Easter in the Fog

We spent the last week, from Wednesday to Tuesday at our friends Caitlin and Khaled’s house in Malvern, St. Elizabeth. Malvern has a much nicer climate than Portmore. Read: It’s not constantly hot, since it’s at a higher altitude. Instead, it is cool and the fog and rain roll in off the Santa Cruz Mountains during the afternoon. It’s also very calm and quite compared to the hustle and bustle of our Metropolitan Area.


We went there on a working vacation. Our goal was to relax, play cards, eat and drink, and work on the database and some grant applications. All of these were accomplished plus we even got to do a little site seeing. We ventured over to the local waterfall at the YS river and on the way got to drive through the famous Bamboo Avenue. YS falls was beautiful, although the water was a bit muddy. We couldn’t help but stare at all the tourists there, as strange as it sounds white people look a bit funny to us now, especially in big groups. Shane finally learned how to play Canasta, so now he can enter the Peace Corps Jamaica Canasta circuit and compete. We opted to skip the Yam Festival in Trelawny on Monday and instead attened the Easter Fest at a local school. There was a cricket match, fried chicken and even a Talent Contest. We took 3 of the neigbour girls and they seemed to enjoy it a lot. But most of the time we sat around, read, and went for walks in the hills of Malvern. Very chill!

Our friends should really consider opening a local bakery because the treats they made us were out of this world! The baked goods list included Dutch baby (a quick soufflé) with bananas foster topping, éclairs, biscotti, cinnamon rolls (with coffee and reading material, the ultimate breakfast), and banana cupcakes. There were also some really good dinners like pasta primavera with coconut cream sauce, soy meat loaf, and stuffed peppers. Luckily, we didn’t eat lunch usually so there was room for all the tasty breakfasts and dinners. Us city folk were in awe at all the garden goodies brought over by neighbors and we had lots of fun at the open air market in Santa Cruz. Buying your fruits and veggies at the grocery store just isn’t as nice as getting someone’s abundance for free or chatting with the market ladies. We did bring back a few local treats though, some lemons and a nice big bottle of St. Elizabeth honey.

It was a really wonderful time and with such great company, yummy treats, and a cool climate Malvern definitely tops our list of escapes from the hot, hot Sunshine City of Portmore.

- Shane and Kae