The Devil Highway

"It took me 40 minutes to get to Ocho Rios from Kingston".

"The highway shaved off 30 minutes off my journey".

"I love the highway".

"You have to be careful on that thing".

"First time I drove there was in the night, it was interesting..."

The above are a few comments about the new Ocho Rios leg of Highway 2000 that was recently completed and opened to the public. This route bypasses Mount Rosser (which a lot of Jamaicans would be ecstatic about). The toll road is FREE for a month (which ends on September 5) so get your free rides in - you may want to "test" it before you pay money to drive on it.

Now, I had my first experience with this highway last week. Luckily I wasn't driving because I don't think I would've been ready for the dips and trips and uphill and downhill roller-coaster journey. We started along the first few metres of the road and I commented about how beautiful the view was "except for that dig out in the mountain". As we drove a little farther my friend decided to tell me that that "dig out in the mountain" was actually the highway. Laughter ensued.... then the road got serious. 

Now, it is a beautifully paved road. Wonderful to drive on.... until you get to the first incline and I don't mean any regular incline I mean STEEP, steep like the forward slash "/" lol. After that nice steep incline, then you just go down, literally like a roller-coaster you take a nose dive, and then there is another series of uphill and downhill adventures and then you're in St. Ann. Your vehicle would have to be in TIP TOP shape to take that road. We saw some that were not and they were smoking their way up that roller-coaster-esque incline.

But, if you think the Kingston - Ocho Rios leg is bad maaaan you need to take the Ocho Rios - Kingston leg. The descent is about 7 degrees and continues for about 5 KM. It may not seem much on paper, you need to experience it to understand. How can you make a highway that is 90% descent? Not any regular descent though, it's a 'hold brake the entire time, cannot take your foot off the brake, better have good brakes' descent. We saw buses and trucks struggling to manage the descent. Can you imagine a fully loaded coaster going down that road? Pressure.

The descent is so serious that they have several escape lanes. Fuss me see dat inna mi life. 

The DEVIL Highway is a very serious stretch of road, which we will be forever indebted to the Chinese for, although it may leave us with multiple accidents and broken down cars. The government needs to educate persons about the escape lanes because there are persons who don't understand their purpose (which is really to help the car to slow down if it's descending too fast, or in other words to help the driver to regain control of the car which may start flying down the hill... or something like that).

I hate this road. I  really do. Although it provides a better view and less trucks and is much wider than Mount Rosser I really hate it. I foresee accidents and other tragedies on the road. But I suppose since we can't afford it we haffi tek wah we get? 

Remember: always drive safely and if you're going to use the road ensure your vehicle has been serviced within a month of your journey.