Our Long Awaited Vacation to Jamaica

We Finally Made It to Jamaica!!!

March 24 - April 7, 2010

We actually had this trip planned in March of 2009, but had to cancel it due to my Father's illness. We decided to book a trip to Hawaii in October of 2009, but again we had to cancel it due to my Father illness. So our long awaited tropical vacation finally arrived and we had a really nice time.

We've been going to Sandals all inclusive resorts since 1996 and we finally earned our "free" week at any Sandals property. Their policy is after 70 paid nights, you get a free week. We went to Sandals Dunns River for a week, then transferred to Sandals Whitehouse for our "freebie" week.

We took A LOT of pictures... over 450, but I tried to spare you by only posting around 80.

I did some journaling so you'll know where we were and what we did. The pictures are in no particular order. Hope you enjoy the pics.

Sandals all inclusive resorts are truly all inclusive. You pay for your trip up front and put your wallet away. There is no tipping, just lots of eating, drinking, and lots of fun.

Any Sandals trip would not be complete without the normal injuries. During our 2 week stay I got a HUGE bruise on the back of my knee (got that on the plane somehow), a skinned knee from beach volleyball (that is still healing to this day), and a bruise on the bottom of my foot. I was jumping out of the snorkel boat onto the beach and landed on rock... I saw stars! I hobbled around for 3 days and it finally healed after 2 weeks. Of course to top all this off we both got colds, but we made the absolute best of it.

In the shallow water on the Whitehouse beach were dozens of these beautiful starfish just hanging out. They were so awesome. You're allowed to pick them up as long as you don't have them out of the water more than a minute or so.



Sunset on the Whitehouse beach

As far as activities go, there's usually a ton of stuff to do. Here are some of things we did besides eating and drinking....

Pitch & Putt, billiards, checkers, shuffle board, snorkeling, beach volleyball, water skiing, water slide, scavenger hunt, sand sculptors and water aerobics.

We built sand sculptures one day. Here I am creating a turtle... not too bad.

I also made a starfish

Now here's Hank's creation... WTF???? He told me he was trying to make a face of some sort. A pig maybe?*!@ He blamed it on not having any "tools" to work with. I didn't have any "tools" and mine turned out just fine! I got a great big laugh from his "sculpture". Maybe he had too may daiquiris at the bar.

These ladies were local singers in their native dress and they were really good. They performed at the Manager's Cocktail Party, which they hold once a week at all the Sandals resorts.

Here's are some friends from New Jersey, Craig & Carol, that we first met at Sandals Halcyon in St. Lucia back in the 90's. We've kept in sporadic contact over the years and it was so great to run into them again... what are the odds?!?!? Our friendship has been rekindled.

Our housekeeper created these towel art shapes for our bed almost every night at the Whitehouse.

Whitehouse grounds

This is the "beach grill" on the beach. There was always a nice cool breeze coming off the water.

This was the "pitch & putt" 9 hole course on the property at the first resort, Sandals Dunn's River. It's a small, short course, but lots of fun.

This is the 3 hour drive when we transferred from Dunn's River to the Whitehouse. These pictures are very typical of shacks and businesses that you see all along the road. Many of the structures are painted in very bright colors, as well as the houses. Jamaica is a very poor country, as you can see.

This is a roof of a house with rebar sticking out. You see this all over the island. The residents can't afford to build a whole house like we do in the States, so they start with the essential rooms; the kitchen and bathroom. They finish those rooms and move in. They complete their houses room by room as they can afford it. It usually takes years to complete a house.

This is the "rich" section and the houses are big and very expensive.

Thumbs up... that's good

On any given day you will see these guys working hard packing and unpacking luggage as guests arrive and depart.

Grounds of the Whitehouse

This is what happens when you've had too much sun!

There's nothing like a Rum Runner in a freshly cut pineapple

The main pool at Ocho Rios Manor... a great pool area with a swim up bar under the tower.

This is the main pool at Dunn's River

This is the main pool at Ocho Rios. When you stay at Dunn's River, you can 'play' at Ocho Rios, which is only a 15 minute shuttle ride. So we went back and forth to play and eat/drink at Ocho Rios.

There are sculptures all over the place!

This is back at the Whitehouse on the beach

These are some really NICE and FUN people that we hung out with at the Whitehouse.

Carrie, Mike, Chris & Ted

We met up for cocktails every night in the Martini Bar, which also turns into the singing piano bar at night. There were a few nights we met at the outdoor Neptune bar for "pre-cocktails" before the cocktails at the Martini Bar... wow we drank a lot!

So here's the story about our new friends Ted & Chris. They are affectionately known as "The Stalkers". We met them one day and from then on everytime we turned around (day or night) they were there... hence "The Stalkers"... LOL

The beach at the Whitehouse is fabulous; nice long walks were great.

Here we are in the plane as we were leaving Jamaica

These beautiful palm trees are everywhere

Little tiny beach at Ocho Rios. Needless to say we didn't hang out here.

People actually hire out this 'business' for fishing and other things... not going there!!

This bartender is making a drink on his head and delivering it to Hank... gotta love these guys.

This is Campbell and he is a Sandals employee and one of the shuttle drivers between Ocho Rios and Dunn's River. He was sooooooooooooo nice and we bonded with him. He has 3 lovely children and a beautiful wife and he works very hard at his job to provide for his family.

Check out the moss growing on this turtles shell

This is the "Tree Bar" (main bar) at Dunn's River. It is totally cool with the tree in the middle of the circular bar. This is where we hung out for cocktails.

OK... these are self portraits gone 'bad'... need I say more?!?!?

There were peacocks everywhere on the Whitehouse grounds. This male is the biggest and routinely courted the females. He would fan his tail and when he was really excited he made it shutter/vibrate and it produced a loud sound... horny little devil.

This is a VERY NICE young couple we met, Matt & Julie. They were on their honeymoon and enjoying the heck out of everything. We invited them to stay at our house if they are ever in the Sacramento area.

It was Easter week and we participated in an Easter egg scavenger hunt. We won 2 tee shirts and a bottle of Appleton Jamaican rum.

I don't know why this was there, but we had to take a picture.

Our Welcome Home balloon arrived with cupcakes

CHECK THIS OUT!!! A gift from my wonderful husband for our 25th wedding anniversary, which is April 13th. A beautiful diamond ring. I received a few comments from the ladies that they loved it.

Now here's the truth (hee-hee)

I didn't want to bring my real wedding ring (with the chance of loosing it), so I went to Kohl's ahead of time and bought this cubic zirconia for $6.00. When Chris (my stalker friend) said she loved my ring I had to fess up that it was fake; she actually liked the idea.

This is the view from our patio at Dunn's River during a rain storm.

I have no idea what this expression means, but he kicked my ass in checkers.

These guys are constantly picking up the plastic drink glasses left around the pool and property. Sometimes the stack gets really high.

Local entertainment from the contortionists

This is a group of people we met at Kimono's restaurant, which is a Japanese teppanyaki style of cooking. We all gathered around a U-shaped table & grill and had a great time meeting new friends. Here we are after dinner enjoying some dessert and after dinner drinks.

The flowers were beautiful

We saw this street sign and had to take a picture of it; considering both our Mother's names were Evelyn.

There's nothing like slamming a big plate of deep fried french fries from the beach grill at midnight, then going straight to bed. Do you wonder why I gained weight... duh

This was a competition on the beach which I did NOT participate in. The girls had to go into the ocean and get wet, then cover their bodies with as much sand as they could all over their bodies. The person with the most sand on her was the winner. She won a big bottle of Appleton Rum. The woman (2nd from the right) with her hands in the air was the winner.

Here are a bunch of really short video's if you're interested in watching them.

Here's a crazy 'snake guy' that danced with snakes and put a snake's head in his mouth. People lined up to have the snakes around their necks... not this girl!!!

The next 2 videos are the "Playmakers" doing the local dance moves (employees who organize all the activities day & night).

Here's me going down a waterslide at the Whitehouse pool

Fire Juggler

Water Aerobics - I'm the one in the back middle with a black suit

This is the very bummpy ride from Dunn's River to the Whitehouse. It was like this for about 1 1/2 hours of the trip with very a windy road with lots of really big pot holes. The drivers in Jamaica are fricken crazy by always passing while it's not safe and coming very close to other drivers. At times you wonder if you'll arrive at your destination alive or not!!! It helps to drink heavily before any car rides and you'll just think it's a roller coaster ride (hee-hee).

Here's one of the bartenders delivering a drink on his head to Hank

The next 2 clips are a guy playing the steel drums and he was fabulous!

Marching Band on the property

This is us at the Martini/Piano Bar. Although it's dark and you can't see anything, it will give you an idea how hoppin' it gets in there at night. There are always a bunch of people singing really loud. Yep, you got... I'm one of those loud people.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures. Thanks for visiting and come back soon for additional posts.