside where two ladies were relaxing at the tables. When we inquired about lunch she said that the chef was at the market in Sav getting supplies. He’d be back in an hour but our stomachs couldn’t wait that long so we sauntered over to Canoe where we were the first lunch patrons. Canoe is a nice place. The view and open air is an amazing atmosphere. We ordered the lionfish entrée and the mahi mahi entrée. The fish was just OK. In hindsight I imagine our waitress had nudged us towards the specials board for good reason. The veggies were great though. That’s a trend I was noticing. Amazing huge portions of vegetables at every meal really gives you good energy for adventure.

Our route taxi back to Tensing Pen was uneventful and we regrouped to get ready for Lenbert’s pickup. We mosied out to the road to find Bill and Robin already there. They had decided to join us on the bar crawl. Nice! I had a feeling that we’d be the first pickup of the day since Lenbert lives nearby. As we drove towards Bloody Bay to start picking people up Bill commented to me that he liked the old school reggae Lenbert was playing. Lenbert overheard him and grabbed his MP3 player to start DJ’ing. After he queued up each track he’d give us a few tidbits of info about the song or the artist. He continued this through our first couple stops. By the time we got back to the cliffs we had two busses full of people and roughly 40 minutes had passed.

Once the crawl got rolling it was a blast. We had a mix of people from all over the beach, including a fun group of 10 Canadians vibing the second half of their annual 16 night stay at Grand Pineapple! My favorite spots on the tour included both the low key spots up the lane (The History Bar and ?), Lenbert’s house for his wife’s rum punch, Xtabi’s cave, and Somewhere West.

I spoke with multiple people in town about Lenbert and what their opinions are of his operations. The opinions run the gamut, and in many people you can sense a confliction. Almost everyone agrees that getting people to try new places is good, but no one can agree on which bars should be the “right” ones. I heard from one person that he shouldn’t take people to the village because “the whole thing started to show people a good time”. Another person told me he shouldn’t go to Xtabi because “you think they need it there?” I had a chance to speak with Lenbert one on one and what I think is that he’s a smart enterprising guy, who is also doing something really creative to help his community.

After watching sunset at The Sands we only had a short drive to Tensing Pen. The moment we got off the bus with Bill and Robin, all four of us knew it was time to eat. We headed right across the street to Shark’s. Unfortunately, right as we walked up a group of 2 and another of 5 sat down. I think we all had a decent buzz going, and combined with a few more at Shark’s, we easily passed the 2 hour wait with plenty of laughs and discussion. At one point while we waited the power to the building went out. One of the women walked over to the power lines and fixed it by jiggling them with a long pole. No problem mon! My wife had curry conch and I had brown stew fish. Both were really good with amazingly rich flavors. After the woman asked us how many beers we had drank, she wrote up the bill. We settled up and sashayed back across the street having earned a night’s deep sleep.