My trip to Montego Bay, Jamaica (2013) -- Part B -- by Anne Shier (a.k.a. "Annie")

Day 2 - Sunday December 15, 2013:

Finally, we made it to Montego Bay, Jamaica!  It was 2:50 pm when we finally landed on a very narrow airstrip at Sangster International Airport.  We then had to wrestle with immigration / tourist papers, customs, baggage and finally with our hotel transfer (by shuttle bus).  We were all hot and exhausted by the time we were on our way to our hotel, and wanting a shower or swim so badly that our bodies ached. 

The next morning was actually when we started to enjoy ourselves.  The weather was already a balmy 80 degrees F and it was only 9:30 am.  After a buffet breakfast in the dining room, and a tiff with the Jamaican Tours Limited (JTL) rep. regarding our mishandled hotel arrangements, Dave and I were finally doing what we came here for - sitting by one of the swimming pools outside, all dressed in our swimsuits, ready to enjoy the water and the sunshine.  Brent and James had already left for the water park and were enjoying themselves immensely.  At this point, I really wanted to just start swimming and sunning and, most of all, relaxing.  I even went down the water slide three times – first time for me, ever!

Our hotel suites were supposed to have two beds each and be connected.  Neither of these things happened.  Instead, we got a king bed in each suite, but we liked the suites so much that we decided to keep them and make do with the temporary sleeping arrangements.  We figured that two people sleeping in a king bed won’t bump into each other accidently, and we decided we could live with that fact, just this week.  We’ll have to remember to tell Pam, our CAA travel agent, about what the actual hotel arrangements…..we weren’t totally happy about them.

There are lots of kids here with their parents, both swimming and sunning themselves.  Apparently, lots of Jamaicans like to come to Sunset Beach Resort from Kingston, Jamaica for the weekend.  It’s a four hour trip to the resort for them.  It’s already so warm that we have to wear plenty of sunscreen - even Jamaicans wear sunscreen!  I conveniently forgot to take mine, but Brent had his and put lots of it on James and shared it with me. 

The food here is okay (not great) and there’s plenty of variety, even if you don’t like spicy Jamaican food, which I don’t.  The meals are mostly buffet-style unless you decide to make a reservation at one of three restaurants at the resort.  It doesn’t cost anything extra to eat at these restaurants; we just thought we would try one or two of them out for something different to eat.

Sunset Beach Resort is huge and it took us a while to get used to where everything is and find our way around the place.  It’s not like a conventional hotel in Canada; it uses more of an open concept place.  The weather at this time of year is so lovely and warm that you don’t need a lot of walls to keep the cold out.  There are four swimming pools, a water polo pool, four tennis courts, a mini golf course, games areas, three beach areas on the Caribbean Sea and lots of time to spend at the different areas.  If you want to treat yourself to a spa, body massage, manicure, pedicure or a facial, you can do that too.  You can also book different activities, like visits to Dunn Falls, white water rafting, parasailing, snorkeling and scuba diving, to name only a few.  However, excursions like this do cost extra.  You should always bring money for shopping, eating and tipping the staff!

At night, after dinner is over, there is sometimes live entertainment on stage – singing and dancing.  We haven’t been to any of these evening shows yet, but we want to do so.  We also discovered that there were fireworks last night.  I thought it was lightning and that there was a thunder storm brewing, but I was wrong.  In reality, a roving camera man was offering to take pictures of tourists for money and that was causing a periodic flash. There is so much to do here that it’s impossible to be bored unless you choose to be.  I am mostly planning on writing and reading and using my computer. 

There is Wi-Fi access only in the main lobby, so we must be physically there in order to access the Internet.  Most people don’t bring their own computers with them on vacation, but I always do.  I’ve been looking forward to this vacation since we started planning it in early October, so I do hope we will not be disappointed - so far, so good.