Monday 28 Jul 2003

Jay and I drive to Atlanta to the Atlanta Airport Hilton & Towers. We have a priceline room here for $45. Parking was $5/day while we were gone. One employee wanted us to pay $12/day but we were told $5 on the phone and I got a different employee to give me $5/day with no hassles.

Tuesday 29 Jul 2003

We leave early on the 6 am shuttle to the airport. The line for Air Jamaica check-ins was rather long. Jay and I finally get to the front of the line and we get checked in. We upgraded to first class for $100 each one-way. They tagged our bags as first class and we were off on our way. Waited about an hour in Atlanta to board. They called for First Class Boarding and at the same time called for those with wedding gowns or anyone else needing special assistance to board as well.

First Class seating was more comfortable with more legroom and only Jay and me on our side (2 seats vs 3 in coach). The flight attendants were not that great for first class flight attendants. I fly a lot on Delta and their first class service is a lot better. We had to beg the attendant for more mimosas while she chit-chatted with the other flight attendants and other Air Jamaica personnel on our flight.

The flight was smooth and easy to Jamaica. About 2 and a half hours long. We were the first ones off the plane and our bags were waiting on us. We heeded the advice of many on the internet that said to head toward the left lane at Customs/Immigration and sure enough a lane opened and we sailed right through.

I am not good with vendors or street hagglers so I pretty much just don’t look at anyone as I am walking through. Jay and I spotted the Sandals desk and made a beeline. Another lady at a desk tried to stop us and I was like “No thank you” Turns out she was from Air Jamaica vacations (how we were booked) and she needed us to check in with her. It was funny but I was pretty embarrassed. She directed us to a Sandals lady with a computer who scanned us in and put bag tags on our luggage. Our bags were taken to the Sandals bus where we waited about 5 minutes and we were on our way.

The first stop was Sandals Montego Bay and then we were taken to Sandals Royal. We were greeted with the cool towels and escorted to concierge. We had requested Windsor Block rooms due to some recommendations on the internet but were advised that this request was not available. Our room wasn’t quite ready (it was only 11:30 am by this time) so we went to the beach bar and hung out awhile. Neither of us were hungry so we just got an early start on the cocktails. Eventually we saw our bags being wheeled on the luggage cart. We watched them wheeling through the gardens and then over to the Sandringham block where they eventually arrived at room 86. We had booked Honeymoon Beachfront Concierge and that is exactly what we got.

We finished our drinks and went back to concierge to get the official news. J We told them we saw our bags go into room 86 and we saw the maid exit room 86 so we knew it was ready. We got our keys to the room and the room safe and our towel exchange card. It was sort of gloomy looking outside that afternoon but we changed into our suits and went swimming in the quieter pool and did a little Jacuzzi time by that pool as well. Soon it was time for dinner. They were having an international buffet that nite but we aren’t buffet people so we found out that the Courtyard restaurant was open. We had a short wait to eat at Courtyard (I guess we weren’t the only ones who didn’t want a buffet) but it was well worth it. Jay had a steak and I had shrimp followed by key lime pie. We shared a bottle of Chilean Merlot that was quite tasty. After such a scrumptious dinner and the long day of traveling, we were so tired that we called it an early evening.

Wednesday 30 July 2003

We awoke wishing that we had put out the breakfast menu request on our door as we were starving. We decided to put on our beach clothes and head up to breakfast. We ate at the breakfast buffet and it was good – not great food. We had a meeting with the minister at 10 followed by a meeting with the wedding coordinator at 1130 am so we hit the beach for about an hour. There were many available chairs either in the sun or the shade. These were right outside our doors which was very convenient. We sunned til we had to go to our meeting.

Reverend Gordon was simply the best. He gave a great pre-wedding counseling session to us and 3 other couples marrying at the resort. Everything went well at both the counseling and the wedding coordinator. We hit the pool and pool bar for the rest of the afternoon and then a nap before dinner. I used to read these trip reports and laugh about the naps before dinner. Never again – it was our ritual! We had dinner reservations at Cucina Romano at Montego Bay that evening. Jay had veal and I had swordfish along with a great bottle of Italian red wine. After dinner we walked around the resort checking things out before we caught the shuttle back to Royal. We had a drink in the bar and were desperately trying to stay awake for the piano bar at 11 pm but just couldn’t do it after all the sun, food and drinks.

Thursday 31 Jul 2003

We filled out the room service menu the nite before and had a great breakfast with omelettes, English muffins for Jay, Danish, fresh fruits, coffee and juice. What a great start to our wedding day. We hit the beach in between the two gazebos right outside our block of rooms. We were half in the water half out of the water on the beach chairs. The water splashed up on us. We headed in at 10 am to get ready for our 12 noon ceremony. Jay had to be at the wedding coordinator’s office at 11:30 with all of the stuff. I finished getting ready after he left and awaited the knock of the attendant to whisk me off to the wedding. One note here – I always do my own hair – always. And I almost always hate the way others do my hair but I wish I had had them do my hair for the wedding although I was pleased with how it turned out. We had really high wind and I was concerned that my flowers that were bobby pinned in my hair would come out with the next gust (didn’t happen) I think it would have been more relaxing to have someone else do it but then again I might have been more anxious about how it would turn out with them doing it.

The ceremony went off without any problems. Rev Gordon chased two people out of the water behind us and we had to wait on one big plane to pass overhead but that was it. The ceremony he did was beautiful and he had no problems reading the sand ceremony we included. One funny thing about the sand ceremony. We filled the sand in the individual bottles at the resort. I forgot to take the price tags off the bottom of the bottles (or maybe I never knew they were there) so you can see the price tag in the video. I just laugh and laugh at that. The pictures turned out great for the most part. I was somewhat squinty in a lot of them since we were outside at high noon in bright sunlight. I guess that just goes with a Jamaica wedding on the beach.

We spent the rest of that day in the pool on our floaties, basking in the sun and enjoying our newlywed status. That evening we dined at the Courtyard. Jay had steak and I had shrimp. It was great once again but a few more bugs were out that nite biting us even though we had the Deep Woods Off in full force. It was also quite warm under the brighter lighting. Previously, we were closer to the front of the restaurant and away from the bright lights and in a breezier location. We skipped dessert and went back to the room to rest up for Casino Night.

Jay and I loved casino night. We played black jack with Garfield all night and won quite a bit on the “Name that Tune” game. Jay won a straw hat in the auction and we liked it so much, we bought another one as the vendors set up Friday for the beach carnival party. After casino night, we headed to the piano bar for a fun night of singing with the other guests. What a fun time!!!

1 Aug 2003

We were kind of hungry after all the excitement of our wedding day and the piano bar singing so we decided to try out room service at 2 am this morning. We got a cheeseburger to split and a couple order of fries. Needless to say, we had already had a lot of cocktails Thursday. J It came pretty quickly and we devoured it.

We awoke Friday morning to the sound of our honeymoon breakfast being setup outside our room on the patio. Complete with tablecloth on our patio table! Very nice touch. Too bad we were both still way full from the “midnight (2 am) snack” we had just 4-5 hours earlier. Neither Jay nor I are breakfast people to begin with coupled with the fact that we had eaten in the middle of the night (which we never do either) – needless to say we didn’t eat much of our breakfast. It was the same scrumptious breakfast we had the day before but today it didn’t look so good to our full stomachs…

We eventually got dressed for the pool and began our day floating about. We spent all day in the pool or by the pool. The only time we took a break was to go check our pictures. They were fantastic. We had an awesome photographer whose job is to take the wedding pictures at Sandals Royal Caribbean. He really had it down to a T. I didn’t take a list of must-have photos but he seemed to get all the ones we wanted. We had no problems picking 24 that we liked out of the 30 or so he took. After we picked out our pictures, we were back in the pool for more sun and fun. It was great to float around the pool with my husband all day.

We had decided to go to Montego Bay to eat at the OK Corral so we caught a shuttle over there after our traditional afternoon nap. We get over to Montego Bay and find out all of their restaurants are closed except for the reservations ones (Cucina Romano and Tokyo Joe’s) due to their having International Night. Nothing at SRC indicated this on the menus for these restaurants that we had checked earlier that day. We played slots in the bar at Montego Bay while waiting for the next shuttle (1 hr later) and had a few drinks. We went back to SRC in time to catch the Beach Carnival Party and eat dinner there. They had a good fire eater show and some couples games. We didn’t participate in the couples games but enjoyed watching them. The food at the beach party was awesome and we were both glad we didn’t miss it.

We went back to the room to rest up for a game of Outburst that was to be held on the main terrace at 10:30 pm. We went down for it and only one other girl showed up so we called it a night and headed back to the room. All the sun, fun and drinks all day really wear you out.

2 Aug 2003

This is our last full day at SRC as we moved to Beaches Royal Plantation the next day. We got a late start to the day with a trip to the breakfast buffet and then a trip to the wedding office to see our video. Our video was fabulous and Jay and I both got teary-eyed watching it for the first time. Reverend Gordon watched it with us and he commeneted on the Sand Ceremony we used. We had taken 3 copies with us in a big font so that it could be easily read just in case anything went wrong. The wedding coordinator out of Miami wouldn’t take a copy in advance and even intimated that the resort didn’t allow it. That was completely untrue. They had unity candles you could buy there if you wanted and likely he knew a ceremony for that since they were for sale.

We headed to the pool but there was a huge cloud looming in the east. We played Trivial Pursuit in the pool with some other couples as the 1230 activity but before we could finish a rain storm began. We dashed back to our room to wait it out on our patio. Then when it seemed like it might slack back up, we headed to the pool only to have it start pouring rain again just in front of the beach bar. We found seats on the barstools at the beach bar which is covered. We drank and chatted and drank with the bartenders as it continued to rain. Eventually we gave up on getting to the pool and retired for an early nap. We had reservations at Royal Thai for 6:00 pm so it was good to get in early.

However, we both overslept and awoke at 6:30 with no way to get on the 5:45 pm boat. HAHA So, we proceeded to get ready and headed to the Regency for dinner. We had to wait about 20 minutes for a table but sat in the piano bar while we waited. Dinner at the regency was super. Jay had some sort of steak and I had a seafood dish with several different types of seafood in it -- shrimp, mussels, oysters, etc. I don’t recall exactly what. We also shared another bottle of red wine. Other couples nearby got a fantastic caramel sundae type dessert but we wound up with butter pecan ice cream when we tried to order it. Our server was very new and was obviously in training but still it was a great meal and we were never left with an empty glass of water or wine. We wandered around the resort and came back to the disco to play some more slots. As we are walking back from the room, they call out our names on the terrace stage. Evidently, we had done enough organized activities for one sandals necklace. Alister, who had been a witness in our wedding, announced to all that we were just married and he was in our wedding a few days ago. Everyone cheered and they “made us” kiss on stage. (It didn’t take much convincing) We got our sandals and proceeded to the disco to lose $20. It was fun though. After a few drinks we headed back to the room to pack for BRP.

When we got back to the room, our check-out time was 9:30 am and a 10:00 am shuttle pickup to Ocho Rios so we ordered a light breakfast to be delivered at 7:30-8:00 so we could get ready and be on our way on time. We packed all of the things we wouldn’t need at BRP into one large suitcase that we wouldn’t open again and all of our other items into our carry on and 2 small suitcases. This worked out great for us when it came time to unpack at BRP.

3 Aug 2003

We get up around 7:30, ate our breakfast (we were too excited to eat a lot) and got ready to check out. Of course, in our excitement, we got ready waaaay too fast and were sitting in the room twiddling our thumbs counting down til checkout. We checked out with ease and we picked up our certificates for china and first and last nite free on a return trip stay at the front desk. We sat down and eagerly awaited our shuttle. 10 am comes and goes and no one can tell us where our shuttle is. Jay and I both make several trips to the bellstand and to concierge. We are told a myriad of stories about when and where our shuttle was. I was very upset and teary eyed over this. And to make things worse, our bags were just outside the front door and we saw several shuttles leave to the airport and everyone tried to take our luggage. Jay had to stand guard over them and make sure that no one took them to the airport.

Eventually, a van shows up and we were on our way – albeit almost 1.5 hours later than scheduled. There is no way that he was our original driver as his usual runs were for Couples Ocho Rios. He had made his 2^nd trip to Montego Bay and was on his way home for the day. (This was his usual off-day). We were the only ones on the van and our driver was awesome. It took almost 2 hours to go about 100 km (60 miles?) but we enjoyed seeing some of the countryside and our driver told us stories about the parishes along the way. We gave him a great tip at the end of our journey and we were finally at Royal Plantation.

We checked into Royal Plantation just after a brief rain shower that cooled things off a lot. We got the champagne and cool towel. Scott checked us in and brought the assistant manager (a lady) to us to take us to our room. We were in room 253 which is their lowest category of room. However, our room was fabulous. In fact, it was quite a bit nicer than our next-to-top category room at SRC. There was a canopied king sized bed, an armoire with a tv and vcr, and a sitting area. This sitting area was actually what they refer to as a French Balcony. It was sunken from the rest of the room and had 2 clubs chairs and a table that was built into the wall that we ate room-service breakfast on each day. There was a fully stocked bar with fifths of Johnny Walker Red, Absolut Vodka, Appleton Rum and some gin we never heard of. (After a bad experience with the Bombay Sapphire last summer, I am shy of the gin for now. J) The fridge also had the bottles of champagne and ting, pepsi, tonic water, ginger ale, soda water etc. There was also bottled water. There was a crystal ice bucket – a nice touch but boy was I nervous the first time going to get ice with it!!!

We arrived at the same time that 3-4 couples from another resort that had been bumped did so our luggage was a little slow to arrive so we headed out for lunch. It was still a bit dreary from the rain so we weren’t missing anything. We ate lunch at the Royal Café (as would become our daily ritual) I had the conch fritters as an appetizer with a Lobster BLT (no tomato though) and fries. Jay had the oyster bruschetta appetizer with the plantation cheeseburger and fries. We were drinking our new usual – Absolut and Cranberry Juice. After lunch, we walked around the property a little bit and then headed to the room to see if our luggage had arrived.

Our luggage was stored neatly in our walk in closet on the luggage area. How nice!!! We unpacked our smaller bags and fixed ourselves a drink from our in room bar. This room was MUCH more spacious than our SRC room and we loved the club chairs. We soon changed into our beachwear and headed to the west beach (which was the beach we could see from our room and just below the Royal Café.) The beach was not crowded at all and we had a good time lazing about and splashing in the ocean. We enjoyed drinks from the bar as we lazed about. After an afternoon in the sun, we returned to the room to get ready for dinner at the Bayside restaurant. There is a French restaurant but I had not taken any closed toe shoes which was a requirement so no French for us. Jay isn’t that thrilled with French so it wasn’t a big deal to him.

Dinner at the Bayside began at 7 pm. We arrived shortly thereafter and we were the only ones dining for about 20 minutes. We were seated at our table on the terrace overlooking the ocean by the hostess and offered a drink from the bar. Jay likes to have a bottle of wine with dinner and that is fine with me and usually works out better on not having to wait for drinks to be delivered. We looked over the wine list and found one that looked good. I don’t recall what it was other than to say “red” but it was wonderful. Another waiter brought the wine and placed it in a wicker basket during the meal that he poured from. Another waiter filled our water while another took our order. There was a lot of variety on the menu and we were torn about what to get. We had appetizers of shrimp cocktail for me and something I don’t recall for Jay. I had a cold salad of calamari which was mixed with other salad-y things I don’t recall but it was tasty. Jay had a Caesar salad. Jay wound up getting the ostrich steak and I got a filet. I even tried the ostrich and it was tasty. For dessert we had white-chocolate cheesecake with fresh fruit. I got coffee with Bailey’s and Jay got Bailey’s on the rocks. It was a great meal in a great location with my wonderful new husband!

We moved into the Appleton lounge after dinner and perused their extensive cocktail menu. This was a dark, quiet bar with lots of tables and chairs as well as bar stools at the bar. They were taking orders and delivering your drinks to you or you could go to the bar for self-service. We decided on martinis – a Cosmopolitan for me (would become the evening drink of choice) and a Crantini for Jay (goes with the Absolut Cranberries we were drinking all day). After a few rounds, we were exhausted and headed for the room. We weren’t too exhausted to drink our bottle of champagne – another nightly ritual we started here. We also filled out the breakfast cards for breakfast delivery the next morning.

4 Aug 2003

Jay and I woke up just before our breakfast was delivered. We had room service at SRC almost every morning and they just brought it to you and goodbye. Not at BRP. Our breakfast was delivered and the table was setup for us with a tablecloth and all of the plates set for us so all we had to do was sit down and enjoy our breakfast. WOW!!! I had heard on the internet that the chocolate croissants were to die for – they are!!! I don’t recall what else we ate other than that.

After breakfast, we eventually got dressed in our beachwear and headed to the west beach. We were served our usual Absolut-cranberries by the waitress on the beach – right at our loungers!!! There were about 10 people total on our side of the beach and a few people laying out on the piers and the gazebos. There was one very tall, athletic looking guy and a friend who appeared to be a bodyguard-type person with him who was in the ocean with us. We alternated laying out and playing in the ocean. Several hours passed and we decided to go for lunch and get out of the sun. At the same time, the two other guys went to eat as well. We were seated by the wait staff at a table near theirs. I am not good at recognizing people so I had no clue who it was. Jay was seated back to back with the guy and could only hear his voice which was only a small help. Soon another gentleman from the resort with a fancy camera came over and asked to take the two guys’ pictures eating and being served at the resort. By this time, Jay was pretty certain who it was. I was still clueless. Turns out it was Dikembe Mutombo – the professional basketball player. Of course, we didn’t bother him or even speak to him once we knew who he was. It was our brush with celebrity!!!

For lunch, Jay and I both had the conch fritters with the spicy jerk sauce and I had a shrimp Caesar salad and Jay had the Lobster BLT with fries. My shrimp were good but I prefer darker greens in my salad – this was more of the iceberg variety and was a little brown – I know we are spoiled with the freshness of our lettuce in the states – and this was fresh but a little discolored for my tastes. We spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach and headed in only to get ready for the beach party. While we were resting and relaxing after our day in the sun, I decided to order a cheese plate from room service. It was delivered quickly and was oh so yummy since I had a small lunch. The beach party was nice with a great spread of food. However, even with OFF, Jay and I were being eaten alive by bugs. There were bugs everywhere and it didn’t provide a great atmosphere for dining. We ate a small, quick plate of food and skipped dessert and headed inside to play some pool and get some drinks from the bar.

I got us drinks while Jay racked up the balls. We played pool and watched TV for a little while in the games room. We then moved onto the bar where we sat and chatted with Mark our bartender. Mark had worked at Sandals in the Bahamas and Jamaica as well as working at a hotel (the Grand?) on Mackinaw Island in Michigan. He was a lot of fun. We compared Cosmopolitan recipes – he makes his like I do with Triple Sec instead of Cointreau. He told us he had been with Sandals for 8 years and loved the company. We asked him which Sandals he would go to of all of them and he said Sandals Negril. After several more rounds of drinks, we decided to call it a night. Of course, we drank our bottle of champagne and even got another cheese plate to go with it before we turned in. Another great day in paradise!!!

5 Aug 2003

This would be our last day in paradise. We had a small breakfast delivered to the room and we lazed about a bit. We hit the beach early and were greeted by Hensley (whom we had met at the Appleton bar on Sunday nite) who was bringing us our Absolut Cranberry’s – before we could even get our towels spread out! How nice is that? He called us by name and was chatting away. We did the usual laying out and playing in the pool most of the day. We ate lunch at the Royal Café – with Jay getting the oyster bruschetta, some sort of soup (of the day) and the special of the day – lamb pita. I got my usual conch fritters and a Lobster BLT. They also brought us chips and salsa. A gorgeous peacock was strutting around the café making friends and getting snacks. I am terrified of birds but decided to try to feed him. He snapped a chip out of my hands and thoroughly enjoyed it. I fed him by throwing the pieces to him rather than hand feeding him as I feared for my fingers. J After lunch, we went back to the beach and soaked up as many rays as we possibly could.

Once we had enough sun, we decided to go back upstairs and play pool some more. I got us drinks at the bar (A Mudslide for me and something the bartender made for Jay that looked good – Jay had asked me to surprise him.) and we played pool. All of a sudden, they start bringing in couples to the pool room for check in. As it turns out, they were all being bumped from SRC to BRP. They hit the jackpot – however none of them realized it. Jay and I told them we had just come from there and they were really lucky to get this bump. I don’t think we helped much but we tried.

We decided to have a late dinner at 8 pm at the Bayside for our last evening in Jamaica. Jay had the shrimp cocktail and a Caesar salad along with some soup of the day and a huge steak. I got an appetizer of chicken, beef and shrimp satay which were yummy along with the same cold salad with calamari and some other stuff I don’t recall. However, tonite I got the Lobster! There were two huge pieces of lobster that were already out of the shells for you. YUMMY!!!!!!!! For dessert, I didn’t see crème brulee on the menu so I asked could they get me one. No Problem!!! Jay got the white chocolate cheesecake again. We both enjoyed it. Again, I had coffee with baileys and Jay had baileys on the rocks.

During dinner, there was a lot of commotion at the pool (which was on the 2^nd level between the ocean and the terrace where we were. Seems the bumpees were down there whooping it up to the band that was playing quiet dinner accompaniment music. We saw the managers head down there with towels and I am sure some stern warnings… This is not a whoop and holler kind of place. Some even walked through the main restaurant in their swimsuits on the way to the pool. It was like the Clampetts in Beverly Hills. J

After dinner, we went to our usual hangout – the Appleton lounge. Our bartender was Siboney and he was making all sorts of drinks and entertaining the folks. There were about 6 other couples in there and this was a “crowd” for BRP. We sang along with him for awhile and enjoyed his Cosmopolitans. He also made us a “Siboney of the Sea” which was blue-green just like the Caribbean and was very tasty. Sadly, we had to return to our room to pack for the 7 am bag pickup for the Air Jamaica pre-checkin in the games room. Our checkout time was 11 am with a 1 pm bus ride to Montego Bay.

6 Aug 2003

We got up very early for our Air Jamaica pre-check in in the games room. We had our bags outside the door at 7 and headed down to the games room. We checked in, got our boarding passes and had our luggage searched by the AJ representative. We were back in the room and asleep in no time. We ordered an early lunch and were allowed to stay in our room until noon (usual checkout is 11 am). We had room service of burgers and fries and Jay got another piece of the white chocolate cheesecake. At noon we cleared our bill and headed to our favorite spot in the games room for some pool. Unfortunately, another couple was already playing. We waited patiently on the sofas but they were rude and never relinquished the table. We counted 8 games and they were playing when we got there. HOW RUDE! (We think they were bumpees from SRC)

Around 12:45 we went out front to catch our shuttle to the airport. Several employees asked were we okay, including the manager who checked us in. She said we looked sooo sad – of course we were – we were leaving paradise!!! She checked on our shuttle and arranged for another one. Once again we were on a shuttle by ourselves headed back to Montego Bay. This driver wasn’t as chatty as our first driver but he was nice nonetheless. He had to make a stop at duty-free. As it turns out, he was buying “spirits” for his brother, whose family was at a small beach about 30 minutes outside of Ocho Rios celebrating the national holiday. August 6^th is their Independence Day. He made our ride back to the airport quick (1 hr, 45 minutes even with the stop) and dropped us off right up front at the airport.

When we walked into the airport and saw the crowds at the desks, we were SOOOOO glad to have done the AJ pre-checkin as we got to go right to our gate. We stopped at duty-free to buy the limit on alchol – 2 liters apiece. We got Absolut for $10/liter and an Absolut Mandarin for $11 and Tia Maria for $12. $43 total for 4 liters. WHATTA BARGAIN!!! Our flight left on time and was uneventful. Immigration and Customs was a little bit of a hassle but Jay thought it wasn’t too bad. We got our luggage and went to find the Hilton shuttle. After a few minutes of being in the wrong spot, we found the shuttle and were on our way. The Hilton van driver offered us cold drinks from the cooler. I was SOOOO excited that they had Diet Coke. All I saw in Jamaica was Pepsi!!! We were taken right to Jay’s car and we loaded up and headed to the Westin – a mere 3 miles away.

At the Westin, where we had another $45 priceline room, we ordered Pizza Hut pizza and we both swear it was the best we had ever had. We missed the pizza while in Jamaica!!! Too much fancy food and we needed some American Junk Food!!! The Westin was great and we were very happy not to have to drive the 3.5 hrs home.