Dunns River Falls, Jamaica

If you ever find yourself a tourist in Jamaica, and happen to be on the Ocho Rios side of the island.  I highly recommend taking a morning or afternoon and hiking the falls.
Just a word of note, I do not believe they allow you to hike this on your own.  You could look into it, but from what I saw the locals pretty much have this as a tourist attraction, so yes you will have to pay to do this.  However, if you get the chance it is worth it.

Dunns River Falls is a 600 foot set of several waterfalls.  You actually start on the beach next to the beautiful blue's in the carribean waters.  From there you hike up with your guide (and group) up the falls.

Now when I went, they made us hold hands.  Yes, I thought this was a little kindergarden, but it is what it is.  I believe they do it because some people may not have a great sense of balance, or strength.  So by holding hands maybe you can help those people out more.  I personally found it to be annoying and actually made it harder for me.  (Granted I was trying to protect an injury from getting worse.)  I wanted to go at my own pace, and place my footing carefully.  However, this isn't really an option holding hands because you have people on both sides of you pulling in opposite directions.

I'll be honest at times I just let go of the person behind me's hand.  The guide yelled a few times for me to take hold again.  But the girl behind me actually didn't want to hold hands any more than I did:)

(Left)myself and my (right) friend - Normally I would never allow a no make-up swimsuit picture
of me on my blog (LOL).  However, this one didn't turn out too bad.

It's a beautiful set of falls in lush tropical bush and tree's.  The water is actually a little cool, it is rain water after all.  However, after you are in it for a few minutes you hardly notice.

I only noticed a couple of really slippery spots.  To be honest most of it was easy climbing.  There are even railings along part of the way.  Not that most need them, but you never know.

IF YOU GO:

*  You'll need a pair of water shoes.  You can either bring your own, or if you don't have them they allowed me to rent a pair for $7.
*  You can bring a water camera, but I wouldn't recommend bringing any other camera there is too much chance of damage.
*  The guides film you and take pictures, and they wanted $40 for this.  Which in my opinion was outrageous.  However, if you have a large group and you split the cost it might be worth it.  But they don't actually take many pictures of you, so that is why I recommend bringing a water camera.

A cruise, a new job, and a little running

Sorry about no Monday posts for a couple of weeks.  I figured since I was on vacation, I would start these back up when I returned.
Since it's "Me Monday" that means, I not only share about me, but I would love to hear about you too!  If you stop by my blog today and have a blog post you want me to check out, please make sure to leave me a link in the comment section below.

THE CRUISE

Near Ocho Rios, Jamaica

I recently returned from a Caribbean cruise.  We stopped off at The Key's, Grand Cayman & Jamaica.  All 3 islands were beautiful.  We had amazing weather the entire time we were at sea and at the islands.  I did a lot of sightseeing, went to Rum city, then to Hell.  Visited a National Park.  Climbed a waterfall, went horseback riding in trails in Jamaica, then swimming with horses (You can read about that HERE if you'd like), just to name a few things.
I decorated this post with a few of the travel pics.  I figure I'll save the adventure details for some upcoming Travel Tuesday posts, as well as the majority of the pictures.  But I had a great relaxing and fun time, and ended up with an amazingly dark tan that should last the summer:) 

In Hell, Grand Cayman

INJURY UPDATE & NEW JOB NEWS

Grand Cayman

For those following my work injury recovery.  I am so thrilled to say, it is doing great!  The trip ended up being amazing for it.  All that time away from work, I almost didn't even notice or remember I was injured the entire trip.
It even let me hike the 600 foot Dunn's River Falls in Jamaica, and as odd as this will sound.  It didn't hurt during or after (even though I was being super careful.)
The week before I left on the trip, I hardly worked, so the injury had lots of recovery time.  Then the week on vaction was great.  This past week, I only worked on it 1 day, it only bothered me slightly that day.  Otherwise, it's been amazing.

Which is 100% proof that the injury will never heal if I keep working on the job that caused it.  This means, the day I returned from the trip, I put a few feelers out that I was looking to change jobs.  I have had some amazing friends who let me know of a few right away.  I even interviewed for one last week, that I was told I may be offered the position later today actually.  I plan to interview for a few more this week as well.
My hope is to find a new job by mid to late April.

Tiki Beach, Grand Cayman

At this point I have absolutely no idea what life will bring.  But I am going to be cutting back the amount of weddings/events I do with my own company.  I absolutely love it, but most of my team members who work for me, are stay at home mom's and its becoming increasingly more difficult to have them work days other than weekends (good help is hard to comeby).  So it seems like a great time, for me to cut back on them a little, and find a 2nd career I will love as well.

RUNNING

Ocho Rios, Jamaica

I have been back to running, this past week I was able to bump it up a slight notch.
I've been running about 100 meter to 200 meter increments a few days a week as part of a run/walk routine.  The most I have ran in a single time if you add it up together was 400 meters.  Which may not be much, but its steps towards building back up.  I have to follow the Dr's and PT's advice and take this part very slowly.
Which is hard to do, but a necessity so it makes it easier to hold back.  So far so good, I have not experienced any pain in the injury area from running, YAY.  This week, I plan to increase it slightly more a couple of days during the week.
But I won't lie, I am already dreaming of the day that I can go out and just run again, and not have to hold back and take it easy for the injury...  But in due time:)

Spring  looks to be a run/walk building and recover time, and Summer so far is looking very promicing to be back to full running again. And Fall, well maybe I shouldn't get a head of myself, but I won't lie I am already secretly hoping there are some Fall and Winter marathons in my future:)

Sunset from the ship

The Spring Fitness hop ended.  I hope you all had a chance to enter as many of the 21 different blogs giveaways as you would have liked.  My giveaway winner will be posted HERE a little later today.  (Sorry, I wrote this post, Sunday night and I work today so I will post it as soon as I get home.)

Last, if you enjoyed participating in the hop.  Or maybe your a blogger who wasn't able to get in on it, and would like to join up in our next hop.  I will be hosting the next one in May, and you can click HERE and start signing up now if you would like.  I'll be sharing more details about it in the coming months, but for now I just wanted to share this quick mention.


So tell me what's going on with you?  Any spring races or fitness programs your involved with?  Have you been on any fun trips recently?  Do you have a fun trip planned for this year?
Additionally, if you have a post you want me to come check out, leave a link to it in the Comment Luv box, and I'll be sure to stop by and check it out!

Swim Horseback in the Caribbean - Travel Tuesday Jamaica

Today for Travel Tuesday, I am taking you on one of my most recent adventures.
A few days ago I had the awesome opportunity to visit Ocho Rios, Jamaica.  While I was there I signed up with one of the travel guide companies for a horseback adventure.

First we took a beautiful horseback ride through the backcountry of Jamaica.  I wish I had more pictures to show of this, but they did not allow me to bring my camera on the horseback ride.  (They wanted me to purchase the pictures they took.  Which I would have if they had been good, and a decent price.  However, maybe I am just cheap, so I didn't.)

However, the above picture was taken at the stable gates of where we started.  So this kind of gives you a good idea about the beautiful area.  I will say, the trails were around this area, but also near the Caribbean Sea as well, which is where we finished.
It was a beautiful fun ride, and I believe my first horseback ride since I think once or twice before when I was a child.
The horses for these are trained, and they pretty much know what to do.  Mine tried to run away and started trotting a few times, but either I was able to stop them, and once the guide rode up to pull the reigns to slow my horse "Alex" down.

For this first part, my horse did great, but at the end we had to cut through a corner of the water and my horse didn't like walking through all the sand and being up to his belly in water.  So I had to give him a few kicks to get him going to get through the water.  After that, up a short hill and my ride with Alex was over.

After we finished our backcountry ride, we took a short break, and then suited up in our swimsuits and wore a waist life jacket.  Because the next portion was my favorite.  We went BAREBACK swimming with the horses in the Caribbean Sea.  We switched horses for this.   This time, my horse didn't enjoy following as much as he enjoyed wanting to cut in front of other horses.

Basically when you do one of these, they get everyone onto the horses and lined up on the beach before you take off running in the water.
Yes, you read that right.  We take off running into the water.  It is a blast, and I will not lie, it is hard to hold on.  You are bareback, you don't have your feet secured, they are just hanging on the side.  Like you see in the above picture.  You basically hold onto the horses mane and keep your balance.  Your feet sort of bend like into a kneel when you are flying through the water as it gets deeper.

I show the above picture to show, yes you do run into the water on that horse.  Yes, it's true the water isn't crazy deep, but it isn't exactly the same depth at every step.
One minute you are only a foot or so deep, and then before you know it the horse dives down into deeper pockets, and you are floating in your waist jacket while the horse is swimming beneath you to catch his ground again.
All the while, you are (or I was) holding onto that mane, just hoping I wouldn't be the one to fall off:)  Luckily, I kept my balance and didn't fall.

Most of the time, like you see in this picture.  The lead rider is running through the water, circling jumping the different depth pockets.  Pulling the lead horse along, so that all the others are running to follow.
Basically, I think the horses love it.  But they do snort and grunt and growl a lot while they are running/swimming through the deeper sections, keeping their heads above water.
We were sort of in a bay of sorts, where we could run and play about 200 meters or more out from the short.  But just beyond that you see the reef, where the water is breaking.  Right on the other side of that is where the water drops 100's of feet or even 1000's, so obviously you don't go all the way to the reef.

My horse growled a lot, and I swear he kept trying to bite the horse in front's tail.  Then when the horse in front would slow, my horse kept wanting to go and cut in front or go out of line.  I didn't mind it, it's a lot of fun.
I have to say, I would LOVE to do this again, it was so much fun!

I also want to mention, I am NOT in any of these pictures.  You can't exactly take your own pictures while out swimming with the horses.  There is a guy that comes out and takes the shots.  But I took these of the group that went after me.  I don't exactly know any people in these pictures, but it was the best I could do to document my own experience:)  I figured, same horses, same water, same guides its the next best thing to the pictures of myself.

I didn't actually purchase the photo's of myself.  I know your thinking I probably should have, and maybe its my loss.  But I didn't, they wanted a lot of money and oh well.
If I had thought ahead, my friend and I should have gone with different groups, and then we could have each taken each other's riding photographs.
So if you ever go to do this, I highly recommend if you are in a group, separating this so you can do this and get your own pictures and save a little money.  (Of course you won't want the tour guides to know, as they really are all about their tips and making those extra dollars:)

This is so much fun, and you don't have to have any horse skills at all.  I believe there is a weight and age limit for a rider, but other than that anyone can do it.  I loved spending the morning riding on these beautiful horses on both land and sea!!  If you ever get the chance to do this, I highly recommend it.  It took about 2 hours to do it all, from start to finish.

I mentioned above we were in Ocho Rios, Jamaica.  But we did take about a 20 minute ride to get to this location from Ocho Rios, and I wish I could remember the exact name of the area we did this in, but I didn't pay close enough attention:(