Jamaica, Yah, Mon

This is where we stayed, Global Villa. It is like a bed and breakfast type place. We did not stay at some all-inclusive resort. We were among the locals. Global Villa had a nice biog kitchen and we had an excellent cook. Boy, did I eat!!! All Jamaican food, all jerk chicken and fish and pork and goat and lots of fruits and vegetables. We had lobster for Thanksgiving. It rocked!!!! This place is half way between Montego Bay and Negril. There is only 2 airports (well, for tourists anyway) in Jamaica. They are in Montego Bay (which we came in on) and Kingston that is on the South side of the island. Negril has 7 miles of white sand beach. That is where all the big fancy all-inclusive resorts are located. Global Villa is known also as a “travel halt” that the tour buses that transport the visitors to and from Negril stop for Red Strips and the rest rooms. Red Strip is the only beer made in Jamaica. There is only 2 imports, Heineken and Guinness. There is no American beers. No, I do not drink so I did not try any of it. There is only Pepsi for sodas, no Coca Cola products. All the Pepsi stuff is made there in Jamaica. I feel in love with this stuff called “Ting” (which is actually thing but they do not have a ‘th’ sound in their language) that is made form local grapefruits. It is very similar to Squirt, just a whole lot better. One bottle (no cans there, yeah!) was $50 Jamaican. 50 J is about 30 cents American. I am not much of a soda drinker, but I put down about 4 of those Tings a day. There is a big main highway that runs around the island. That is where our villa was located, just about 10 kilometers west of a small town called Lucea (pronounced Lucy).Montego Bay is east of Negril. We did some shopping in Lucea for food and stuff, but there is no tourist stuff there. Across the road form our villa was the volcanic rock on the shore. About a 5 minute walk was a nice little beach. We had it all to ourselves most of the time until the local kids saw us, anyway.