Jamaica Trip

(Don’t worry, be happy)

July 20 - 27, 2002

It had been nine years since I first went to Jamaica and I rarely visit a country twice but Kathy and I decided we needed to really get away from it all so we decided to stay at Hedonism III in Runaway Bay, Jamaica. It was a great week!

Kathy’s son drove us to San Francisco International Airport to catch our red-eye flight to Miami, Florida. We had a 4½-hour layover in Miami so we had planned to rent a car, drive to South Beach and have breakfast there. Even though we both only got about 2 hours sleep on the plane, we went ahead with our plan in Miami. A friend of mine told me to check out the News Café in South Beach. We didn’t know where it was located but we drove around looking at the art deco district and for any outdoor café open at 7:00 a.m. on a Saturday during the off-season. We finally found a café open and when we looked at the menu, it turned out to be the News Café! Even though it was the off-season, we still saw some “interesting” people there. After we ate, we took a stroll on the beach and we ended up pretty sweaty from the heat and humidity. Then we drove back to the airport to catch our 75-minute flight to Montego Bay, Jamaica.

When we arrived in Mo Bay, they made us stay seated and came on the plane and sprayed something in the cabin…deodorant? We arrived at Hedonism III at about 3:00 p.m. after a 90-minute bus ride with a very animated driver/guide. We immediately unpacked and headed for the pool and beach, as you are not allowed to be tired in Jamaica.

Hedonism III is only three years old and is a four-star resort. It’s one of the all-inclusive SuperClubs and it is truly all-inclusive: food, drinks, water sports, entertainment and NO TIPPING. There are three pools (one nude) and two beaches (one nude), three spas, a disco, a piano bar, recreation room/casino, water slide (that goes through the disco), swim up bars, a trapeze on the beach, a dining room for the buffet meals and three restaurants. There are all kinds of water sports available including scuba diving, water skiing, etc. The rooms are very nice and all have Roman-style Jacuzzi bathtubs. The grounds are beautifully landscaped, as you would expect on a tropical island.

We ended up doing one or two activities during the day and then spending the rest of the day at the pool and/or beach. We tried sea kayaking, got a really wild, fast ride on the Hobie Cat while the Jamaican skipper sang oldies, snorkeling, and we even tried lessons on the trapeze.

We took one optional trip to Dunn’s River Falls near Ocho Rios, which is a National Park and the number one tourist attraction in Jamaica. You don’t just look at the falls, you CLIMB the falls. They have guides that take you up (in a long chain of people all holding hands) but we decided to go it alone – it was a very invigorating experience.

The food was very good. We ate buffet breakfasts and dinners and we ate at all three restaurants – we had dinner at the Italian restaurant called Pastafari and the Japanese restaurant called Munahana. The Japanese restaurant was the type where you sit around the chef who chops and cooks everything right in front of you. At one point, I looked at Kathy and she had a panicked look on her face…seems she tried some Wasabi not knowing that it is Japanese horseradish that you use to spice up the soy sauce. I tried a tiny amount and it is definitely hot!

Speaking of hot, we had one lunch at the Jamaican restaurant called the Scotch Bonnet. Even though I don’t care for spicy food, I had to try some jerk chicken (the national dish). I had them put the jerk sauce in a dish on the side and it was definitely hot but good. One night they had dinner on the beach and they had barbeque lobster tails – most excellent! The rest of the time, we ate lunch at the pool – Cheeseburgers (in paradise), grilled cheese, french fries, crab salad, hot dogs, etc. I almost never drink hard stuff at home but I sipped Dirty Bananas by the pool all day long – they are sooooo good! Kathy liked the Piña Coladas. They use all the top brands in the drinks and they are not stingy with them like some all-inclusive resorts are with the drinks. Of course, we drank Red Stripe beer and tried Jamaican wine – both quite good.

During dinner, they would have different entertainment each night. One night, they had a circus show on the beach, another night they had “Name That Tune”. The talent show was fun. One guy who was probably around 60 came out as Elvis. He looked ridiculous with a really bad wig but didn’t sound too bad. Later he came out (without his wig and costume) with his wife and they swing danced. The younger crowd really liked them. The resort staff filled in with some wild dance routines of their own.

After dinner, we played some table tennis a few times. At night, we went to the Piano Bar for some raucous sing-alongs…it was a lot of fun. Everyone sings (they have the song books) so it was loud enough where no one could hear my attempt at the song. Then we checked out the disco, which didn’t really get going until midnight. They had theme nights each night: Tropical, Pajama, 70’s, Toga, Bare as You Dare, Costume Ball, etc. People wore anything from elaborate costumes to nothing but body paint. The nights we went, we didn’t stay too long and we ended up on one of the piers at the beach just relaxing and talking into the wee hours under the moonlight…it seemed like the moon was full the whole week we were there.

We actually tried the trapeze lessons. The instructor on the ground was Becky…she was maybe five feet tall but she could be a marine drill instructor. She called herself the “Bitch of the Beach” and you better listen to her instructions. We climbed the ladder up about 25’ to the platform where another instructor told us what we were SUPPOSED to do – swing out, hang from your legs and then do a flip to the net. The first time, we didn’t look too good but we both did much better the second time. It was really tough, especially in the heat and humidity. Not bad for a couple of people hovering around the half-century mark, and Kathy had to do it without her glasses – she said it was probably better not being able to see how high she was. If you keep at it, you can actually get caught by one of the instructors and then try to jump back and grab the swing.

We tried just about everything we could (except the Ganja which you could smell on several occasions). The water slide was fun. It is a tube that is clear only where it goes through the disco. The rest is mostly dark and makes several wild turns. We shot some hoops, played table tennis and played pool on a pool table in the middle of the pool. We brought tennis rackets but it was just too hot and humid for tennis.

Even though it sounds like we were very active, we got plenty of relaxing in. On several days, we just spent the whole day at the beach and pool. We probably averaged seven or eight hours a day there so we got pretty tan. It was great being a slug! The Jamaican activity directors Romeo, Crazy Sean and Fantasy (she’s definitely not Julie from the Love Boat) would periodically come around to get some kind of activity going…some were pretty wild.

The age range at Hedo was 18 to maybe around 60 with the average age in the 30s. The weather was great – it only rained once and that was at night. It was very hot and humid – our glasses fogged up when we stepped out of our air-conditioned room. One day the power went off for several hours and the next day there was no water for several hours but hey, this was Jamaica. We were also on Jamaica time, which reminded me of Hawaii time – no rush to get to anything.

This trip will definitely be hard to top! The hardest thing about it was getting back to reality and having to get up at 3:30 a.m. to go to work at the airport. My first day back to work, I heard the Muzak version of Bob Marley’s “Jamming” in the terminals and it brought a smile to my face.