Adventure awaits - Jamwest safari guides use botany, humour to bring unique experience to tours

WESTERN BUREAU:

When visiting the Jamwest Motorsports and Adventure Park in Sheffield, Westmoreland, among the attractions that patrons can look forward to is a scenic, educational and humorous tour of the park’s wildlife by Aston Pallis Jr and Peter ‘Metro’ Wallace, two of the attraction’s long-time safari guides.

Pallis, 65, has been employed at Jamwest for the past four years since the park began operating in its current capacity, a year longer than 48-year-old Wallace. They each bring a special skill to their jobs that leaves guests desiring more of Jamwest’s attractions, which include motorcar races, water-slides and rock-climbing facilities.

Pallis, who hails from Orange Hill in Westmoreland, told The Sunday Gleaner that his background in botany helps him greatly in identifying the park’s local flora during his guided tours.

“A botanist runs parallel to the science of zoology, and safari is zoology. Botanists deal with plants, so the science of plants and the science of animals run parallel, and if you know one, you know the other,” said Pallis. “The response from the visitors is overwhelming; I’m called a walking encyclopaedia on the property.”

Pallis, who copped Jamwest’s Safari Guide Award for 2018, admitted that while he was not initially vetted for his job the way other employees would be, it was his botany expertise that won over Jamwest’s owner, Ian Gordon.

“I didn’t go through the rigours of how people are vetted for the job; I was hand-picked. The owner (Gordon) came to my yard one day and, since I’m a botanist by profession, I gave him a tour at my yard, and he said I’m fit for that job over here at Jamwest,” Pallis recalled.

“This is something I have a passion for, and the most rewarding thing out of this job is to speak with people who know what I’m explaining to them. It’s like putting the icing on the cake.”

Wallace, while not as talkative as his older co-worker, speaks quite fondly of his spontaneous style of tour-guiding, which helped him to claim the 2019 Jamwest Safari Guide Award.

“The animals we have on the tour are animals that the guests already know from back home, but my style of working is that I punctuate a bit of humour in the discourse and I am spontaneous,” said Wallace, who was born in St Andrew and raised in Hartford district, Westmoreland.

“Sometimes they don’t even pay attention to the animals, but they are just fixed on what I am saying, because I make them laugh and enjoy themselves.”

Concerning his recent award win, Wallace was both humble and appreciative to have been chosen by his Jamwest family.

“I feel great that I was nominated and eventually selected to be the Safari Guide (award winner) for the year 2019, because I feel it is something they saw in me to give me the award. This is my third year here, although the attraction and park have been open for four years and the racetrack has been here for about 20 years,” said Wallace.