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center of the island is mostly mountainous and heavily wooded,
spotted occasionally with small mining towns and villages.
And, of course, there's the famous Cockpit Country in the
northwest region, an eerie terrain of conical hills and deep
sinkholes.
 The
central mountain range, dominated by 7,402-foot Blue Mountain,
divides the south coast of the island from the north and extends
from Half Moon Bay to Portland.
This
great variety of terrain and climate allows virtually everything
to grow here. Visitors can step into a country market and
see a vast array of tropical fruits and vegetables with such
unfamiliar names as callaloo, dasheen, soursop, breadfruit,
cho-cho, and ackee .
Jamaica's
main exports (other than tourism) are sugar, citrus fruits,
bananas, spices, and world-famous Blue Mountain coffee.
 The
first Spanish settlement was established at Seville Nueva
near St. Ann's Bay, but the settlers soon moved the capital
across the island to present day Spanish Town. Finding no
precious metals, the Spanish paid scant attention to their
Jamaican colony. When an English force of 5,000 men invaded
the island in 1655, they offered little resistance and within
a few years abandoned it as a colony.
Early
English settler planted crops like tobacco, cotton and cocoa
and logged indigo. However, privatizing and piracy helped
Port Royal become one of the richest towns in the Americas
and certainly the most notorious. Its title as the wickedest
city on earth went down with it when most of it sank during
the earthquake of 1692.
The
eighteenth century saw the reign of King Sugar. Vast acreage
of cane fields dominated the plains while hillside slopes
palatial residences, like Rose Hall near Montego Bay, were
built. Success of the great plantations depended upon a vast
and cheap labor force. As a result, slavery was introduced
into the New World. Soon, large, organized slave markets were
established, consisting primarily of Africans torn forcibly
from their homelands and sold as slaves to the planters. Jamaica
itself not only absorbed nearly one million slaves but became
a huge trans-shipment center for slaves for other colonies
in the Americas.
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