MoBay Marine Park on Facebook

During the obsessional 'waiting for the container' phase of this blog, I omitted to mention a very entertaining afternoon I spent with Andrew Ross, the director of Montego Bay Marine Park. The park was set up in the early 90s after it had become apparent that the unchecked raiding of coral to make trinkets for tourists and over-fishing of the coastal waters inside the reefs, combined with the impact of hurricane Gilbert, was leading, inexorably, to a major ecological disaster. It was one of the first such parks in the world, and although the indiscriminate destruction of the coral has stopped, many of the issues concerning declining fish stocks and how to develop economically viable eco tourism still remain.
Andrew and I had been emailing for several months and had met briefly a week or so before for the first time: now we settled down on the patio with a couple of Red Stripes to see how I could help with the park’s work, possibly by writing an article in The Daily Telegraph’s Travel section.
Andrew has a refreshingly pragmatic approach to conservation. He points across the bay where, about a mile away, the last uninhabited bit of Bogue Lagoon stretches out to sea. Not for long. Plans are now well advanced for a 700-room hotel complex, part of which will sit next to the only beach in the area where turtles still come to lay their eggs. Does this worry him? No, because he thinks it’s better to embrace tourism and do a deal with the hotel so that they are legally obliged to protect the turtles. ‘I used to think that conservation meant keeping the things the same, but if we leave the turtles alone, what happens is that someone comes along and digs up the eggs. It’s better to have someone responsible for looking after them. And, after all, that’s why people are paying high prices to come to the hotel – so that they can see the turtles.’
Andrew has drawn up an ambitious development plan for the park designed to turn it into a world-class dive centre over the next two years with man-made reefs sunk to provide alternative attractions for tourists while the coral is allowed to recover. At the same time he hopes to enforce restrictions on fishing to build up stocks by a factor of three. There is still the unresolved issue of how incorporate the handful of local fishermen who resist any kind of change into this bright new, eco-friendly future. But one thing he’s certain of is that the marine park needs tourism dollars to achieve its aims.
During the course of our conversation I suggested Andrew set up a MoBay Marine Park page on Facebook as a way of gathering the park’s many friends and supporters worldwide into a viable group for supporting some of the projects he was proposing. Well, bless him, he’s done it: so I urge you to look up MoBay Marine Park on Facebook and sign up to be a fan immediately.

Smooth Runnings 4

Merrise finally managed to extract our UPS shipment from Air Jamaica cargo on Friday, but then had to pay around £30 to have it delivered. So much for the door-to-door service I paid for. The dog continues to grow at an alarming rate and there are now fears that her father was a Great Dane.
The relative lack of action in real time means that I can return to our family trip around the spas of Jamaica I last blogged about on November 13.
If you can recall, we were planning to tour the island, visiting as many spas as possible. We set off from Montego Bay, leaving the delights of Doctor's Cave Beach, after lunch the following day driving almost due south towards Black River on the south coast. After passing miles of rich farmland in the interior of the island, the final stretch along a lonely, winding shoreline to Milk River was quite eerie. The pitted limestone rocks and desolate cacti at the side of the road began to assume strange, exotic shapes in the fading afternoon light. It began to feel as if we were travelling back in time and the first sighting of Milk River Mineral Bath confirmed this feeling. It's a fine 19th-century colonial structure, with the dining room and bedrooms on the first floor, surrounded by a wide veranda. The baths are on the ground floor: nine blue doors open into narrow cavern-like rooms, with steps down to a private, mini pool, into which flows the mineral spring. Inevitably, the first thing we did after a hot day in the car was dump our bags in the rooms (en-suite with a big bed, a big old air con unit and an even bigger old telly) and jump into a bath.
The water is crystal clear, pleasantly warm and has a strong saline taste. Dr Phillippo reports that Savory and Moore of London had analysed the water, revealing the following constituents: "Chloride of sodium, sulphate of soda, chloride of magnesium, chloride of potassium, and chloride of calcium, besides traces of lithia, iodine, bromine and silica. These constituents with its temperature of 92 deg place this spring among the thermal calcic waters of Hamburg, Weisbaden, Kassingen, Bourbonne, Schlangenbad, Gastein and Kranznach. It has the soapy unctuous feel that characterises the Schlangenbad and the warm springs of Virginia, imparting to the skin a velvet smoothness to the touch which continues after leaving the bath."
After what seemed like only a few minutes of floating blissfully in the water, a rude knocking at the door reminded us that guests are only allowed to bathe for 20 minutes at a time ("de watah so powerful, y'see," explained the attendant). We withdrew to the dining room to examine the effect of the first dip. No question: we felt a distinct smoothness. Velvety smooth, in fact.
We spent most of the mealtime involuntarily caressing our bare arms and shoulders to reconfirm the 'velvety feel'. Meals, it has to be said, are not Milk River's strongest point. The menu has a determinedly Jamaican solidness - cornmeal porridge at breakfast, yam, banana and rice with the evening meal. I found myself, in Phillippo-esque mode complaining to my wife Merrise: "If only they had a really creative, more health conscious, Jamaican chef here - imagine, fresh fruit juices, lobster with green pawpaw and chillies . . ."
The following day, fortified by a substantial breakfast of banana porridge, ackee and salt fish with fried dumplings and a helping of calaloo, we decided to get some exercise. After bathing early we set off for the nearby Farquar's beach. "How far to the beach?" I asked a young boy who came past on a bicycle. "About eight chains," he replied. "How many chains to a mile?" I asked. None of us knew. "Isn't a chain the length of a cricket pitch?" I asked no one in particular. The use of such long-abandoned (in the rest of the world, anyway) units of measurement emphasised the other-worldliness of this part of Jamaica. We passed some fishermen's cottages, with a few men sitting around mending their lobster pots. The ambience was completely tranquil. Everyone said "Good morning" and no one begged any money - although most of the residents looked as if they could do with a few extra dollars. The beach was deserted save for 30 or so fishing boats, all pulled well clear of the water. On the way back we noticed a tree with what appeared to be a huge outpouring of flickering blossom. Closer inspection revealed it to be a bush covered by hundreds of butterflies. Nearer the hotel we saw a sign saying 'Beware of the crocodiles'. The girls rushed back into the hotel, keen to take another dip in the baths.

Never, ever, send anything by UPS

Merrise emailed to say that UPS called Mr Bish-TON to confirm that the shipment from Uncle Eneil had definitely arrived in Montego Bay (via Miami, Kingston, and Miami again). So, that’s just the six weeks to get from New Orleans. Fantastic service. But that’s not the end of the story. After she had tracked down the UPS agents in Mo Bay (not easy - backstreet dive, round the corner, turn left up the concrete stairs, hope someone opens the door type of place) and taken the documents to the Air Jamaica cargo office at the airport, they refused to release it to her because UPS had forgotten to put my name on the address line. At this point, she gave up for the day, and will try tomorrow.
I tried to email UPS customer service to complain about the whole process. This turns out to be impossible because the pre-set email form requires that all fields, including the tracking number, be filled in. I put in the tracking number I had been supplied with, but the form refuses to recognize it, and consequently will not send the email. It is now entirely possible that a shipment I began negotiations to send back in August with the friendly but totally useless Fred in the UPS office in New Orleans will now not arrive before Merrise leaves Jamaica on December 17. UPS – Unbelievably Protracted Service.

Of bats and rats

Yes, it was the container. History and I worked like dervishes to get everything under cover in case it rained. I have never felt so tired in my life. Finally left Jamaica on Saturday, after three days of lugging boxes around and packing everything away safely so that next time I can really get down to some serious work (painting walls, fixing taps, putting up curtains and so on). Managed two mini outings in the inflatable tender, but didn’t have time to try out the outboard, so I just rowed around the lagoon in the early morning stillness. The water was incredibly clear and it was possible to see all kinds of fish beneath the boat.
Also unpacked the wind chimes (which I had bought on a whim) because History says they are the best way of getting rid of bats. We’ve always had bats, but they seem to have become much bigger this time around. They love the almond tree on the terrace, and at night it’s quite entertaining to watch them swoop over the pool, dipping down to touch the water. However, now they’ve grown, the amount of bat poo splattering onto the tiles under the tree has become a real problem. It's also quite disturbing when an almond with all the green flesh eaten away suddenly drops like a stone out of the tree when you're sitting underneath. It's like the bats are trying to dive bomb us. History says the wind chimes disturb their radar, but I think I may have to ship out a few more to see if this approach works. If anyone has any suggestions, I'd be grateful: they live in the tree during the day, as far as I can ascertain.
Back in the UK I was faced with a rodent problem of a different sort: a rat has taken up residence in the engine compartment of my car. I opened the bonnet on Sunday night to find five tiny rats, obviously only a day or so old, nestling up to the engine block. I picked them out and thought that would be the end of the matter. But this morning I checked again, and there were another five babies, in the same spot. I am now a serial baby rat killer. Ten kills to my name and counting.

The lull before the container storm

We spent yesterday at the docks in Kingston again, this time trying to clear our container for delivery. Again, we got up early (3am) and drove through the early morning to arrive in time for a breakfast at the container depot (calaloo and yam with sweet coffee). Hours passed as the process of bringing the container into the customs shed dragged on. Then our inspector appeared. She was new, someone our man Dave from the Jamaican shipping agents had not encountered before. She was clearly determined to make her mark and ordered that the entire contents be removed and each of the 131 packages opened for her perusal. Lunch, taken promptly at 1pm, interrupted the process and it was not until 3.45 that Merrise emerged from the ordeal with a bill of JA$20,000 (£1= JA$145) to pay for the ineligible items (which included her brother Oliver’s hydraulic slab-making machine). Merrise has asked me to make it quite clear that my role was to stay outside in case sight of my white (and therefore rich) face pushed up the amount of duty we would be asked to pay. It was she who did all the work. By the time the officious new customs officer (who, incidentally specialised in the Kingston ‘look’, a super sized version of the one commonly available in Jamaican circles elsewhere) had satisfied her desire to peer into every corner of our life, our hopes of getting the container delivered that day had gone. So I’m writing this as I wait for it to arrive today. It seems incredible that when we calculated the time it would take for the container to get to us, we took the shipping company’s estimate, added a further three weeks, than added another week, and that was supposed to coincide with our arrival on the island nearly three weeks ago. I was supposed to be returning to the UK tomorrow, but that’s impossible now so I’ve had to re-book for a flight on Saturday.
While I was dozing in the unforgiving heat at the docks as Merrise and Dave supervised the removal of the packages, our phone rang. It was UPS. “Hello Mr Bish-TON” (Jamaicans always accentuate the last part of my surname). “I can confirm that your consignment (from Uncle Eneil) is now in Miami.” Even by the convoluted standards that this shipment has already involved, this seems faintly unreal. “But last week it was in Kingston,” I stammered. “Yes, I know Mr Bish-TON, but I’m assured by Miami that it will be sent to Montego Bay late on Friday.” I’m speechless. I thank her for calling.
As I write, I’m interrupted by the sound of a huge American truck pulling into the drive, and swiping a bit off the gate column. Can this really be the container?

Still waiting on the container

Wednesday we got up (by mistake) at 1.25am – I thought it was 5am – and drove to Kingston. After about an hour, when the sunrise stubbornly refused to appear, I looked at my watch again, and realised my mistake. We arrived in Kingston in good time, needless to say, for our 8.30 appointment with destiny. In terms of distance, the journey is about the same as the one I regularly make from London to Birmingham, but in every other respect it’s like driving on a different planet. There’s a great highway from Mo Bay along the north coast going east, but the moment the road takes to the mountains – Kingston lies on the south coast bounded by some seriously high mountains – things start to change. The incessant rain that fell for the best part of three months during this year’s hurricane season has turned some of the twisting bends on the mountainsides into something more akin to a battle scene. Huge chunks of road, turned upside down by the sheer force of the water. At one point, the tarmac had huge channels gorged into it by the water, so that it looked like a monstrous withered tree root. At these points, progress is slow. In retrospect I was glad it was so early because at least there were no trucks struggling along.
We got lost in Kingston, drove through Denham Town along a road that separates it from Tivoli Gardens – which, in spite of its gentile name, is a war zone. Finally made it to the freight office. The rest of the day for me passed dozing in the car with the engine running and air con on, as Merrise went through the endless procedures designed to establish her entitlements for duty free import. Now they have to find the container so that customs can inspect it. This was supposed to be Friday. But we knew as we drove back on Wednesday that it was unlikely.
Meanwhile UPS continue to fail to deliver the pedal boat sent by Uncle Eneil. The online tracking system says that it has arrived in Mo Bay but it lies: we know it is sitting on some lonely piece of tarmac at Kingston airport. This may finally have made it to Mo Bay last night but as there’s no one picking up the phone at UPS, who knows?
On the plus side, History caught about 7lb of lobster this morning, so we’re going to grill them tonight.