ALL-TERRAIN VEHICLES AND MINI-MOKES!

Tourists are renting a lot of these ATVs (All-Terrain Vehicles) around Nassau. They remind me of the Mini-moke I drove across the Blue Mountains on our honeymoon in Jamaica!

We had flown into Montego Bay and took a “limousine” to the Hilton in Ocho Rios in the dark of night. The “limousine” was actually no more than a very packed, uncomfortable little bus! It was all part of the “Honeymoon Package” that had enticed us to book a room at the Hilton.

We had really wanted to stay at the Blue Mountain Inn near Kingston that we’d read about in a magazine, but in those days there was no internet, so I couldn’t email them, and phone calls were expensive. I’d sent them a snail mail letter of enquiry and never heard back from them.

The Hilton advertised their “Honeymoon Package” as “free champagne with first night’s dinner and double bed”! We discovered at dinner that “free champagne” meant one glass each and not the bottle we expected, and the room contained twin beds! After they shuffled us to another room, we decided to call the Blue Mountain Inn. There was “room at the Inn”, so a couple of days later we set off in rented Mini-moke, map in hand. I drove, as Erskine only had a scooter licence at the time. Of course, I’d really never driven anywhere before this, except once when my boss in England loaned me his car to attend a wedding and another time when I drove an old Ford around some Devon cliffs before I purchased it for my newspaper reporter job (I had to quickly resell it when I found out how much the insurance would cost!).

But with the courage of the young, I happily manoeuvred the Mini-moke around breathtaking bends in the road through the Blue Mountains, with cars that had run off the road hanging over the mountain sides.

The Blue Mountain Inn was everything we expected for a honeymoon – the trickling of a mountain stream outside our window, fresh fruit in our room every morning, and roses and candles on our table at dinner.

We explored the area in the Mini-moke, even venturing into the heart of busy Kingston.

So when I see couples in ATVs driving around Nassau, I wonder if they are having as much fun as we did with our Mini-moke on our honeymoon!