Stephon Nicholas

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent

Once claimed by British colonis­ers, Moth­er Na­ture is now the un­chal­lenged ruler of Eng­lish­man’s Bay. Nes­tled be­tween Cas­tara and Par­latu­vi­er, the se­clud­ed beach is one of the gems of To­ba­go with a pic­turesque coast­line un­like any oth­er.

On a sun­ny day, the glis­ten­ing turquoise wa­ters seem to en­tice the vast rain­for­est to draw near­er to the shore­line.

Lo­cat­ed ap­prox­i­mate­ly 300 me­tres from the North­side Road, a canopy of bam­boo trees hides na­ture’s mag­nif­i­cent won­der.

Colour­ful dress­es and wraps hung on a line propped by a bam­boo stick form a flut­ter­ing rain­bow over the Caribbean Sea.

The bay is a swim­mer’s par­adise, draw­ing vis­i­tors in with the gen­tle crash­ing of waves and tran­quil wa­ters.

Known for its depth, Eng­lish­man’s Bay has be­come a must for ad­ven­ture seek­ers and na­ture lovers.

The name comes from British colo­nial his­to­ry, no­tably af­ter the bay came in­to the pos­ses­sion of an Eng­lish­man named George Fer­gu­son in 1832.

Unique from oth­er pop­u­lar beach­es in To­ba­go is the seren­i­ty, un­spoilt for­est on the bay’s edge and the am­bi­ence of Eng­lish­man’s Bay. The on­ly con­crete struc­ture is Eu­la’s Restau­rant and Sou­venir Shop, owned by Eu­la Agard, who has been there for 32 years.

Paint­ed in white and green with a green roof, the shop cam­ou­flages per­fect­ly and com­ple­ments its sur­round­ings.

A wood­en hut with a swing over­look­ing the ocean al­lows vis­i­tors to en­joy the cool sea breeze while re­lax­ing.

Eu­la, who sells food, craft items and cloth­ing, said the decades at Eng­lish­man’s Bay have not numbed her to the un­prece­dent­ed beau­ty which greets her dai­ly.

She said, “At times I am blown away. Wow. You look at the sea and you are amazed. You nev­er get ac­cus­tomed to the beau­ty of God’s cre­ation. It is amaz­ing to look at.”

While not­ing cer­tain times of the year are ac­com­pa­nied by tur­bu­lent wa­ters, she said the beach is nor­mal­ly very calm.

Eu­la said her es­tab­lish­ment re­mains a hall­mark of the lo­ca­tion.

“It is a sig­na­ture. A lot of peo­ple take pic­tures of the wraps. It’s seen all over the world, even in the air­port.

“Peo­ple say when they come down the hill and don’t see those wraps, they know that I’m closed.”

Asked what the beach means to her, she de­clared, “This is my life. This is a fam­i­ly-ori­ent­ed busi­ness. I’ve ren­o­vat­ed here at least three times over the years.”

Start­ing with just juice and sand­wich­es on a wood­en bench, Eu­la now has a breezy din­ing area up­stairs over­look­ing the ocean. The es­tab­lish­ment em­ploys five work­ers.

She has added bath­room and toi­let fa­cil­i­ties, but urged the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) to help fix the road lead­ing to the beach.

“It gets re­al­ly bad when it rains. The gov­ern­ment can do some­thing, “ she said.

Crafts­man Ed­win Alexan­der has his own stall a few me­tres away from Eu­la’s with jew­ellery items, paint­ed cal­abash masks and oth­er items made from bam­boo.

Re­lax­ing on a ham­mock as he smoked a cig­a­rette, Alexan­der said he has been at the beach for over 20 years.

De­spite agree­ing that the wa­ters were gen­er­al­ly safe, Alexan­der still be­lieves a life­guard should be present. He said the bay was one of the most pop­u­lar lo­ca­tions among first-time vis­i­tors.

“All over the world, peo­ple does come,” he said.

Belle Gar­den na­tive Prince and his friend were al­so at the beach when WE vis­it­ed, get­ting ready to go spearfish­ing. He said Char­lot­teville was their usu­al hunt­ing ground, but they want­ed to try some­thing new.

“The wa­ter more deep on this side. They say the Caribbean side deep­er. We say we gonna try on this side to­day,” he said ex­cit­ed­ly.

Ob­serv­ing a flock of birds feed­ing on the sur­face of the wa­ter in the dis­tance, Prince said there was plen­ty game avail­able.

“We go­ing for bar­racu­da. If you watch them birds out there feed­ing, you will get cav­al­li.”

A British fam­i­ly of five was al­so there for a snorkelling ex­pe­di­tion on the near­by reef. While en­joy­ing their va­ca­tion, they said a friend rec­om­mend­ed this as part of their ac­tiv­i­ties, and they quick­ly made their arrange­ments.

Hold­ing hands while walk­ing to­wards the ocean, a cou­ple with a young boy soaked in the beau­ty, play­ing briefly on the swing be­fore get­ting their feet wet at the edge of the wa­ter.