GRAND LIDO, CROWN JEWEL OF THE ISSA DYNASTY

The Issa family may be fulfilling that prophecy, as Grand Lido in Negril becomes the crown jewel of the Issa family’s half century in the Jamaican tourist industry and a third generation of Issa enter hotel management.

From the gracious Myrtle Bank Hotel in downtown Kingston where journalist, Evon Blake, plunged Jamaica into a new era of desegregation by taking a bold leap into the swimming pool, to a discreetly-set nude beach and pool with catering to topless Europeans at the Grand Lido, the Issas hotels have “made waves” in the industry.

Today, employing nearly 2,000 people with only nine being foreigners on work permits, Village Resorts, the parent company of the SuperClubs group, is the country’s largest foreign exchange earning company in this “growing industry.”
The Grand Lido, a joint venture between SuperClubs’s Village Resorts, Limited, the Urban Development Corporation, Mutual Life Assurance Company Limited, is a showcase of Jamaican marble, mahogany and craftsmanship.

Its natural beauty on a ceiba cotton-strewn half mile of white sane beach shows tourism at its best in the way the Jamaican Conference Centre demonstrated local ingenuity and industry can accomplish.

ULTIMATE ALL-INCLUSIVE
The entrance to the Grand Lido which faces SuperClubs’ Hedonism II at the Bloody Bay end of the Norman Manley Boulevard, is “deceptively plain.” Once past the brilliant white stuccoed façade, subtle crystalline colours interplay in a beautiful marble foyer.

The soothing sound of a waterfall produced by the lazy turning of a waterwheel, welds Jamaica’s past when sugar was king, to Jamaica’s future whereby the sweetness of success is indulged at every turn.

In the ultimate all-inclusive resort, guests are collected at the airport and sip cocktails while surveying the hub of sprawling 22-acre resort while uninformed staff check them in.

The Grand Lido features nine bars, three restaurants, three club houses with 24-hour restaurant or room service, sunset cruises aboard a 147-ft yacht, satellite television and stereotapedecks in every beachfront room, watersports, video movies, discos and a piano bar.

A midnight swim is enlivened by music piped into the water and coloured lights flashing in syncopation with a reggae beat. A week at the Grand Lido is like a cruise aboard a luxury liner except your cabin is spacious and you will not get seasick.

Bloody Bay is not name for its illustrious pirate history, the capture of Calico Jack Racham and his consorts Annie Bonney and Mary Read, who were enjoying a rum punch party there when captured in 1720. Bloody Bay is named for the condition of the water when they were slaughtered there.

Grand Lido’s brilliant beach arcs in a gentle half mile curve and joins another two-mile stretch in the direction of Lucea, Hanover’s capital.

Guests can wind surf, sail, water-ski, view the reefs through the Grand Lido’s glass bottom boat, and admire the sleek lines of the refurbished yacht, “Zein,” whose American captain, because of insurance requirements, (like Garvey’s Black Star Line, a foreign captain and engineer had to be hired) departs each afternoon at three for a leisurely cruise pass Negril point for a sunset at sea, with lavish libations which Calico Jack and his lady pirates would have envied.

In calm weather the “Zein”, once owned by the Greek millionaire, Aristotle Onassis, who made a gift of it to the Raniers of Monaco, accommodates up to 140 passengers. With a maximum occupancy of 400 at the Grand Lido, every guest could enjoy three sunset cruises during their week stay.