Day 2

Day two was tourist day. The only day we did official touristy things. Two hours in the car each way to Black River, YS Falls, and Appleton Rum Factory. The drive, itself, was an event.

Our second day began early. Sometime during our drunken debauchery of the day prior we passed a tour guide parked at the front of resort. Rumor has it I questioned his parenting skills when I learned, in the first 2.5 seconds of meeting him, that he had a child living in the US and not with him in Jamaica. Despite grilling him about whether or not he paid child support, he still agreed to cart our asses around Jamaica. And he even brought me pictures of his kid. And later became our friend. Hi, Marc!

Though the trip was supposed to be about the Black River tour, the falls, and the rum factory, I was actually more amazed by the trip itself. Two hours each way, winding through small little mountain roads, bordered on one side by the ocean. We stopped at roadside stands for fritters. We giggled at the goats walking along the side of the road that apparently make their way home every evening all on their own. The whole trip I was in awe. The view! The mountains! The ocean! The goats!

Stopping along the way to Black River to take pictures.

By the time we arrived at Black River we were giddy and ready for some adventures.

Black River. Called so, because, obviously, the water looks black. However, the water is actually the clearest river water I have ever seen.

The four of us were joined by several other tourists, including a family with a disabled teenager. The mother immediately announced they were making this trip for the girl who looked miserable after being lifted, and almost dropped, onto a pontoon boat in her wheelchair. Mama, then whips out her camera. A polaroid. No not a fancy I-still-use-a-polaroid-for-artist-purposes polaroid, but a cheap, old polaroid. "Sit up straight and smile like you are having fun," she barks at the poor girl. Then before any of us knew what was happening, she made us all pose with her family members "like we were friends."




Someone should have thrown her to the crocodiles, which there were plenty of along the river. Our tour guide thought it great fun to pull the boat right up to them. Especially the side of the boat I was sitting on.


"Don't worry," he assured us. "They are quite tame," he says as he hand feeds them chicken.



Luckily, that crocodile did not eat our tour guide.


After escaping death by crocodile, we drove another thirty minutes or so to YS Falls. By the time we arrived the sky had darkened. Then the rain began. We made it about halfway up the falls, before some old dude leered at me and grabbed Emily's ass. I was a little upset, because, obviously, that meant she had the better ass.

By that point we were over it. It was raining. Hard. Old men were creeping us out. Emily and I found ourselves waiting at the bottom of the falls while the guys headed off to find the rope swing. While waiting we noticed two things.

1.The signs all explicitly warn you not to smoke ganja.

2. The non-American men wear little bitty swimsuits with their junk hanging out.

The guys never made it to the rope swing. And Kenny caught me taking pictures of this guy in the little pants. Kenny and Michael decided it was best to head on to Appleton Rum factory before we were completely water logged I got myself in trouble.

This is the tour that everyone looks forward to. All you can drink free rum. Rum punch. Rum shots. 30-year-old rums. Whatever your heart desires. Unless, of course, you heart desires to never see rum again after drinking rum punch for 8 straight hours the day before. The smell wafting from the parking lot was enough to make me want to puke.

But the tour was supposed to be really interesting, too.

Or not. We could have cared less how the pot stills work.

I did perk up when I heard that we could taste some raw molasses (a by product...see I was too listening Mr. Tour Guide Who Kept Fussing At Us For Trailing Behind). Sugar in any form is my friend.

Licorice, however, is not. And that is what that shit tasted like.

By then end of the day, we were done being goofy tourist. We took our fanny packs off Not really. You didn't think I actually have a fanny pack did, you? and started planning our next day. Local spots. Where the natives go. Those were our requirements. Marc, mapped out a plan, and we agreed to meet at four the next afternoon.