IF I AM NOT BACK BY WEDNESDAY...

It all began on this verandah, as have so many books, or pages therein; Andrene Bonner's first published piece, JJV:The Storyteller's, Richard Moore's The Bolt Supremacy, Chris Gayle's Six Machine... The inspiration for this book was different though. It was not the verdant view that inspired creativity, the still of the morning that clears thoughts or just being far from the madding crowd that gives pause to refresh. It was none of these for Geoffrey Haddad.

Geoffrey's book was etched in his memory from a personal experience of nearly 50 years ago; penned indelibly by his real life experience in the Blue Mountains as a schoolboy, young and yearning for adventure. And adventure he did get. He made assiduous notes of that encounter with near death, kept mementos of the experience and told his story to many a friend.

It was in the summer of 2012 that I got to hear his story, first hand. Mark you, few in Jamaica would have forgotten the news in late 1967 when, again, 5 Jamaica College schoolboys got lost attempting to create their own trail through Jamaica's Blue Mountains. Again, because an all too similar thing happened in 1939. So riveting was that story that it never left the mind of the young, impressionable Hartley Neita. In 2008, he published The Search, a gripping encounter of that earlier experience. 

In my quest to promote The Search far and wide, Michele Parkin, my Servite Convent school friend, who knew Geoffrey, got wind of it and brought the book to Geoffrey's attention. A year later, he was on my verandah with the makings of his manuscript, asking about how to get his book published. Long story short, it is here now, and Geoffrey saw it only fitting that the Jamaican launch of his book would not be complete without him leaving a copy in our library for our guests to read and enjoy. Priced at J$2,500 each, and like The Search, copies of If I Am Not Back By Wednesday are available at, and are in aid of, the Jamaica College Foundation at 189 Old Hope Road, Kingston 6, Jamaica. The office can be contacted at 876-970-1817 and jcfoundation@cwjamaica.com. 

Your bedroom is here for you at Neita's Nest, and it is neither stiff nor staid. Sparse, yes, but with just enough bare essentials that leave you the space to make this your own.

Keeping your bedroom on the sparse side allows you to focus on the breathtaking view outside and on the artwork and accents inside.

White linens are offset with colours suggestive of the tropical birds for which each room is named. 

​Imagine the dusty cobalt blue of the orange-throated Blue Quit, 

the persimmon underbelly of the brown Zenaida Dove, 

​or the emerald green endemic Jamaican Doctor Bird!

From the sanctuary of your room you can hear these and other birds chirping, and you can smell the mountain air as it wafts through your wall-to-wall louvered windows.

The sights, sounds and smells keep you in that Zen state of mind here at Neita's Nest. Come, rest, relax and rejuevenate! ​Whether your Kingston visit be for birding, business or a break from it all, book your bed and breakfast stay with us. We will reserve one of these beautiful rooms for you.

My! We have grown! From a refuge for survivors of the 1692 earthquake in Port Royal, to being named the capital of Jamaica in 1872, a country which gained political Independence from Great Britain 90 years later, this relatively young city has carved for itself an interesting history recorded by many.

Emily Mann's March 24, 2016 article in theguardian makes for interesting reading. Check it out here. 

Amidst all the growth in visual structures is a vibrancy that comes from the spirit of a resilient people such that Kingston has been designated a Creative City of Music. Come visit with us and experience why.

As we celebrate our 2015 Sportsman and Sportswoman of the Year, Usain Bolt and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, we also take time out to celebrate a 2015 Reggae Marathon 2015 Winner, Inge Joachims, who was our guest in December, fresh from winning the Full Marathon - Female Category, in Negril.

Inge, a vet in Belgium, and her sister Anita, made a special request for Vegan/Vegetarian, Jamaican Style and were delighted with our meal plan during their 3 nights with us. They also enjoyed getting to know our capital city, thanks to specialty tours by Jamaica Cultural Enterprises.

​Inge and Anita were a joy to host, and were gracious guests, enjoying the camaraderie with our other guests from Europe.

We had a wonderful 2015 making some 200 new friends who came to our Kingston Bed and Breakfast as guests. We also had the pleasure of reuniting with our several repeat visitors.

It is January and we are still enjoying the Christmas Season at Neita's Nest. Our guest reviews continue celebrate us as Tripadvisor's #1 Kingston Bed and Breakfast, friends are visiting, the ponsettias are in full bloom, we have been baking to fill post-Christmas pudding orders, a new crop of sorrel has been brewed, and our Christmas Tree is still green and smelling of fresh pine.

So, despite the custom of taking down the Tree by The Feast of the Epiphany, we are not doing that just yet. There is still much to celebrate, not the least of which is our tradition of the exchange of Christmas Tree ornaments with our guests from around the world. It is a symbol of the uniting peoples, which is what we do all year round.

​In December, we added several to our beautiful collection, exchanging Jamaican-made ones with guests who brought theirs in from Ireland, Germany, New Zealand and India. Glass baubles, crystal bells and mirrored charms, a leprechaun snowman and a santa building sandcastles on a sunny beach Down Under, all add to the richness of our collection and the loads of memorable moments of sentiments shared.

​Continue to celebrate the spirit of Christmas - one of sharing and gratitude.

This is what "Full House" looks like at Neita's Nest, your choice bed and breakfast in Kingston, Jamaica! Friends meeting friends they never met before, laughter, chatter and using a single language common to all. 

Kicking off our winter season are the Diekstall family from Germany along with the Joaquims sisters from the Flemish side of Belgium. The two families chose English as their means of communication. It was the first time to Kingston for both, and there was much to exchange about their experiences in the other parts of our island they had separately visited.

They shared over a very Jamaican 2-course breakfast of tree-ripened tropical fruit, and mackerel rundown with boiled green bananas and avocado pear. Fruit juice, freshly perked Jamaican Authentic Coffee, breads and spreads completed their meal.

Green hills bathed in warm sunlight while ponsettias red graced the tables and garden. What better place is there to warm up to winter than with a homestay experience at Neita's Nest in Kingston.?! 

​See you soon.

A Brief History of Seven Killings, ...the finest in fiction, ...the very best book of the year, ...the Man Booker Prize, ...the first Jamaican-born to win it, ...Marlon James! These are the buzz words on lips all over the world today! It's incredible.

In his initial interview on BBC after the announcement, Marlon said, "It's totally surreal...it's so exciting, ...so humbling. His 686-page epic novel was inspired by reggae music, the attempted assassination of Bob Marley, and speaks to life in Jamaica and the gang culture in the 1960s through to the 90s, and how it is inextricably linked with politics, the CIA and the international drug trade.

My sister, Karen, is a prolific reader, and an avid collector of books. Good books. Select books. Every now and then she will highly recommend one for me to read, she will even lend them to me. Recently, I was helping her to move house and to put some of her things into storage. She handed me a couple of must-reads. When I came across her copy of A Brief History of Seven Killings and I attempted to ask to borrow it, she quickly packed it away. No! It was her prized possession. She had already read it twice, but she was not ready to part with it.

She knew it then. She knows it now. She called me today to check if I had heard the news. She told me in which box it is packed, how it is labeled, and where in storage it can be found. She is lending it to me, and I am so humbled!

​So much has been published about Usain Bolt, the fastest man in the world. Quite a bit has been written about historic Falmouth, the capital of the parish, Trelawny from which Usain hails. Far less has been documented about Neita's Nest except for in the social media that hosts my blogs and the generous reviews of my guests. Until now...

Richard Moore,  published author and freelance journalist, and a repeat guest of Neita's Nest, recently paid tribute to our services in his most recent book, The Bolt Supremacy: Inside Jamaica's Sprint Factory, published in July 2015. Much of the research took place while we hosted him during his visits to Jamaica, and many of the pages were drafted here at his desk.

If that was not enough, I woke to an early morning email from a friend in Quebec who had already scrolled through today's edition of theguardian, and who was compelled to share with me the "honourable mention" Richard gave to us in this worldwide publication. Yes, it was a good morning here at Neita's Nest! Just to read that the highlight of his days exploring our city, Kingston, was to return home to our meals, made today memorable. Thank you Richard.

A former racing cicyclist who represented Scotland at the 1998 Commonwealth Games, Richard's passion for sports and his intimate knowledge of the win, lose and draw of competition comes through clearly in his writings. It is no wonder his books have received awards and acclaim. At the end of one of his visits last year, he was on his way to New York for the premiere of the film, Slaying the Badger based on his book of the same title.

We at Neita's Nest are at once touched to be mentioned in the same publication as the supreme Bolt and the historic Falmouth and honoured to be acknowledged by Richard for the services we provide. 

 So much has been published about Usain Bolt, the fastest man in the world. Quite a bit has been written about historic Falmouth, the capital of the parish, Trelawny from which Usain hails. Far less has been documented about Neita's Nest except for in the social media that hosts my blogs and the generous reviews of my guests. Until now...

Richard Moore,  published author and freelance journalist, and a repeat guest of Neita's Nest, recently paid tribute to our services in his most recent book, The Bolt Supremacy: Inside Jamaica's Sprint Factory, published in July 2015. Much of the research took place while we hosted him during his visits to Jamaica, and many of the pages were drafted here at his desk.

If that was not enough, I woke to an early morning email from a friend in Quebec who had already scrolled through today's edition of theguardian, and who was compelled to share with me the "honourable mention" Richard gave to us in this worldwide publication. Yes, it was a good morning here at Neita's Nest! Just to read that the highlight of his days exploring our city, Kingston, was to return home to our meals, made today memorable. Thank you Richard.

A former racing cicyclist who represented Scotland at the 1998 Commonwealth Games, Richard's passion for sports and his intimate knowledge of the win, lose and draw of competition comes through clearly in his writings. It is no wonder his books have received awards and acclaim. At the end of one of his visits last year, he was on his way to New York for the premiere of the film, Slaying the Badger based on his book of the same title.

We at Neita's Nest are at once touched to be mentioned in the same publication as the supreme Bolt and the historic Falmouth and honoured to be acknowledged by Richard for the services we provide. 

Jamaica's lush Blue and John Crow Mountains National Park (BJCMNP), one of Neita's Nest's recommended tour destinations for our B&B guests, has become our island's first UNESCO World Heritage site for natural and cultural heritage.  

The Park covers the Blue Mountain Forest reserve which is over 78,000 hectares of forested area within the eastern parishes of St Andrew, St Thomas, Portland and St Mary. It is one of the few pristine areas of forest remaining, records Olive Senior in her extremely useful tome, Encyclopedia of Jamaican Heritage. She goes on to add that the park area, "is the most biologically diverse in the island, with a range of climate and a variety of vegetation from tropical to near temperate".

In a Daily Gleaner report last year leading up to this historic designation, we are reminded that in addition to the region's protected flora and fauna, there is great heritage value here, as it consists of indegenous Maroon communities, and Nanny, our National Heroine, lived and fought the British there.

We often recommend this area to persons interested in birdwatching or to those eager to walk the plantations of our world-famous coffee. For others, it beckons for the historic, social or environmental value of the region. Whatever the attraction, the significant feature of this region is the marked reduction in temperatures as you begin its swift ascent from Kingston, the lush vegetation and the amazing views. 

Expect a strong embrace as this mountainscape takes your breath away. You will find no compelling reason to rush your return to the city. Dotted with options for delish dining experiences, vitalising vistas, rushing waterfalls, farming communities, historic landmarks telling long, interesting tales, there is enough in this area on which to feast and refresh your eyes, ears, your whole body and soul as you linger.

So, as reported in today's Daily Gleaner, Jamaica now joins the list of iconic sites, such as the Great Wall of China, the Pyramids of Giza, Egypt, the Taj Mahal of India, Acropolis of Athens, Great Barrier Reef of Australia, as well as the Pitons in St Lucia. World Heritage status is given to natural and cultural sites across the globe which are considered to be of outstanding universal value, that is, they possess cultural and natural significance so exceptional as to transcend national boundaries and are of common importance for present and future generations. 

The Blue and John Crow Mountains, another real reason to leave your boundaries and visit ours. And while here, ask for a copy of Hartley Neita's The Search, a riveting account of five audacious Jamaica College school boys lost in the Blue Mountains in 1939.