Negril Notes

PNS - Here it comes!!

February 20, 2006

PNS is taking over! I sit on the computer for an hour each night trying to tweak every imaginable variable to get the lowest fare. What if I left from Newark, maybe Atlantic City? What if I left Monday, or Sunday, or a week later or a week earlier? Itâ€™s a few weeks of obsessive-compulsive insanity that in some ways keeps me sane.

Then itâ€™s the hotel. I have an ideal room in my mind though every amenity can be altered as needed either for a better price or for another momentarily more important amenity.

I love to find the cheapest place in Negril which also has the most things on my moving target list. Itâ€™s not that Iâ€™m poor, but I like the feeling when someone is wowed by my Blue Cave Castle pics and I can say, â€œAll that, and for only $35.00 a night!â€ All bow to the “Travel Guru”!

My main requirements are a balcony or patio, a mini-fridge, and an indoor shower. I really donâ€™t ask for much. The balcony, veranda if you must, is just a little private space outdoors to read, chill-out and have some â€œmeâ€ time. The fridge is for Red Stripe, water and leftovers. Actually all food goes in there, Jamaican insects are survivors, and will be roomates if you’re not careful. Lastly the indoor shower, I donâ€™t even need hot water, and although I never actually stayed in a place with a communal bathroom, I almost did, once.

There are some niceties like a kitchenette, or a hammock that can push a property several notches up my list. My favorite place, accommodationally speaking, was Banana Shout. We were there just weeks after Hurricane Ivan (10/04), the place was a construction site, but the house rocked. Two verandas with hammocks, a hot plate with a coffee pot, it even had hot water, though the water in Negril is never really cold.

My finalists for my 2006 Easter trip are Travellerâ€™s, Hidden Paradise, Catcha Falling Star, The Yoga Center and Banana Shout. Travellerâ€™s has a great price and always seems so well kept. Hidden Paradise offers breakfast. I snooped around on my last Negril trip, and it too seems like a place that gets a lot of TLC from its owners, but both those places are on the beach side and I find myself becoming a cliff dweller.

Catcha Falling Star is awesome and is currently topping my list. It has everything I want, is beautiful, and Rob from The Real Negril got me a great deal. Banana Shout and The Yoga Center are sentimental favorites, both wonderful places Iâ€™ve vowed to come back to.

So you see, Iâ€™m a mess!

Any suggestions to further muddy the waters?

Peace