... "taliban" travelogue trilogy ... 3rd gear ... Black River ...

I believe it was Paul who first told me new slang for these automobiles ...

hardy versatile car-truck, best form-function combo found on four wheels ...

as seen on newsreels from Afghanistan ... built tough to suit the nether regions of anywhere ...

rebel-associated pick-ups now known as ... "taliban" ... linguistic inventiveness rules life here ....

I had been north to Toronto, a vital visit with my grown-up daughter and son ...

barely three weeks after a Jamaican excursion ... here I was having another one ...

this time I planned to relive long-time memories ... nostalgia, to tell the absolute truth ...

via the same road trip to Black River ... we so often did back then in our youth ...

Dad was once doctor-of-record, in old Spanish Town ... poverty and strife still entrenched there ...

I always think on him hard, passing that hospital front-gate ... the old cathedral and historic town square ...

prior commitment detoured us to Ewarton ... Pleasant Farm actually, way off our track ...

but effectively, it doubled my experience ... driving all the way 'round there and back ...

the talk was of past times and present reality, farming cassava, Paul's beloved livestock ... and whatnot ...

in the Rio Cobre gorge we paused to admire mother nature's salacious split ... the "pum pum" rock spot ...

on the French-built, multi-lane, wide Mandela Highway ... we paid our compulsory cash toll ...

here speed demons hype-flex flash rides ... Beenie wrote off his hummer and Bolt's bimma did a pupalick roll ...

Gutters, Tombstone, Goshen, Lacovia ... many a familiar place-name ...

in the St. Bess red dirt some things do change ... but most seemed to stay exactly the same ...

over two days and nights I'd do everything, get to know the next generation ...

visiting the Black River Upper Morass was bonus ... up past derelict "Sixteen Pump" location ...

a species-rich ecosystem I'd heard tales of ... felt like Jamaica's version of Africa's Nile ...

never more so than when we saw, off to one side ... the fabled, yet elusive Black River crocodile ...

Paul and I grew up fishing, this time in a "taliban" on the dykes, today my eight-inch catfish won our lifetime contest ...

rod and line couldn't match the guys with no fear of reptiles ... beating water into all-day nets earlyset to corner their quest ...

inspiration screamed at me in a meditative morning stretch ... we ate ackee and headed back to town ...

three road-trips this year felt spiritually connected ... this travelogue trilogy had to be written down ...