Monday was a day of relative rest in anticipation of what was to come.
Tuesday - Chickens Magic Bus Trip
So, here it was. The day out that had been planned months previously by Marley and ‘spoken’ about continuously on Negril.com for as long. The group of around 20 would be picked up at their various hotels after 7.30 - 8 in the morning, for a full day visit to YS falls and the Pelican Bar.
Excited………..Oh yes, it was also the first real time we would be with the group that has now written it’s name in the history of the Negril.com board. We set the alarm in case we slept in, but woke as the sun was rising with smiley faces. Breakfast (for me anyway) consisted of a four inch sub and a glass of orange juice. Now I was ready. Packing a couple of bags with Red Stripes and crisps and biscuits and my Homer opener, we lumbered our way to the gate of Idle Awhile and waited. Before too long the bus arrived. Here they all were, faces recognisable from months of looking at photo’s. Wow Marcus is taller than I thought, Ninja, look at that smile, who’s that with the hat, must be Guirigay, so many new faces! It would help if I’d not had so much breakfast.Everyone was so pleased to see us, so to break the ice, I opened the bag of beer. First one up, ‘Hi I’m Michael, I’d love one of those’. Excellent, a man after our own hearts, beer at 8.30 in the morning. We’re on holiday after all. Booger, Sandy, Marcus, Daisy, beers all round, this is gonna be a good day. We rumble our way back to Negril town, music playing, laughter, early morning singing and stop for cash and carry at the ATM.
The bus empties and bodies disappear into the throng of the day. Time passes, what’s happened? Marcus is stuck in the ATM booth!!! Really? Where is everyone, ah, there’s Booger and Sandy and there’s Shauna and Raul, it takes a while, but everyone’s back on. Of we go again, past the roundabout, go about 100 yards, stop again for beer and supplies. Everyone off the bus. Time passes, gradually people start to wander slowly back in the direction of the vehicle.
It was then that the phrase I’d never heard before, became such an integral part of the day and the rest of the vacation. beccajean, sitting behind me, ‘Jees, it’s just like herding turtles!’ It summed up the start to the trip. We’d all gotten into Negril time and both speed of thought and movement had slowed accordingly. Beer was loaded into coolers at the front of the bus, but wait, Chicken’s here with another bus. I haven’t got a clue what’s going on. ‘Everyone off the bus and into the other one’……..OK, people, bags, coolers, more people, ready?
It’s 10 before we leave Negril, the Turtles are on the move.
Sandy was tired from the night before, this photo isn’t upside down.
Brasi’s head popped up at the back of the bus. He’s also suffering from the night and (probably) days previous. I should point out at this time, that the ‘back of the bus’ actually took up all the seats apart from the front couple. So we’re moving down the road, trying to loosen the load, windows open, with the bus from the outside probably looking like a 1950’s steam train!!
The views from the bus was great, there’s some great country once you start to go inland and before long we arrived at YS. The weather was wonderful, warm and sunny, a perfect day, Marley had even organised that properly. Everyone off the bus, turtles totter here there and everywhere. So what now? We have to get on a trailer and get towed up to the falls. Yeh right!!! These are turtles after all, some make the first trailer, some don’t. ‘We should stay together!’………… Yeh right!!!
So we get to the bit where we get out. ‘Lets wait for the others’, no probs there. We’re all expert at not going far. The gang eventually group and the climb up the falls starts.
So now I get to a really important bit.
Before we left the UK, there was lot’s of ‘board’ conversation about jumping off cliffs and videos and photo’s posted. At the time, Jacky said to me, ‘You’re not jumping off the cliff are you?’ ‘No way Jose, I’m far too on the wrong side of 20 to be jumping off anything’, I said.
So, here we are walking up the wooden stairs and we arrive at a large pool of water.
Above the large pool of water is a rickity platform with a rope, where there is a queue of ‘nutters’ swinging and jumping and falling into the pool from about 100 feet. (Well it looked like it to me!!) Suddenly, Jacky is gone!!! Oh there she is, where’s she going, why is she wearing washing up gloves? She’s not……….is she?.…..she bloody well is!!!!!
I must say, I was very proud of her for doing that. It’s something I would never have dreamed she would’ve done. But it’s the holiday isn’t it? It’s the team, the trip, the accumulating mass madness that is gradually seeping into everyone. There’s nooooooo way you’ll get me doing that!!!
So, why am I standing on a rickity wooden platform with blue washing up gloves on?????
There’s reasons we do things in life. Peer pressure, excitement, The Dare, money, love………….well friends, it was none of those, it was the beer and sub that got me there. Looking back, I can’t even remember walking up there, I just remember this damp slick rope being shoved at me and someone shouting , Go!, over the noise of the waterfall. I’m flying………I’m wet and cold……I’m drowning……No, I can breath……..I can’t feel the bottom……..I’m alive……who’s all these people……why have I got blue washing up gloves on?
Other’s did it. I know Booger did, I think Sandy did, Tizzy might have, I really can’t remember. The next 10 minutes were lost in a haze of finding clothes, finding Jacky, wandering back down the stairs looking at the faces of the people walking up.
Sitting at a bench at the bottom of the falls with Booger and Sandy and Tizzy and I’m sure Guirigay was there with Sweetie Pie, Sneaking another sub out the bag, more Stripes, keeping it topped up, gradually the turtles gathered and at some point boarded the trailer back down the hill and back onto the bus. I am having one of the best days I’ve ever had in Jamaica and it's not even lunchtime!
