“This is the craziest thing we have done”: Husband-and-wife open new pub in St Helier

When Islander Samantha Milho and carpenter Simon Wheals met as “young care-free twenty-somethings” in Australia, the last thing the couple could have imagined was that one day they would be running their own Jersey pub together.

But a combination of happenstance and a shared appreciation for their local community has led them to opening their very own establishment: The Crown & Caravela in St Helier.

“This is the craziest thing we have ever done, even crazier than moving across the world together,” joked Simon, the final renovations for the pub bustling all around him ahead of the pub’s official launch today (Friday).

The husband-and-wife team are certainly not complete industry outsiders – for years, they helped run the iconic Benfica Bar on Cattle Street, having come to Jersey in 2019 to visit Samantha’s Dad, José Rodrigues Milho, the pub’s long-term manager.

“One of the hardest years of my life”

“We got stuck here in Covid, and my Dad was not the most technology-literate, so we helped him reopen the Benfica with all the Covid regulations,” Samantha explained.

Two years on, and all set for a return to Australia, the couple put their plans on hold again after being handed the devastating news that José had been given a terminal diagnosis.

“For us that was one of the hardest years of my life, it had only been five years since I had lost my Mum and I was so scared that I was going to lose him too – I spent the whole year in fight-or-flight,” his daughter recalled.

Thankfully, José has “outlived all the prognoses” and remains an active part of their lives.

For Samantha, ‘The Crown & Caravela’ is all about carrying on the “family hospitality tradition”.

“My Dad is a well-known Portuguese pioneer over here, my parents came over in the 70s and they were one of the first people to have a Portuguese business”, she said.

“They had a café to begin with, then they had a restaurant, a nightclub, two guest houses and another restaurant after that.”

“So this pub is kind of like handing the baton to us,” Simon reflected. “This is our project now, it’s a small family business and that’s how we’ve kept it.

“We hire local people, we have a tight-knit group of friends and we all work for each other, and this is our little crack at it.”

A bridge between communities

They hope that their pub – formerly known as The Daily Globe, which closed in December – will act as a bridge between the Portuguese and English communities in the Island.

“My parents were super Portuguese, and my Mum pretty much only spoke Portuguese to me, but when I grew up I felt super British as well – so we wanted the pub to reflect that”, Samantha told.

Pictured: The premises was previously occupied by the Daily Globe.

“That’s why we’re called The Crown & Caravela, the crown is a nod to the English side, and then the caravel ships were the ones that ones that the Portuguese went exploring on.

“So we figured that the English people will just call it ‘The Crown’, and then the Portuguese will call it ‘The Caravela’.”

The Portuguese and English hybrid approach extends to décor too.

“There are Portuguese tiles behind the bar, and the plants on the wallpaper are all plants that grow in Madeira, which is where we’re from”, Samantha pointed out.

We figured that the English people will just call it ‘The Crown’, and then the Portuguese will call it ‘The Caravela’

And what does her father, José, make of their undertaking?

“It is a very big pleasure of mine to pass this onto my daughter,” he told Express. “Because I sort of had enough, and I decided that this was the time for her and her husband to start.”

He smiled: “I think it’s brilliant – everything works nicely, and it is made with love.”