07-22-2014, 10:25 PM
(This post was last modified: 07-22-2014, 10:26 PM by rastagirl777.)
Part IV
“Make everything an adventure. Otherwise, it will suck.”
― Nita Morgan
― Nita Morgan
December 22, 2012
We got home from Bath and recounted our experience to everyone at the Villa over dinner. We had a good laugh; Blue shook his head, telling us none of it would have happened if he’d been with us. After we finished Bigga and Anesta invited us to come with them to a party at the Old Marina in Port Antonio and after a little thought we agreed.
We arrived at 8:30pm, early for a bashment in Jamaica. The place was not yet crowded, and, as per usual, there wasn’t anywhere comfortable to sit. The sound system was outside at the front entrance and it was loud, living up to Jamaican decibel standards; that being if the music isn’t distorted, it isn’t loud enough. The four of us grew bored within an hour and disturbed by the number of police walking through and around the place. The smokers wanted to smoke and that was not going to happen anywhere within the confines of this party. We grabbed Blue and headed outside of the Marina, into the night time streets of Port Antonio.
We stopped at the end of the drive where there was a small building that housed the Port Antonio Marching Band and a small art gallery/studio. We hung out in the shadows, even ventured in and around the gallery and admired the art. We knew not much would have changed at the party so we continued on into the city.
December 14, 2013
I shook myself awake early, wondering if I’d just had some bizarre dream. A quick count of the number of parked motorcycles assured me I had not.
When we’d returned from our day we found Thing 2 at the kitchen table swilling from a bottle of rum. I’d gone and taken a nap and when I emerged for dinner there he was, face down on the table an empty bottle of rum beside him. Going against common sense Bigga shook him awake for dinner.
In a repeat performance of the night before Thing 2 proceeded to alternatively rant and close talk each person at the table. Les and I and Ron and Peg managed to escape and head to bed, leaving him, once again, to the Germans.
At around 2:00am I was awakened by a gravelly French accented whisper:
“Lezzzzz….Lezzzzz!”
I lifted my head off the pillow – there he was, Thing 2, in our room standing a few feet away from the bed. I shook “Lezzzzz” awake as it was asking for him but engaged with it anyway while Les looked on.
“What? What’s the matter, what’s happened?”
He began to pace in little circles, speaking rapidly, “NeeeKeee! I have to get out of here. My daughter’s been shot – my baby daughter’s been shot! I have to get to MoBay and be on the first plane out to Montreal.”
What? Wait…his daughter, the one who just bought a house, the one whose house he was going to help fix up when he returned from Jamaica the following week?
“She lives in a bad area,” he continued, “they broke into her place and shot her…” he broke down in tears, sobbing “My baby! My baby!” He went on to say how he’d just gotten a phone call with this terrible news.
What could I do? I comforted him, telling him everything was going to be OK. I tried to get him to go to Kingston in the morning rather than ride all the way to MoBay tonight – no dice. He calmed down and explained he just had to leave right now. He put 3000JMD on the nightstand. “I know this isn’t enough,” he said, “but I’ll pay you guys back when you get back to Negril.” Then he was gone – the motorcycle roared out of the driveway.
I stood there for a moment wondering what the hell had just happened. Why us? Out of everyone we were traveling with he knew us the least. Phone call? None of us had any signal, Digicel or Lime, at the Villa – the best signal was out by the gate. As far as the money it didn’t need to be said that this would be Thing 1’s problem – the guy was his “date” afterall.
Assured this wasn’t a dream, I told everyone at the table what had happened. In the light of day the story became even fishier. Thing 1 filled us in on what took place in his room right before Thing 2 came into our room. Apparently in the course of rambling with the Germans, Thing 2 discovered that he and Thing 1 were paying slightly more for their room, something that disproportionately upset Thing 2. Thing 1’s theory was that the guy split because he was disgruntled. I just couldn’t imagine someone lying about his daughter getting shot. Either way, he was gone – we were down one rider but on our way to the Blue Mountains.
As we were leaving the driveway and hitting the main, we lost Thing 1. He was worried about Thing 2, felt he should go back to Negril to see exactly what was going on and hoping not to find his friend mashed up on the side of the road. That left just the four of us…and it was just fine with the four of us.
December 23, 2012
Over breakfast we discussed the route to the Blue Mountains with Bigga, Anesta and Blue. We took our time packing the bikes, settling our bill and bidding farewell to our hosts and fellow guests, in other words, our new friends. Ron and Les hopped on, Peg and I prepared to walk down the hill. All the right sounds were coming out of Ron’s bike – and nothing out of Les’ bike except for a “click click” when he turned the key. Thinking back on our repair in Runaway Bay we started to check off what could be wrong – not the battery, we had a brand new one. The Startex? “Click click”. Immediately all phones came out of the pockets and phone calls were being made to auto shops in Porty and to our bike’s rightful owner. Les jumped into a route taxi to try to track down a part at that auto store while Ron, Peg and I retreated to the kitchen “checked back in” to Rasta Villa and waited for Les to return. We were hopeful that Les would come back with the magic “thing” that would fix the bike and we’d be on our way.
I’d been observing the other visitors to this area and took note of their youth. Portland seemed to attract young people, just as Negril used to. There were young backpacker types, lots of young surfer types and from all over the world, especially Europe. It was refreshing to hang out with our new friends, young Germans and a young Swede. I enjoy watching the surfers at home so it was a nice change to watch them here. The sea was far too rough for me to even think about venturing into it but I enjoyed watching these dedicated souls with boards navigate each set of waves, riding in the curl and landing on shore with huge smiles…and not one of them in a wet suit!
When we returned home, our hosts and fellow guests were gathered around the kitchen table. Two new guests had arrived; a young American couple who were on their honeymoon. The group was discussing a little off-property adventure and we were down to join in. We’d split up between the German couple’s rental car and Anesta’s truck. Where to go? After much discussion we put it to Blue, Anesta and Bigga and they unanimously agreed that we should check out Reach Falls.
December 14, 2013
Amidst the roar of the bikes we said goodbye to our friends and made them promise to keep us in the loop and let us know where they landed after New Years. Anesta got teary – between our dramatic entrance this year and our dramatic departure last year I’m sure she was a bit emotionally overwhelmed. At the end of the road we ran into our old buddy Blue – we had not seen him at all this time around so we paused to catch up for a few minutes. Then we were off – continuing our adventure from the year before.
The German couple was also heading to the Blue Mountains so they trailed behind us in their car; our initial idea was to share the road trip with them. Just before we hit Port Antonio however it started to rain so we ducked into the same place that we had on our way to Long Bay two days before. We were detained for about a half-hour; the Germans decided to forge on ahead without waiting for us. We understood; they weren’t psyched to stop for every drop of rain that we needed to stop for, it could get pretty tedious.
Striking out on new territory, we turned off the North Coast highway and headed through Buff Bay. It was still morning, not too hot and town was busy with people going about their business. Pretty soon the road started to narrow, conditions got a bit worse and on our right a beautiful river rattled and flowed over smooth rocks and reflecting the few clouds in the Cobalt sky. Ron signaled for a pull-over; we hadn’t gotten very far but we were more than ready for our first stop and smell the roses moment.
More photos: http://westcountywestend.com/2014/07/23/tale-of-two-road-trips-part-iv-photo-gallery/
"Once in a while you can get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right..."
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