Cycling is a good option when touring the Blue Mountains. Blue Mountain Bike Tours (tel. 876/974-7075 in Kingston) offers all-downhill bike tours through the Blue Mountains -- you peddle only about a half-dozen times on this several-mile trip. Visitors are driven to the highest navigable point, then cruise most of the way down. Lunch, snacks, and lots of information about coffee, local foliage, and history are provided. The cost is about $93 per person.
You can opt to head out alone into the Jamaican wilderness, but considering the dangers of such an undertaking, and a possible mugging you might encounter en route, it isn't advisable. A better bet involves engaging one of Kingston's best-known specialists in eco-sensitive tours, Sunventure Tours, 30 Balmoral Ave., Kingston 10 (tel. 876/960-6685; www.sunventuretours.com).
The staff offers lots of tour choices. The Blue Mountain Sunrise Tour involves a camp-style overnight in one of the most remote and inaccessible areas of Jamaica. For a fee of $75 to $120 per person, participants are retrieved at their Kingston hotels, driven to an isolated ranger station accessible only via four-wheel-drive vehicle, and guided on a two-stage hike that begins at 2pm. A simple mountaineer's supper is served at 6pm around a campfire; late, at 3am, climbers hike by moonlight and flashlight to a mountaintop aerie selected for its view of the sunrise. You stay aloft until around noon, then head back down to Kingston. There's also a shorter 4-hour trek offered, costing $25 to $30 per person.
