Day 5: April 25, 2012

I awoke this morning with a smile on my face. And why wouldn’t I? I was lying in bed listening to the waves crash against the cliff in my favorite place in the world and I was laughing and smiling thinking of the events of the previous day. It took a moment for me to remember what day it was and once I realized it was Wednesday I then instantly knew what today was…..it was the Pub Crawl! I realized I still had 4 more days to go and that made me happy. Yesterday I spent all day on a bus with crazy fun people and I was looking forward to doing it again today!

I got up and headed out to breakfast. I joined Sweetness at our usual table and grabbed my cup of coffee and rum cream. We chatted and laughed about the Magic Bus trip and how much fun we all had. We talked about our plans for the day and enjoyed chatting some more while we ate, this became a morning ritual for us and I really enjoyed it.

We saw some rustling from Booger, and Tizzy and Jon….but no sign of Pooper. The three of them headed out to breakfast (I think maybe Just Natural?) and they left Pooper in the room to recover….we never even ended up seeing her that day! LOL Later on that day Booger, Pooper and Jon checked out of Catcha and headed down to the beach for the rest of their stay. Tizzy had one more night at Catcha and then she was to leave to go home. But she was having such a good time she called and got her flight changed and extended her trip until Saturday…Yay! So her plan now was to stay around Catcha that day to recover and then join them all the next day down on the beach.

After breakfast, Ninja and I called to get our scooters. We always rent scooters while in Negril because it makes it much easier to get around but we realized we had been having so much fun and on the go here there and everywhere that we were already on day 5 and had not even rented our scooters yet! So we called and our friend came and picked us up and took us down to his place on the beach. We were getting everything in order when we saw Kopper (Patty’s hubby) walk by on the road. We called out to him and he crossed over to chat with us. We asked if they were going on the pub crawl later today and he said no, that they were all having a dinner party at their place that night, so we told him we might stop by later depending on how crazy the pub crawl gets. So off he went and us too. We hopped on our scooters and headed over to the gas station to fill er up! By the time we were done with all of that it was probably noon and since we had a pickup time of 2pm we decided to just head back to Catcha.

When we got back the place was pretty quiet so I assumed this meant that Booger and gang had checked out. LOL Ninja and I headed to our room to just chill out and enjoy the view from the hammock for a bit.

Name: 823368596311.jpg Views: 1911 Size: 89.4 KB


After that we headed to Ivans for a pre-pub crawl drink and a light lunch.

Name: 727368596311.jpg Views: 1877 Size: 92.6 KB
(A Purple Rain at Ivan's Bar)

We chatted with Tizzy for a minute but she said she was going to sit the pub crawl out so she could recover a bit but that she would call us later and maybe meet up then. I noticed it was 2pm but it is Jamaica so I didn’t run directly to the front gate. I got Ninja and all of our stuff, spoke to some of the gang at Catcha, gave some dog biscuits to Ben and then headed to the gate. I was in no hurry because it’s Jamaica, no one is ever on time and by now it was only 10 after. I greeted our favorite security guard, Louis, and told him we were headed out on the one love bus. He then told me “Oh, they were just here looking for you but I didn’t know it was for you guys” I was like “OMG, REALLY?!?!?!?!” We missed it !?!?!?!?! And he said well, no, they said they would head up to Seastar and then swing back by. So I was like “Phew” ok so we just went ahead and walked up the lane towards Seastar. We saw the bus there at the end and we headed down towards it. As we almost reached we could see Guirigay and Sweetiepie boarding and then the bus started coming towards us. We waved and stuck out our hitchhiking thumb and they stopped to pick us up.

We got on and greeted our fellow travelers. On the bus was Guirigay ad Sweetiepie, Gerryg123 and SuzieQ. Our next stop was Xtabi where we picked up Katho and Wpyogi and +1 (though I didn’t know that was who they were at the time). Since that was pretty much all of the west end stops, Lenbert asked if he could drop us off at the first stop while he heads down to pick up all of the gang on the beach. “Sure…no problem” we all say. So he lets us off at the first stop, which was Swordfish. We get off the bus and head up to the top deck, what a great view from here. (I had some pretty great pictures, but of course-by now you should know whats coming-they were on the camera we lost). I ordered another Apple vodka and Ting (thanks again Bre) and sat in the little hammock swing chair off of the bar. Around this time I introduced myself to Katho (who I recognized from her pictures on Negril.com) And then there was the other couple, whom I didn’t recognize. I asked if they were boardies and the wife said “I am but he isn’t” She said her name on the board was wpyogi and she was shocked when I said “Oh yeah, I know you” She said “Really? I don’t post much” And I said “Well I read all of the posts lol and I remember seeing that name before” So we chatted and got to know each other a bit better….all of the what’s your real name, where do you live, what do you do, etc etc.

Around that time the second bus group showed up. I was pretty excited because I knew that Daisy and Markus, Spottycatz and Booger and gang would be onboard. So as folks started piling in, there were LOTS of people, but I didn’t recognize a single one of them. Finally I saw Daisy and Markus but no one else. It seems Booger and crew decided to chill beachside after their check-in and I later found out that Spottycatz did intend on coming but after waiting about 15 minutes for the bus they gave up and just headed back out onto the beach. So this was it, but there surely was NO lack of folks on this traveling party. We welcomed Daisy and Markus and they also met Katho and wpyogi and +1 (that was the name assigned to the elusive hubby of wpyogi LOL) We had enough time for another round and then SuzieQ came over and told us that Lenbert wanted the first bus load to round up and head out to the next stop. So we went downstairs and got on the bus, this time we picked up a couple of others from bus 2 who just thought it was time for everyone to go, no worries, we headed out and our next stop was C&D Country Western Bar. (Let it be known that this is the ONLY country bar I have EVER stepped foot in….sorry folks, but I am not a country fan) But this is actually a fun little place. Connie is a pleasure with her big smile and heart of gold. They also have some pretty good dirty bananas so we headed in and ordered a round. Unfortunately Connie wasn’t there today but we enjoyed our drinks all the same.

Soon after it was time for the next stop so we headed up the cliffs and stopped at Bella Donnas. As we got off the bus each and every single one of us was greeted with a hug….by Bella Donna, how sweet. Here we chatted a bit more with Gerryg123 and SuzieQ. They told us what all they had been up to and how they were enjoying their time. SuzieQ also decided to extend her trip and she was thrilled (Who wouldn’t be?). Gerryg then told us he had plans for a big boardie meetup and meal at Bentley’s that night and was inviting any and all who wanted to come. I have been dying to try out Bentleys but I already had been discussing plans with Brasi to go possibly Thursday night. However, here it was Wednesday and we had not set anything final and I had forgotten to ask him the day before. So I tried calling him and got no answer. I said, well, we will play it by ear and see how we feel after the crawl.

So a little bit later we boarded the bus and this time it seems we now have all passengers on one bus. It was CROWDED. I can’t even tell you how many folks were on the bus, it seems like 50+. Everyone sitting on someone’s lap, people standing....we all became friends real fast (but drinking helps that of course). We even picked up two more passengers who decided to join us mid-crawl. These two guys will make an appearance again much later in our evening (more on that to follow). So anyways, we managed to fit all of these people in this bus AND get the doors closed, hoping, of course, that we didn’t have too far to go until the next stop.....hahahahaha were we wrong. Lenbert says “Next stop, Westender Inn” Yeah, not exactly close, but I was excited to be going as I had been wanting to check this place out too ever since Gerryg and Sweetness both had mentioned it and shared photos.