Barbados: From Chester, NS to Cattlewash
Meet George and Barbara Wilson: Canadian Ambassadors to this idyllic Island.
Nova Scotia natives George and Barbara Wilson have made 27 trips to Barbados.
Driving north on the Ermy Bourne Highway it was becoming harder to keep our eyes on the road. To our right, three thousand miles of uninterrupted Atlantic swells were breaking on the beach. To our left, the sloping green hills of eastern Barbados displayed lush vegetation and the swaying leaves of breadfruit and coconut trees.
But as we passed giant Round Rock (an Instagram favourite), we saw the smiling Barbara Wilson, waving from her lawn in front of the big green cottage she had told us to look for “just across from the rock.”
We’d arrived in Cattlewash, named years ago when farmers walked their cattle down to the beach so saltwater could provide some relief to fly bites. These days it is a tiny rural neighbourhood serving two ends of the age spectrum: retirees looking to get away from it all and hipster surfers from around the world who ride giant waves in international competitions.
“Welcome to Cattlewash. Come on in.” said George. “May I offer you a drink…rum punch perhaps?”
The Wilsons have lived in several Maritime communities during their careers, but now make their home in Chester, Nova Scotia.
George is a tall, boyishly handsome 84-year old, a former head of sales for Kraft/General Foods in Atlantic Canada. With his velvety smooth, measured voice he could pass for a diplomat, well-suited to moving in high circles.
Barbara, now 80, was a nurse and wound care specialist who trained at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal. More than once she’s had to treat friends on the island for everything from heat stroke to burns from a leaking gas stove.
Like her husband, Barbara has fallen in love with the Bajan people and their lifestyle.
“On some level, we equate it to the openness and friendliness of Newfoundland, which we both love,” she said. In their sailing days, they cruised the southwest coast, visiting outports and making friends with locals who helped tie up their boat. One couple invited them to their wedding.
We’d been tipped off about the Wilsons by fellow Nova Scotian John Cavill, a retired Air Canada public relations executive and representative for Barbados Tourism Marketing, Inc. (Sadly, John passed away in 2021.) In a country that relies heavily on tourism dollars and foreign exchange revenue, loyal repeat vacationers like the Wilsons are routinely feted at glitzy events hosted by the Prime Minister. This year marked their 27th trip to ‘Little England.’
“At our reception, two children in their school uniforms opened our car door,” said Barbara. “They were so polite and engaging. Inside, we were met with steel pan drums and children singing Beautiful Barbados.”
Beautiful, beautiful Barbados
Gem of the Caribbean Sea
Come back to my island Barbados
Come back to my island and me.
Please me come back where the night winds are blowing
Come back to the surf and the sea
You’ll find rest, you’ll find peace in Barbados
Come back to my island and me.
“We shook hands with Prime Minister Stuart that night. I told him we’re from Nova Scotia, and that along with Newfoundland we’ve always had a wonderful history of trade with Barbados. I said ‘We always sent salt, fish and lumber. In return, you gave us rum and sugar. We got the better part of that deal!’”
The Prime Minister of Cattlewash
Not five minutes into our hors d’oevres and rum punch, it’s clear why this Canadian couple has no trouble filling the cottage with guests. They are gracious hosts and love to share stories. Their friendships with Bajan neighbours and fellow vacationers have led to some creative hijinx.
“We have had fun jokingly forming our own government at Cattlewash,” said George. “We had a prime minister who was from Montreal, a Dr. Doug Kinnear who was the doctor for the Montreal Canadiens. He and his wife Katie have been down for about ten or fifteen years, living near us. So we had our ‘government’ meetings’. Barb, as a former nurse, was going to be minister of health. I was minister or tourism or something along those lines.”
“Unfortunately, Doug died just last year. So last night at our party we held our glasses up to honour Prime Minister Doug Kinnear of Cattlewash. He was a colourful character. He always had stories about the Habs.”
Dr. Doug Kinnear, the Prime Minister of Cattlewash, treats Habs captain Bob Gainey. Photo credit: Globe and Mail
I found an obituary of their friend. He led the Canadiens’ medical team from 1962 to 1999. During that time, they won an impressive 12 Stanley Cups.
All roads lead to rum
It’s said of Barbados that wherever you see a church, you’ll find at least one rum shop nearby. We checked. It’s true. There are said to be as many as 1,700 rum shops – on an island only 21 miles long by 14 miles wide!
I was curious if our new friends were fans of the tried and true Bajan rum punch recipe of one part sour, two parts sweet, three parts strong and four parts weak. “Actually, we leave out the weak…the water or juice. Ice cubes are all you really need.”
Seated on their patio, with the ocean in full view and a noisy surf soundtrack, we got into some good stories. Like the time they showed up in the local church, the only whites in the congregation, and the pastor, Father Matthias, invited them to stand up and announce to the flock who they were and where they were from.
“We gave our names and where we’re from in Canada,” said George. “It was pretty quiet. I told them we came because of the warmth of the people, who are very special and then added that we also came for … the Bajan macaroni pie. That’s when they got excited and broke into applause.”
An inauspicious welcome
George still recalls their first day in Barbados back in the late sixties. “In all our excitement, in the darkness I rushed into the water and had no sooner stepped in when I told my friend Bill, a doctor, that I thought a shark had bitten my foot, the pain was that bad. I had stepped on sea urchins. I had 40 barbs in each foot. I spent two weeks with my feet in buckets trying to get them out.”
In Barbados, everything is close. At 432 square kilometres (166 square miles), the entire island covers roughly the same area as St. John’s, Newfoundland. One minute you’re facing the calmer waters on the west coast, where play is the order of the day. Pasty white tourists, mostly from the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States fill the beach chairs and restaurants.
The Wilsons’ front yard view, where the Ermy Bourne Highway skirts the Atlantic Ocean in eastern Barbados.
But head a few miles inland and the landscape changes dramatically. The terrain rises through sugar cane fields, past roadside neighbourhoods (with those ubiquitous rum shops) past an occasional long-abandoned windmill. When you climb Cherry Tree Hill facing the wild east coast, the view is stunning – one of those stop and stare moments. It’s hard not to imagine the country’s colonial past and these very fields where slaves worked unbearable days in oppressive heat.
Soon, the twisty, bumpy roads wind down toward sea level and the untamed east coast where the Wilsons have found their Shangri-La, where it is quiet and scenic – just the way they like it.
George and Barbara point to where they like to go for walks. Cattlewash has a beautiful one mile stretch of unbroken beach – said to be among the longest in Barbados.
“We’ve stayed in Sunset Crest in Holetown, and we like to visit,” said Barbara. “and we’ve had a safari tour into places that are like jungles, so dense and gorgeous. But when we come over that hill and in view of the sea and feel the trade winds, ahhh…coming down the hill…everything falls off and it is so lovely seeing the sea.”
