Negril and the West, Jamaica

Highlights

• The beaches are the busy side of Negril, and a leisurely walk along the beach turns up restaurants, beach bars and glass-bottom boats offering snorkelling and sunset cruises.
• The cliffside of Negril is the quiet side, with many luxury boutique hotels, ideal for a romantic getaway, destination wedding or honeymoon.
• Negril Point Lighthouse is a white concrete tower sixty-six feet high, built in 1894 over a fourteen-foot tank of water that steadies it in an earthquake.
• Mayfield Falls, one hour from Negril in the heart of Westmoreland, has caves, 44 mineral pools and 21 natural Jacuzzis.

How long to stay

Negril is the island's westernmost town, with a seven-mile beach on one side and cliffs over the sea on the other. It goes by the Capital of Casual, and the appeal is the pace: slow days, seafood landed daily and the sun going down over the water. Three days suits most visitors, two shared between the beach and the cliffs and one for a trip inland.

• With one day. Spend the morning at Long Bay Beach Park, the public park on Seven Mile Beach. In the late afternoon head for the West End and reach Rick's Cafe an hour before sunset, when the local jumpers go off its thirty-five-foot cliff.
• With two days. Add a morning on a hired bicycle or scooter, an easy way round the resort. Ride out along the cliffs to Negril Point Lighthouse, the white tower at the western end of the island, which has stood there since 1894. Spend the evening on Norman Manley Boulevard, where the tourist board sends visitors for nightlife.
• With three days. Give the third day to one trip inland, such as the Blue Hole mineral spring, a ride at Rhodes Hall Plantation or a bamboo raft on the Great River. Be back on the coast for sunset.

Seven Mile Beach or the West End

Negril has two sides, and the side you choose shapes the stay. Seven Mile Beach is the busy one: walk it and you pass restaurants, beach bars, musicians and glass-bottom boats selling snorkelling trips and sunset cruises. The West End cliffs are the quiet one, a run of boutique hotels away from the beaches and their nightlife. The tourist board pitches the cliffs at couples, weddings and honeymoons.

On the beach

The large all-inclusives are mostly at the north end of the beach, with the smaller boutique places further south. Many places open straight onto the sand, and a great number are all-inclusive or include at least breakfast. The law keeps out high rises, so beach bungalows sit beside the big resorts.

On the cliffs

Rockhouse has forty rooms built of stone, timber and thatch on the West End cliffs. It is mainly for adults and couples, takes children over twelve and suits guests at ease with cliffs and stairs. Tensing Pen's cottages are hand-built from stone, wood, bamboo and thatch, and its two Rock Cottages sit alone on the cliff top. Breakfast is included there, with Jamaican coffee and tea all day. The Caves has cliffside rooms, a private dining cave and the Blackwell Rum Bar.

Rates and what is open

In November 2026 the Westender Inn listed its garden-view room from US$85 a day for two. Its rates add 10 per cent tax, a 10 per cent service charge and a guest accommodation tax of US$1 a room a night. On the tourist board's list for 5 November 2026, Rockhouse, Tensing Pen, Sunset at the Palms, The Caves, Charela Inn, both Couples resorts, Sandals Negril and the Westender Inn were open. The same list showed Hotel Commingle, Kibo Hotel, Rum Runners Resort and Shields Negril Villas closed. Check the list again before you pay a deposit.

Negril after Hurricane Melissa

Hurricane Melissa came ashore near New Hope in Westmoreland in October 2025. Negril recovered fastest of the western resorts, with most of its hotels open again between December 2025 and January 2026. Britain's travel advice said every western parish suffered significant damage and that some communities were still without electricity and piped water. Off the resort strip, carry water and expect the odd outage.

Food and nightlife

Best in the West, about halfway along Seven Mile Beach, is an open-air jerk spot with a full bar, known for its coconut pie. On West End Road, Murphy's is a family-run jerk hut with hammocks, and Pushcart cooks traditional food street-food style. Ciao Jamaica, on the same road, serves Italian and Jamaican cooking with a view of the sea.

Many West End restaurants belong to resorts but take outside diners. The Lodge at Tensing Pen serves breakfast, lunch and dinner over the sea, and Blue Mahoe mixes local and international dishes with seafood. For a special night, the restaurant at Rockhouse is the town's best-known fine dining, with a front-row view of the sunset, and Le Vendome at Charela Inn serves five courses. Up in Canaan Mountain, Zimbali Retreat cooks what is grown locally, serves no red meat, suggests booking and offers a return trip from anywhere in Negril.

After dark

Nightlife runs along Norman Manley Boulevard, with reggae at beach parties. After sundown the beach bars bring out live music and fire shows, and at some restaurants the tables make way for a DJ and a dance floor. Alfred's Ocean Palace has live reggae bands after sunset, and Rick's Cafe adds parties with DJs to its cliff jumping. The Jungle Night Club is the other name to know, while the Blackwell Rum Bar at The Caves sits in a cave at the water's edge. Margaritaville's club on Seven Mile Beach runs from 10 pm to 3 am. Its club nights typically charge US$10 at the door unless there is a special event, and after dark it is strictly 18 and over. Walk the main street by day to see who is playing where.

Getting there and around

From Montego Bay airport (MBJ)

Sangster International at Montego Bay is the most convenient airport for Negril. The transfer takes about an hour and a half with operators such as JUTA, Paradise Travels or JCAL, and some hotels run their own airport transfers. A hotel can also book a chartered car or van, generally air-conditioned, with the fare usually confirmed at booking. Get the price in writing for the whole vehicle and all your bags, and ask whether it covers the return.

From Kingston (KIN) and by coach

Knutsford Express runs air-conditioned coaches between the main towns, Kingston, Montego Bay and Negril among them, from more than twenty locations including the international airports. Popular runs typically take two to four hours. Its Negril office is open to passengers from 5.15 am to 8 pm every day. Fares change, so check them on the company's booking page before you travel.

By air

Negril's aerodrome is one of four on the Airports Authority's list, and it was working again within days of the storm. From Sangster you can connect by air to Negril and to Tinson Pen in Kingston, and domestic flights are chartered through licensed operators.

Getting around

Bicycles and scooters can be hired for easy trips round the resort. Montego Bay is about an hour and a half away by road, and YS Falls about two hours. For a day inland, a charter booked through your hotel saves working out the back roads.

Day trips

Blue Hole Mineral Spring sits under a cavernous opening in the limestone, with a mineral bath. Rhodes Hall Plantation, eight miles east, covers five hundred acres, and you see it on horseback, with a crocodile and mangrove reserve and a swim to finish. Closer to town, horses go out to the ruins of Whitehall Great House and boats cross to Booby Cay.

YS Falls

YS Falls drops in seven layers down the mountainside in Saint Elizabeth, about two hours from Negril. It admits visitors Tuesday to Sunday from 9.30 am to 3 pm, and stops earlier once it reaches capacity. In November 2026 an overseas adult paid US$25 and a child of three to fifteen US$16, and the canopy zipline was closed until further notice. The two large pools at the base suit children.

Rivers, wetland and reef

On the Great River at Lethe, thirty-foot bamboo rafts drift downstream with a raft captain. The Royal Palm Reserve is wetland with a nature trail, a museum and a thirty-foot tower over the mangroves for bird watching. Bambuza Falls was open in November 2026, while Benta River Falls was closed. Mayfield Falls, about an hour away, is more than twenty small cascades walked on a boardwalk or in the water. Ask your hotel whether it is running before you go.

On 5 November 2026 the tourist board listed eleven Negril-area attractions closed, among them both craft markets, Roaring River Park and Cave, Dolphin Cove at Lucea and the Negril Hills golf club. If you mean to jump at Rick's, buy insurance that covers adventure activities.

Maps

Negril and the West

Negril

Practical facts

• Westmoreland Parish: the parish's capital, land area and population as the Jamaica Information Service parish profile records them.
• Negril, a shortened form of Negrillo meaning little black ones, was named by the Spanish in 1494, either for the black cliffs south of the village or for the black eels along its coast.
• Negril is the island's westernmost town, with a seven-mile stretch of beach and cliffs overlooking the sea.
• Rafting at Lethe runs down the Great River in a thirty-foot handcrafted bamboo raft piloted by a raft captain.
• Lucea runs along the western side of a horseshoe bay that the government counts among the island's safest ports.
• From Dolphin Head Mountain the other parishes of the western end of the island come into view.
• Hanover shares the Negril strip with Westmoreland, its southern neighbour, so a visitor staying at Negril may be in either parish.
• Lucea sits twenty-five miles west of Montego Bay, about halfway to Negril.
• The Hanover coast is broken by caves, coves and bays rather than running as one long beach.
• Savanna-la-Mar grew as a port for shipping sugar from about 1730, and its Spanish name means plain by the sea.

More about Negril and the West

• One of the first Spanish settlements on the island stood at what is now Bluefields.