It’s amazing how much of an impact in time, little things make.
When I decided I wanted to take a trip to Port royal Jamaica, it was a whim of the moment. I had nursed thoughts about the location, partly because my colleague at work had sung repeatedly that they had the best fish, and I just had to see it for myself.
I set out that morning after a little bachata to some Latin music, (my new found obsession), the weather was calm, it looked as though rain would pour, but my colleague assured that we were going against the rain, so it was not going to cause a lot of problems.
The 45 minutes drive from my place in Kingston to Port Royal was exciting, yet riveting. The richest and wickedest city in the world, had so much to show you, so much to tell.
It is said that the “Brethren of the coast” as the pirates were called, once used this city as a home and storage for all their loots and treasures of silk, everything was available including bars, maybe that’s where she gets her nickname from. The town still retains its ancient architecture, you can almost see a scene from Medieval movie, being set here.
The children playing on the sidewalks, mother tending to her baby, tourists driving in and out, locals watching dutifully from their windows with questions in their eyes, I genuinely understood their skepticism, as I too would be that inquisitive if I lived in a town with so much history in her belly.
A whole leap of stories yuh know! The lucky man, who was said to have have been swallowed by the great earthquake of 1962, that happened to the island, and was vomited back out to land, as the land opened up again. His grave site is found next to the St Peters Anglican church, which was also a victim of the earthquake. As impossible as this story seems I like to believe in folklores, they help make sense and give hope to people in a seemingly uneasy world.
At the other side of the town, laid Morgan Fort, walking into this landscape overwhelmed me with emotions, there was admiration, excitement, anger and hurt, each of this emotions I felt to the maximum. Admiration for the brilliance of the “Prince of Wales line” although a bit dilapidated, the Monument still held brilliant cannon guns which overshot towards the coast, these canons were built by the British in a bid to rearm their coastal defenses as they had over taken the island from the Spanish people at the time, it is said that these cannonballs were later replaced with shells, for more accuracy. The striking similarities with the current occurrence in Ukraine brought a lot of fear, anguish and hurt back, I decided to step away.
What’s a tour without food?
When we approached the famous Gloria’s Seafood Restaurant, we found that the menu was pasted on the walls, so we looked through, identified our meals and placed a collective order. While the rest of the group was deciding, my eyes immediately spotted a bicycle and my soul leaped with Joy.
For so long I had searched for a bicycle and I was too broke to get one. So imagine my Joy when I find one laying around, beckoning me. I was a bit Skeptical that the person who I assumed to be the owner, would refuse my request, but you never know unless you try, so I asked my Jamaican friend to talk to him and he agreed.
Immediately I jumped on and took it for a spin round the perimeters of the restaurant.
I was careful not to go far because it was a strange neighborhood and I did not want to get hurt. It was a lovely time, the spin, it reminded me of simple times in life when there were no worries. I thanked the kind stranger for his benevolence and took a picture with him, because freezing moments in photographs are the best thing to do.
There also was this sweet little girl, who danced around like the world was her oyster, owning her strides as though she were in a movie, and we were her audience. You could tell she was comfortable in her neighborhood, it was her little world and I loved that for her.
Happy little girls add color to the world.
Much more amazing was the fact that she agreed to a picture with me, I was honored. 
Happy little girl, agreed to take a picture with me
Some minutes after the mini photoshoot, we went in to have our food. It wasn’t really a long wait, but the scenery was beautiful and the ambience was top notch. I had some brown stewed fish with festival (a deep fried bread of Jamaican cuisine with a sweet taste, often served with seafood) and every meal was served with a salad. I also got some coconut water to drink, my entire meal cost about 3000 JMD, it was a whole big fish so two people can share depending on their ability.
Prior to settling in to have lunch, we had booked for the boat that would take us to the Island Lime Cay, the main Islet of Port Royal. When we finished our meal, we sorted the bills and headed to the dork, where we met a nice speed boat waiting as well as other people some of which were tourist who were on their way to the Island as well, we also met some who were coming off.
Another set of interesting creatures we saw where Seagulls and boy where they mighty, they flew around like they owned the place, making beautiful circles around the dork, one flew directly over my head. it was so close, I could definitely feel the wind over my head, really exciting.
…….to read part 2, please click here