The Port Royal Run

The Palisadoes strip unfolded like a ribbon between two worlds—Caribbean blue on the right, mangrove green on the left. Hubby guided the car along the narrow causeway while I watched pelicans dive beyond the seawall. In the back seat, the twins pressed against opposite windows, each claiming their side of the water as the car sliced through the shimmering heat.

Norman Manley Airport rose and fell behind them, its control tower a brief interruption in the endless horizontal line where sea met sky. The road grew quieter here, more intimate. Mangroves leaned close enough to brush the car with their shadows, their roots disappearing into water the color of strong tea. This was the last stretch of land connecting Kingston to Port Royal, a seven-mile thread holding the old pirate city to the modern world.

Port Royal emerged gradually—low buildings weathered by salt and sun, fishing boats nodding at anchor, the stone bulk of Fort Charles standing watch as it had for three centuries.

Hubby parked near the square where fishermen worked in the shade, their knives flashing silver against red snapper scales. But the seafood would wait. The girls had been promised an adventure first. Captain D's boat waited at the dock, its blue paint surrendering to gray, its engine loyal despite decades of salt corrosion. The captain himself embodied Port Royal's patient endurance—dreadlocks silvered by time, skin darkened and creased by sun, gold tooth catching light when he smiled his welcome.

The boat slipped into the mangrove channels, and the world transformed. Here was Jamaica's secret architecture, a labyrinth older than any human construction. Roots twisted down from branches in impossible tangles, creating arches and corridors through the brackish water. Oysters clung to the roots in knobbed clusters. Small fish darted through the shadows. The air thickened with the smell of mud and growth and ancient salt.

My little one's hand trailed in the dark water until Daddy caught her wrist, remembering the crocodiles that sometimes drifted through these channels like logs with teeth. The boat's engine hummed low, respectful of the cathedral silence. They emerged into open water near the submerged ruins. Captain Davey cut the engine and let them drift over Port Royal's drowned past. Down there, beneath the blue-green clarity, lay the remnants of what had been the richest—and most wicked—city in the New World. Two-thirds of it had slid into the sea during the earthquake of 1692, buildings and brothels and treasure houses tumbling into the deep in a matter of minutes. Some said it was judgment. Others said it was simply Jamaica's restless geology, the same forces that lifted the Blue Mountains still shifting beneath the island's feet.

The children stared down, trying to distinguish stone from shadow, trying to imagine streets where fish now swam. Back on land, we walked through what the earthquake had spared. Fort Charles stood solid, its walls thick enough to stop cannon fire, its courtyard baking in the midday sun. Inside the Giddy House, that strange tilted building thrown askew by a later earthquake, the children stumbled and laughed on floors that ran downhill, their bodies fighting the slanted geometry, their equilibrium confused by walls that refused to be vertical.

By the time they finished, hunger had sharpened to an edge that only Gloria's could satisfy.

The restaurant sat at the water's edge, unpretentious as a working dock, its plastic tables and chairs arranged for the breeze. But what came from Gloria's kitchen was pure alchemy—the kind of cooking that makes people drive across the island, that gets whispered about in Kingston and remembered in foreign cities.

The escovitch fish arrived first, its skin crackling-crisp, a golden armor protecting flesh that flaked at the gentlest pressure. The vinegar marinade sang with scotch bonnet heat and sweetness, carrots and onions and peppers dancing in the acid, each bite a small explosion of flavour against the tender fish. I closed my eyes at the first taste, the way people do when food reaches past hunger straight to memory. Hubby's fried snapper came scaled and whole, eyes intact, its meat sweet and dense with the ocean's salt. He worked the flesh from the bones with practiced fingers, dipping pieces in the pepper sauce that sat on every table—tamarind-dark and dangerous with heat.

The children devoured their bammy, that cassava flatbread fried crisp and served alongside their fish, festival on the side—those sweet fried dumplings with just enough cornmeal to give them texture, just enough sugar to make them addictive. Cold sorrel washed it all down, hibiscus-tart and Christmas-spiced even in the middle of the year. Around us, Port Royal went about its business. Fishermen unloaded catches. Tourists photographed Fort Charles. A pelican waited on the nearby piling with patient certainty that something would come its way. The water lapped at the pilings beneath the restaurant, patient as centuries.

After lunch, I moved through the fish market with the focused attention of a woman who knows quality. I examined eyes for clarity, pressed flesh for firmness, lifted gills to check their color. The vendors knew me, knew I wouldn't be cheated but wouldn't waste their time with unreasonable offers.

The drive back was quieter. Both children slept, their faces flushed from sun and seawater. The cooler sat between them, packed with ice and protein, tomorrow's dinners and next week's memories.

Hubby drove slowly, reluctant to leave the Palisadoes behind. To the right, the Caribbean stretched toward Cuba. To the left, the mangroves held their secrets in the mud. And ahead, Kingston & St. Andrew waited with its noise and traffic and relentless forward motion. But for now, we existed in this in-between space, this ribbon of road connecting past to present, carrying them home with the taste of Gloria's fish still on their tongues and the weight of Port Royal's history settling like salt on their skin. The cooler in the back chilled the promise of a savoury soup feeding memories of our trip. The island would continue to feed us, as it had fed generations before. The sea had given up its treasure. And we would return, as we always did, to this place where Jamaica remembers what it was and continues being what it is—patient, generous, and alive with flavour.