A Jelly Belly Time In Cali

I don't have kids, but I immediately became one again when I went on a 40-minute tour of the Jelly Belly Candy Factory (www.jellybelly.com) in Fairfield, California (near San Francisco). I must admit I didn't know the difference between a jelly bean and a jelly belly--until I went inside. Scents of chocolate, cinnamon, and sugar hit you immediately as you enter the sweet smelling building. Jelly Bellys actually started in 1976, in L.A. by a candy distributor who wanted to make jelly beans with natural flavorings.The first eight Jelly Belly flavors were: Very Cherry, Lemon, Cream Soda, Tangerine, Green Apple, Root Beer, Grape and Licorice. Turns out Ronald Reagan—whose portrait is done here in Jelly Bellys along with Queen Elizabeth, Laurel & Hardy and Ben Franklin—was a JB fanatic. On the tour, I viewed workers cooking up to sugary treats—some 50-plus flavors, including some that didn’t sound so tasty.

Apparently it takes more than a week to make a single bean because of all the different varieties. In all they churn out 1.25 million a day. The beans get steam baths, sugar showers and end up in the "engrossing pan," where they are doused with four flavored syrupand sugar coats. Then they are they're polished and printed with the Jelly Belly logo. The Jelly Belly folks also make taffy (which is pulled and pulled until it is a large wad before it is cut into small pieces), chocolates, and gummi candies. After the tour, I headed to the sampling bar to taste test. After around of specialty flavors: Buttered Popcorn (the favorite in theU.S.), Watermelon, Juicy Pear, A&W Root Beer, Jalapeno, and Banana Pudding. I tried some of the “recipes.” If you combine Cappuccino, A&W Cream Soda and Chocolate Pudding you get Tiramisu. Eat Mango, Lemon Lime and Jalapeno together and you get Mango tango Salsa. They also have Belly Flops, imperfect candies sold at a discount. I ate so many Jelly Bellys I didn’t have room for lunch in the Jelly Belly Cafe where they serve up Jelly Belly-shaped pizza and hamburgers. Well, maybe next time—after I get over my sugar shock.

Travel Tips...St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands's Divi Carina Bay Resort & Casino (877-773-9700, 340-773-9700, or visit www.divicarina.com), one of the destination's top resorts, has fifty new guestrooms and an on-site spa offering various treatments. The fifty guestrooms all feature oceanfront views...Thinking of checking out St. Kitts? Check out its new official website first. The St. Kitts Tourism Authority announced on Friday that it has officially launched its new website (www.stkittstourism.kn). It''l help you find places to stay, eat, things to do as well as other information...Anguilla's Food and Wine Lovers Getaway, Jan. 3-March 31, might be just the ticket. $4,930-$6,505 per couple cost includes: depending on accommodations and includes beachfront accommodations for two; wine and hors d’oeuvres on arrival; two gala celebrated chef’s dinners for two; two dinners for two at Cap Juluca’s George’s, Pimms or Kemia restaurants or from room service; half-day snorkeling trip to Little Bay Marine Preserve, including beverages; one group Tai Chi class for two; a gift bottle of wine. Contact: 1-888-858-5822 or visit www.capjuluca.com.

Mexico Rebounds: And Funjet Vacations Can Get Your There

Don’t scratch Mexico off your upcoming destination short list. The country is on the rebound since being devastated by Hurricane Wilma. And to encourage tourists to make their way to Mexico again, family owned tour operator Funjet Vacations (www.funjet.com) is offering enticing incentives.

So if you want to say adios to those winter blues, or take a much-needed vacation after the Holiday frenzy, you will find deals that include free nights and a second person flying for free. For example, through Funjet you can head to Cancun and the Riviera Maya—with a second person flying free. The package includes four nights with all-inclusive accommodations at the Gran Costa Real Resort & Spa. The package starts from $749.99 for the first person, and from $549.99 for the second person.

You can also take your chances and enter Funjet’s Mexico vacation contest, giving away an all-inclusive package to the Riviera Maya with accommodations in a 4.5 star hotel. Contest ends January 4, 2006, so hurry and enter online at www.funjet.com.

And, according to the folks at Funjet, Mexico is ready for you. “Almost all of the hotels in the Riviera Maya are now open for business and better thanever,” says Funjet spokesperson Tammy Lee. “The beaches are whiter and wider than ever –about 50% bigger – after Wilma washed more fresh sand ashore. The hotels are all in perfect condition and the attractions are all open for business. Tourists are already returning in full force from around the world. Americans need to book now to ensure availability for the peak winter travel season.”

Sounds like a plan.

Living The Accra City Life

After two weeks, we'd gotten into a routine of city life in Accra. Sure, we'd seen the tourist attractions, but by hanging out in the city we became almost one of the citizens. We'd grocery shop at the only large grocery store we could find in the business district, Osu. There, $10 worth of grocery would last a few days. The Western-style, Arab-run store attracted a wide range of folks--from literally African queens stepping out of their huge Ford SUVs wearing magnificent traditional dresses with their children following behind to white, teen backpackers to lower-income locals.

We'd pick up lunch or dinner at Papaya, a favorite local grilled chicken haunt.For $4 bucks tops you got a half of chicken that was cooked outside on a rotating grill. Inside, they served burgers and upstairs there was a popular diner. We contemplated trying one of the numerous Chinese or Italian restaurants on the Osu strip or the popular Korean restaurant, but we never did.

We'd head to Busy Internet, a huge, 24-hour internet shop that let you go on line for about $1 an hour. In their Internet call center you can make cheap calls back to the States—when it was up and running. On certain nights, they showed second run movies for $2 bucks. There was lunch buffet daily and at night the bar Busy Internet owned next door was jumping.

But the city can be tiring, so we decided to spend our last—and third--week at the beach. Unable to spring for a luxury beach resort, we hunted around for a guest house and found one owned by an African-American woman who moved to Ghana years ago. Her Ghanaian son, Melvin, runs the property called the Beachcomber. Taking a $4 cab ride from the central Accra to a town called Teshie, we found the guest home after a bumpy ride down a long dirt road. The night we arrived, a group was holding what seemed like a birthday party in the garden area. The DJ was spinning Ghanaian music and all the teens danced while the older sat back, ate and drank.

We had reserved one of the “huts” right where the party was going. The huts, five in all, had the bare essentials—two beds (it is hard to get a room with one bed at any of the hotels), a fan, and in our case a mini fridge, a desk and a small TV that got only two local channels. The "huts" had ocean views and were a quick walk to the beach (more on the beach below). The Beachcomber also offered apartments for shot stays; they included cable TV, a full kitchen, a dining room, living room and one or two bedrooms. These were a bargain at $50 a night, but had no ocean view. The huts were $25 a night with a morning breakfast--though we passed on the dry toast and instant coffee most of the time.

The property was neat, clean; and the staff (two sisters and a brother) friendly. At night we were lulled to sleep by the waves. In the morning the rooster, which strutted around the property, woke us up.

The only downside is that you DID NOT want to go to the beach. Since the beach in this area was public, the local fishermen used to it as a bathroom. So once you made it down the rocky hillside to the small beach, you didn't want to stay--let alone take your shoes off. Also people dumped garbage (including the Beachcomber staff) on the beach, so it is filthy.

While at the Beachcomber, we met an elder black woman from Detroit. At 75, she said this was her third or fourth trip. She always came to the Beachcomber and was staying in one of the apartments. This trip, she was scouting for property to buy, as she and her son and his family were planning a move to Ghana. I sat and talked with her in the garden while her driver cut coconuts from the trees and opened them for us to drink. He also went and bought the woman fish from one of vendors outside of the property who smoke the freshly caught fish. I didn’t try it, remembering the condition of the beach, but she said it was delicious. I know the coconut was. And I had another.

All in all, our beach stay was the perfect way to end our Accra adventure.

Travel Tip…If you decide to head to Africa yourself and wind up in Cape Town, South Africa, you might want to stay at The Hout Bay Hideaway (www.HoutBay-Hideaway.com), where during the winter, room rates are 50% off. And get this, all rooms have floor heating and almost every one has a private fireplace. So when the night chill hits, you’ll be more than comfy.

My Trip to the Motherland - Ghana, Specifically, Continues

The plane lands—I am in Africa! Accra, Ghana, to be precise. My first trip. Instantly, I am hit by the humidity. Next, I am hit by the horde of cab drivers vying for fares. 120,000 cedis they tell me (about $12 U.S.) to get to the main part of the city. The guide books and Ghana tourism site said the ride would about $4 U.S. But at nearly 11 pm and after countless of hours in flight, I am ready to pay just about anything to get to a hotel. Plus, my haggling didn’t work as all the cabs kept saying the same fare. (I later find out that if you can make it through the cab crowd around the door, just a few steps away from the airport exit, you can get a cab for about $4.)
On a tight budget, we had chosen a super, super cheap hotel. All the guidebooks suggested it for travelers on a shoestring. The cab pulls up. We don’t even bother to get out—the place is rundown, the area in front is filthy and judging by the windows there was no AC. This is why you need travel guides written for and by black folk; most African-American travelers don’t go for the survivor-on-the-road mode. The cab driver suggests another place else near by, at about $20 U.S. more (so about $40 a night, which is still cheap). While in the same area of town, which even in the dark (no streetlights to be found) you could see how poor the city was. The next hotel was cleaner, neater and had AC. The St. George it was called. The staff was extremely pleasant though very formal in manner. We fell asleep immediately.
Venturing out the next morning, I explored the main part of the city on my own. It was like black New York in overdrive. The people were hurrying about. There were street vendors everywhere (selling everything from fish to cell phone time). Little kids wondered around with no clothes on playing in open sewers. School children rushed to class dressed in crisp uniforms. Cab drivers constantly beep their horns--or hissed at you--looking for new fares. But in the midst off all this seeming chaos, the people were friendly, stopping long enough to greet you every time you passed someone on the street. If you were on line is a store, those coming in would offer greetings to all those already inside. Items were incredibly cheap (a can of soda was .10 cents). Another thing stuck me, the people were unbelievably beautiful. Woman after woman I saw on the street could put any supermodel to shame. Some wore weaves, some close crop afros. Some wore colorful and customed traditional dress, others blue jeans. Many carried items—huge ones--on their head without so much as a wobble. All the men reminded me of my brother and his son.
Some 6 million slaves were taken from West Africa and brought to North and South America. Maybe this is where my family hailed from. It was worth exploring more...…


Travel Tips…Looking for some travel books to help you on your next trip? Check out "The Travel Detective: How to get the best service and the best deals from airlines, hotels, cruise ships and car rental agencies" by Peter Greenberg (Villard) and "Travel Photography: A Guide to Taking Better Pictures" by Richard I'Anson (Lonely Planet Publications)...A new website called Unique Jamaica (www.uniquejamaica.com) is a well-organized guide to where to go, what to do on the island. Unique Jamaica includes allied members representing: hotels, bed & breakfast accommodations, restaurants, eco- & geo-tourist attractions, air and ground transportation, tour operators, tour guides, integrated marketing communications, public relations & event management companies…St. Lucia is getting a new boutique resort in Feb. Called Discovery at Marigot Bay (http://www.sonesta.com/stlucia/), it will have 124 rooms, a spa, marina, pool and beachfront luxury room…Grenada’s new (debuted in April) Maca Bana Villas (www.macabana.com) has a deal going. Gorgeous hillside, ocean-view one-bedroom villas are $360 per night from now from December 15th – April 14th. Each villa include a six-person dining table and a lounge area with wireless Internet access, satellite TV, stereo—and a private hot tub and an infinity edge swimming pool overlooking the beach.

Flying in Style-Economy-To the Motherland

I was heading to Accra, Ghana. Of course, I was excited to take the trip. It was, after all, my first to Africa. But it was also my first flight on the German airline Lufthansa. Sure, I had flown foreign carriers before, but not many--Air Jamaica numerous times, ditto for Air Canada. Mostly, however, I have always booked on U.S. airlines, so I was curious to see the difference. Would it be like Air Jamaica’s champagne flights? Would the landings be as smooth as I always found Air Jamaica's, where I never know we have hit ground until I hear the other passengers clapping?

The first thing I notice even before boarding was that as you enter the jetway, they had a table stacked with newspapers and current business magazines to select from. I took the two English papers—The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal--they had--all else was German. After I get seated I set to toss the blanket and pillow aside as I usually do. But this pillow was different—it was super soft. On further inspection, it was a feather pillow—and it looked super clean. This time I will use, I thought.

Right after takeoff, they bring out the cocktail cart. Free, I am told. Free! I have a white wine, then another. Then was a snack, a nut mix. Then another round of cocktails; this time I tasted the red. The white was nicer.

Finally, the movie began. After the drinks, anything looked worth watching—even Fever Pitch with Drew Barrymore--especially since the earphones were also free. Soon, dinner was served. I had beef stroganoff--and it a good! And it was served with real silverware, knife included, and a cloth napkin. (Even the plastic ware they handed out for coffee later was stylish; it was mustard colored, thick and looked like it was designed by Georg Jensen.) Then came after-dinner drinks--I had Baileys. Then came the coffee cart. After drifting in and out of sleep, catching a few glimpses on the non-funny-romantic comedy—I was more than satisfied. But there was still more. Before we land, they bring out a light—a small sandwich—snack.

We land in Munich for a short—an hour and a half--layover. In the waiting area, they have free tea—a really good quality brand and unique flavors (such as Vitamin Blast with vitamin C and Ginseng)—and coffee. There is also a rack of free newspapers. I take USA Today and look at the pictures in the German newspapers. I also grab a couple of the papers from Britain.

Back on the plane for a quick hop to Frankfurt, where I had a much longer layover before my final leg to Accra. I was not as impressed with the Frankfurt airport. While larger than the Munich one, it was noisier, dirtier (no one seemed to clean as there were beer and soda cans everywhere), and more smokers (you can smoke inside the airports, but only around these filter machines. You still smell it though). But after a few hours it was back on the plane to Africa. And, of course, the food and drink parade started all over again. Another movie too, though I can’t remember because I fell asleep. Before dozing off, if this was economy class, I wonder what they got in first class. Compared to my last domestic U.S. flight, from New York to Vegas, this was a delight.

First off, on the American carrier (who will go nameless) you had to pay for the earphones –and lunch. They served great Wolfgang Puck lunches, but you had to fork over cash (and we ain’t talking about a McDonald’s type money). And, they didn’t give out any snack much less a choice of a free, non-Wolfgang meal. Prior to that, on a flight from Arizona to New York I took, passengers had to pick up snack bags (literally a brown bag with fruit, yogurt and cheese) out of a cart before boarding. I cannot imagine an American carrier feeding its passengers as much as I had on Lufthansa—I must have gained a pound or two just sitting there. Well, I will have to work it off in Accra.