Hello again
Blog readers.
In the last
blog update we were to be found in South Africa visiting national parks. Well,
since then we have sailed along the coast a fair bit, (more of that anon) but we
are still in South Africa, and this update will start with tales from yet more
national parks.
Hippopotamus
13th of November 2014
We hired a
car and drove north along the coast from Richards Bay to St Lucia Marine
reserve. We had reserved a self-catering chalet at Gerda’s Place on the edge of
town. Our kindly landlady asked us to be sure of locking the gate to keep hippo’s
out of the garden! “They will create havoc, and it’s really hard to get them
out until they have eaten or trampled just about everything in the garden. At
dusk you can sometimes see them walking along the main street.” However we
didn’t see them, but we were sure to lock the gate.
A Harem of Hippopotami
Early the
next morning we took a delightful tourist boat tour on the local river, where
we saw hippos doing what they normally do all day long: that is, wallowing in
the mud while nine tenths submerged and sleeping off their diet of half a ton
of grass and a few begonias.
We also saw
a monitor lizard and a few crocodiles. Several male weaver birds were busy
making nests, high up on the stems of rushes. The female would inspect the
workmanship of her male suitor and, if his nest was not up to scratch, would
set to and tear it to pieces. Let that be a lesson for any male DIY enthusiast
reading this report.
Weaver birds and their
nests
Before our
next National Park visit, we did what we should have done much earlier and
bought ourselves bird watching binoculars. They were relatively inexpensive
until we realised that one pair between us would lead to squabbling. So we
wisely forked out for two pairs.
Sunday 23rd November
We drove up
to Inkosana Lodge, in the Monk’s Cowl area of the Drakensberg Mountains, in
company with Fi and Chris from the yacht Three Ships. Pippa and I stayed in a
very upmarket rondavel, that is, a westernised version of a small, round,
southern African-styled hut with a thatched roof. Fi and Chris chose a cheaper,
more European room.
Ours was the middle
one
Our first
outing was a simple day walk of just a few hours that helped shake the
stiffness out of our legs. The next walk was rather more taxing. We took
camping gear for a two day walk with an overnight stay in a Zulu cave.
We were
safe and well sheltered in our cave, so were able to enjoy the thunder,
lightning and torrential rain that entertained us in the late evening.
The entrance to our
cave.
We got up
early the following day, it was rather misty, the sort of day when you can’t
decide if it’s necessary to wear your anorak or not. I elected to wear mine,
but I soon got uncomfortably hot, so I took it off. “You know what’s coming
next, don’t you”? Yes that’s right, before I knew it the rain increased and so
I had to put it on again.
By mid-morning though the sun was out, the rain had
stopped and we were able to enjoy watching a troop of Baboons watching us.
Baboons watching us
Pippa in the
Drakensberg Mountains.
The Drakensberg
mountains.
The home of
the Drakensberg Boys Choir School was just a few miles from our base at
Inkosana. They were having their weekly afternoon concert. So we decided on a
rest day and took the opportunity to relax with a bit of culture. Well I was
bowled over, as was Pippa. I was speechless on the way out. I can’t ever
remember being so moved by a choir. http://web.dbchoir.co.za/
Tuesday 23rd December
Umkhuze Game
Reserve is a lovely reserve with several hides. Pippa and I made the effort of
getting up at 0500 one morning and driving a short distance to a hide at a
waterhole. Our effort was well rewarded because of the number of birds and
animals to be seen. In fact it was so good that we went back for more in the
early evening. A female white rhino with its fairly big calf were the guests of
honour.
The observant will
notice that this is not a Rhino.
Until that is
a lioness arrived. As she strolled into the arena, there was a rush of
commotion as a leopard, that none of us had seen, retreated up into the high
branches of a nearby tree. He/she made itself comfortable in classic pose, with
legs hanging down on each side of a large branch. Just wonderful! As twilight
edged towards dark, Pippa and I, along with a small group of other people, made
our way to the tunnel linking the hide with the car park. To our surprise we
were met by three other people who told us “There’s a lioness between the gate
of the tunnel and the car park!” Oh bother!
A young man
who obviously knew the ropes for such an eventuality, said we must stay calm,
stay together, and to keep talking but not to shout. He would lead us away from
the lioness and back to the car park by a different route. And so it was! But I
don’t mind telling you my pulse rate increased a tad.
January 2015
We went
back to the hills for New Year, this time, though, it was to be just Pippa and
me. Our goal was the Tugela Falls route on the Sentinel. It provided a pleasant
walk on a fairly high mountain. (3000m) A 100ft cliff barred access to the
summit plateau. But fortunately the park authorities had placed two near
vertical chain ladders, so we were able to admire the view from the summit.
(But where is the summit on a plateau). We became aware that the clouds were
gathering and that we were in for rain, so we shot off like scalded cats. But
we were not quick enough. The rain pelted down. Thunder and lightning crashed
all round us. Hail like golf balls (OK, small golf balls) stung us even through
our anoraks. We felt rather sorry for ourselves by the time we got back to the
car. The Park Ranger on the gate was very kind and directed us to a room where
we could put on dry clothes and lick our wounds.
Chain Ladders
The
following day was delightfully sedentary as we explored The Golden Gates
National Park by car. The park derives its name from the brilliant shades of
gold cast by the sun on the numerous sandstone cliffs. Very pleasant driving
circuits had been constructed and enabled us to see, black-backed jackal, bald
headed ibis, baboons, wildebeest and many birds.
Golden Gates National
Park
While
driving to these various game parks, we had noticed that a lot of black people
were hitchhiking. We had been warned that it was dangerous to offer lifts, and
were advised not to do so. However a young man in his early twenties we saw
hitching one day, seemed harmless enough, so I stopped and offered him a lift.
Quite reasonably, Pippa felt safer siting in the back seat behind the hitch
hiker. Our passenger spoke good English and was very polite. He told us that we
were the only white people ever to give him a lift.
We were
encouraged by this encounter and started to be less picky about who we would
offer a lift. There were two Sotho young men with ceremonial staffs going to a
gathering of some sort. Three fat ladies astonished us by squeezing into the
back seats with their luggage on their knees. I thought the front wheels would
lift off the road! Two young women
bundled a teenage boy into the car, who turned out to have a head injury and
was heavily bandaged. The young women couldn’t fit in themselves, but gave the
boy a ten rand note. We thought we were taking him to hospital, but it turned
out that he had been to hospital and we were taking him home.
And so it
went on. Pippa soon realised that she was quite safe being in the front seat.
There were people we didn’t stop for, but everyone we did take was polite,
interesting, and no threat whatsoever. All our passengers offered a token
payment for the ride, which of course we refused.
Richard’s Bay,
where Sula had waited patiently for us while we’d been gallivanting in the
hills, is rather a tourist town. Loud boom boom music all night long was to be
expected on New Year’s Eve. So we thought it best to escape to Ithala Game
Reserve in northern KwaZulu-Natal for a few days.
The back of our house
at Ithala
Ithala
accommodation is very upmarket by our standards. Our “chalet” boasted a large
bedroom, excellent shower room, small kitchen and comfortable lounge. All under
a huge thatched roof, and we had a superb complimentary breakfast in the
restaurant each day. Yes, I know we paid for it really, but it took some of the
sting out of paying the bill (Which, by UK standards, was very reasonable)
Most of the
game reserve was explored by car, and we saw plenty of scattered wildlife, but
not, unfortunately, the elusive elephants.
The
highpoint of our stay was a really good walk along some lovely cliff tops. and
across a simply beautiful meadow. We met a huge troop of baboons on the way.
They watched us from a safe distance and we watched them. We took a minor
detour to avoid disturbing them.
Apart from the Baboons, the warm sunny weather,
the cactus, the isolation (We saw no one), we might have been on a Derbyshire
Edge. The walk was officially closed. A farmer had withdrawn his permission to
cross the tiny section of the walk that entered his land. But we circumvented
this minor inconvenience by walking to within a mile of his land, and then
retracing our steps back to the car.
Game Reserve in Northern
KwaZulu-Natal
Or is it Derbyshire?
Game Reserve in northern KwaZulu-Natal
2nd
January 2015
So the holiday
was over and we were back in Tuzi Gazi Marina in Richards Bay. Our neighbour in
the marina said there had indeed been a lot of noise all night long on New
Year’s Eve, though the fireworks were spectacular. However, several boat owners
joined in the fun by letting off distress flares. That wouldn’t normally be a
problem, but unfortunately several still burning flares landed in the water close
to berthed yachts. Our neighbour resolved to sit in his cockpit with a bucket
of water close to hand.
We were
having a pre-dinner can of beer one evening when I asked Pippa a question. "Why
are we going back to the Caribbean"? In the course of the discussion, it became
apparent that Brazil was not somewhere we wanted to go, because of the increase
in violence towards yachties. Large marinas with armed guards are apparently
OK. But small anchorages along the coast are considered much too dangerous. We had
considered going to French Guiana and Suriname, but we would still arrive in
Tobago during the Caribbean hurricane season and have a long wait before it was
safe to go to the Islands. We have, of course, spent a season there already and
don’t feel it’s worth all the hassle to go there again.
The
alternative route is to go north west from Cape Town, to St.Helena. We will
probably sail past Ascension, directly on to the Cape Verde Islands. From there
we will go to Flores in the Azores. We will probably call into Cork to clear
customs. Then on to Llangwm.
The last
time I cleared customs in Cork, some years ago now, I phoned to say we had
arrived from America. ”Oh and where are
you now?” Crosshaven. “Oh that’s a
long way away. Tell me, have you any drugs on board” NO. “Do you have any guns on board?” NO. Well that will be fine then.” We had cleared customs.
On the 11th of January,
Having agreed our new long term
route, we departed Tuzi Gazi at 0400 on a long day passage to Durban. Light
winds forced us to motor most of the way. We only found the helpful Agulhas Current
for part of the passage, and arrived in Durban at midnight.
We had been
advised to enter in daylight, but that couldn’t be helped. And we certainly weren’t
going to heave too overnight. As it happened, we had no problem entering
harbour and before too long were tied up at the International Jetty.
Customs,
immigration, Police etc. were cleared without any problems the following day. You
may remark “Why do you need to clear customs again, you haven’t left South
African waters”. The answer is that I haven’t a clue. Nor have the people I
asked. But you have to. It’s just the
way it is.
14th
January
Don’t
worry if you get confused about the next bit, both Pippa and I did! Our South
African visas were valid for three months, not quite long enough for our visit.
Unfortunately we were required to apply for a renewal after two months.
So we
duly made our on line application and got an appointment at the Visa Facilitation
Centre.
We
hadn’t got far into the abyss of bureaucracy, before they sent us away to get
certified copies of our passport. Strange this, because of course they had seen
the original. Nonetheless, we had to go to the post office to get a certified
copy. After that our passage through Quality Control seemed to be going OK and
we were passed on to Submission. After much confusion, we were told we had
filled in online application 11.6 instead of 11.1: Visitors Temporary Residence
Permit. So we had to go right back to square one.
The next stumbling
block was getting a certified copy of our bank account. The solution turned out
to be getting the account details on a USB memory stick and getting the yacht
club to print it out for us. Then taking the paper copy and Pippa’s ipad to the
local police station. I showed the policeman the paper copy and the original on
the ipad. Once he had got the idea he stamped the statement to say this was a
certified copy of an original document. What a palaver!
It’s a bit
sad to note that the visa will take a month to reach Durban, and of course we
will have sailed by then!!!
20th
January
We sailed
for Port Elizabeth at 5pm. Unfortunately, at 9pm, the engine stopped! We had
run out of fuel. I had forgotten to fill the tank. How embarrassing. Worse,
despite all my efforts once I had filled the tank from the fuel cans we carry,
I couldn’t get it started again. Still, at about this time the wind had
increased a little and we made good progress under sail.
Before too
long we picked up the Agulhas Current, and we had an exhilarating sail all day
long with 10 knots showing on the GPS. I reckoned that we were sailing at five
knots and had another 5 knots of current.
At 3am on
the 23rd we arrived and anchored off Port Elizabeth.
As I had
been unable to start the engine, we contacted the Yacht Club and asked if it
was possible to be towed in. The Yacht Club’s safety officer said their barge
would tow us in, but could not go outside the harbour. However, we had a zephyr
of onshore wind and once I had gained permission from the harbour master, we
sailed in. It was a slow job, because the wind became very light. At one point
we were down to ¾ of a knot. The barge was not to be seen, but the wind picked
up nicely, so we continued to sail up harbour. About 50 metres from the yacht
pontoons we saw a grubby little moorings boat with a small outboard engine. It
turned out to be our barge! Despite our concerns, the three yard crew did an
excellent job of ushering us into our berth.
But what a
horrible place! Poor old Sula was quickly covered in black sticky manganese
dust from the adjacent tanker-loading jetty.
From our
berth we could see the centre of town, and were told that a supermarket could
be found there. Unfortunately there was a tall fence and a railway line between
us and the town. We walked along the fence line until meeting the heavily
protected dockyard gate. No problem there and we were ushered through the
turnstile. I asked the guard the way into town. “Oh just cross the railway
line, and scramble up the grass bank.” I just love these situations. No silly
Health and Safety here.
The next
day Guy, a mechanic recommended by the Yacht Club, instaled new fittings for the fuel
/water separator filter. My pride was restored somewhat because he took some
time before identifying the problem. The fuel problem was sorted, but I then
discovered a small leak in a cooling water hose. Our friendly mechanic offered
to have a look for a suitable replacement. But he seemed to have gone to earth.
Guy, our friendly
Mechanic
The refurbished
fuel /water separator filter
can be seen RHS centre of this photograph.
Our
friendly mechanic turned up the following morning with a pipe that, with a bit
of judicious trimming with a stanley knife, would do the job perfectly. So I
fitted said hose, ran the engine, and realised that if we were quick we could
sail for Mossel Bay. And so we did.
Thursday 29th
On passage,
sailing well and again helped a little by the Agulhas current. The sun shone
all day, and we were entertained by both albatross and quite a few seals.
Friday 30th
Jan.
We arrived
at Mossel Bay in the early afternoon and anchored outside the marina. The
Marina staff were most apologetic that they didn’t have a berth ready for us,
but anchoring was really no problem. We would be spending much of the afternoon
catching up on our sleep. These two day passages are quite a chore, because it
takes three or four days to get into a watch keeping rhythm. Never mind, we had
a cat nap and in the late afternoon were treated to a wonderful aerobatic
display.
January 31st
We moved
into the marina. And what a lovely place was Mossel Bay. It has tourism as the
base of its economy but it is very well managed. The town centre is attractive
and not at all crowded. The yacht club opened its doors to us and made us
welcome.
Monday 2nd February,
At 8 am we sailed
for Simon’s Town and had to use the tin sail quite a bit because of light
winds. We were a little sad to leave Mossel Bay, but to be honest there wasn’t
much to keep us there, and we had a good weather window to get us to Simons Town
that was too good to miss.
Wednesday 4th
After a
quiet and uneventful passage we arrived at Simon’s Town. It was quite foggy so,
unfortunately, we missed what should have been a memorable landfall.
Please
note:
People of a nervous disposition might
wish to skip the next paragraph.
The Agulhas
current and its effect in bad weather, has been the dominant consideration in
all our passage planning from before our landfall at Richards Bay to Simon’s Town.
It flows from the Mozambique Channel off Madagascar in a roughly south westerly
direction, then follows the South African coast near the 200 metre depth
contour, from Richards Bay to Cape Agulhas, where it moves well off shore. It can
reach speeds of six knots.
So far, so good. However, if it meets up with a strong
to gale force south westerly wind, which is fairly common, even in summer time,
it can make for terrifyingly dangerous sea conditions.
Our nautical charts warn
of “Abnormal waves of up to 20 metres in
height, preceded by a deep trough”. Big ships have apparently broken in two,
when their bow was on one wave, and their stern on another. A yacht might
literally fall off a wave into the trough.
On the good side, weather forecasts in
this part of the world are excellent. There are also ham radio operators who
will give weather forecasts twice daily all along this coast. It’s simply a
matter of not being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
We spent a great deal
of time in harbour, studying weather reports and looking for windows of
opportunity. Then we would dash as fast as we could for the next port. A bit
like crossing a busy road. We had mostly excellent and fast sailing conditions
or light airs. And like 99.9% of yachts making this series of passages, did so
safely. Though it must be said, both Pippa and I are heartily pleased to be
well clear of the unique Agulhas current phenomenon.
Thursday 5th
Simon’s
Town is an attractive small town, with many fine 19thcentury
buildings. The yacht club is most welcoming and the water in the harbour is
clean enough to swim in. No manganese dust here.
Just twenty
minutes pleasant walk from Simons Town is a lovely African penguin sanctuary, The
Boulders Penguin Colony, where we can walk, explore, swim or just look. The
weather is mostly fine and our only chores are shopping and a few jobs
aboard Sula.
Cape Penguins
Our favourite beach,
Plenty warm
enough for swimming.
Saturday
7th
We took the
train to Cape Town and visited the Waterfront Marina and the Royal Cape Yacht
Club. Perhaps surprisingly the former was much too posh for us and the latter
was not up to much. Huge, and rather uninviting, with no local shops. But we
will have to go there when the time comes, to check out of South Africa.
