Tuesday April 1 - a day at the cliffs

Today was a day with zero agenda, which made for a nice recovery after all the big adventure of the day before. I woke around 6:30 a.m., grabbed my camera with the zoom lens, and meandered down to the restaurant to pick up a cup of coffee. The staff are all kind, wishing me a good morning and keeping their voices low as I pause to look for birds. One of the groundskeepers, Mikey, kept quietly getting my attention to point out birds in the gardens for me to get photos of, and then he would name the birds... “here is a lionsquit... over there is what we call a ground pigeon”. I have seen several hummingbirds in the gardens, however they have unfortunately been far to swift for me to capture on film.

There was a woman staying at the hotel who looked familiar to me, but I could not exactly place her face. For the most part I saw her sitting alone in the restaurant reading her book during her meals. I overheard her speaking to another guest at breakfast this morning about yoga, which is why the conversation caught my attention, and then I also thought her voice sounded really familiar. It turns out she was Karen Allen (the actress from Indiana Jones – Raiders and Crystal Skull) I had heard before that a lot of actors like to stay at this hotel, and the one next door, however this was the first time I ever noticed one in person. I suppose I am too narrowly focused on the birds and other critters.

This heron was hanging out in and around the pool all morning, up until more guests came out of their rooms for breakfast.

Standing on the edge of the property looking north... this is one of my first attempts to use my Lensbaby with the optic80 glass.

This lizard on the next table is what I end up noticing, as opposed to Karen Allen eating breakfast at the table on the other side of me.

This morning I had the pleasure of finally attending one of the yoga classes at Tensing Pen. (I have always missed them in the past due to the timing of our visits) G joined us, along with one of my nieces and another guest staying on the property. The teacher was very interesting... the yoga was a very slow pace and all poses that I have done before, however we entered into each pose in a new way. In addition, she gave us a talk about “body habits”... the way we clasp our hands in one direction and cross our legs in one direction. She instructed us to always do the action, then immediately switch our legs/hand/fingers (whatever is crossed) so that we can begin to find more balance. Otherwise, one side of your body is always longer than the other. One of the reasons I enjoy trying new yoga classes is because I always learn at least one new technique from every teacher.

Most of the rest of the day was very laid back for us all... we walked across the street for food and I had a combination Ital meal from Ras Rody's. Ras Rody is currently living in the US and no longer runs the stand himself, but his kids are keeping up the family tradition.

Lunch... pumpkin soup on the left, then calaloo, mixed vegetables, soy, and another veggie mix on top of a bed of rice and peas.

The afternoon was spent relaxing in the pool for some of us, and swimming in the ocean for others, and generally just enjoying the warm air and sounds of the ocean waves. 

D jumping off the cliff

G was very proud to show everyone how she made the leap to jumping into the pool, all by herself!

 We all gathered back at the house as a wave of rain came in, so we cleaned up and began discussing dinner. Nobody really wanted to travel far, so we sent a few scouts out to grab some food and bring it back to the room. Unfortunately, the first place tried was out of jerk chicken, the next place was closed, and the night ended up being a series of hop-scotches around Negril trying to track down some jerk pork and jerk chicken. Back in the room, I was experimenting with drinks and came up with a nice combo of one part pineapple juice, one part guava juice, and one part coconut rum (but only CocoMania will do... all the others taste like sun tan lotion) As our hunting party returned, foil wrapped packages of jerk chicken, jerk pork, cocobread and festival were laid out in the center island of the kitchen and we all dug in. As our evening progressed, we all dropped off to bed one by one, to be well rested and ready for the next day of adventures.

March 30 - snorkeling and fun

Our first full day at Tensing Pen dawned warm and humid. I woke around 7:00 and wandered out onto the patio to take peek at the activity in the gardens. Birds were busy hopping around in the trees, so I headed inside for my camera gear. Unfortunately I forgot about the condensation problem... I'd left my gear in our air-conditioned room all night, so as soon as I walked outside the lenses fogged over. I had to wait about 20 minutes for the zoom lens to fully warm up enough to shoot. I stepped down to the restaurant area for a cup of coffee while I waited, and then spent about an hour or so wandering the grounds seeking out wildlife. I found several birds and many lizards. I had a close encounter with a Doctor Bird, the national bird of Jamaica, however he zoomed past me and along down the path far too quickly for me to get a shot.

Stepping out the front doors of our house, this is the view... a round table on the patio just above the path, the cove and the bamboo bridge are directly in front of us.

A bald pigeon gathering sticks for a nest

I love how this lizard blends into the background

Our clan woke a few people at a time, wandering down to the restaurant for coffee and continental breakfast. After finishing a satisfying breakfast of toast, fruits (pineapple, papaya, and watermelon), yogurt and orange juice, we lingered at the table and chatted, waiting for our food to settle. Some of the kids headed for the pool to cool down. A few of us went over to the ocean side instead and geared up to snorkel for a bit.

I haven't been in the ocean in nearly 3 years, so my first dip in was a little tense for me. I did have a couple moments of panic when my snorkel plugged up and when a wave hit me on the side of the head... I had to spend a few minutes concentrating on slowing my breathing down, since I was too far from the ladder to just get out of the water.

My feet, the bridge, and the house we are renting (viewed from the water)

As the water wore us all down, our crew regrouped in the house to clean up and head out to find lunch. We'd read a lot of great reviews about a little restaurant down the street, so we took a walk down to Sips and Bites, just about a 15 minute walk down the road.

The food was excellent... I ordered the snapper, which was served in a browned gravy along with rice and peas, a slice of breadfruit, a piece of festival (fried bread), and some veggies on top. I was so hungry and busy visiting that I neglected to get a shot of the food. The cut of fish was interesting, it was a very boney piece of fish and took some delicate flaking to have bites without toothpick-sized bones.

After lunch we walked back to the room and immediately wanted to get into some kind of water to cool down. I spent a little bit of time in the pool, which gave instant relief to the heat, then gathered up my snorkel gear to head over and find some fish.

My second run of the day was far better than my first. I felt no panic, and I even managed to find some really interesting fish. I ended up swimming out much further than I ever have before due to being in pursuit of a decent photo of a little stingray I spotted skirting along the bottom.

This is the stingray I followed for a bit

Some of the colorful fish near the side of the cliffs

Can you spot the flounder in this picture?

The terrain in the cove

We had a late lunch, and felt all waterlogged, so the evening has consisted of mainly showering off the ocean salt and generally chatting and relaxing around the house. We ordered dinner in from the on-site restaurant, a couple of ackee pizzas and jerk chicken pizzas to share, as we visit and play games.

The yellow chunks on the front pizza are ackee, the pizza behind it and to the left is jerk chicken.

March 28-29... getting in and getting settled

The time leading up to are departure was the most frantic we'd experienced... and it was not helped by the fact that I had not reset my watch for Daylight Saving (because I hardly wear it) so I operated under the delusion that we had an extra hour of time up until about 5:00 p.m. But, with a great amount of team work and coordinated effort, we managed to be packed and sitting by the front door a full 5 minutes before the airport shuttle arrived. We hit a little traffic on the way to the airport, but arrived with plenty of time to check bags, print boarding passes, get through security, and have a leisurely dinner at Anthony's in the central hub of Seatac Airport.

The frantic day had in large part been due to the discovery that our flights had been changed without notification to us. Our flights over were pushed out by nearly an hour, but had not had the numbers changed. Our flights back, however, were completely different flights and had been pushed back by half a day. We spent the morning on the phone with the airline trying to understand what happened and why we weren't notified of the changes (they were apparently changed back in December) and trying to ensure that our reservations were indeed secure and we would not be stranded on the island at the end of our vacation. Throughout the day, D suddenly began receiving frequent updates via text and phone about the continually changing flight out of Seattle. All told, we were incrementally pushed out nearly two hours from our original departure time. This turned out to be a good thing, since we were able to push our airport shuttle out an hour and take the time to finish straightening up the house before we left.

Given the disruption of the sudden changes, and to spite the delays, the airline travel itself was incredibly smooth. I was able to sleep on the plane for a few hours, and the Seattle delays meant a shorter layover in Miami. The second flight was not full, so I had the unusual pleasure of sitting by myself and being able to choose between the aisle seat (for snack time) and the window seat (for the view)

Gayle in the Miami airport, catching some zzzz's

Looking back at the engine as we approach Montego Bay

Looking straight down from the plane, a large coral reef off the beach

The flight also landed early, and we ended up meeting up with my sister and two nieces the entrance to the immigration line. After winding our way through the ropes to the counters, down the corridor and through customs, we arrived in the hustle and bustle of baggage claim... half filled with weary travelers looking for their bags, and half filled with energetic taxi drivers looking for a customer. D had arranged for us to be driven by Errol, of Errol Flynn Tours, so he walked ahead of us to meet up with our driver.

Almost everyone who comes to stay in Negril will land in Montego Bay and be driven along the coastline to the beach, roughly a 90 minute drive (or so). This time, though, D had been researching some different restaurants and he heard about a great jerk place up in the hills, so he asked the driver to take us on the inland route to Negril so that we could stop there for lunch.

This is Border Jerk

The girls digging in

We ordered large portions of jerk chicken, jerk pork, and festival (a fried bread) which were brought out to our table in foil pouches along with a few bottles of sauces... jerk sauce, spicy ketchup, and a mixture of scotch bonnet peppers and vinegar. We dove in, enjoying it too quickly for me to get a picture of the food. Once we had reduced the piles of meat down to bone, we cleaned up and piled back in the van for the rest of the journey.

On our way down through the hills, Errol stopped in several places to get us samples of the local fruits. 

Our driver, Errol, jumped out of the van to pick up some fruits for us to sample

 We tried jackfruit, naseberry, and a custard apple. I will have to get photos of the jackfruit on this trip... it tastes something like a dried apricot that has been rehydrated in pineapple juice. The naseberry is a small, brown, round fruit with brown flesh and tiny black seeds... it tastes like a bosc pear that has been cooked in brown sugar. The custard apple was my favorite... it broke open similar to a sour sop, and also similar in appearance, with large black seeds and fleshy white interior. You scoop the fruit outo f the skin to eat it and it melts in your mouth, leaving you with a black seed to spit out. It tastes something like a peppery banana (peppery like allspice, not black pepper) with the texture of custard (hence the name). 

Half a custard apple.. it is better than it looks!

 We also picked up some super sweet tiny bananas, and something called an otaheite apple, which we haven't tried yet as we were warned to wash it before we eat it.

A short drive out of the hills and we were in Negril. We made a quick stop at the cambio to exchange money and pick up a few drinks and snacks at the Hi Lo grocery store, then headed over to our hotel right around check-in time. We had a little wait while they finished preparing the room, and G took the time to show her cousins around the property a little big. Once we made it to the room, bags were dropped and some of our crew headed straight out to the water. I had just taken my camera gear out of the bag when a thunder storm began to roll through... so I put it away and instead spent some time with the unpacking. The fatigue of travel crept through the room, and we took advantage of the down time to unpack a bit more or take naps. We were still waiting for the final 2 of our party to join us (their flights were changed around at the last minute as well) so we decided to just stay on the property and have dinner in the restaurant.

The food here is really excellent... I ordered the jerk shrimp which was amazingly spicy, I believe I drank 8 glasses of water just throughout dinner.

Tonight will be a relatively early turn-in for myself... I had about 3 hours of sleep on the plane last night and no nap during the day. Looking forward to our first full day tomorrow snorkeling on the cliffs.

Sunday May 1 - move from TP to IA

Sunday dawned slightly later than Saturday for me... I was still amongst the first up on the grounds, but it was far enough after sunrise for the hammock hut outside to be fully lit by the sun.

 The view from our balcony looking to the right

 

Looking down to the left, that wonderful horrible bridge

 Standing in the doorway of our hut, looking out over the garden paths.

It was our last morning at Tensing Pen, so between packing the few items we'd unpacked, and double and triple checking to ensure we remembered everything, I took some opportunities to skirt around the grounds with my camera gear, shooting the gardens and the few critters who would hold still long enough for me to focus on.

 Orchids are grafted to trees, this is the tree just outside the gift shop hosting several all the way up the trunk.

 This is a bananquit nest.  These little twitchy birds have been too quick for my camera so far this trip, but I followed this one to his hiding place - that stripe in the center of the dark spot it his head.

After being teased by these birds the entire trip, this one finally gave me a break and posed in a sunny spot for me.

We were ready to go fairly early, so Tyrone came to pick us up and shuttle us down the road to Idle Awhile.  D checked us in, we piled our luggage inside the lobby, and we headed down the garden path to the beach side bar. 

 

Checking in at the lobby of Idle Awhile

 G and her American Girl doll, waiting patiently as we check in

We were immediately greeted with a lot of "Hey!  Welcome home!  Good to see you again!"... Jenny, one of the bartenders, came around to give us all hugs, and Needle shook our hands with a great big smile.  A wedding party had partially vacated the hotel that day, so as we waited for our room to be cleaned we climbed up to the bar and ordered some lunch.  I had their jerk chicken, which is very good and decidedly spicy.  As we ate, a really decent rain storm came up across the beach, hitting us with some thunder and pounding rain, letting up for about 5 minutes, then washing us out again.  After about 40 minutes of good downpour, the sky cleared, our luggage moved to our room, and we were given the keys.

We were greeted by a surprise "Welcome Home" gift... a really nice quality canvas beach bag, and a nice deep coffee mug.

 So fortunate, as we seem to have lost our old beach bag over the last year, and this one is MUCH better quality anyway

Birds of Paradise in a vase on our coffee table, I can't see these without thinking of Farscape!

You know when it's going to rain on the beach, because you can see it coming from miles away.  I *love* the dramatic lighting we get during storms.

After unpacking and slathering on some sunblock we headed straight for the water, diving in and finding a small school of fish dashing about.  It was a great relief from the heat (which has been a consistent "85 feels like 100" every day thus far)  After soaking in some refreshment from the sea and the bar, we cleaned up and headed down the beach for dinner.

Dinner was honestly not good.. we went to Alfred's (which we've been to a couple years prior, for a breakfast that I was equally less than impressed with)  We didn't bother with photos of this meal... I had shrimp, it was mediocre at best, and I forgot how very "outhouse with no sink" their bathrooms are.  We had a lovely walk down the beach to get there, however, and a nice walk back up on the road side... admiring all the drum-pan chicken we're thinking of trying one of these nights.

Saturday April 30 - Full day of photo and water adventures

Saturday I awoke on my own at the unusual hour of 5:30 a.m.  I grabbed up my camera bag, whispered to D, and headed over to the restaurant to find a cup of coffee and wander the grounds.  The only other guests I saw were a couple who were getting ready to catch their flight back home, an author (Mark T. Sullivan) and his wife. He saw my camera bag, looked at his watch, and said "you are ambitious"... we chatted for a few minutes before they headed to the lobby to meet their driver.

The grounds are usually very calm in general, but particularly before others have woken up it is a different experience.  There is a great deal of activity everywhere, in miniature form, if you walk slowly with light feet.  Take a step, hear a shuffling of leaves, and pause... look to the source of the sound and you're likely to see a lizard or crab creeping around the gardens.

A lot of these red crabs can be found in little holes in the garden areas.  I've seen them somewhat inland before, but it still surprises me to see crabs living in groundhog like tunnels instead of tide pools.

Pause by a pool of water on the cliff edge and you may see a bird fly down to take a morning dip.

 This guy seemed to be very interested in what I was doing, he's one of the few birds that hasn't bolted at the sight of my camera.

Pause along the rock paths out by the cliffs, hold still and watch the cracks in the rocks... the crabs and hermit crabs scuttle nervously around, trying to find a hiding spot.

 These crabs are shy, scuttling away at creepy fast speeds as soon as they detect human movement.

I call him Hermy... I nearly stepped on this little guy, his shell is only 1/2 inch long at best.  This is shot with my 50-300 zoom plus macro filter.

This guy was on a garden path, I followed him along the edge until he found a mini cave to hide in.

And of course, you could also run into Tensing or Sugar, one of the resident Rhodesian ridgebacks, enjoying some early morning sun.

As others woke up I would stop and chat for a few minutes, sometimes a brief good morning, where are you from?  Other times pointing out what it is I'm sitting on the ground trying to zero in on with my zoom lens.  I shot steadily for about 2 hours, stopping back through the restaurant to refresh my coffee before taking another path, looking for fresh views.

Wandering the grounds on my own for that long, I was able to observe and enjoy so many little intricate details that would be so easy to zip past on a normal day.  It was an incredibly soothing and peaceful shooting experience.

I met up with D and G for breakfast... I went continental while they had some kind of egg dishes... then we lathered up with sunscreen while our food settled, and grabbed our gear for a little bit of snorkeling off the cliffs.

MMMmmmmm, breakfast!

This time of day had much better lighting for taking photos, though the movement of the water still made shooting straight a little difficult.  I didn't see any lion fish today, instead there were about a billion little fish swimming in a giant bait ball around the interior of the cove.  I swam through and over them several times trying to capture the magnitude of just how many billions of fish I saw, as well as trying to zoom in on some larger fish which stuck to the bottom of the sea floor.

 Can you see the two bigger fish in the center of the shot?  The one on the left is kind of yellow with spots, the one on the right is sort of dark blue.  The fish right along the cliffs are not very bright, you've gotta take a boat to the reef for brighter fish.

 All those little dash marks along the ocean floor are fish. 

 Billions and billions of little tiny fish everywhere you turn.

Here I'm trying to swim through them and they scatter.

There was a small family of yellow and black striped fish hanging out by the ladder... the babies kept hiding but the parent fish swam defensively back and forth in front of me.

G spent a little time with me in the ocean, but then was quickly done.  I, surprisingly, didn't want to stop, and I swam around outside of the cove a little ways, following some larger fish and checking out other nooks and crannies.  Not once did I feel any panic, even when I accidentally let go of my snorkel while trying to get a shot.  The waves, the fish, the depth... nothing phased me... and I didn't even fully realize it until I got out of the water.  All in all, a major milestone for me :)

I was a little waterlogged after so much time in the ocean, but G wanted to go to the pool so D went with her to hang out there while I headed across the street to pick up my lunch from Ras Rody's stand. 

 G had the pool to herself at lunch time.

I had the combo plate, which is a cup of pumpkin soup, a bed of rice and peas, calallo, a stewed veggie mix and some curried soy.  As I approached the stand there were about 4 Rastas hanging out, one with a large basket of herbs and spices for sale.

I was a little waterlogged after so much time in the ocean, but G wanted to go to the pool so D went with her to hang out there while I headed across the street to pick up my lunch from Ras Rody's stand.  I had the combo plate, which is a cup of pumpkin soup, a bed of rice and peas, calallo, a stewed veggie mix and some curried soy.  As I approached the stand there were about 4 Rastas hanging out, one with a large basket of herbs and spices for sale.

 This lunch was 600 Jamaican dollars, about 7 bucks for an incredibly filling pile of food.

I grabbed my lunch to go and went back to the pool to munch while G swam, then we ordered her lunch at the restaurant.  As she ate, another thunder storm blew through, and there was a crack of thunder so close it must have hit next door to the resort.  Every indoor table in the restaurant was filled with guests, and after the BOOM we fell silent for a few seconds, then there was a loud outcry of "Wow!" and "Woo!" and "Holy Crap!"  When the rain let up to a drizzle we dashed back to the room where we showered up and rested.  By the time we were cleaned up the rain had stopped, so we meandered down the street to a little market for a few snacks.  Back at the hotel G was right back in the pool, swimming with some new friends (a pair of twin girls around 10 years old) while D and I sat above and chatted with some guests.  After a bit of time we saw Tyrone had stopped by with a gallon jug of home made soursop juice.  (Soursops are just about out of season here, but D is a huge fan of the fruit, so Tyrone tracked down some fruit and made juice for D)  We stayed at the bar a while longer, testing out the juice with some coconut rum to see what kind of mixed drinks we could make with it, then put it in the room fridge and headed out for dinner.

Tonight we decided to go over to Ivan's, the restaurant at the resort next door... Catch a Falling Star.  I had a dish called the "Snappy Snapper", which was simmered in a sauce that had a distinctly sweet and sour flavor to it.  The grounds of Ivan's are incredibly beautiful, open stone platforms like Tensing Pen, but with a pool that has a winding river to float on, and a little bridge to walk over the canals.  As we listened to the waves crashing against the rocks we noticed a few fireflies zipping around the edge of the tables.  That was the first time I'd ever seen a firefly :)

 Plantain wrapped shrimp appetizer.  So.  Good.

My hearty helping of snapper.

After dinner we were all pretty tired from the big active day, so we went back to the hut to get ready for bed.  G crashed out, but D went out to wander the property.  I fell asleep for a bit, then woke to the sound of some wedding party guests having a great (and apparently very funny) time along the path just outside our room.  I went out to find D and he ushered me over to the chairs just below our deck, overlooking the ocean.  He pointed out where the bright stars became thinner, and the wide band of darkness along the horizon.  "Just wait... stare out there and wait," he said.  I stared, not really sure what I was looking for, then I saw a couple of rapid bright flashes.  Somewhere out over the ocean was a massive thunder storm... too far to hear the thunder, but the sky was clear enough to see the lightening from the cliffs.  We sat up watching the light show for a while before heading back up to the hut to crash for the night.