Truck & Sarah - November, 2008
Trip Report: November 15th - 29th
Sarah’s BIRTHDAY Trip
Truck bit: OK – let’s just pretend I have written 32 paragraphs
concerning our journey and you are now all up to speed as to how we
managed to get to Hedo at 5:00pm!! The bit when the Jamaican armed
police came on the plane to detain two ‘air rage’ passengers was
quite interesting was it not?
One of the drivers in booking this trip was that
Checked in reasonably swiftly and headed to 2267, a location we
liked; due to it being on the second floor – allowing us to have to
window open with less risk of theft – and it was well placed to the
nude beach, without being too close to the sound system or general
revelry: meaning we could get a little peace and quiet if required.
The phone did not work, meaning I had to walk back up to reception
to get the safe problem sorted – it did not work either!! Two bits
of good news here; the staff were very helpful and got the safe
sorted very promptly: in addition I bumped into John (Mugsey) whilst
up there – after 5 years or so we were starting to think we would
never meet! What a nice guy, even better in ‘real life’ than
cyberspace. It was quite funny though; John came back to the room to
meet
After unpacking and a little love making – kind of compulsory at
Hedo don’t you think? We went to the main bar and hooked up with
John and some of his friends for the night. We caught up with a few
familiar faces and met some new ones. I also think it will become
some sort of ritual to say hi to Chris and
Truck bit:
Why put this in? Well it was
our first time to experience the health support service at Hedo and
I have to say that the nurse on duty was excellent. She escalated
the response to my visits – yes the phone was still not working and
I was getting progressively fitter with each trip to the nurse –
sensibly and progressively. The doctor was called at the right time
and, although
Sarah bit: Also big hugs and
everything else to Truck for looking after me so well. Sx.
Also a big thank you to
Geraldine (our maid) who came in and cleaned up the bathroom after
my awful night – and did this so quietly I carried on sleeping.
I woke up on Monday morning; feeling slightly more normal – if
that’s possible – Truck had gone to the gym and I wandered down to
the beach walking in the water and watching the birds feeding. It
was so quiet and warm and relaxing – one of those lovely peaceful
morning moments. Unfortunately I was unable to eat a great deal for
the first few days – or drink any alcohol – shame - but as Truck
says I was in the gym Tuesday morning feeling a little more active.
We met some excellent people in the first week of our holiday –
along with the couple of days with John - sorry I missed you most of
the time Mugsey! Diva and Art were there the same time as us, you
two are just awesome!! We also got to know Ruby and Taj on the beach
– Ruby and I giving Truck one of his “special” moments to remember
at the bar!! We had some good chats with them – great people.
There was also Kenny,
fantastic company; sorry we didn’t see you go. Also Roger with his
excellent grasp of Russian!! Not forgetting Lee and Debbie – we
often have Americans saying they love our English accents (sorry
Truck!) but Lee, I just loved your voice!! Not forgetting Cindy and
Rick – I will be looking out for some equally brilliant sun glasses.
Also I must mention the other British visitors who were such a
pleasure to spend time with – Ian and Jan and Sam and Paul – It was
just great meeting you guys – and all flying back on the same plane.
On in time and Dick and Kathi, and Phyllis and Doug, Don and Anne
and of course Darrel – It was brilliant meeting you all, thanks for
making our trip special. Every day the trip got better, special
memories – dancing with Mo at the bar late afternoon as the sun was
going down – that was special – more lovely people, we had a couple
of overcast days but that was no problem.
The highlight for me was my birthday which fell on Thanksgiving – so
I had a pretty busy day. This was the best birthday ever, made
special by all those people we already knew and those we had come to
know. The parade was excellent – never before have I dressed up in
an English flag, carried a Welsh one and begged men at Sandals to
take their shorts off, awesome!!
It just got better – the Champagne party was superb – again
another first for me; dancing on a table naked as everyone sang
happy birthday to me, being surprised with a delicious Birthday cake
– Truck and Anita – you made my day THANK YOU!!...and getting
covered in silly string!! Watching Truck gallantly sitting in the
ice bath for me hehe!!! Unfortunately due to the amount of champagne
and whatever else I drank that afternoon I can’t remember everything
and Truck won’t tell me: but I danced with and hugged some gorgeous
people – thank you all for sharing my birthday – I just have to be
back there next November!!
Other special memories: the sunrises, Truck running four miles in
the gym, – before we went to Hedo he would rarely run 1 mile!!
Walking on the wooden walkways in bare feet – trust me that feels so
good - finding our rock from
April, getting a tree engraved, being massaged professionally; in
addition to several times (very sensually) by the sexiest man on the
planet, sleeping whenever I felt like it and laughing so much.
The only negatives – apart from the illness at the beginning of the
holiday were the lack of scrambled eggs and nice pineapple at
breakfast, only having three working treadmills in the gym, with no
cross trainers or rowing machines and being unable to spend much
time in the piano bar because it was far too cold in there! We just
hung out with the people outside.
Truck bit: Can I get a word in edgeways
now? Thank you honey: of course I am still on day two now, whilst
Sarah is already a week and a half into our trip!!
Matters that some are interested in:
food, generally as expected. We had one meal in Pastafari with
Parrott, which was fine, if a little chilly – this is not a
complaint as getting the a/c level to suit everyone would be an
impossibility. The nude grill is poor; there is no other way to
describe it. The burgers are still designed to clog arteries and as
I mentioned in my 2004 report, they should make their own. One major
issue is; why they are incapable of preparing more than one and a
half orders in advance? Some restaurant training is missing I’m
afraid – the queues could be reduced considerably if the cook was
more confident and dynamic. The prude grill will not take you long
to walk to and the standard of food is vastly different: they also
had no problem with our ordering naked there. Although I would
suggest that if you want to sit and eat there that you do cover up
out of respect to the others and for reasons of hygiene.
We don’t tend to eat a great deal while
at Hedo and did not try the lunchtime buffet, so nothing to report
there. One highlight was the spicy Conch stew in the evening, which
we had a couple of times – it was delicious!!
The room was as always; the new a/c was
vastly improved from the previous units and very easy to use/adjust–
on the few occasions Sarah would let me put it on, I did tell you
she hates being cold!!
It was very nice to meet Ms Santilli and
Wayne – even if Chris tried to torture me with a penis shaped pasta
measuring device on the beach:
Due to the strong winds over the first
few days the beach had a load of debris washed up – Augustus is such
a hard working person he, single handed kept the nude beach a place
you wanted to be. We did discuss how our kids might benefit from
spending a day as his assistants!! We did feel very sorry for those
who had come to dive; week one was a write off for them and the
first time I had experienced red flags on the beach.
The gym was the same as before, the same
treadmill was out of action as in April; that is just not good
enough. In addition, as there are only 4 treadmills in total, it was
not good to have one out of order and two occupied by staff at 7 in
the morning when 3 guests were queuing up to use them! I am all in
favour of the staff being able to use the facilities, very good for
morale and that sort of thing; it is not acceptable that they do not
relinquish equipment in favour of guests though – there was on
American gentleman on that particular morning who was absolutely
furious – it’s just wrong. They should add a couple more treadmills;
fix the ‘rogue’ one and get a couple of rowing machines. We do
enough damage to our bodies whilst there that a token effort to
stave off the consequences is recommended!!
The parade was, as always, good fun: a
count of 137 was not too bad considering the economic climate – I
would doubt Hedo was above 70% occupancy at any stage during our two
weeks. Sandals was dead – we walked the beach the day before the
parade and it looked like the staff there outnumbered the guests!
Mind you, it was hard to decide who looked the more miserable!!!!
One note regarding Julio’s hat – for
those who know the famous topper, it has now been retired and
occupies a hallowed place at Delroys – he now has a new hat, of a
slightly smaller variety; which still had the sort of decoration one
has come to expect. We had some good chats together and one lovely
moment came when we could observe the genuine confusion on his face
as he recounted his grilling at immigration as to his destination.
“What do you mean where am I staying? It’s written on my hat!!”
He was obviously concerned that his new hat was, perhaps, not
eye catching enough!
The hot tub temperature was slightly more
consistent than in April, when it was essentially just too cold to
use! But we did not have too many late nights – due to
We had a fabulous two weeks – except for
an appalling incident on our last night - and just love the place to
bits: well the people we meet really.
We had showers up to 3 times daily and
there was always hot water at a good pressure; we never had a
problem getting beach towels. There were less new faces than usual;
but a hell of a lot more guests than the other resorts we passed
when we walked the beach. We renewed and strengthened some old
friendships, we made some new ones, we missed some old friends – but
will see them again - that’s what Hedo II is all about.
We feel you get what you pay for and in
that respect Hedo II still delivers.