Red Stripes in Jamaica

By Mike Gerrard

A few years ago I was sitting in the Trans-Love Café in Treasure Beach on Jamaica’s south coast, when a man in a snazzy uniform puttered by on a moped. Who’s that, I asked the café manager, Ralph. ‘It’s our policeman,’ he said. I looked surprised, as I didn’t know this little fishing village had one. ‘Oh yes,’ Ralph said, ‘he comes about once a month from Black River, drives through without stopping, and goes away again.’

Ralph also told me about the bank that had opened in Treasure Beach. Some friends of his were walking by one Saturday night, and saw that the front door was open. They went closer, and noticed that the keys were still in the door. Inside, they took some photos of each other lying on the counter drinking Red Stripe, then locked the bank up properly and returned the keys on Monday morning. On my latest visit to Treasure Beach I discovered that the bank had now closed down, which didn’t altogether surprise me.

I was surprised to discover that Jake’s Hotel, my favourite place to stay in the entire world, now had a Security Guard. Was there now crime in Treasure Beach? ‘No,’ said the owner, Jason Henzell, ‘but the rules are that when you reach a certain size, you have to have a Security Guard.’ The only intruders we saw were two men who came fishing off the rocks below our wooden patio. ‘Any luck?’ we asked them as they left. ‘Yeah, bad luck!’

Jake’s is a collection of cottages, some right by the sea as our Seapuss was. Each is individually designed by Jason’s artist mother, Sally Henzell, using Moorish, Mexican and other influences. They are simple but stylish, the colours bright and subtle at the same time. It’s been called the chicest shack in the Caribbean, and has attracted celebs like Robbie Williams, Naomi Campbell, Marianne Faithfull and Helena Christensen. Exclusive doesn’t mean expensive, though, otherwise I wouldn’t be there.

Each night as the sun began to set I would go to Dougie’s Bar, by the small pool, and return with two Jake’s Special Rum Punches. We would sit on the patio and sip these potent drinks, watching the silhouettes of the pelicans flying across the salmon sky, as the sun plunged like a burning orange into the dark Caribbean Sea. You expected it to hiss as it hit the water. At night we would dine beneath the stars in Jake’s own little restaurant, choosing from the marlin, the tuna, the curried goat, seafood pizza or pepperpot soup.

Days would laze by with late starts, walks on the beach, sunbathing by the pool and catching up on all those paperbacks. We were never energetic enough to rent bikes, go see the manatees along the coast, do the crocodile safari in the nearest town, Black River, or take a trip to the offshore islands.

Our lazy days at Jake’s faded as we headed across the island to spend our second week in Port Antonio, on the northeast coast. This was where Jamaica’s tourism began, way back in the 1890s, when an enterprising banana exporter from Boston in the USA realised he could fill the empty boats heading back to the Caribbean with fare-paying passengers. Port Antonio had another boom in the 1950s when Errol Flynn settled here, buying his own offshore island. However, when cruise ships stopped calling in and went to Ocho Rios instead, Port Antonio went back to being a rather ramshackle but wonderfully friendly little town.

Port Antonio appeals to more adventurous travellers, who don’t want to spend their time locked into an all-inclusive resort. I prefer to see the real Jamaica, and at the Mocking Bird Hill Hotel you are encouraged to do just that. This heavenly 10-room retreat in the wooded hills outside Port Antonio is owned by two women who believe that tourism can and should benefit the whole local community.

Shireen is originally from India and Barbara was born in Guyana of Jamaican parents, her father a diplomat. Both being from developing countries, they had seen the negative effects of tourism but both believed in the great good that it can also do if handled properly. They met in Germany in the early 1980s, where Shireen was managing hotels for such chains as Holiday Inn and Inter-Continental. Barbara, an artist, organised and promoted functions at the Gallery Am Buttermarkt in Cologne.

They came to Jamaica in 1993 with the aim of opening a hotel/art gallery that would promote cultural understanding and work with a community to develop sustainable tourism. They succeeded admirably. The hotel is eco-friendly without being dull (check their cocktail list and gourmet menus), and if you want to spend all day lounging by the pool drinking Red Stripes, watching the hummingbirds feeding in the trees, that’s fine.

We were ready for a bit of adventure, by now, so Shireen and Barbara organized a feast of activities for us, including birdwatching, hiking in the rainforest, river-rafting and a drive with a farmer friend of theirs to see some of the more remote homes in the John Crow Mountains.

We also got to meet Sista P, who runs a small craft shop in Port Antonio. Sista P is a Rastafarian lady, one of those rare people you meet in life who exudes dignity and wisdom. We sat on the porch outside her shop, on a hot Jamaican night, and listened to her hypnotic voice tell us tales of her life as a child in the mountains, of what it means to be Rastafarian, of life in Jamaica today, her visits to Africa and a hundred other things besides. We were in the real Jamaica.

Back at the hotel, we sat on the bar terrace and watched the lights of Port Antonio twinkling down below. Barbara mixed us two Mocking Bird Margaritas. We ordered our dinner of deep-fried brie in a tamarind sauce, followed by pork in a pineapple and coconut sauce, and we wished time would stand still as it doesn’t get any better than this. But there was always tomorrow….