No Sun, Still Fun, Jamaica

Viannca: In 2010, we traveled to Jamaica to celebrate Hamlet's birthday which is in October. We set ourselves up for what we thought was going to be an amazing week of laying in these beautiful bungalow beach beds all day, soaking up the sun with cool tropical drinks in hand at a fancy all-inclusive resort. We read that the hotel included unlimited kayaking, we thought maybe we will do some of that. We thought we'd spend countless hours playing volleyball, laying out poolside or going a couple of excursions. 

Well we thought completely wrong because, as novice travelers, we didn't think to check what season October is in Jamaica. We should have known, Hamlet being from the Dominican Republic and me knowing full well what Puerto Rico is like any time of the year. Not sure where our heads were because we only came to realize that October is rainy season when we arrived on the island and were greeted by a tropical storm, a full seven days of rain. 

While at first, we were super down about how little sun we were getting and about how wet everything was, it didn't take long for us to adopt the spirit of 'Jamaica, No Problem.' This mindset that right then, in the moment and place in time we had, there was no problem. There could be no real or big enough problem to come in between a good time and us. And there wasn't. 

In episode 3 of our podcast we talk about how we lost our canon camera the first night, with a fully loaded memory card of photos from another trip, we missed a birthday party that was organized for Hamlet by new friends we had made, I fell in front of the entire buffet line, and yet this trip was an amazingly good time. It was filled with camaraderie, friendships, bonding and seeing the beauty in fun without the sun.