We had a flying visit to Bath, Jamaica. (It nearly wasn't a flying visit, thanks to Hurricane Floyd on the way out from Miami.) Jamaica away from the tourist resorts is a wild place, daunting, independent and proud. It's also spectacularly beautiful, lush, and - when you make the effort to talk to people - friendly and fun.

Bath, Jamaica itself is a run down former colonial town of 2000 or so (all black, of course). It's not a wealthy place. Most of the houses are wooden sheds or shacks. There are a few rickety bars and rumshops with handpainted signs where you can buy a shot of local grog for 30p. You have a choice of at least four churches (Jamaica is a very Biblical place). Women carry breadfruit and ackees for sale in buckets on their head. (Ackee is a fruit which looks and tastes like scrambled eggs; ackee and saltfish is the classic Jamaican dish.) Unemployment is high; the local sugar-cane factory only works half the year, and new management at the local banana works made redundancies.

Bath is built on the site of a hot springs. We stayed in the Bath Fountain Hotel, an almost grand place of faded elegance a mile up a tropical ravine. The water in the taps comes straight from the springs, and you get hot and cold running water. That is, cold out of both taps during the days and evenings, and hot out of both taps during the mornings. Not that it matters: you get to use the special baths downstairs for free. These are like miniature swimming pools, big enough for two people, filled up tot order with the splendidly hot sulphurous spa water.

Thanks to Mrs Delrose Roberts, JP, the headmistress of the local Primary and Junior High School, who gave us a real insight into the place, and to Ken the friendly old American hippy. With his Jamaican girlfriend Anne-Marie we had a tour of the south-east in the back of a rickety and wildly bucking pickup, meeting her friends and family - a priceless insight into the real Jamaica. Many thanks to you all.