LONE RIVAL IN AFRICA

Liz Hammick Scott

Liz and Mark were awarded the Water Music Trophy this year for their Cruising Information about the east coast of Africa, the culmination of a three year cruise aboard their Rival 38 Lone Rival.

For some reason the cruising areas we've enjoyed most (Southeast Asia, the Middle East, East Africa) seem to bring the same questions every time: what about security? theft? pirates? It was the same with Madagascar, and indeed there have been a couple of violent incidents involving cruising yachts in the last five or six years. But everyone we'd met in 1996 who had visited Madagascar loved it, so we planned six weeks there on our way from Kenya and Tanzania to South Africa.

It's increasingly difficult to find an uncrowded tropical cruising area these days (we were rather shocked to read in a recent 'Flying Fish' that someone had counted forty boats at Salt Whistle Bay in the Grenadines) but thankfully East Africa still comes into this category. We spent almost four months in Tanzania, exploring the coast from Tanga in the extreme north to Mtwara in the south, with a 300 mile trip inland to go on safari and for Mark to climb Kilimanjaro, at 19,000ft Africa's highest mountain. The choice of Tanga for a six week stay proved to be a great success. The little yacht club was a friendly place, with other children for Chlo‰ to play with, showers, and cold beers at the bar. The town has a colourful market selling the best fruit and vegetables in Tanzania. Supermarkets haven't reached this part of the world, but you could track down most of what you needed by visiting several little grocery stores and the bakery. Not the fastest way to shop, but when you're cruising, time is more plentiful.

The best thing about Tanga was the International School, where Chloe attended the kindergarten for the last three weeks of term. A rattly old bus took the children six miles past sisal plantations and mud-hut villages to the school, set in lovely grounds and surrounded by fruit and frangipani trees. She enjoyed herself and became more independent, while we were able to concentrate on boat projects without a `helper'.

Visiting East Africa and not going on safari would be a real omission, and certainly our week under canvas in the Serengeti National Park was a highlight of our cruise so far -- and a special treat for me, with no meals to think about or prepare! We were very lucky with Martin, our driver/guide, and Lambris our cook. Martin's ability to drive over shocking roads for hundreds of miles and spot elusive leopards in trees was remarkable, only matched by Lambris' three course dinners, all cooked on a charcoal fire in the open air.

By late July it was time to move on and 'Lone Rival' cruised south. First we visited the spice island of Zanzibar, where we saw cloves growing and explored the fascinating old `Stone Town', scene of the biggest East African slave market 150 years ago. Then to Dar es Salaam on the mainland to store up before cruising the southern coast of Tanzania almost to the Mozambique border. We found some beautiful deserted beaches, ruins of a major Swahili city dating from the 13th century at Kilwa, and quiet fishing villages where the people were very poor but nevertheless friendly and welcoming. Our four months in East Africa were a great success and we felt privileged to have sailed there before the crowds arrive -- if they ever do.

Mayotte in the French Comoros islands 300 miles to the east was our next port of call. There we enjoyed all the good things that such places offer -- excellent bread, cheese, pat' and wine -- during our ten day visit. October is the best month for seeing migrating humpback whales, and although we were a bit early we did see several, including a female and her calf inside the reef at Mayotte. We managed to get quite close, quietly under sail, but at about 13 metres she was bigger than us so we were wary. We were seeing more marine life in these waters than anywhere we could remember, and during our four week stay in Madagascar were lucky enough to watch a loggerhead turtle come ashore on a quiet beach to lay her eggs. After digging a deep hole she produced about 150 eggs, covered them with sand, and struggled back to the water -- assisted over the sharp rocks by some of the cruising people who'd been unobtrusively watching. Chlo‰ wouldn't get this in school nature study class!

The lemur, a primate subspecies similar to the bushbaby, is native only to Madagascar and we saw plenty of wild ones: the black lemurs at Nosy Kombo and white ones further down the coast. They are usually shy and watch you warily from high in the trees, but at one village the locals make a profit selling bananas for lemur feeding and the animals, about the size of a large cat, get quite greedy and aggressive. After storing up at the excellent market in Hellville on Nosy Be, and bargaining for one of the embroidered tablecloths for which the area is famous, we sailed in company with three other yachts through the islands and little bays of northwest Madagascar. It was a memorable experience -- good winds during the day, beautiful beaches with a fire at sunset, fishing (we lost more lures than we caught fish!), and palmleaf villages where the people were happy to trade fruit, lobsters, even wild honey for T-shirts, empty jars, and other useful items. We certainly won't find anything to match those few weeks.

The passage to South Africa took ten days, with a twenty-four hour stop at the tiny island of Juan de Nova where the French military invited us to share their Sunday barbecue. Our swim off the pristine beach was to be our last in the tropics for many months. Grey skies, drizzle and poor visibility greeted us as we approached Richard's Bay, our first landfall in South Africa. With a 3 knot current threatening to sweep us past the entrance we thanked our stars for the GPS -- not for the first time, either.

It would be hard to better the hospitality extended by the Zululand Yacht Club, where large grassy areas and even a small swimming pool kept the children happy while we berthed alongside (free) and enjoyed the luxury of a spotless shower block and washing machines (!!) for the first time in months. Sailing around the South African coast, with its notorious weather and the powerful Agulhas Current where abnormal 20 metre waves can build up, becomes the major topic of conversation amongst the cruisers, almost to the point of stirring up unnecessary anxiety. As it turned out, our ninety mile passage down to Durban took just twelve hours, definitely a record for 'Lone Rival'. We were aware that we were going too fast as we surfed down huge waves, spray flying out like a dinghy, with a 30 knot northeasterly behind us, but one has a great sense of urgency to arrive safely before the next low brings southwesterly winds.

The International Dock for visiting yachts in Durban has the advantage of being right in the centre of the city, a ten minute walk from big stores selling anything you could want. It's also a good place for getting boat repairs done -- we had our aft solar panel support rewelded in a much more streamlined shape, and our spray-hood restitched. 'Shemali Blue' (Peter and Carda Best, OCC) was hauled out for major work -- a new deck to replace the old one which leaked so badly. Their tentative plan is to head for Australia via southeast Asia.

The OCC isn't well represented in South Africa, so when Durban Port Officer Peter Schofield moved upcountry there was no one to take his place. However he'd be delighted to help any members travelling inland. We spent a very enjoyable evening with Peter and his wife Penny on one of their rare visits to Durban.

East London and Port Elizabeth were also very pleasant stops, where we met old friends and made new ones and found ideal diversions for Chloe in the form of excellent museums and a day out on a narrow gauge steam railway. By luck or good management -- probably a bit of both -- the coastal passages of 250 miles and 140 miles respectively went off without mishap and at reasonable speed. But one is never far from reminders of the danger of this coast: the chart of shipwrecks in the East London museum -- literally thousands of them -- and huge rolls of brown paper washed up on the beach, cargo from a ship that had been lost with all hands only a month previously.

Knysna, with its infamous entrance between the `Heads', has been mentioned before in 'Flying Fish' and didn't disappoint us either, with a nerve-racking ten minutes as we `shot the rapids' into the huge and tranquil lagoon inside the cliffs. Conditions were rated as medium by Hank on the VHF at Knysna Base, who did a wonderful job of talking us in. Only two days later another yacht had to sail on past when breakers made getting in impossible. After a quiet but pleasant Christmas we left in almost flat calm, then day sailed to Mossel Bay where strong southwesterlies held us up for a week -- no hardship as the yacht club was welcoming and the town had excellent beaches and an impressive museum devoted to Bartholomew Diaz, who made a landfall here in 1488, the first European to set foot in South Africa.

New Year's Eve saw us ready to fend off parachute flares (none actually landed on 'Lone Rival', thank goodness) and by 3 January we were safely round Cape Agulhas with a southwesterly behind us, which increased to 30 knots as we surfed across False Bay for the protection of the marina at Simonstown. A quick haul out for antifouling (while it continued to blow at gale force making the sturdy cradle shudder alarmingly -- living aboard on the hard is a necessary evil, we've decided) then off again, round Cape Point, home to the most powerful lighthouse in the southern hemisphere, and up to Haut Bay. Two days there meant we could meet up with OCC members Tom and Sue Morgan, who live on their Roberts 43 'Spraydust' with their children Bridgette and Ian. Tom has written a much-needed South African almanac, which we found especially useful for harbour diagrams and information. Copies can be bought at chandleries in Richard's Bay and Durban, or obtained direct from Tom. The Morgans enjoy meeting new people and would be happy to help any member passing through. Look out for their bright orange hull in Haut Bay Marina.

Cape Town was our final stop on the South African coast, a busy two weeks shared with family who had flown out from England and filled with sightseeing (the new Two Oceans Aquarium on the Waterfront is outstanding), wine tasting, and storing up in readiness for several weeks at sea. Even as the wind howled through the Royal Cape Yacht Club Marina we marvelled at the beauty of Table Mountain with its `cloth' of cloud. Our African adventure was coming to its end.

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