Diny's World Travels.

Travel and volunteering in southern Africa 2009

2009-09-10T21:14:00.125-06:00

I left the penguin rehab center in Cape Town the end of April 2009. But I still want start the next story of my trip with this cute little video of Rocky the Rockhopper penguin from Antarctica.

On May 4th I flew to Port Elizabeth. I was picked up for the 45 minute drive to “African Dawn bird and wildlife sanctuary”, where I met the owner Percy and the other volunteers

Owner Percy (in the middle) and the volunteers at African Dawn.

“African Dawn” is a bird and wildlife sanctuary. Most of their animals can not be released into the wild either due to injuries or because they were unwanted pets, so they live out their lives in the sanctuary.

I was housed in a little hut which was about a 5 minute walk from the sanctuary and located next to a game reserve.

From my window I could often see the antelope and zebra grazing.

Near my hut was a small enclosure, home of 3 little meercats. These little critters are diggers and had easily tunneled themselves into the outside world. However inside food was placed every day and there was a cozy nest for them. Reason enough to not go too far away.

Charley, one of the little meercats, liked humans and he would greet and follow us like a dog.

The unwanted pets originated from places around the globe. A variety of birds, ostriches, emus, monkeys, wallabies, antelope and more domestic type animals like ducks, geese, a mean black swan, goats, calves, etc. had found a home here. Permanent staff members took care of the more ferocious animals, like the lynx and crocodile.

Some species that are threatened in the wild, were bred, such as servals, cheetahs, caracals and lynx (cat varieties).

Some successful breeding of servals .

The place was set up like a zoo, where anyone for a fee could come to visit.

The volunteers took care of all of the non-dangerous animals. Our days started at 0730 with food prepping. Because of the wide variety of animals and their different food requirements, we followed exact feeding schedules, which were set up into 5 different feeding routes. Because it was all quite confusing for the first week new people teamed up with volunteers who had been here longer. Each team was assigned a route and off we went.

We had several pages of feeding schedules and routes and every morning started with food prepping.

We placed the food inside the cages and we poured fresh water into the bowls. While doing this birds sat on our head and shoulders,

and monkeys crawled all over us. None of my clothing stayed intact.

Wallabies and emus ate out of our hands.

Some of the very young animals had be bottle fed, such as Ron, the Blesbok.

After the animals were all fed, cages had to be cleaned, food organized, repairs and maintenance done. All of this would keep all of us quite busy for about 6 to 8 hours a day.

Fence maintenance the dish cleaning area.

After a week I had 2 days off and together with 2 other volunteers I went on a safari to Addo Elephant National Park + Scotia Game Reserve. We saw elephants, rhinoceros, giraffes, zebras, lions, hippos, crocodiles and many different types of antelopes.

Rhinos, crocodiles, warthogs and wildebeest in Addo National Park.

After 3 weeks I left. I rented a car and I spent 10 days traveling the Garden Route. According to the South Africans this is one of the most beautiful areas of the country. It's probably true as much of South Africa is dry and flat. It is an area of one of the few old forests, that survived the axes of woodcutters, mountains and gorgeous beaches.

I rented a car and spent 10 days traveling the Garden route.

In the mountains I passed through Oudthoorn, the ostrich capital of the world. Surrounding Oudthoorn are big ranches, but ostriches take the place of cows. The ostriches were a blast to watch; I watched them graze peacefully when all of a sudden a group of males would go into a wild run and then start whirling themselves insanely around with flapping wings. Some of the ranches gave ostrich tours with the opportunity to ride one. First a sock was placed over the animal’s eyes, which calmed it enough to be able to get onto its back. Then the sock would be pulled off and the ostrich would take off at full speed. It felt like bull riding in a rodeo.

Crazy Ostriches. Crazy person riding an ostrich.

In Plettenburg Bay I kayaked to a seal rookery. The seals were busy fishing and laying out in the sun. On the way back I had a great surprise, a large school of dolphins surrounded the boat.

I kayaked to a seal colony and found myself surrounded by dolphins.

A few times I rented a canoe and paddled some pretty rivers.

And I did some great hikes along the beaches and in the forests.

Ten days was not enough, but I had signed up for a 1 month professional wildlife film making course in Kruger National Park, starting June 1st. I flew to Johannesburg, where I met the other 8 students, and the course coordinator drove us to Kruger National Park in the North East corner of the country.

I learned wildlife film making in Kruger National Park with 7 other students, our coordinator Kaanu 5th from left.

We stayed in a beautiful tent camp at the edge of the Park and all equipment that we needed was provided.

We had several different instructors who were all experts in their respective areas of film making. We had cameramen teaching us the use of the cameras and various filming techniques, writers to teach us how to write a script and a professional editor taught us how to put it all together into a documentary. Park rangers taught us about the park and its animals.

Everything we needed was provided and various professionals taught us their skills.

For a week we went on daily safari rides to film wildlife.

To complete the course we had to think of a story and make a movie of exactly 5 minutes in length to teach us to work within time constraints given by film producers. It was amazing how many hours it took to make such a short documentary.

Each one of the student movies had a different story, but the end products were quite satisfactory and we all loved making them. The course was very intense; our days were usually 12 or more hours long. In this month we were only given 4 days off, but it was amazing how much we learned in this short amount of time.

On one of our days off we visited Jane Goodall’s chimpanzee rescue center “Chimp Eden”.

Some of the rescued chimps at "Chimp Eden", the two youngsters were best friends, they walked the whole time with arms around each other. (pics by fellow student Rieghard)

Another free day was spent with fellow students Sonny and Fortunate at nearby beautiful Blythe canyon.

At the end of the course we returned to Johannesburg and from there I flew back for a few days visit in Capetown.

It was time for a vacation and I joined a 3-week overland truck trip “Cape to Vic.Falls” with Nomad Tours, which took me through the northern neighboring countries of Namibia and Botswana, ending at the Victoria Waterfalls in Zimbabwe.

I joined a tour through Western South-Africa, Namibia, Botswana, which ended in Zimbabwe.

Overland trips are active participation adventure tours. We were with 12 passengers, a guide/cook and a driver.

The Overland Truck group.

It was winter in the southern hemisphere; daytime temperatures were a balmy and sunny 20 – 25 C (70 – 80 F), but night temperatures were mostly around the freezing point. We camped most nights, big campfires kept us warm and many of the campgrounds we stayed at had little bars to warm our insides.

We camped most nights and made campfires to ward off the cold.

It was a long distance from Capetown to the border with Namibia. Before independence Namibia was colonized by Germans and their influence was very evident in the neat little, western looking towns. Languages were mostly in Afrikaans, English and German, besides the tribal languages. It is one of the least populated countries in the world and the small towns were spread widely apart. The truck drove huge distances and long hours through desert type country, varying between dry grassy plains and large areas with only Sahara type sands. Most days ended with some sort of activity, such as hikes, a little boat trip, encounters with tribal people, etc. We also saw lots of wildlife through the vehicle windows, especially various types of antelopes, zebras and ostriches.

One of the highlights were the enormously tall and orange colored sand dunes. We climbed one at sunrise, it was only 200 meters (600 feet) high, but it was a strenuos hike through the deep and loose sand.

We watched the sun rise on top on one of the many sand dunes of Namibia.

Due to the extremely dry climate there were sections with trees that have been dead for 900 years, but that are still standing.

Sosseivlei with trees that have been dead for 900 years.

We hiked around Fish Canyon, supposedly the oldest canyon in the world, a deep and dark split in the ground.

The pretty town of Swakupmund in the middle of the sandy desert is the adventure center of Namibia. All kinds of activities were arranged here; e.g. skydiving, sand boarding, horseback riding, helicopter rides, quad bike riding, boating trips, etc. The whole group opted for the quad bike ride. It was fun, but also tricky between and over the sandy dunes. The only way to make it uphill was to go at full speed. I went up one of the dunes, expecting it to have a road at the top, but instead it peaked and it went straight down again. The dune was too steep for my quad and it rolled end over end. I landed on my head, but luckily the helmet protected me. However the steering must have hit me right in the middle of my chest, probably bruising my sternum. For a month I could not do any pushing or lifting without a sharp pain. But I really had no choice, I climbed back on the horse uhh quad and finished the trip.

We went quad biking in the extensive Namibian dunes.

A few days later we stayed at a village of the very primitive Himba tribes. Their women spend about 3 hours each morning beautifying themselves by covering their bodies from head to toe with red ochre. They weave false hair pieces into their hair and cover that with ochre as well.

We visited one of the primitive Himla tribes.

In the north of the country is Etosha National Park. For 2 days we did several game drives here, in which we saw a lot of animals, although for some mysterious reason big cats refused to show themselves to us.

The animals in Etosha National Park.

Our last Namibian night was spent in the capital city of Windhoek, where sadly enough, one of our fellow travelers, Choi from Korea, became ill enough to have to be admitted to the hospital. Luckily it was a very modern and clean building and his care was very adequate.

We crossed the border into Botswana; in the Kalahari Desert we camped a night by a bushman village, where the bushmen performed some tribal dances around the campfire for us.

We camped by a bushman village and saw some of their dances.

Onwards we went to the town of Maun, situated at the edge of the huge Okavango Delta National Park. With a small 8-seater airplane we had a birds-eye view of the park, which is covered by water and 1000’s of islands, and where wildlife freely roams.

We flew with little 6-seater airplanes over the Okavanga Delta.

The next morning we cramped ourselves, gear and food into very small and unstable “macorroes” (dug-out canoes) for a 2 days/nights camping trip in the delta. Only two of us could fit in a boat with a local “poler” expertly “poling” it through very shallow water.

In small dugout "macorroes" we were "poled" into the Okavanga Delta.

It took about 4 hours to get to one of the larger islands. Apparently the delta water was at its highest level in years and many of the islands were flooded or had become too small. We stayed on this island for 2 days. In the mornings and evenings we hiked around it with a local guide and we were able to get quite near various animals, such as impala, wildebeest, zebras, and elephants.

The local guides took us on walking safaris on the island.

In the afternoons we did the same as the animals and we relaxed in camp, it was great soaking up the sun next to the water and reading a good book. I attempted to “pole” the macorro for a while, but I found it very difficult to keep it going in a straight line and to keep the boat from capsizing.

On the 2nd evening we were “poled” to a deep lake, which was home to many hippos. We stayed out of the way at the edge in very shallow water. In Africa the hippo kills more people than any other animal. Even though they are vegetarians, they are extremely territorial and aggressive and they can easily knock over one of these little boats. The weather had turned cloudy, which resulted in one of the best sunsets.

In the evening we poled to a "hippo" lake, where we enjoyed our best sunset.

The nighttime temperatures were below freezing, but a roaring campfire kept us warm and it also kept the wild animals at bay. Elephants were breaking branches from trees about 20 meters (60 feet) away and lions were roaring all around us. The sky was extremely clear and covered with billions of bright stars. On the second night we had a big party around the campfire where the Botswana boatmen and my group took turns singing and dancing.

The last morning was very windy and cold and everyone was shivering on our float out. It was nice to get back to the regular campground and take a hot, hot shower. By afternoon we continued our tour.

Close to the border of Zimbabwe is the Chobe National Park. In the afternoon we got on a large river boat for a cruise into the park. This vessel could get very close to shore, where lots of wildlife did not pay any attention to it. A large herd of elephants came to drink at the rivers' edge, including tiny babies, hippos and crocodiles were sunning themselves, a large herd of buffalo was a bit further away and lots of beautiful birds were flying all around.

We saw lots of wildlife from the boat in Chobe National Park, including a gorgeous oryx.

The next day we crossed into Zimbabwe, a country besieged by political problems and poverty. Right on the border of Zimbabwe and Zambia are the rightfully world-famous Victoria Waterfalls, where we roamed around for about 3 hours. The falls are in a line of about 1.7 km (1 mile) long and in places they are 100 meters (300 feet) tall. In some areas the spray is so intense, that you are unable to see the falls and it is impossible to stay dry, even though I wore a very good rain poncho.

The world-famous Victoria Falls, it was impossible to stay dry in the spray.

This was our final destination. We stayed in a backpacker’s hotel for the night and everyone in the group made their further travel arrangements. I received a great pedicure in the afternoon and I did a Zambezi dinner cruise with some of my fellow travelers. The whole group enjoyed a goodbye drink in the evening.

We ended the tour with a Zambezi river dinner cruise in the sunset.

Another Nomad truck was leaving the next morning for a 2 day quick transfer to Johannesburg and I joined them at 0600. It was a relatively cheap way to travel, but the truck was crowded and uncomfortable, the scenery mostly very boring and it was a very bouncy trip over the potholed roads of Botswana. With my poor sore bones (from the quad accident) I was sorry that I had not spent the extra money and flown back to Jo.burg. We arrived there late the next afternoon, I spent the night in a backpacker’s hotel and took a bus the next morning for the 200 km (140 ml) trip to Kroonstad.

In Kroonstad I started my next animal volunteer project. I arrived here at a cat breeding center, called Boskoppie, owned by Ingrad Swart and her son Pieter.

Boskoppie has approximately 85 lions,

Twelve Bengal tigers from India.

A pair of jaguars (from Central/South America) and their cub.

1 caracal,

A vervet monkey, named Apie, here together with Bassie, a 3 month old lion cub.

When I arrived there were 2 other volunteers: Kim (Belgium, who left 2 days later) and Aiden (British), a local (African) staff of 8 and a manager Donovan. The place had several cubs;

four lions of 1,5 week old, and the jaguar of 2 months old,

The babies: Kimmie, Aidie, Dino and Titan, in the company of Blessing, the jaguar.

Aiden and the 3 month old lions: Bassie, Thomas and Victor.

and the 5 months old lions Levi, Diesel and the tiger Malakai.

and approximately fifteen lions, including three white lions, and three tigers of less than 1,5 year old.

The "teenage" lions and tigers.

All of the cubs at Boskoppie are hand raised which guarantees a near 100 % survival rate (barring genetic/birth defects) and an animal population that is used to people and therefore much easier managed.

The adults and teenagers were taken care of by Pieter and the regular staff, but we volunteers did the care of the young cubs, except for the jaguar who was living with Ingrad at her house.

The 2-month old Jaguar cub, who was Ingrad's special pet.

Boskoppie does lion tours for a fee (which we learned how to conduct, (I know a bit about lions and other cats now) whenever people request it and it has several very nice guest cottages.

I was placed in the nicest accommodation I had had anywhere so far.

Accomodations were great and I always had great company from Linky, the friendly lab.

The 1st few days I worked mostly with the 3 month old cubs giving them milk and finely minced meat.

Feeding time for the 3 month old cubs,

and I played with them to get them used to me. They had spent most of their short lives with Ingrad and were a bit shy of other people.

and then they tried to eat me.

Better not to wear sandals around them.

Aiden and I played with the 5 month old tiger Malakai and lions Levi and Diesel. However, these guys were already getting too strong and rough, especially Malakai, who was tireless and kept coming back at you, so I would never go alone into their enclosure and only in heavy clothing.

Malakai and Levy in more peaceful moments.

After a few days I also participated in the care for the babies. Many times a day they had to be fed bottles with a special formula.

The babies loved their bottles, after their tummies were full they'd fall asleep.

And they also needed to be stimulated on a regular basis to help them urinate and defecate, a task that is normally done by the mother lion. The care was a round-the-clock job and therefore Aiden and I would take turns sleeping in the same room as the babies to do their night time care.

The baby room, where Aiden and I took We took over mom lion role and stimulated

turns sleeping with the little cubs. the cubs bowels.

During the day, as soon as it was warm enough (also here the nights were quite cold), the babies were placed in the yard. Apie, the vervet monkey, was free to roam around the whole area. She was lonely after losing her mate and she had very strong motherly instincts. In the past she tried to steal cubs and once succeeded into taking caracal cubs into a tree. Every day she sat among the cubs and she spent hours grooming and protecting them from any perceived dangers. One of us (mostly I) would stay with the cubs to make sure that she would not take them up high again.

Apie (the vervet monkey) spent hours grooming the cubs and was very protective of them.

She and I became quite friendly, and even though she never allowed me to touch her, she often sat right next to me and we would share my lunch together, occasionally, like a typical monkey, she stole it.

Apie, the vervet monkey, and I shared lunch. She always kept a close eye on the cubs.

Occasionally Ingrad brought the jaguar cub over and I could spend the afternoon playing with him as well. She called the cub “Blessing” and she was very protective of him, as it was the only jaguar cub that had ever survived at Boskoppie.

Ingrad and her special baby Jaguar. His breed comes from the tropics and he needs a sweater on cold days.

In nature the adult cats only feed approximately once a week, therefore Sundays at 4:00 pm was officially feeding time. Many people came for the special feeding tour, which was usually conducted by big cat expert Ingrad herself. She gave them all kinds of interesting information about the animals. Enough meat had been placed in special feeding areas next to the enclosures, gates were opened and the animals came rushing through. The cats at Boskoppie do not get live animals to eat (in nature lions scavenge and/or steal a big portion of their food supply). Farmers in the area notify us whenever a cow, horse or sheep has died and we pick them up with a small truck. Whenever there is not enough big meat, the cats receive chickens. The volunteers took turns coming along to pick up the dead animals.

The new volunteer Rob is delivering a dead cow to the "4 kings".

Little Aidie stopped eating and was very lethargic. Ingrad took him to the veterinarian and he was diagnosed with pneumonia, a major killer for young cubs. She took him home for the extra care he now required and to give him some company she also took little Kimmie along. Now I only had 2 babies to take care of, luckily after a few days little Aidie got better, and Ingrad brought him and Kimmie back. I was so happy to have all my babies with me again.

Little Aidie caught pneumonia, we put a jacket on him to keep him warm. With extra care and antibiotics he soon recovered.

On that same day two new volunteers arrived, Andrew and Jaquie from England. We introduced them to all the animals and had them take over the care for the older cubs, but Aiden and I continued the care for the babies.

Volunteers Andrew and Jaquie from England and Rob from Holland (who came later) with Linkie, the Labrador in the foreground. They learn to give bottles to the other cubs.

After a week we were taken by Ingrad to a white lion farm about one hour drive away. This farm had about 25 white lions, beautiful animals with a cream colored coat, who look bright white in moonlight. However, in nature this is a problem because lions are night time hunters, and white lions stand out too much to be able to stalk their prey unnoticed.. There are probably less than a 1000 white lions in the world. They are not albinos, but they have recessive genes, that cause the light coloration. The farmer had one young white lion, which was very cute and gentle, fun to play with.

Beautiful and rare white lions.

All the volunteers became involved in building a Jungle Gym for the 6 month old cubs, a job that took us about 6 days.

The volunteers built a Jungle Gym for the 6 month old cubs.

It took the cubs a while to figure it all out, but within a few days they clambered all over it.

We knew that the female tiger “Vickie” was pregnant and Aiden and I checked on her. In all the enclosures are stone huts where the animals can go for protection from the elements and to sleep at night. We noticed that she had 2 little cubs in the hut. When we told Ingrad, she named them Andrew and Jacqui, after our newest volunteers. Because it was very cold at night, the next day the cubs were removed. Mom was lured with some meat into a different enclosure, while Aiden took the babies out and placed them in a cardboard box. They were very small, approximately 1 kg (2 lbs) and approximately 30 cm long (1 ft), but with the full coloration of Bengal tigers. A full-grown adult male can weight as much as 350 kg (770 lbs).

It was too cold at night to leave the babies with their mom, so Aiden took them out

The baby tigers at 2 days old and then a week later.

A little calf was rejected by its mom. It was placed next to the tiger enclosure. Silly little thing would run away when I tried to bring it a bottle, but it was perfectly comfortable right next to a huge tiger.

After about 2 weeks Aiden’s time was up and he left to return to England. It was decided that since Jacqui and Andrew are not nighttime people, I would do all the night care for the babies and sleep with them, and they would do more of the day time care. The next day a new volunteer came in, a Dutchman named Rob. We introduced him to all the lions and the various jobs around Boskoppie.

It was full moon and for a few evenings, while it lit up the area, we went to the big lion enclosures. Those were great times to visit them, as the adults had deafening roaring contests,

and the youngsters were all roughhousing and playing with each other. The white lions looked like cuddly polar bears in the moonlight.

White lions do not do well in the wild. They stand out too much in the moon light.

But rolling in the mud after a good rain took care of that.

The remaining days were filled with more of the same, we took care of the little cubs, who were getting bigger, older, cuter, more independent and they did not need our full-time presence anymore (they were too big now for Apie to carry them into a tree), we fed all the animals and played with the older cubs, we cleaned the enclosures when it was needed, collected meat for the animals, made sure all the fences were safe and intact, the animals healthy and in good shape, took visitors on tours and rented out rooms to overnight guests.

After 3 weeks Jackie and Andrew had to go home, so only Rob and I were left. That day many people came for tours and we took turns taking them. On the last tour of the day Rob spotted a female lion in the distance with a cub. The next day Pieter took the cub out, we named it Robbie and it became part of the baby group. Robbie was very quiet and refused to eat for about 2 days. However the babies accepted him right away and soon he cuddled up with them. Finally on the 3 rd day he started to take the bottles and was cuddling with me as well. When the other cubs were found, this one must have been missed. It was bigger with a thicker coat than the others and it had been very well taken care of by its mom.

Little Robbie adjusted quick to the other babies,

it took a only a little longer with the humans.

One evening four 6 month old cubs were flown in from a private golf course. The owners had rented them from Ingrad several months ago and they returned them now. The cubs had been tranquilized and were still unconscious when they arrived. We placed them with our other older cubs and Rob kept watch for several hours, to make sure that the other lions would not attack them, while they were unable to defend themselves. They were very groggy when they woke up, walked around drunkenly and occasionally fell over.

Four 6 months old lions had been rented to a golf course and they were returned by truck. The drugs were not worn off when they arrived.

However, by the next morning they were fine and happy. They were very friendly and very well behaved.

Sadly enough after 3,5 weeks I had to give goodbye hugs to all my animal and human friends, it was time to go home. Rob would now be the only volunteer until a new one was going to come in several days.

It was really hard to leave my babies.

I rented a car and drove to Pretoria. The drive took about 4 hours due to all the road construction; about 1 hour out of the city I visited one of the colorful African craft markets.

By evening I drove to a backpacker’s hotel in Jo.burg near the airport to stay for 2 nights.

The next afternoon I took a tour of Johannesburg and Soweto, two places that have played a significant role in the apartheid history of South Africa. Downtown Jo.burg looks very modern from a distance with its tall office buildings. However a closer looks revealed that practically all of the buildings are only occupied at ground level, most of them are empty from the first floor up, victims of the end of the apartheid era.

Many white businesses left Johannesburg at the end of apartheid, leaving most of the office buildings empty above the first floor

In the late 80’s it became clear to most (white) businessmen that South Africa would get a black government. They were fearful that all their riches might be taken from them and it caused a major exodus out of the country to places like Australia, New Zealand and Canada, countries that welcomed the influx of money. The people of the nearby township of Soweto, with its current estimated black population of 4,5 million people, up to that time were 99 % employed by these businesses. The loss of their jobs has created a current estimated unemployment rate of 75 %. There are no unemployment benefits in South Africa, these people still had to feed their families and the end result was that Jo.burg now is known as the crime capital of the world. When we entered Soweto the tour guide pointed out the multitude of fancy high priced vehicles around, as well as many street side body shops. According to him a newly stolen vehicle will lose its old identity within an hour.

The slums of Soweto, where stolen vehicles get converted rapidly on the side of the road.

We drove into the only street in the world where 2 Nobel peace price winners used to live; Nelson Mandela’s small house where he lived before and after his 27 year imprisonment until shortly before he became South Africa’s first black president. Just one block away is the house where Bishop Desmond Tutu still lives today. Nelson Mandela also continues to live in Soweto, but now in a huge, heavily guarded mansion.

Market in Soweto. Nelson Mandela's house before and after his imprisonment until

shortly before he became the first black president of South Africa.

The middle of August I left Africa for a quick family visit in Holland and at the end of the month I returned to the USA.

2009 - South Africa; Cape Town penguin project.

2009-04-27T10:44:00.045-06:00

February 17, 2009 I left the USA for my adventure fix this year. The original plan was another big sail trip with “Reflections”, but that fell through just a few weeks before departure. So I decided to go to South Africa instead. After a few weeks in Europe to visit family and friends I arrived on March 12, 2009, in Cape Town, South Africa.

My childhood dream was to be a veterinarian, what of course never happened. But I had wanted for a long time to someday do work with wild life. Through the internet I found the organization AVIVA, which sets up volunteers with a wide variety of projects in South Africa. North of Cape Town in the suburb of Table View, AVIVA has a beautiful home set up especially for the volunteers that are involved in their projects in this area. Bedrooms are set up dormitary style. With most of the volunteers' ages being from 18 to 35 years, I was the grandmother in the place. There were some other "oldies", but they had left just before I came. However there was no issue of a "generation gap", we all got along just fine.

AVIVA house for volunteers in Table View.
One of the AVIVA projects is Home Of Hope, a center for abandoned and abused children;.

Charlotte, volunteer in House of Hope + another AVIVA orphanage Masagcine in Cape Town.
The other project is a rehabilitation center called SANCCOB for injured, sick or orphaned seabirds, which includes the African Penguin. I had signed on for 6 weeks with SANCCOB. 90 % of the actual animal work is done by international and/or local volunteers. There are a small number of paid staff, but only 2 of them work daily with the animals.

Following is a day in the life of a volunteer at SANCOBB:
We would start at 0800 with a quick little briefing and an assignment of the area where we would be working for the day.

The SANCCOB door sign and the assignment board.

Most of the time while I worked at SANCCOB, we had a fairly low number of animals, because recently no big disasters had happened. Cape of Good Hope is an infamous boating area and shipping disasters happen on a fairly frequent basis, with resulting damage to the environment and sealife. So during my stay the place was far from full (they can handle 2000 animals) and we volunteers only had 3 areas to deal with: ICU, PEN 1 and PEN 2. Regular staff took take of the aviary (birds that were able to fly and would be close to release) and Home Pen, where animals live that for various reasons can not be released. In ICU were the sicker animals that needed quite frequent care. These were mostly various sea birds, such as gulls, cormorants, etc. in which I do not have a big interest. I mostly worked in PEN 1, where we had several cormorants, and PEN 2, which has most of the penguins. My favorite area to work. These animals were on the road to recovery. The penguins were divided into 3 groups: the strongest ones are the 1-hour swimmers, then the 20-minute swimmers and finally the non-forced swimmers. As the name implied the 1-hour swimmers were placed in the swimming pool twice daily for a 1-hour swim.

The worksheet with swimming times and treatments. PEN 2.
Once in a while after these swims, their feathers were checked for dryness. A penguin coat is like a wetsuit, if it functions well, it will keep the animal perfectly warm, but when it does not, the animal in the wild is basically doomed. It can not swim, because it can not stay warm enough and therefore it can not feed itself. Once an animal was judged strong enough and its coat stayed perfectly dry below the top feathers, it would be released back into the wild. So at the beginning of the day, I would place the 1-hour swimmers in the pool right away. These stressed penguins will not eat and sometimes not drink. The ones that were dehydrated had a regular schedule for fluid administration. This consisted mostly out of placing a tube through their throat into their stomach and give them fluids with a large 60 cc syringe. Several of them had to have it done 3 x a day + some of them needed medication which we placed deep into their throats.

Dehydrated penguins get fluids administered per tube.

After the 1-hour swimmers were in the water for 40 minutes the 20-minute swimmers were added to the pool. Only a few animals would be left in the pen, these would be placed aside and we would quickly do a thorough cleaning of the pen. After the 1 hour was up, the non-forced swimmers (the weakest or youngest animals) went into the pool and the gate was opened. At this point any penguin that wanted to come back in was allowed to. The funny thing was that often the 1-hour swimmers were very anxious to come back in, but the non-forced swimmers loved to stay out and swim for quite a while.

Time for a swim in the pool. Many are in a hurry to come back in.
Next it was time for feeding. None of them would take fish voluntarily, so we had to take them between our knees, restraint them and forcefeed the fish. Penguins swallow fish whole, so once you had it in partially, they would usually swallow it the rest of the way. They do not have teeth, but they do have little spikes on their tongues facing inward, which helps them to hold onto the fish and push it inward. For the same reason, if the animal did not swallow the fish, you could never pull it back out; it would damage these spikes. We would wait for the animal to spit it out itself, which at times was quite a messy affair.

Volunteers Anika (Germany), Jennifer (USA) and I feeding fish to the penguins.
Penguins look very innocent, cute and sweet, but often this was far from the truth. Our penguins were wild animals that did not understand and appreciate all we were trying to do for them. So they tried to defend themselves with pecking and biting at us. Even though without teeth they could not cause severe injuries, we all ended up with some nice bruises and cuts from them, even though we wore neoprene armguards and one left-handed neoprene glove for protection. We kept the right hand uncovered to be able to insert fish, tubes or pills easily. Penguins have only one hole to discharge all of their bodily fluids, which could happen at any time. So we wore plastic suits to protect ourselves from their “guano” (a great fertilizer, by the way).
Some animals had wounds and cuts, which we treated several times a day. 3 of our penguins had either been attacked by sharks or seals and had huge cuts over their neck, belly and back. By the time I left I was happy to see that all had healed quite well. Because the ultimate goal for all of our animals was to return them to the wild, we did not want to “tame” them. So we did not pet them, and try to get them used to us. Also we did not name them. Each penguin had an impersonal number assigned to it, applied to an armband around its flipper.
A little problem that was caused by the current environment was “bumble” feet. Penguins are supposed to walk on sand or rocks, not on the flat ground and mats (for adequate cleaning), that we provided them with. So for the long-term birds it caused a sort of pressure sore on the bottom of their feet (called bumble feet), that we also had to treat several times a day.

The left penguin has a healing abdominal wound, possibly a shark or seal bite. Penguin on the right has a bumble foot (see the pink/brown area on the left flipper).
So our day consisted mostly out of giving fluids and medications 3 x daily, feed fish 2 x daily and letting them swim 2 x daily. In between we cleaned the pen and pool; all of this kept us quite busy. For a while we also had a cape gannet in PEN 2, a beautiful bird, but with a very powerful and big beak, which we treated with much respect. We were all happy the day he was released back into the wild.

After cleaning the PENS, we cleaned the pool. We had a healthy respect for the strong beak of the Cape gannet.
Together with PEN 2 we usually took care of PEN 1, where we had 6 cormorants, we had to do similar care with them as with the penguins, but catching them was usually a bigger challenge. With their long necks it was hard to avoid their pecking at our hands and arms. We placed them in a box with breathing holes for a short while when we cleaned their pen.

Cormorant in PEN 1. While we cleaned their PEN, they had to wait in boxes.
The majority of our penguins were the “African penguin”. As the name implies, they are found in Africa. They are quite small, approximately 1 to 1,5 foot (30 to 50 cm. high) and they weigh approx. 3 a 5 kg. Everyone knows that penguins are found in Antarctica, but many also live in the lands surrounding Antarctica, such as Chile, South Africa and New Zealand. The African penguins have had a sharp decline in numbers, a 100 years ago 2 million lived in South Africa, at the present there are only about 26.000 breeding pairs left. SANCCOB's goal is to save these cute creatures from extinction.

Penguins live in Antarctica + in the countries surrounding it.
Their appearance goes through quite a few changes during their life time. As a baby they are very fluffy, and not waterproof . Next they become a youngster “Blue Penguin”, then a "Juvenile" and finally an "adult". Adults have the most clear and pronounced "tuxedo" markings.

The small chick in the left picture has fluffy, non-waterproof feathers. In the right picture on left is an adult, 2nd is a young "blue" penguin, the 2 on right are juveniles, they do not have pronounced markings and a dirty-yellow belly.
During my first week at SANCOBB, we did get a “foreigner” in. A Macaroni penguin, that normally only lives in Antarctica. How did it get here? We did not know, but a theory was, that sailors had picked it up in Antarctica. Upon getting close to Africa, where they were not allowed to have it on board, they probably released it. This one did get a name "Mac". At first I did not think that Mac was going to survive. He was extremely stressed; he would just stand in a corner and seemed to be gasping for air. On top of that he was moulding. Penguins mould once a year for a period of 3 weeks and between different stages of growing up. During this period they change their feathers and they are not waterproof. They can not swim and feed themselves. Usually they eat a lot before moulding starts, so they can live off their fat during this time.
Slowly Mac came around, he finished moulding and he started to improve. Because Mac can not be released into the African penguin colonies, and we can not bring him back to Antarctica, it was decided that he would stay at SANCCOB. Therefore he was an exception to the non-befriending and no-name rule. We also did not force feed/fluid him, but we offered him the fish by hand.

Mac in the middle of his moulding. He has his nice new coat and accepts fish from us.
Max after a while, became very tame with people. He allowed us to pet him and would start preening when approached. On the other hand, he did not allow the African penguins to get too close. After he had finished moulding and he was doing much better, he was placed in “home pen”. Home Pen is a separate section at SANCOBB where birds and penguins, which for some reason can not be released into the wild, can live out their lives in a natural looking environment. Here Max appeared to be befriending “Rocky”, a rock hopper penguin, who also was a stray from Antarctica.

Mac has become very friendly with humans. Rocky (L) and Mac (R) in home PEN.
Home PEN is taken care of by one of the regular staff members, Lana, a job I would love to have. When the penguins see her, they start running to her, because they know she will have fish for them. She does not need to tube or force feed them, they eat straight out of her hands.

Another oddball lives in Home Pen, “Fluffy” an arrested moulder. When Fluffy moulded, he for some reason got stuck in that phase, and never grew a normal coat. This also means that Fluffy can get cold quite easily, and just like humans, needs some extra protection on cool days.

Fluffy in Home PEN needs a sweater on cold days.

Fluffy is "an arrested moulder"; he got stuck in the moulding stage and is not waterproof so he needs a sweater on cold days.

While I was there, we received 2 other “visitors” from Antarctica, 2 giant petrels. Very large birds, luckily very shy and they never did try to bite us. However, they do not last long in captivity. After the first one unexpectedly died, we set the 2nd one free, as soon as he seemed strong enough.

The giant petrels also came from Antarctica. They don't survive long in captivity.

Besides rehabilitation and conservation SANCOBB also does education for the local population, and tours can be booked at the facility. For the school children Rocky is the star of the show, because he is so friendly and he does not bite. He has the run of the whole place, including our coffee room.

Rocky is very popular and he is good for education. He goes all over the place, including our coffee room.

Bobby, the cormorant, also lives permanently at SANCOBB, he flies all over the place and at times interferes with our work. He, however, is not as friendly and will pick at us. However we can make him happy by giving him some fish tails.

Bobby, the cormorant, lives permanent at SANCCOB, He flies all over the place.

SANCOBB has a veterinarian on staff, who checks the animals frequently and takes care of their problems.

The veterinarian treats the animals. The gull does well with the leg splint.

Once a week all the animals get their weight taken and staff member Priscilla draws blood so they can be checked for parasites or diseases.

On Mondays we check the weight of all the animals and Priscilla draws blood.
In my last week at SANCOBB big changes happened. There was a 13 mile (20 km) oil spill in the neighboring country of Namibia. The facility there could not adequately care for all the affected animals and 129 penguins were trucked to us. They arrived at 3:00 pm after a 1300 km (800 mile) 20 hour drive on a large flatbed truck in cardboard boxes.

The Namibian penguins have arrived. The volunteers are ready for them.
Many local volunteers came to help, reporters and tv were on scene and we all worked frantically to get all these birds numbered, recorded, medicated, hydrated and fed.
Luckily apparently most of the oil was already removed from their skins, but they had gone through a lot of stress. After a quick swim the work was done for that day by 7 pm.
Each box contains 3 penguins, hungry but in pretty good shape. The new penguins get medicated, fluids and fish.

Finally they get to go for a swim and then into the PEN for a well-deserved rest.

But now instead of caring for 20 penguins, we had 160 to take care of. But many local volunteers have been helping and so all has gone well so far. 2 of the new penguins have died in the meanwhile and autopsy showed severe internal trauma, probably sustained during the long drive. Luckily no other birds were affected.
April 24 was my last day and I was sorry to say goodbye to my cute tuxedoed friends and staff and volunteers at SANCOBB.

Volunteers Elizabeth, Alex, Lacy, Breanne and staffmember Lana.

Because most of the time it was not that busy at SANCOBB we only worked about 3 or 4 days a week, so there was plenty of time for other things.

AVIVA organized many things, including braais (BBQ's) and several tours for their volunteers.
During the “Cape Tour” we were shown all the beautiful and interesting areas around the Cape area. We saw some of the famous beaches flanked by the 12 Apostel Mountains.

AVIVA takes the volunteers around with their van. Camps beach in Cape Town.

We took a boat ride out to a seal island and of course we had to see Cape of Good Hope, the infamous point that boats have to try to safely get around. The trees reflect the prevailing winds.
Cape of Good Hope, the most south-western point of Africa, where the trees get shaped by prevailing winds.

Along the way a baboon visited a car and ostriches were running along the road.

The baboon was comfortable and refused to leave. Ostrich running on the side of the road.

Probably everybody’s favorite was the visit to Boulders Beach where the African Penguins have a large colony and you can wander near them on a board walk.

Boulder Beach has an easy accessible, large penguin colony.

A week later AVIVA took us on a “wine tour”. North of Cape Town are major grape growing areas with many wineries, several are in stunning surroundings. It was very appropriate that it happened to be right on my birthday.
Too bad that I am not much of a wine lover, so I did not appreciate many of the wines we got to taste, but I enjoyed seeing all the beautiful areas.

The wineries north of Cape Town.
That same night we went with a group of our volunteers to a cultural African restaurant with live music. Together with a piece of cake it sure made my birthday memorable.

I had a birthday dinner in a typical African restaurant with live music.

Later we went on the “Cultural Tour” , which showed us more of Cape Town itself. The downtown part is pleasant and very western looking.

Downtown Cape Town is very western.
However most of the white-owned houses are behind stone walls and iron gates, with signs cautioning that the place is protected by armed security.

Most of the white-owned houses are behind fences with strong, metal gates.
The tour included the ugly side of South Africa. During the days of Apartheid many areas in the towns were determined to be "whites-only" and the blacks or “coloreds” who lived there were simply evicted and their houses destroyed. We visited “District 6” near downtown Cape Town, where 60.000 non-white people were simply uprooted and kicked out. Their houses were bulldozed down. For various political reasons the area was never rebuild and still exists now as a overgrown dirt area.

The former District 6 ("Zonnebloem"). A museum displays the old streetsigns and many stories and pictures of life in the former neighborhood.

These people set up shanty towns around the outskirts of cities. Furthermore, many other people have been lured to the big cities with their promises of jobs and money and they also ended up in these “townships”, a very fancy name for crowded areas full of corrugated shacks. The local residents have extended power lines into their areas with thin poles and branches, there are no good facilities and porta-potties are all around the outskirts. These townships apparently can be found around many of the South African towns. They are also areas of huge unemployment and high crime. We were taken into 2 of the townships: Langa and Kayeletisha and we visited some of the projects that aim to educate, to increase employment and to better the township people’s lives. Even though Apartheid ended about 15 years ago, it does not seem that life in South Africa has improved a lot for the many of the non-whites.

Shacks in the townships. One of the projects to teach local women weaving.
Continuing in the Apartheid era history and the atrocities that were committed, I took a trip by boat to visit Robben Island, the place where many political prisoners, including South Africa’s former president Nelson Mandela were imprisoned

Robben Island lies off-shore from Cape Town. During the Apartheid era it was a maximum security prison, where besides common criminals many political prisoners were held.

It was quite impressive. By bus we were taken around the sights on the island. The tour of the prison itself was conducted by a former prisoner, who had spent here 10 years. We asked him why he was doing this. The answer was simple: "I needed a job". We were told stories of what life was like for the prisoners and the forced labor they had to do in a limestone quarry.

A former prisoner showed us around. Forced labor was done in this limestone quarry.

Of course we saw the maximum security prison with large dormitories and the solitary prison cell, in which Nelson Mandela spend 18 of his 27 years as a political prisoner. Pictures show many others of the Apartheid freedom fighters.

President Nelson Mandela's prison cell, it did not have a toilet, a "honey bucket" took care of that. There were many political prisoners.

Robben Island is off shore from Cape Town with great views of its landmark Table Mountain.
It does not seem very far, but the waters are very cold with powerful currents and sharks. Hardly any prisoners were able to escape alive.

Views on Cape Town with Table Mountain towering over it.
With a group of the volunteers we went “Shark Cage Diving”, in other words; have a very close eye-to-eye encounter with the infamous Great White Shark. We were picked up at about 4;00 am for the 2 hour drive along the coast to Gans Baai.

A few miles off-shore is Dyer Island with big colonies of seals and penguins, which is a major food source for the great white. So we were loaded on a boat and motored to near this island
A metal cage was lowered next to the boat, a fishy liquid was poured into the water to attract the sharks and we struggled to get our bodies into heavy wetsuits (the water is very cold in this area). 5 people could get into the cage at one time with a snorkeling mask on their face.

We were taken by boat to "shark alley", where a large metal cage was placed on the sde of the boat.
The staff would throw a large fish head connected to a rope into the water and gave a yell; “DOWN” each time a shark came near. We would then stick our heads under water and see the shark swim by the cage. The first time the shark was too quick, and grabbed the fish head before staff could pull it back. It was very interesting to see these scary creatures so close by, being in the cage felt quite secure, we had no fear that he could get to us. The weather was beautiful, the ocean calm and we never totally agreed on the number of sightings we had, but there were many.

5 people could sit in the cage and watch the sharks underwater close up.

We stayed for several hours, then we spent a little while seeing the seals, before returning to Gans Baai. It was evening before we were back in Table View.
The seals and penguins on Dyer Island attract the sharks. Life is better at the top of the food chain.

I did a few more visits to Cape Town, either alone or with other volunteers. I roamed around the city and I visited the beautiful and busy waterfront full of shops, restaurants and street entertainment.

Cape Town's waterfront. Beautiful painted ostrich eggs are on sale.

I also took a cable car ride up to the top of Table Mountain together with Suzanne, a Dutch volunteer.

(Photo Jennifer Quinn)
The cablecar to the top of Table Mountain.

where we hiked around the flat top for a few hours and admired the views.

Views from the top of Table Mountain.
I had plenty of time left over, which made that I could fulfill another long-time dream; to learn paragliding. It turned out that there was a paragliding school just a few minutes walk from where I am staying. “Birdmen” Paragliding is owned and operated by Barry, who has a huge amount of patience to put up with me.

Barry, the owner of Birdman Paragliding, taught me the skills of paragliding.

I started out with ground handling on a nearby beach, where I learned how to deal with the parachute and how to run in order to get it into the air. The same day we drove twice to a nearby hill to fly, but each time it was just too windy to get up. But the next day it was good and I flew right away all by myself. So from then on any of my spare time here has been spent flying whenever the weather has been suitable. We have gone to a couple of different areas. Occasionally I do have some tense moments and I still need improvement on my take-offs and landings. I sure do not look like an eagle in the sky, more like a duck, but nevertheless I think that it is a great experience and I've been loving every moment of it.

First I had to learn how to run properly with the parachute, then the take-off.
It's great to soar like a "Duck".
Today May 3rd I finalized all my paragliding requirement after a great sunny weekend of flying. And so I qualified to get my glider license!!!!

Most of the time the weather here in Cape Town has been very pleasant, sunny and warm, but not hot. Now however it is late Fall here and this week the weather has cooled down considerably and it has been quite rainy. Apparently that is what the winter is like around here, so it is a good time to move on.
On May 4th I will leave Cape Town and I will go to a different area of South Africa for a new animal project to work at. That story will be in the next blog.

Traveling through S.E. Asia.

2007-09-04T22:29:00.000-06:00

Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia trip.
Jan. 10, 2007.

My friend Michelle left today, back to the USA after we traveled together for 7 weeks through Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia. It was an interesting, fun, sad, and an eye opening trip for both of us.
We flew Nov. 20 from L.A. to Bangkok in a time-span of 23 hours, which included a lay-over of 4 hours in Taiwan. We lost a day of our lives in the process, but we’ll get it back in the end, so no worries about thatWe spent the first 10 days in Thailand. Michelle was quite surprised when Thailand ended up not being quite the poor, third world country that she had expected. Especially not Bangkok, with its brand-new airport, tall modern buildings and its excellent road system. We spent a few days in Bangkok, while waiting for our visas for Laos and Vietnam to get ready. We stayed near Khao San Rd; it is Bangkok’s backpacker ghetto, but a convenient place to start. It is full of cheap guesthouses, restaurants and all the stores you need to buy those last minute trip supplies. It was fun to take a boat over the river and visit the gorgeous royal Palace.
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A comfortable overnight bus brought us to northwest Thailand, where we went trekking for a few days in the area of Umphang, right next to the Burmese border.

To get to the specific area we had to take a 5 hour songthaew ride, which is a small pickup truck with 2 benches in the back, which will not leave until it is totally overloaded with people.

In Umphang we floated for 5 hours on a raft down a very pretty river, followed by a 3 hours uphill hike through bamboo forest. The first night we camped out in a tent, with all the camping equipment provided by the trekking company. By western standards it was pretty substandard, so we did not have the most comfortable night. The next day we ended up visiting a gorgeous waterfall.

We then hiked for 3 hours to a hill tribe village of the Karen people, where we spent the night in a home stay in one of the bamboo stilt houses.

Next to the village was another pretty waterfall with a great pool for swimming and some caves. The village was quite interesting to wander around in. On the third day elephants were supposed to give us a ride out. Two persons per elephant rode in a basket on its back. Michelle and I sat on the biggest and the oldest elephant, a grand old guy of 50 years old, who was in no hurry whatsoever to go up and down the steep trails. He kept the driver very busy in trying to keep him moving. After two hours Michelle and I felt sorry for the elephant and we walked the rest of the way, which then caused the elephant to pick up the pace a bit. We only had to use him again to help us cross a rather wide river.

Leaving the area again by songthaew became quite the experience. Of course it was full (which should be 12 people, but is always more) as we left, rather overfull, so Michelle, I and another Westerner climbed on the roof, much more comfortable than being cramped inside. Along the way we passed another full songthaew with engine problems. What do you do???? Make space and load up those people as well. I counted at least 30 people traveling like sardines on this little truck.
We also got more company on the roof, Burmese refugees, who told us a bit about their lives. Burma has been living under a military dictatorship for many years now, after they placed the democratically chosen leader under house arrest. All along the border on the Thai side are huge Burmese refugee camps; some of them contain as many as 50.000 people. Even though Thailand allows them to stay there, they have no freedom to go outside the camps. For any sort of travel they need a special pass.

The next country we visited was Laos. A very poor country that only recently opened its borders for foreign visitors. The mighty Mekong River flows right through it and for a big part forms the border with Thailand.

We hired a long-tail (outboard engine with a very long propeller shaft) wooden boat together with 2 French travelers. We boated down the Mekong River, which is very pretty in this area. It is not very wide with interesting shores, and frequent small islands and rocks in the river bed. After about an hour we turned north and went upstream onto the Namtza River (a tributary). What a gorgeous trip it was. Cultivated land and forests, many small villages with stilt houses, fishermen, children and water buffaloes along the shore. Everybody seemed very friendly, everybody was waving, after a while you felt like the queen of England.

This trip was UPSTREAM against a strong current and through class I and II rapids. Before this trip Michelle and I had done many a whitewater rafting trip together, but always DOWNSTREAM!!! The night was spent in a village at the midway point in a stilt house.

It was a national holiday for Laos, and the teenagers were singing and dancing around the village, trying to make us drink their strong and foul-tasting rice whiskey. This evening the boatman informed us nicely that the river was too shallow to continue and that he would drop us at a nearby village with road/bus access in the morning. That was not the deal we had made, and so we protested. He compromised by finding us a boatman with a smaller boat that was willing to take us further upstream. The next day we found out that he had not lied to us. The river was indeed shallow, sometimes less than knee deep, narrower and a lot more rapids and rocks in the way.
The boatman was in the stern with the engine, but in the bow stood 2 helpers with paddles and long bamboo poles. They sure earned their keep in pushing the boat out of the way of all the rocks and obstacles.It was fascinating to watch them work.

We arrived safe and sound in the town of Muang Namtza, where we hired a guide to take us hiking through the jungle to an Akha hill tribe village.

The hike was gorgeous, but because it had rained the night before, it was in places very muddy and slippery with lots of leeches trying to dine on us, some of them rather successfully.

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The people were welcoming and friendly and we ended up having great interaction with them through the use of the digital camera. They loved having their picture taken and then seeing themselves on the little screen.

The village was very interesting; women were coming back from the fields with baskets full of food or firewood on their back.An ironsmith was making a machete, pigs, chickens, goats and dogs were all living below the stilt thatch-roofed house.
Little kids were taking care of the littler kids and carrying the babies on their backs.

The hill tribes love to chew on betel nuts, which discolor their mouths and teeth red and black, which takes away much from their otherwise attractive appearance

An unlucky chicken was sacrificed for our dinner and 3, very young, girls came, fully dressed in their traditional outfits in the evening to give us the worst and the roughest massage we’ve ever had. But they were so cute; you just had to adore them.

By bus and after visiting a few small towns, we circled back to the Mekong River, where we took a wooden speed boat back to the same town as where we had initially entered Laos.
From here we took a much larger tourist boat for a 2 day trip down the beautiful Mekong River

to the historical city of Luang Prabang, the major tourist attraction for most visitors to Laos. It is a nice city.
We were fascinated by tons of young monks walking down the street in their orange robes carrying umbrellas. They did not seem to mind having their picture taken, but none were willing to stop for it. So we almost felt like paparazzi, trying to keep shooting to get the one perfect shot that was not blurred by their motion.
Luang Prabang had the best handicraft night market I’ve ever seen. The area specializes in silk weaving and they make just the most beautiful things. Michelle was spending half her budget buying clothes and home decorations.
The city is quite nice and 3 days were spent in no time. The road took us south through gorgeous mountains with cute little road side villages, consisting of bamboo or wooden stilt houses with thatch roofs. We got to the area of VangVieng, which lays in the middle of beautiful karst (rock) hills. The town itself is trying to be a tourist center and to cater to the western tourist, which is a disaster. S.E.Asian food is excellent, but their version of western food is a sad imitation. However the scenery around the town is stunning. The first day we kayaked down the river, took an inner tube into a 200 meter (600 feet) deep tunnel cave and played around on a flying fox. Great fun. The next day we hired a local guide and went motorcycling around the area. The hills are full of caves, but the guide took us to a village that never sees visitors and a few village men took us through the rice paddies and jungle to a gorgeous cave. They made a bamboo torch to light our way, which created a great effect.
By van we traveled south to the small, peaceful capital city of Vientiane. The Mekong River was very wide here and not nearly as interesting looking. Vientiane also had a small and very quiet airport, from where we took a one hour plane ride to Hanoi City in Vietnam.
The contrast could have hardly been bigger. Hanoi city is large, noisy and extremely busy. Motorcycles everywhere.

If they are not driving down the road, then they are parked on the sidewalks, blocking it and so forcing pedestrians to walk on the street. Crossing the road is a whole new ball game. There is no way that you can wait for an opening in the traffic, it just won’t happen. So you cross the streets the way the locals do. You slowly and steady start walking across. Due to the huge volume of traffic, everything goes slow, and the motorcycles and cars will work their way around you. It is very freaky in the beginning, but it is effective and we soon got used to it. We stayed in the old quarter of town, a very interesting area. Each street caters to a certain product. So you just figure out what you want to buy and then you go to that particular street, where practically every store sells that type of product. Silk Street was the most interesting to us. Smack in the middle of this super busy area is a pretty and peaceful lake, a great place to wander around in the evening. There was a street show with excellent acrobats and a little theater had a cute water puppet show for the grand price of $ 1,25, which included a little paper fan. Neither Michelle nor I are city lovers, but with all its craziness, we liked Hanoi City.
We took a bus north to Halong City. The houses in North Vietnam are quite unique. In the old days property taxes were assessed according to the width of the building. As a result all the houses are very narrow, maybe about 3 meters (12 feet) wide and they are mostly 3 story buildings. In contrast they are very long towards the back. The fronts are beautiful, very nicely decorated with open patios in various bright colors. The huge sides are plain concrete with none or just little windows. In Halong City we organized a trip into Halong Bay, an absolutely amazing area, which is dotted with approximately 3000 islands.
Most of them are just karsts, granite rocks sticking up from the water in beautiful formations with many large caves. A tour boat took us around these islands and into one of the large caves and dropped us off at one of the few inhabited islands, the island of Cat Ba. Cat Ba has one small-sized town and some small villages, lots of caves and a national park. We ended up hiking to some of the beaches; a walking path was built all along the sea, and we climbed to a high peak along a narrow jungle trail with a great view of the surrounding area.

The next day we hired motor cycles and drove all around the peaceful island and visited Hospital Cave where the communist rebels under Ho Chi Min had a hide-out from the Americans.

The third day we hired kayaks for a day and paddled to some of the islands, beaches and to a floating village with fish farms.
We were very lucky; it was winter in this area, but we had gorgeous weather with temperatures around 22 C (72 F).
We ended up back in Hanoi City on Dec. 24, Christmas Eve. Even though communist systems shy away from religion, and even though Vietnam used to be mostly Buddhist, Christmas eve was celebrated with a humongous crowd of people circling around the, normally so quiet, lake. The management of our guesthouse had organized a little party with snacks and booze, which was an escape from the madhouse outside.

Christmas Day was spent on the train from Hanoi to Hoi An, a 16 hour ride. Choices were hard or soft seats, hard of soft beds. The bed compartments had 3 levels. Michelle and I said: “Oh, 3rd level will be o.k.” Luckily the girl that arranged our tickets ignored us. All that was available were hard beds and she placed us on the 2nd level. They were bunk beds, 6 to a compartment with 3 cm. (1 inch) thick pads, not enough head room to sit up, but the 3rd level had hardly any space at all and was too high to be able to look out the window.

The train was old and noisy, but overall it was not a bad ride.
Hoi An is an historical town in the center of Vietnam, a very pleasant place with a river flowing through it, high school students have to cross it with the local ferry, and old-style traditional yellow-colored houses.
It is a town filled with dress maker shops. They display examples of their work, but everything is made to size, a great place to buy tailor-made clothing for a fraction of what it would cost in the west.

Instead of another 16 hour train ride, we spent $ 12 extra and bought ourselves a one-hour plane flight to Ho Chi Min City (formerly Saigon). Another mad house, so much traffic and so much pollution, that it gave me a sinus infection. However, the restaurants had excellent food, even though all the food in Asia had been great and Vietnamese is our favorite anyway. Vietnamese food has all the great flavors, but not the extreme hot spiciness that Thai food has. Of course, being in Vietnam, you can’t help but think about the American-Vietnamese Wars. Occasionally we had conversations about it with the locals. Contrary to Michelle’s expectations, there seemed to be no grudges towards Americans at all, and we only experienced friendliness and helpful attitudes. A museum is dedicated to the war: “War Remnants Museum” and we spend an afternoon there. It had helicopters, planes, weapons, etc. There were many pictures that had circulated in magazines and papers in the west, but also pictures with the physical disfigurements due to Napalm and Agent Orange. Some of the jails and torture apparatus were on display.
In the city a striking after-effect of the war are the Pedi-cabs. Many of these are operated by former professionals, doctors, teachers, etc. The communists did not allow them to practice their professions anymore, many were send to “re-education camps” a misnomer for slave-labor camps and now they only have their Pedi-cabs to try to eke out a living. Many have no place to live, so they sleep on the seat behind their bikes at night along the street.
From Ho Chi Minh City we traveled west into the Mekong Delta. A vast plain of waterways, rice paddies and river towns. We went to the town of Vinh Long, where we arranged a 2 day boat trip to An Binh Island. It was just Michelle and I + a female guide on the long-tail boat. It took us to one of the floating markets, although either it was very small or almost finished by the time we got there. On the island are many little factories where all kinds of local products are made, coconut candy and coconut wood ware, rice paper and cakes, noodles, bonsai trees, etc. etc. She took us on a tour of several of these factories and they were actually very interesting.

The island is criss-crossed by paths and small roads and we took an hour bike ride around them, followed by one and half hour boat ride through very narrow channels. The small boats are rowed standing up with the oars crossed.
Even though Michelle and I are used to rowing our own boats, this was such a different technique, that we were hardly able to keep a straight line, which the locals found hilarious.

We spent the night in a nice guesthouse, and the next morning visited the local cement factories. The bricks are baked in huge kilns, with fires fed with rice husks; the ashes then make perfect fertilizer for the rice fields. Talk about recycling! Poor people though that have to spend their working lives in the heat and smoke of these factories.
The next Mekong Delta town we visited was Can Tho. We arrived here on the evening of Dec. 31. Vinh Long and Can Tho both have beautiful waterfronts along the river with nice restaurants and bars. We spent our New Year’s Eve spoiling ourselves with an excellent Vietnamese dinner in a gorgeous river side restaurant. The next morning we hired a long-tail boat to take us to the floating markets. It was an all-day affair with a very early start. The markets were absolutely fabulous. All the little wooden boats filled with fruits, vegetables and other products floating around. Our boatman planted his boat in the middle of it, and we just stood there gaping at the sights and taking a million pictures.

For lunch he floated us into a small side canal, where we ate in the gazebo of a nice restaurant. Upstairs a group of Vietnamese people were celebrating the New Year with Karaoke. When Michelle and I investigated where the music and singing came from, we were pulled in to their party and had several toasts with them, before we could wrestle ourselves away. The Mekong delta is subject to tides and after lunch the water was high enough to boat through the local country side.
We finished the Mekong Delta visit in the border town of Chau Doc, probably our least favorite town; it had a large local market selling lots of raw fish and meat, talk about bad smells!!!

A speed boat with about 10 people took us via the 4 km wide Mekong River over the border to the Cambodian capital city of Phnom Peng. Cambodia was subject to the horrors of the killing fields by the Khmer Rouge in the 70’s and even after their overthrow it had a lot of political instability until the late 90’s. It has only recently opened to foreign visitors (just like Laos). Although Phnom Peng is a pretty city with a lot of beautiful buildings, palaces, temples, monuments, and a nice water front, the poverty and horrors of war are much more evident here than anywhere else. We saw practically no beggars in Thailand and Laos, more so in Vietnam. But here there were so many, often with missing limbs or terribly disfigured as a result of the wars and the remaining landmines. In this country you are warned never to go off the beaten track, there are still thousands of landmines buried, especially in the border regions. It will take many more years before they are all cleaned up and in the meanwhile they still claim about 800 victims per year.

A local restaurant played documentaries of the land mine problems and the years with the Khmer Rough, films made by the French restaurant owner. They were very thought provoking. To bring it all more home to us, we visited the genocide museum “Tuol Sleng”. It is in 4 formerly high school buildings that were made into a prison, torture and death chambers by the Khmer Rouge.

It is estimated that 2 million out of a population of 8 million were murdered by the Khmer Rouge between 1975 and 1979. In 2001 I visited Auswitz in Poland; this place was very reminiscent of it. Humans conflict terrible deeds in the name of ideology and religion!

On a much happier note, we visited the national museum, which displays many of the items found in the country’s biggest treasure: the ancient temples and cities of “Angkor Wat”. We reached Angkor Wat by traveling by bus to the town of Siem Reap, where we rented bikes, which was a great way to go around the ruins. We’ve heard stories of people spending 3 weeks exploring these ruins, but we were happy with just one day, and with only seeing the major highlights. Angkor Wat itself is a huge temple, absolutely amazing, but what thrilled us more were all the huge stone faces of “Bayon”

and the jungle overgrown temple of Ta Prohm, used in the movie “Raiders of the Lost Arc”. A picture tells a 1000 words, so no sense trying to describe the scene.
Angkor Wat made for a long and busy day, and we rewarded ourselves the next day by doing practically nothing, relaxing, reading, and down loading pictures onto the computer.

We boated for a day south on a river with many floating villages, including a "float-in" church, where a service was in session as we passed.

Which brought us to Battambang, our final town in Cambodia.

The next morning we shared a taxi with 4 locals (regular sized vehicle) + the driver to the Cambodian/Thai border. We then spend the fortune of $ 1,25 on the 5 hour train ride back to Bangkok, where we ended up back full-circle in the backpacker’s ghetto of Khao San Road. Michelle found a way here to convert her left-over Baht (the Thai currency) into Thai products and now she is on the plane on her way back to Colorado.

I am writing this story in the house of a friend of mine in Phuket in the south of Thailand after an all-night bus ride. Tomorrow I will catch a plane to Aceh, Indonesia, where I will visit my tsunami friends for 5 days, then I will go for a few more days to Langkawi, Malaysia, before I will come back here.
The beginning of February I will become a member of a sail boat crew and the 6 of us will sail from Phuket to Greece, where we expect to arrive by April.

I will try to write stories of the sail trip and place them on this web site, whenever I can.

Final trip through Turkey,Switzerland,Holland,England and Ireland.

2007-08-27T08:54:00.001-06:00

Max wanted to see some of the interesting places of Turkey, so we rented a car for a few days. First we drove to the ancient city of Efesus, a place mentioned in the bible. In its heyday it was one of the world’s wonders.

The Turks, with the aid of many Western organizations, have done some nice restoration work, especially on the ancient library

and the theater.

The Efesus people had an awareness of sanitation issues. The communal toilets had water running below them, which was discharged into the sea far from the town.

On the way north along the Western coast, was an island with an old monastery, where supposedly Mary, mother of Jesus, is buried.

Final place on our Turkish tour was Troy. The ancient city that was besieged by the Greeks for 10 years, of course only ruins are left now

And a really hokey horse replaces the wooden horse the Trojan people were fooled with.

Finally Max and I said our goodbyes, as he drove back to Marmaris and I took a ferry/bus to Istanbul.

I had a day to roam around this fascinating city. One of the top sights is the Blue Mosque

and of course I had to go shopping in the Grand Bazaar.

On July 21 I took a plane to Switzerland to visit friends. First I stayed a few days in Basel with my friends Dani and Monika, and then I took the train to Southern Switzerland, where friends Hasi and Monika were just enjoying their vacation. I joined them

on some great hikes and bike rides through the Swiss Alps. Colorado is often called the “Switzerland of America”, but it can not match the intense green color of the Swiss mountains.

On 30 July I took the train to Holland, where I first spent several days with my oldest brother Henny, his wife Leny and their family.

Later I moved on to my younger brother Joop and his wife Simone. Of course during those visits I saw a lot of my nieces and nephews

including the 2 latest additions to the family, my grand nephew Sem(2) and grand niece Resy.(4).

I still have several friends in Holland as well, so a few weeks were spent visiting and socializing with everyone. They all whined and dined me and treated me like royalty. In between I found a little bit of time to roam around the Amsterdam canals.

I left Holland again on August 16 and flew to England, where I rented a car and toured some of the major sights, such as: The Windsor castle,

the mysterious boulders at Stonehenge,

and the beautiful city of Bath

I went to visit my friends Julie and Kenny. Julie was just involved in a run against an old steam train. I got to ride the old historical train

while she struggled to try to beat it (she almost did).

After 6 days I flew on to Ireland, to visit some more friends. I took a bus tour to see the sights of Dublin. But I had hardly slept the night before and I fell asleep on the bus. Only during its third circle through the city did I wake up enough to look around me.

I only stayed one day, just enough to see my buddies and go for a nice dinner with them. On August 22 I flew back to the USA. The end of a great adventure.

Turkey-Greek Islands-Turkey

2007-07-14T09:19:00.000-06:00

The last leg of the trip started in Marmaris,

Turkey

. It took us through the Greek islands for 6 weeks, before returning to Marmaris, where our boat journey ended.

We left the busy Turkish town of Marmaris on May 31, with the plan to go to Rhodes Island, The wind was fairly strong, but it blew us in the right direction. However when we arrived in Rhodes, the local port was very full and we could not find a suitable place to anchor.

So we decided to turn back north. We ended up finding a very cute, protected little bay at the end of a Turkish peninsula, called Bozuk Buku. Several sailboats were anchored here. We were able to tie up to the dock of one of the taverns with the help of the proprietors.

A cute local girl came by in her boat, trying to charm Max into buying her goods.

It is simple in Turkey with restaurants in isolated places. If you eat a meal in their place, you are welcome to spend the night on their property and use their facilities. Fair enough. The meal was good, the people extremely nice and we decided that we liked it here better than in the tourist trap of Rhodes anyway.

Pictures of Ataturk, “father of Turkey” can be seen all over Turkey and one decorated this restaurant.

A full moon shining over “Reflections” made for a great picture.

The next morning the wind was favorable for a heading to the Greek island of Simi, it was only 12 nautical miles away and we reached it in 2,5 hours. The town of Simi was gorgeous with its pastel colored houses on the hill side and its cute little harbor,

Surrounded by taverns and shops selling real sea sponges.

I wandered all over the place and climbed the many steps to the village above

for some terrific views,

while Max occupied himself with manly matters, such as dealing with immigration issues, filling up the diesel tanks and taking a nap.

Nisiros was the next island we landed. It did not get a lot of tourism. The little village with its cute little white houses was just a little walk from the little harbor, where a few little restaurants served little gyros, the Greek national dish.

It was 8 hours of motoring (no wind) to the island of Astipalaia, where we anchored in a lonely bay. There were just a few houses on the shore and goats with bells around their necks, which succeeded in keeping me awake at night.

We reached the island of Amorgos after a 6 hours trip. A great little port surrounded by square, blindingly white, houses.

Here in the Mediterranean Sea, boats are tied to the pier “Mediterranean style”, which means that you throw a bow anchor into the water, then you back the boat against the pier and tie it by the stern.

It is an efficient method to be able to place many boats in a relatively small area, but it is very difficult to accomplish for boaters, especially if you are not used to it. There was a fairly strong wind, which kept trying to blow us all the way onto the pier and we had to place several fenders to protect the boat. For safety we dropped an extra bow anchor. However, the next morning a strong wind gust turned the boat partially side ways and then blew it hard into the pier. Of course, according to Murphy’s Law, it had to hit on a corner, just where there was no fender and it did cause some damage to the fiberglass of the boat. The original plan had been to spend a day exploring the island, but after this incident Max quickly slapped some putty on the area and he just wanted to leave the place.

The next island, Paros, became a base for a longer stay in the islands. It had 2 port towns; Parikia and Naoussa. We decided to stay in Naoussa. It was small, but very pretty with its bright white houses

and extremely cute little fishing harbor,

which was protected by an old fort.

A local man, Janie, acted as harbormaster, he gave information and assistance to all the visiting boats and he was quite skillful in catching squid.

The village was just adorable with its maze of slated tiny streets and alleys,

nice waterfront,

little stores and outdoor restaurants.

We felt quite safe and secure in the area, especially with geese acting as guards and attacking whoever came near. It was very risky taking pictures of them.

Of course, as usual there were some repairs to be done. Max fixed the damaged stern,

while I did some work on the sails.

We rented a car to explore the island,

The island was quite small; a 50 km (35 miles) ride circumnavigated it.

Many places along the shore had beaches, some were very nice, but many tended to be coarse and rough.

The prettiest village was Lefkes,

where we wandered around the tiny streets with its many little stairways.

In the arid hills were ancient marble quarries. The marble mined from this island is of a very white color and high quality. It was used to carve Venus de Milo and the tomb of Napoleon.

Holland is famous for its windmills, but Greece has them as well. They were very different from the Dutch ones and I just loved them.

In the town of Parikia one of them even decorated the center of a round-about, although it just happened to be under repair.

In the harbor fishermen were repairing their nets.

On July 2 Max went by ferry to Athens

To pick up his wife Debbie and his daughter Janelle, while I stayed in Paros to watch over the boat.

They spent a few days seeing the famous sights in Athens, such as the Pantheon,

other historical places.

and the changing of the palace guards, who were assisted by Janelle

A few days later the family arrived in Paros. They had decided not to go sailing this time and the boat was used as a vacation resort.

The weather had been on the cool side when Max and I first arrived. However, right at the time that his family arrived, Greece was struck by a severe heat wave with temperatures over 45 C (110 F). We erected an awning over the boat to keep it cooler. But it sure limited our activities; we ended up sitting around the boat a lot, playing cards, reading, working on the laptop computer and of course we went swimming several times a day.

But in the cooler hours of the evening there was time to go to the restaurants and to go shopping.

Max and his wife went out to celebrate their 18^th anniversary. It gave Janelle and I an excuse to go out for dinner together

and to watch a Greek dance performance.

Santorini Island is a must-see place in Greece. We all took a ferry over there. Max and family did a one day tour, but I stayed for 3 days. The island is amazing; volcanic, long and narrow with extremely steep cliffs. The marked area in the water is the site where a ferry struck a rock not long ago and sank. It is supposed to contain the spilled fuel.

The main town Fira is pretty with beautiful views, but crowded with tourists.

Of course Greek food is offered everywhere.

I stayed in the gorgeous little village of Oia, overlooking a magnificent bay with a little fishing harbor.

Charter boats gave people a sense of a bygone era.

On the third day I took a boat trip to the volcano, which in 1500 BC had one of the largest eruptions the world has ever seen, and which had caused the current shape of Santorini. It caused a tsunami with 40 meter (120 ft) high waves, which destroyed many areas. It has been dormant, but activity is still showing in little steam pots. In the heat it was quite a climb to the craters.

After my return Max and family took a trip to the island of Mikonos

with its spectacular windmills

and the ruins on nearby Delos island,

where Janelle demonstrated the proper use of ancient toilets.

Whenever he was in port Max could not sit still. When there was no work to be done on his own boat, he was helping other cruisers with work on their boats. His beneficiaries wanted to return some favors, so we were invited to the house of Bill and Annie, a Scottish/American couple who have lived in Greece for many years.

And we were taken for a nice dinner by a group of young sailors from Denmark.

July 17 Debbie and Janelle had to return to the USA. Max brought them back to Athens, and he returned a day later to Paros.

After a few more days in Paros Max and I left as well. The heat wave had ended as soon as Debbie and Janelle left, but now the wind had become very powerful. Apparently these strong north-western winds are so common in the summer that they even have a name: the Meltemi.

Our goal had been to travel east and to visit islands that we had not seen before. The first island was Naxos.

We anchored in the lee of a large sea wall, but the water was still so turbulent that Max did not want to leave his boat alone. So I explored the town by myself. In the area where there was no seawall big waves were breaking onto the beach.

Nearby were the ruins of Apollo, “Reflections” is framed by the gate.

It did not matter where we had planned to go the next day, the wind gods determined differently and as a result we could only sail safely to the island of Amorgos. However, we anchored in a different area than the first time, by a very cute little beach town called Ay Annas. Although the bay was deep, it was still blowing quite hard from varying directions. So again Max did not want to leave the boat and I explored the area by myself.

We had set out 2 bow anchors and a stern anchor, but they were not enough to keep the boat from moving. It still managed to make a few complete turns during the night

and so in the morning the lines of the anchors had twisted around each other, which gave us a bit of a challenge in raising them.

30 knot winds and 3 meter waves again prevented us from going to our planned islands and we ended up back on the island of Astipalaio. This time we tied on to the pier of the only tavern and the night was finally calm enough to enjoy some uninterrupted sleep.

The weather was much calmer the next day and we had no problems boating to the island of Kos. It was quite a busy and touristy island with a castle right by the water front

and some old ruins with an interesting mosaic floor pattern.

Hippocrates used to teach medicine on this island. Max gave me a copy of the Hippocratic Oath.

Kos has a huge and very expensive marina, and we decided that one day/night was enough.

We returned to mainland Turkey and we went to the town of Bodrum. It also has a huge marina

overlooked by a large castle.

A small boat met us to guide us inside and then managed to push us into an impossibly small space between other sailboats. The boat needed some repair work in the top of the mast, from where I shot these 3 pictures.

Bodrum is a touristy town as well. We needed to get checked in by the Turkish Immigration officials, which meant that we had to go to 4 different places, something we had avoided the last time in Turkey.

After 2 nights we continued the trip east. The route ended took us to the previously visited Greek island of Simi, although this time we anchored on the opposite site. We anchored in a nice bay, with 13 other sailboats around us. On the shore were a huge monastery with a beautiful clock tower and a tavern, which relieved me from cooking duty that night.

This ended our cruise through the Greek islands. Overall I found the islands themselves not very pretty, they are often dry, barren and rocky.

However many of the towns and villages are wonderful places to visit with their distinct Greek culture.

On July 13 we returned to Marmaris in Turkey. A light house showed us where to turn.

and a true pirate ship showed us the way in.

And we made it safely to the forest of masts in Marmaris Yacht Marina,

our end goal for this trip. Time to celebrate the grand finale of the great boating trip.

Max will leave his boat here for the rest of this year.

We left Thailand 5 months ago and we covered 6200 Nautical Miles, out of this we boated 3155 NM with just Max and me on board.

Overall it has been a great adventure. We visited many interesting places and cultures, we experienced a few scary moments and overall we had great weather. Thank you Max for giving me this great opportunity and making one of my life’s dreams come true.

Sailing from Egypt to Turkey

2007-05-30T12:45:00.000-06:00

4th leg of the trip: Egypt to Turkey.

We left Port Ghalib, Egypt on May 8 after filling up with diesel and water. The Red Sea has a bad reputation for unexpected storms with high waves, so Max wanted to take advantage of any nice weather to get going. The weather was gorgeous, light winds and calm seas, so we had to motor. The Egyptian coast is full of coral reefs that are great for snorkeling and diving and we were planning to stop at some of these sites and check out the underwater world. The area we had selected was designated an underwater park and anchoring is strictly forbidden in order to avoid damage to the coral. But there were supposed to be moorings that we could tie up to. We reached the areas and we searched and searched for the moorings, but if they were there, they were well hidden from us. We never found a single one, so we could not stop and therefore the glories of the underwater world were denied to us. The weather stayed good and we continued into the northern part of the Red Sea, where it splits into 2 sections. The left one is where we had to go and it is quite narrow: it is called the Strait of Gubal. The guidebook told us, that the wind blows hard here most of the time, accompanied by large waves. It advised, that “if the weather is good, go for it.” The weather was good and we went for it. We had selected 2 places where we were going to spend the night for the 3 day trip. The weather stayed great all day and by evening we reached the first overnight spot. The GPS told us that there was a marina and anchoring was strictly prohibited due to oil pipe lines lying on the sea bottom. We tried to contact the marina by radio and we were told that there was no marina and we should anchor. Because the weather was good, we decided that instead of stopping we would just continue and boat through the night. A good thought at the time, but only one hour later the wind picked up and it reached a strength of 25 knots at times with about 1 meter (3 ft) waves. The Strait is only about 6 miles wide and 150 miles long. It ends at the start of the Suez Canal, therefore it is full of large freighters coming and going and again there is a traffic separation scheme. Small boats are advised not to run between the freighters. But running close to shore is not an option as well as it is full with obstacles, oil drills, oil drilling platforms, channel markers, etc. etc.

And they are not necessarily lit up at night. So we decided to boat right next to the left traffic channel, where the freighters were heading south (with other words; towards us).
With the darkness (no moon) wild weather, freighters and obstacles on our route, needless to say that we both were up all night, keeping a very close look-out. Again the night vision goggles did wonders; at least we could see the freighters coming from about 10 miles away. Long before our radar picked up on them. By morning we reached our 2nd overnight spot. The weather had become nice again and even though we were both very tired, we decided to continue. At 1600 hrs (4:00 pm) we reached the town of Suez, which marks the beginning of the Suez Canal, where we finally could enjoy a well-deserved rest.

The next day our boat was measured and all sorts of fees had to be paid in order to be able to go through the Suez Canal. A cute Egyptian man would come frequently along side the boat to sell us food items.

Max had become sick and he spent the whole day in bed. I played nurse for a while and gave him some medicine that after a while made him feel a bit better again. On May 13 Max felt well enough to continue and the pilot, who was going to guide us through the Suez Canal, arrived.

At 1100 hours (11 am) we entered the Suez Canal. The canal is not wide enough for 2 way freighter traffic, so there are set times for them to move north and other times to move south.

They stayed in so-called waiting areas until it was time to go.

Little boats (like us) can go at in between times and we are mostly kept separated from the big freighters, but nevertheless, there were still some that we passed awfully close. It was almost a case of “reach out and touch someone”.

The shores were quite barren, although frequently we saw big containers.

Also security in Egypt was very tight, and in many places there were military units with big machine guns on the shores.

Midway there were some large lakes that the route goes through. We still had to keep a very close look-out, because even in the lakes were all kinds of obstacles to avoid.

But again the weather was nice and we reached the midway town of Ismailiya just before dark.

It was a pleasant, good size city of 1,5 million people with a nice marine. Local people were fishing

and digging for clams right in the area.

We ended up staying there for 5 days. As usual boat work had to be done, but we also took a day off and we rode the local bus to crowded and smoggy Cairo (pop. 20 million).

Near Cairo are 9 of the Giza pyramids and a huge sphinx.

When you’re in Egypt, you of course have to visit these places. The pyramids were a little distance from each other, separated by sandy desert roads and we hired a horse and carriage to take us around.

We rode through the little town of Giza,

where the locals were simply going about their business.

The pyramids were of course very impressive

And Max even attempted to climb a little way up.

While the locals were smarter and took their siesta in the shade.

One of the locals talked me into getting onto a camel.

And graciously offered to shoot some great pictures.

After which he then demanded an outrageous amount of money. The fact that police on camel back was nearby probably prevented him from keeping our cameras for ransom.

We paid him what we felt was fair and we continued on.

Next we went on to the sphinx. It is huge and beautiful;

you could get close, but not right next to it.

Later in the afternoon we returned to Cairo, where we had another view of the Nile River.

Here we spent several hours in the Egyptian museum where the treasures from the pyramids and tombs are on display. It was truly amazing!

On May 18 another Suez Canal pilot woke us up at 0600 hr (6 am) and soon we were going down the 2nd section of the Canal.

The day started out with a heavy fog, the pilot had us boat on the left side of the canal, close to shore. It was tricky, because just to our right the big freighters passed on our bow, and on our left were canal markers and fishing boats. We could not see any of them until they were very close.

By 10:00 hrs (10 am) it was clear again and we continued without any problems. At 1500 hrs (3 pm) we reached the end of the Suez Canal at Port Said, where we dropped the pilot off.

Port Said looked from the canal like a big, busy and fairly nice city,

with ferries crossing from one side to the other.

We had been told that in Port Said it could be quite costly to go ashore, as all kinds of people want some “baksheesh” (tips, bribes, a way of life in Egypt), before you can get your exit visa and legally leave the place. We decided to ignore it all and to just keep going straight ahead into the Mediterranean Sea.

So we did not get an exit stamp on our Egypt visa, which may cause problems if we return, which is unlikely anytime soon. We went east along the coast, direction Israel and we arrived in the Israeli town of Ashkelon the next day at 1330 hrs (1:30 pm). Apparently there has been fighting in the Gaza desert among the Palestinians, which is only 20 km (15 miles) to the south of this town. By radio we were directed to go a bit past Ashkelon before we could go in. A high speed Israeli naval boat, fully armed, circled our boat, before turning away and telling us: “Welcome to Israel”.

Ashkelon was a very western, modern and new town. It had good roads and if it was not for the Hebrew signs, you’d figure that you were in “anyplace U.S.A.”.

It is apparently also a favorite beach town for the Israeli people.

Lots of construction was going on.

We were told that fighting had been going on between 2 Palistinian factions in the Gaza: the Hamas and El Fatah. Even though it was an internal war, just for sport they were also throwing rockets into Israel, some of which landed less than 10 km away from us. So we could frequently hear rocket explosions, but that was all we noticed about the problems.

Being in Israel, you HAVE to visit Jerusalem, the center for 3 of the world religions. New Jerusalem is modern.

but old Jerusalem placed us back into medieval times. It was surrounded by a city wall,

on which we walked for half-way around the city.

The buildings were ancient, but it did not seem that anyone lacked having their satellite tv’s.

Being on top of the wall gave us good view of an area that was being excavated.

And a large graveyard just outside the city walls.

Old Jerusalem was accessed through several large city gates.

And of course the city was full of historical and biblical sites.

For the Christians the Via Dolorosa was an important route as it marked the 14 Stations of the Cross, the route that Jesus was forced to follow while carrying the cross.

Prayer sessions were conducted along this route.

We visited his tomb in the middle of a large temple, which was built 300 years after his death.

And of course we had to visit the famous Wailing Wall, which has separate sections for men

and women to pray at.

As everywhere else in Israel, security was high.

And we found that America still has friends in the world

All kinds of different religious groups were roaming around and having their prayers in various places.

The city was full of ancient houses, narrow arched streets and it was quite a pleasure to walk around in.

Of course like any other tourist place, holy or not, it was also full of little tourist shops, with lots of cutesy or religious items, made in China. It also had great spice shops, where I could not resist buying some.
Even though I am not religious, I found Jerusalem to be a fascinating ancient old city
E We stayed a few more days in Ashkelon, to do some boat work and we had some time to relax and to visit with other yachties.
On May 24 we headed west again. The exit procedure with immigration did not give any problems, but the female officer stayed with us until the boat was pushed off from the dock. The navy boat circled us again on the way out, but we did not get a greeting this time.
It took us 1,5 day of motor/sailing right into 15 – 20 knot winds and 1 meter (3 ft. seas) before we reached Cyprus. As we got to the east side of the island, the winds died and the waves became flat. The island is divided into a Turkish northern section and a Greek southern section. The Greeks have never forgiven the Turkish for invading what they considered their island. Any boat visiting northern Cyprus, better not go near southern Cyprus after that. The sailors get arrested and thrown into jail. Northern Cyprus was cheap to visit, but southern Cyprus was expensive. We had contemplated visiting Cyprus, but with all the hassles and expenses we decided to forego it. Especially since the weather had turned so favorable. During the night we boated on the east side of Cyprus and in the morning of May 26 we took a northern heading towards Turkey. The weather gods must have agreed because the wind died completely and the seas were perfectly flat. We had to motor, but it was a real pleasure to be on the water. Most of the trip the weather had been quite warm, since about midway in the Red Sea temperatures had been steadily dropping. There we had to start using sweaters and blankets at night, now we even had to wear a sweater during the day. But after all the heat in the Indian Ocean it was quite welcoming.
The next afternoon we reached the Turkey coast. I had boated around here in 2001 and it was still as gorgeous as then. The wind picked up a bit, so we could set out some sail as we headed west. For the first time on our whole trip did we see lots of other pleasure and charter boats around, especially the traditional Turkish gulets.

By 2000 hours (8 pm) that night we reached the town of Fetiye,

where we decided to tie up for the night.

In the morning we boated 8 hours more to the town of Marmaris, where we arrived on May 28. Max is considering leaving his boat here when he goes home, so he wanted to evaluate the possibilities. It is a gorgeous area, and a pretty, though very touristy town.

The waterfront right by the marina is stock full of restaurants, which are a bit empty this early in the season. Food from most of the northern European countries is available; I have seen tons of Dutch restaurants, although so far I have limited myself to Turkish fare.

There are 3 marinas right around this area, so Max should have no difficulty leaving his boat.

We stayed here for a few days and then we headed for the Greek islands. We reached the first island today on June 1.

All is still well and I am looking forward to visiting many of the Greek islands.

Sailing from Oman to Egypt.

2007-05-14T02:45:00.000-06:00

Our route from Oman, along the coast of Yemen, through the Strait Bab el Mandeb into the Red Sea.

After sailing for 12 days across the big Indian Ocean from the Maldives, we arrived on April 9th in the town of Salalah in the small country of Oman. We needed to order a new part for our automatic pilot, which had to come from Dubai and took 5 days. So the time was spend working on the boat and checking out the town of Salalah. We had nice local type meals, eaten in appropriate Omani style.

We were about 6 miles (10 km) out of the town of Salalah and taxi driver Ahmed became our regular driver.

On April 12 it was the last day to have C.J. with us. He had run out of time and he had decided that it was easiest to travel from Oman to Dubai to leave the area from there. But before he left we hired the taxi driver Ahmed to take us on a tour of the area.

Driving through and out of town we saw quite a few camels. Some seemed to be just wandering by themselves and even caused road hazards.

A bit out of town was a large herd of camels, according to Ahmed; they were a local food supply.

We drove over hairpin roads through the arid hills; the country reminded me of Arizona. Ahmed showed us the plants from which frankincense is obtained, which apparently has been exported from here since biblical times.

The coast line was beautiful with large beaches and of course the gorgeous ocean colors.
We ended it with a nice lunch in a beach restaurant, where we were watching the local men smoking their hookah pipes.

At the end of the day we dropped C.J. at a hotel in town from where he would continue his travels. It sure was sad to say goodbye to our buddy, it will be quiet on the boat without him.

Max and I stayed 3 more days in Salalah, where we made friends with Mike, a British solo sailor. We helped him with some of his boat’s problems; he helped us with some of ours. Mike had just come down the Red Sea and he had had a series of misadventures. His boat engine had broken down and there was either not enough wind to sail or it had come from the total wrong direction. A stretch that should have taken 5 days, took a month and he had started to run very low on food and water. He gave us a bunch of info about the Red Sea, always usable.
Of course as always there were some repairs to be done. Going to shore had become a bit more difficult as our poor little dingy had had it, and the floor had come halfway out. We had run out of the glue to fix it, but luckily Max and I each have little paddle boats that we can still use to get to shore.
Our wind indicator had not been working well and I climbed to the top of the mast to fix it, a place that affords nice views over the surrounding area and the boat itself.

On April 15 we received the new part for the auto pilot and Max was able to install it without any problems. And luckily the GPS was working fine to help us with navigation.
The diesel tank was filled, we had enough water and there was plenty of food. So at 4:00 pm we continued our trip and sailed off toward Yemen.
The winds were calm, the sea flat and the sun was shining. So we had to motor. Until we would reach the city of Aden in Yemen, we were planning to motor the whole route anyway. This time it was not related to the weather, but to the fact that we would have to travel through an area, where boats occasionally get attacked by pirates, nicknamed: “blood alley” (only 1 – 3 %, not really high-risk). We had had conflicting advice of how to travel safely through this area. One option was to stay 10 miles off shore and if you were attacked you could radio for help by the Yemen coast guard (big question remains though, how long they would take to reach you). Another problem is that fishing boats in that area set out their nets, which can be as long as 5 miles. We had heard of some boats getting severely damaged that way. The other option is to stay 50 miles off where the pirates can not see you from the shore and the fishing boats don’t go. However it was not advised to go much further, because then you would get near the island of Socotra and the country of Somalia, where apparently the pirates are even worse than those from Yemen. We opted for the 50 mile off-shore route.
The first day we were still boating along the coast of Oman, where there were no problems. For safety we ran with no running lights on at night and not even any lights on in the cabins or cockpit that might be visible. This then meant that we had to keep a much sharper look-out, because other boats would not be able to see us. To improve our vision we used night vision goggles, which create an eerie-looking green glow. But it was amazing how well you could see with them. During this trip there was no moon at all, which was welcoming in this case. However this picture was taken later with the goggles when there was a full moon.

On the second day we reached Yemen territory. In the morning I was on watch duty. I had scanned the horizon, no boats in sight and I went down below to the bathroom. When I came back up, there was a very fast wooden speedboat with 4 guys inside, about 100 meters (yards) from the starboard side of the boat, aiming full speed for the bow. I screamed for Max, ran back up to the helm, turned off the auto pilot and steered the boat 180 degrees away from the speedboat. At this point they were only about 10 meters (30 feet) from the bow. Then finally did they slow down and started gesturing to us. We had no clue what they were trying to say, but we waved them away. Amazingly enough that is exactly what they did. Max felt that they had aimed for the bow, because at that point they could grab our boat easily and jump right on. I am not sure who or what these guys were, pirates or obnoxious opportunistic fishermen. Either way, we were happy not to find out what their intentions were. Needless to say, that after this incident the helm was not left unattended at any time for as long as we were in the pirate zone.
No further incidents that day, but the next morning 3 speedboats, each with 4 or 5 guys inside, sped towards our boat. We were both on deck and waved them away. They passed close to the bow and stern, but they made no attempt to stop. It sure made us nervous though. A few hours later, when I was on watch, I saw them again through my binoculars. They were around a large boat and it seemed that there was another small boat in the water as well. We were too far to be able to see what exactly they were doing, but I took some pictures through the binoculars.

We figured that they were not pirates, but probably smugglers and transferring goods between the boats. They were probably searching for the right boat when they passed us.
On the third day we truly entered “Blood Alley”. We were on very intense look-outs. There was a distress signal on the radio, followed by repeated messages from a boat, giving their coordinates and claiming that their boat was taking on water and they were going to sink. The message was in heavily accented English. We had read stories of pirates using this tactic to get boats to come to them. Other boats responded to them and advised them to notify the coast guard; no one showed any intention to go find them. Max and another boat came on the radio, pretending that they were U.S. Navy. At this time there was no response. Later a U.S. warship send out radio messages, again no response. You kind of worry during those signals, is there really a boat in trouble? Then you should be there to help them. But because they did not respond whenever there was a military radio response, we decided that it was a trap.
Amazingly after we entered the worst area, it became much quieter. There were hardly any speed boats at all anymore. But we were traveling in the freighter lane. On one hand this was comforting, if there was a serious problem, you might get help. On the other hand, how well are they watching? A few times we had to maneuver to get out of their way.
We were still running with no lights on at night, so the watch person continuously had to scan the area.
Early in the morning of the 6th day, we reached Aden (in Yemen). We were totally out of the pirate zone now. The entrance to the harbor was well-marked and we had no problems finding a good anchorage.

There were 3 other sail boats anchored nearby. Immigration and customs did not give any problems. We stayed in Aden for 2 days, cleaning (and a few small repairs), shopping for food, diesel and water and exploring the area a bit. The pier was very nice looking.

Apparently in this same place cruise ships stop by quite a bit for just a day. We saw a few of them.

They herded their guests (1000 people) into buses and took them on a tour of the area. In the morning a group of school children with their teachers were sitting at the pier. When I asked what they were doing, the response was: “We are looking at the tourists!”
The area is poor, hot and dry,
but again the people were lovely.

I walked the streets by myself and people would start a conversation and offered help whenever they thought I needed it.

Some women called me over and let me take pictures of them.

I went to a bank to change some money. This particular bank could not do exactly what I needed. A woman, to whom I had talked for a few minutes, thought that I had money problems. She tried very hard to give me money and I had to convince her that I really did not need it. Later I took a local bus to another area and a man sat down next to me. He spoke excellent English and insisted on paying the bus fare for me. When I went shopping for food, it must have been the time of day that the women go shopping. There were a lot of them in the store and probably about 60 % of them were covered head to toe (including face) in black gowns. At the office where we had to buy diesel, I became friendly with one of the women workers there. She was dressed in black as well. I asked her if the material and color was not very hot and that it seemed that the men used a much cooler material and color. She told me that the cloth was light and cool, and let me feel it, it was very thin. Then she said: “The color does not matter, because during the day, when it is hot, we stay inside where it is cool. The men need lighter colors, because they do go out in the hot sun”. Men can have as many as 4 wives in these countries and we found that the birth rate is very high. What a way to make sure, that women stay covered and pregnant in their kitchens!!!

In a store, Max was dressed up in Yemeni style; it actually looked very good on him.

Max had stayed on the boat while I went shopping. It was dark by the time I returned and I could not get his attention to come to shore to help me with getting the groceries over to the boat. A man jumped in his boat and went to notify Max. This same man then let us tie our boat next to his in order to fill our water tanks and arranged with some friends to help us. It took quite a while to get all of that done and Max became quite friendly with them.

On the morning of the third day we left Aden. The weather was beautiful, seas flat with little wind, so we had to motor. We did not see dolphins as much as before, but we had a nice visit from 2 killer whales (orcas) who came up right next to the boat to have a closer look at us.

We followed the coast west

and then we had to turn north into the Red Sea. The Red Sea is quite infamous with sailors, the winds and waves can be ferocious at times, usually they come from the north (against you) and it can take a long time to get to the Suez Canal. In the southern end is the Strait Bab El Mandel, which is very narrow and a major bottle neck. There is an island in the middle: Perim, where you are absolutely not allowed to stop and the Yemen government prefers that you to pass it on the west side. The strait is also extremely busy with large freighters and therefore it has, what is called, a traffic separation scheme. Boats going north have to stay on the east side; going south they have to stay on the west side. It was dark by the time we reached this area. The winds had become strong from the south and the waves had grown to about 6 to 8 feet (2 to 2.5 meter). With these waves we were limited in the ways we could maneuver. We tried to stay as far right as possible in order to stay out of the freighters ways. But whenever we got closer to Perim, a boat from that direction would start following us. So we ended up having to travel right between the freighters, a very scary experience. I can compare it this way: Imagine that you are traveling in a very small and slow car at 25 miles/hr (40 km per hour) down a 2 lane road. In both lanes are very large trucks driving at 60 miles/hr (100 km per hour) and they do not want to slow down for you. You are also not sure how well they can see you and it is not possible for you to turn to the left or to the right. Twice a large freighter came right on our tail end and we had to notify them by radio to change course. One of them did not answer and we had to fire a flare to get his attention and to get him to go around us. It is not a pretty sight to see such a large freighter so close to your boat in the dark. The biggest problem was that if they had hit us, they would not even notice it! It was a very intense night and neither one of us had had any sleep.
The original plan had been to cross west as soon as possible and to sail the African coast along Eritrea and Sudan. However, it was impossible with these freighters, wind and waves to go anywhere but straight north along the Arabian coast. Arabia does not welcome tourists and their harbors are off-limits. By morning the wind was still strong and the seas were still big, but we had passed the bottleneck and we were out of the freighter lane.

We passed the Hanish Island group (Yemen) on our left and we decided to anchor in the lee side of one of the islands. We ended up at Hanish As Sughra Island. Apparently it was a military look-out point and no one was allowed on shore. There was still a strong and gusty wind, but the waves in this location were small. The island was very stark looking; dark rocky hills with very little vegetation, just a few shacks on the shore and on the peaks of the hills.

We anchored in a bay, where there were also about 6 fishing boats. The poor fishermen were also not allowed on shore and had to stay in their boats.

A few boats came by and we understood that they lived on islands about 20 ml (30 km) away.
They were hiding out from the wind and waves as well, friendly and polite people. One boat had an old man, who complained about stomach pain and diarrhea. We gave him some medicine and bread and they gave us a fish, which we cooked that night.

We ended up staying here for 3 days. The first day we were both exhausted and slept the day away. The next 2 days were spent giving the boat a good cleaning, resting, reading and watching videos (good ones). On the third day all the fishing boats had disappeared and did not come back, so we figured that the sea had improved.
On the morning of day 4 there were still strong, gusty winds, but it seemed that there were fewer whitecaps in the distance. We decided to leave as well. Because of the wind and the waves we were still forced to continue north, but slowly during the day everything became calmer. By evening we reached another island group: the Zubayr Islands. By this time the wind was calm and the waves only about 1 – 2 feet (30 cm) high and instead of stopping we decided that it was the right time to head north-west and to try to get to the African side. It caused us to have to cross the freighter lane going south, which created a few tense moments. But we passed it without problems and as we started sailing along the African coast, life again became very nice and peaceful. The moon had come back up and during the night we had visits from hitchhiking birds, who found our boat to be a great resting place

The weather was gorgeous, although there was very little wind, and Max was worried about when this was going to end. I suggested that we would use the weather to our best advantage and to keep heading north for as long as it was good. Eritrea and Sudan are both very poor countries with lots of internal problems and we decided to pass them and not to stop there. Sail boats in this area stay in daily touch with each other by radio. Each morning at 0900 the boats call in at the “Red Sea Net” and they inform each other of conditions. From these radio transmissions we found out that conditions further north and closer to shore were quite rough. A lot of boats were hiding out in bays, waiting for the winds and seas to go down. But further off-shore conditions were much better. We had very good boating and we decided to stay 50 miles off-shore.
But now a new problem popped up. We had had to motor a lot during the heavy seas and the calms and we were starting to run low in diesel. We reached the border of Egypt without problems, but unless we would get good winds and we could sail, we would not have enough diesel to make it to Port Ghalib, our next port of call. Via the “Red Sea Net” we heard that 5 boats had been hiding out for several days in a bay by Port Bernice. We were about 70 miles directly east of them, but when we turned the boat, the wind blew from the west. We could finally raise the sails and turn off the engine. Accompanied by dolphins we were blown right into the bay, where we anchored next to the other boats.

We had a good night rest, early in the morning the wind was still blowing about 15 knots, and everyone decided to stay another day. The shore was quite barren, a tent and a few shacks nearby and further away there appeared to be a small village.
Apparently it was also a military outpost and we were told that no one was allowed on shore. So everyone stayed in their little spaces on their own boats and had frequent conversations with each other by radio. It was a nice relaxing day, a little cleaning, repairing, reading, and starting to write this story. I wanted to go snorkeling, but the boat was surrounded by hundreds of jelly fish. They can give a nasty sting, so it did not seem like a good idea.
The next morning we woke up at 0530 am. Wind still!! At 0600 all 5 boats had had their coffee and anchors were being pulled. Including ours. We pulled the 200 ft. (60 meter) of anchor that we had put down into the 50 ft (15 meter) deep water, but after half of it was up, it got stuck. O.k. you motor the boat back and forth a bit to get it unstuck. Right? Not in this case, because the anchor broke, right at the mid-way point. So I donned dive gear and wetsuit (to protect myself from the jelly fish) and I went under water. Luckily we had anchor coordinates on the GPS, which helped us to relocate it. The chain was stuck under some rocks and I worked hard to get it unstuck and to move the anchor to a sandy spot from where it would be easy to pull it up. But working this hard I forgot about the time and all of a sudden breathing became hard. My tank was empty and I had no more air. So, much faster than is advisable, I went back up to the surface, where it took me a few minutes to get my breath back. Max got the 2nd tank out, and down under I went again, telling myself to be more careful. Max had been able to maneuver the boat right above the anchor; he let the remaining chain down with a karabiner and a rope. I connected the 2 pieces of chain and I placed the rope around the anchor. I went up to tell Max to start pulling and back down to make sure that the chain would not get stuck again. It came up without any further problems. We were here right next to a gorgeous reef, full of a wide variety of coral; I still had time to enjoy the sight of it. Obviously Egypt deserves its name as a major dive destination. At 0830 we were ready to go. We were still concerned about our diesel supply, but other boats had told us, that they would give us some along the way if we needed it. Then on the radio the boat “Joanie D” came on. Their engine was running very rough and blowing lots of smoke. During radio transmissions between the different boat owners it was diagnosed as having a blown head gasket. They were still able to motor, but they were concerned that along the way the engine might quit all together. They were missing an essential tool, that was needed to fix it. "No worries, mate, Max has the perfect torque wrench for you". And the "Joanie D" had plenty of diesel for us. So a little way out we got together and exchanged the promised goods. In order to make sure that the “Joanie D” would be safe, we decided to stay together all the way to Port Ghalib. "Joanie D" took this picture of us under (partial) sail.

We arrived at our first Egyptian port of call: Port Ghalib with its brand-new marina at about noon time.

About 10 other sail boats were there and everyone was waiting to get checked in by immigration. Some of them had been waiting already since 0600. But the papers for immigration had to be taken to the airport 10 km away, and so the waiting was for all the boats to get in for the day. Two more boats arrived after us and finally at 1700 hours (5 pm) the papers came back and everyone was checked in.

Only then were we allowed to go to the yacht club for a more comfortable tie-on with running water and electricity.

The area was still under construction and nothing was actually finished except for a luxury diving hotel, where we could berth. Lots of large dive boats were parked nearby.
The first day after arrival was as usually spent cleaning and fixing things and exploring the possibility for a visit to the Luxor temples and tombs from here. We were not the only ones and so, at 0400 am the next day we found ourselves on a 2-day tour with about 10 other yachties. Because of the attacks on tourist in past years, the Egyptians are very careful to protect their major source of income and bus trips are made in huge convoys under police protection.

It took about 6 hours of driving through hot and dry desert

to get to the lush valley of the river Nile, where the town Luxor is located.
Occasionally we passed little villages and small towns, where time seemed to have stood still. Many people in Egypt were very poor and their major source of transportation was the donkey.

We arrived in Luxor at about 10 am and right away we started to visit the sites.
The first one to see was the biggest, the 3000 year old Karnak temples.

Several people from the other sailboats in Port Ghalib came with us. I became good friends with the Spanish occupants of the boat "Cormoran".

Of course, a tour in Egypt could not be done without being taken to some "factories", who then gladly would sell you their product.

Haggling was a way of life in Egypt, and Max was getting good at it.
We stayed in a gorgeous 5 star hotel right on the banks of the Nile with great swimming pools, and delicious buffet meals served in their restaurant.

The Falukas (traditional Nile sailboats) made for a gorgeous sunset picture.

In the evening we were taken back to the Karnak temple by horse and buggy and had a light and sound show at the site, very nicely done.

The next day we were taken to several different sites. We visited the valley of the Queens, a tomb dedicated to a queen, who pretended for 20 years to be male, so she could be a Pharaoh, a position that was restricted to males.

Some of the local tour guides were trying to drum up some business.

In the "Valley of the Kings" were the tombs of the great Pharaohs. The inner walls were all decorated with the well known Egyptian pictures and hierographs, but all the valuables and loose decorations had been moved to the museum in Cairo.

In this valley are 62 tombs, we went inside 3 of them. That was plenty in the desert heat.

Everywhere in Egypt security is tight, but there was time for talks with the female tourists.

Included in the tour was a boat trip on the river Nile.

where Max was requested to take the helm for a while.

At 1800 hours (6 pm) the huge convoy worked its way back to Safaga again. On the way the bus had a rest break in the middle of the desert, where I had my picture taken with some Bedoins, a very poor, nomadic people, that are some of the few that can eke a living out of the hot, dry desert.

They were accompanied by their donkeys, goats and camels.

I usually stay far away from any type of tours, but this one was very convenient and very well done. Being with my new friends from the other yachts sure added to the trip. It was midnight before we were back and the next day was spent getting the boat ready in Port Ghalib.
We left Port Ghalib on May 8 after filling up our tanks with diesel.

At the moment (May 15) we are going through the Suez Canal. The story of the trip from Port Ghalib to here will have to be placed in the next blog. These stories and pictures take a bit of time to do, and that part is not ready yet.

This 3rd part of the sail trip sure was interesting. My friend Bob from Utah, who sailed for 7 years, had told me: "Sailing is 98 % boredom and 2 % pure terror". He might be right about the terror part, but so far the boredom has not been a problem for me yet. I still enjoy life at sea.

Sailing through the Maldives and to Oman.

2007-04-10T05:43:00.000-06:00

Male Atoll in the Maldives.

We changed our mind regarding sailing to India next, the currents and the wind would just be too much against us and after all the delays we were just too much behind schedule. So we decided to head west to Oman, but first we went north from Male and did some traveling through the islands. We left Male on March 20, 2 days short of a 4 week stay, which was mostly spent with work on the boat. (Which, as I said before, is what sailors do when they get to an exotic port)? However we also had a lot of good times in this port as I described in the previous story. The town was very pleasant and the people extremely nice, hospitable and helpful. We had a final dinner with the 3 boat mates, who were separating from us.

We were very sad to say goodbye to them; we had some great times together, but I know I’ll see them again in the future. Especially C.J. was sad, but also for another reason. Suzie had attemped an unsuccessful cut on his hair and so C.J. had decided to just shave it all off. Something you really have to get used to in the beginning. It was amazing how pasty a skull looks when it has never been exposed to the sun. He planned to leave it like this for a while, to see if he would get to like it. However, before reaching our next destination he ended up having his hair grow back.

So now it is 3 of us continuing the journey, Max, C.J. and I.
We sailed north through a multitude of Maldivian Islands for 9 wonderful days.
The weather of course was gorgeous, sunny, warm (around 30 C – 90 F) with little wind. Actually too little wind, which means a sail boat can not sail. So we motored all the way. But then there are so many coral reefs and small islands around, that sailing would have been tricky anyway. We had some charts of the area, but no really good ones, because Max had initially not planned on traveling through these islands. So even though it showed us most of the underwater obstacles, not all were marked, and we had to keep a close watch. The ocean colors help a lot. Deep dark blue means plenty deep. Lighter blue is much shallower, keep an eye out! The most gorgeous aqua color was a “no go” for the boat, especially if there were dark areas within. Those signified very shallow rocks and coral. Of course these were also the primo areas to go snorkeling in.

Because we are now with only 3 people we had to rearrange the way we have been doing things on board. On the last trip everyone took turns cooking. Because Max is famous for his ability to cook pasta, but nothing else and C.J. is great with opening cans, I offered to be the primary cook.
The men were very happy to agree to this, even though it meant that they will wash all the dishes and do all the cleaning on the boat. An arrangement that makes me happy just as well.

The first island we stopped was Thulusdoo, also called Coca-Cola Island, because there is a Coca-Cola factory, very obviously painted in Coca-Cola red colors.

The island had a small village with about 1200 people. A few men came to greet us right on arrival. After first taking us to their local little tourist shop, 2 young men appointed themselves as our guides and took us all over the island. There was a boat building facility in the process of making a huge yacht. The streets were very clean covered with beach sand and all the houses were hidden behind stone walls.

They had us visit the local school and introduced us to the head teacher, so he and Max could compare notes about the Maldivian versus American school systems. They took us to a gorgeous beach on an island right next to theirs. where we could watch the sunset and have a view on another island that according to them was used for police training.

Max and C.J. went night fishing with them, Max caught two fish, the others caught zero! Nearby the reef was a protective wall build in the ocean. I snorkeled around it, and surprised a large lobster in its hole in the wall. Several dolphins swam leisurely past me at about 3 meter (10 ft) distance; however they were not interested in having a chat with me and the water was too murky to see them underwater. The next day there was time to just relax, my little inflatable kayak is just the spot for it.
Later 3 locals came with us and all of us went back to the same area. I did see the lobster again, but when we tried to get it, it crawled so far back in its hole, that we could not get to it. The locals showed C.J. how to spear fish the proper way; they caught several large fish and an octopus. Then they invited us for dinner at their place to eat them. The fish tasted good, but as usual in these islands, they were too spicy-hot.

We left Coca Cola Island the next day and we motored for about 4 hours. I guess our bad luck with technical items on the boat had not ended yet, because while I was steering, the automatic pilot sudden stopped. Max and C.J. did everything to get it going again, but to no avail. This was actually quite frustrating, because it was brand new and it was just installed at the beginning of the trip in Thailand. But as convenient as it is, many boats do not have automatic pilots, and we can continue our trip by manual steering until we can get it replaced, somewhere, somehow (not in the Maldives though). We arrived at the resort island of Makunudo, it had a very small and fairly deep anchorage, surrounded by a mean looking reef. But the weather was very calm with no current and with some extra precautions we figured that the boat would be safe. We asked permission at the resort to anchor overnight and to sweeten the deal, we made reservations for dinner. Many of the island resorts are very expensive and they cater to exclusive clientele, therefore often, cruising yachts are not welcome. This place was a cheapy with rooms for only US $ 300 per night.

We went snorkeling on the reef around us. It had probably the best coral we’d seen, it made me think of a Japanese rock/bonsai garden. The sad part is, that I lost the underwater housing for my camera, so I have no pictures to show of the underwater world anymore. There were 3 large turtles feeding, they would look at me, and decide that I was harmless and continue to eat. One swam away at a leisurely pace and I swam with it for quite a while.
Dinner was US $ 25 per person (in a country where you can get a wonderful meal for US $ 5). But we had some nice drinks with it on the patio overlooking the ocean, where we could also keep an eye on the boat.

The island was tiny; it only took maybe 10 minutes to walk around it. It has 30 bungalows, set between tropical trees, each with their own little private beach in front of it.
The next morning we wanted to get a very early start, however we had to wait for enough light for the water colors to show. The early morning light did not show the water colors, so you would know where the reef was located. We motored a big part of the day and in the late afternoon we reached the uninhabited island of Varihuraa.
The water was here deep, so we had to set anchor too close to the reef for comfort.

Kind of scary, but Max always has a solution, so we set out a second anchor, with the use of the dingy. A first-time experience for C.J. and I. We explored the island and fantasized how we would survive here, if we were actually stranded. With all the coconuts, crabs and fish around, we figured that we might keep ourselves alive for a few months….. The coral reef was not that great, but snorkeling here treated us as usually to a large variety of colorful fish and several sting rays and manta rays.

Felivaru island was the next place we visited. Actually we never set foot on land. There was a bad smelling fish factory that we had no desire to visit. Our main reason for coming here was a huge ship wreck lodged on the reef between 2 islands. It sat on the side of the reef, and a large part stuck out above the water. The first wreck I’d ever seen that you could just snorkel around. The whole ship was mostly intact, but the part sticking out of the water was just rusted metal. However under water it had become a piece of art. Colorful coral, yellowish flowers and other growth was all over it and tons of fish had made it their habitat.

March 25th was my birthday, but men being men my ship mates only realized it after I had baked my own birthday cake.

We motored for about 6,5 hours to the island of Dholhiyadhoo, We had been told that is was a wonderful, uninhabited island, full of crab which you could just pick off the beach and bbq. It probably used to be that way, but things change. About 550 construction workers from Bangladesh were very busy converting it into another exclusive resort island. Management showed us the plans for about 200 bungalows, including a presidential suite (for the president’s private use). We were welcome to walk around and observe the construction, but taking pictures was a definite no-no. They were probably afraid to we would carry their secrets with us to the west. No bungalows were finished yet, although we could see the basic construction, work was mostly being done on staff housing in 2 story buildings. Of the western end of the island it was still unspoiled beach and the guys figured that there might still be crab waiting to be caught.

Right! What do you expect with 550 Bangladeshis around? So after an unsuccessful hunt, the men occupied themselves with their own construction project: building sand castles,

while I was reading a book in the shade.
We had my birthday dinner on the good old ship. Before we left Male I had asked the fellows how the propane situation looked. “Oh, the gauge still shows 50 lbs, we have plenty” was the answer. This night was proof that gauges can lie, in the middle of cooking dinner, we ran out of propane. I finished dinner on the stern b.b.q. but it was not a great succes. However we were compensated with a great sunset.

It took 8 hours of motoring to get to the truly uninhabited island of Kudanaagoashi.
It was small and heavily forested in the middle, so you could walk across it. But it was great for a beach walk on the wonderful soft white sand.

Max was finding crabs here, but they were too small to make them worth while cooking,

I found gorgeous little pieces of coral, which would make great little Christmas ornament.

Lack of propane was not a problem tonight as we barbequed hotdogs on a campfire. A half-moon lit up the beach, making it as clear as day light. It was great for an evening walk, which also brought out lots of the little crabs.

Around these northern islands we saw the locals fishing from cute little sail boats. It also shows that some islands are no more than just a sandbar.

On our last day, we passed the Hide-Away Island. The only place in the Maldives where there is a yacht marina. However we had been told that the president’s son-in-law owned this island and had made it into an exclusive and super-expensive resort. Small yachts are not encouraged to go there. We tried to made radio contact and no one bothered to answer.

We decided to continue to Dhidhdhoo, which has a small village of 3500 people. As usual the locals were great. They met us right on arrival. “Yes, we can sell you diesel, yes we have propane and what else can we help you with?” A boat arrived to fill up our diesel tanks (yes, the new diesel tank is doing just fine).

And then they gave me a ride into their village.
There was no way to fill our current empty propane tank, so we did have to buy one of theirs, which has a different fitting. But again, Max would not be Max if he would not find a way to make it fit. They were even able to turn us on to a computer on which we could all check our emails. “Do you get many sail boats here?” we asked. “Well, you are here this year and there was one last year”, was the answer. No wonder so many of the locals came out to see us.

It was time to leave the Maldives. The boat and engine got a total check-over, all loose items were tied down, and the dingy was brought back on deck.
The boat was surrounded by thousands of fish, which I fed 2 loaves of old moldy bread.
Early in the afternoon we were ready to go, compass set at 300 degrees north-west for Oman, our next destination. We passed several more islands, many uninhabited, some with villages, some with resorts. One of the last islands was Uligam where most sail yachts stop and arrange immigration formalities. We had actually been illegal in this country since leaving Male, so we had no desire to stop there as well. The final island we saw was uninhabited and looked very inviting.

But no, we could not stop. On March 28 at 1700 hours (5 pm) we started the next big ocean crossing that will take us across 1235 nautical miles to Oman.

Still there was no wind, so we had to motor again. Because there are no more islands, there are no places to stop overnight, and the boat moves 24 hours per day. Again we had to assign watch duties, but because the auto pilot is broken we also have to be on the helm and steer the boat into the right direction. Since we are only 3 persons now, it translates into 8 hours each. With everyone’s agreement we divided it into 3 hour stretches twice a day and a 2 hour stretch between midnight and 0600, quite doable. My hours became 1800 (6 pm) to 2100 (9 pm) hours, 0200 (2 am) to 0400 (4 am) and 0900 (9 am) to 1200 (12 noon. Which gave me time in between to cook lunch and dinner and leaves me about 4 hours to spend as I please, reading, writing, working on my laptop or if needed, help with some boat repair and maintenance.

The first 4 days we had to motor most of the time, only occasionally there was a light breeze and we would sail for a bit. At this rate the concern was that we would run out of diesel and without wind we would just float around the Indian Ocean.
C.J. calculated that we could reach our destination in 30 days if we could move 1 knot per hour and the current would not pull us in the wrong direction. How much food and how much water do we have? Yes, enough for that month, if we watch our use of it. But what if we can’t get there still? Who will be eaten first??? We did some prayers and dances for the wind gods and they responded by day 5. The wind started picking up and for the next 5 days we had a nice breeze that occasionally became quite stiff. Great sailing weather! However on April 7 the winds died again and the ocean was perfectly flat.
We were still about 200 miles from Oman, but we only had enough diesel left for about 100 miles. There had been several days that we never saw any other boats and the times that we did, they were usually big freighters or tankers, who can not stop for a little sailboat.
But on this day a Pakistani fishing boat passed by.

They did not respond to our radio call, so we motored our boat straight to theirs. They had their long fishing lines floating off their stern. Initially when we saw them only a few guys were on deck, but as we got closer, about 20 of them appeared. They waved us over and appeared quite friendly.

We showed them our diesel tanks and they asked how much we needed. “100 liter”, Max said. That could not be done, but they were willing to give us some. “Whiskey?” (Muslim?? Whiskey?? Hope Allah won't find out about it. ) they asked. Sure enough. We gave them some whiskey, some cigarettes, fresh water, and some Tylenol (Paracetemol); they gave us 14 gallons of diesel (55 liter). When we tried to pay, they refused, they felt that the trade was fair and they gave us a large Tuna fish to boot.
We had a delicious dinner that night. Thanks to our Pakistani friends we could motor again, although we still did not have enough diesel for the remainder of the trip. During the night the winds picked up again and we were able to sail the miles that we were short, before they died again.

C.J. had calculated on the morning of April 6 that Max had reached the exact midway point from San Francisco to San Francisco. We woke him up and presented him with a memento of this event. Max has sailed this boat for 20.000 miles now. The world is 26.000 miles in circumference, but he went quite a bit north and south along the way.

Along the way we had quite a few visits of one of my favorite animals again, the dolphins. A few times they came in huge numbers, at least a hundred and they were just swimming and cavorting around the boat.

What a great sight!!
One of my dreams came through. One day we had turned off the engine, the ocean was perfectly flat and a group of dolphins came swimming up to the boat.
C.J. and I jumped immediately into the water and went swimming with them. I had brought my snorkel and mask and so I had a perfect view of them in the crystal clear water. They were a bit shy and they did not come all the way up to us, but swam around us only a few feet away. Obviously they were very curious about us. They are so graceful under water; it was an experience never to be forgotten.

This trip was very different from the one sailing from Thailand to the Maldives. We had no sudden breakdowns, no emergencies during the nights. Except for some of the worries caused by the wind stills there were no real issues. Because the auto pilot was not working, we had to steer the whole way by hand. But I actually liked it. On the open ocean you have no objects to steer towards. It is amazing how fast you can be going in circles. I trained myself to keep course by various methods: of course there is always the GPS, but occasionally we had too little power for the GPS to work. So I would use the windvane only or I would watch the compass closely when the winds were too variable to watch the windvane. Our crossing started with a half moon, and so we had nice moon light all of the nights, making the watches much easier.

We saw a few flying fish and occasionally birds. Some had to take a rest from their long flight. Mostly we only saw deep blue/purple water and blue skies with a few clouds.

Towards the end of the trip C.J. gave us a sad message. He will leave the boat in Oman. His plan had been to leave from Egypt, but with all the delays that we have had, he is running out of time.

On April 9th we reached Oman very early in the morning. After 12 days of open ocean it was quite exciting to see land again.

We contacted the port by radio and we were directed to the large harbor, which actually lies 6

miles outside the town of Salalah.

We were very surprised to notice that it was a very modern and large port, with huge freight and container ships, that were being loaded with multiple large cranes.

We were directed to a smaller corner of the harbor, where we awaited hassles with immigration and customs. But nothing could be further from the truth. Two customs officers showed up fairly soon after arrival. Way before we expected them, so I was actually just taking a shower as they arrived. They were very friendly and professional, no hint of asking for a bribe, and the formalities were completed in no time. They told us where the immigration office was, it was actually quite a bit of a walk to get there. When we asked a man for directions, he placed us into his car and took us there. Not just that! He introduced us to the immigration officers, then waited until we were finished and took us to the harbor police. All that without asking for anything in return. When he left he showed us where the taxis were stationed. Immigration was also very friendly and professional. "How long do you want to stay?" they asked. "Oh, we don't know exactly, maybe a week". "O.k. here is a month visa, and you can go where ever you like". There was our stamp, again no hint of wanting anything from us. Because we are in a restricted area, we have to show the harbor police our passports each time we go in and out, but they also create no hassle at all.

night time view from the boat.

The country is not cheap, as S.E. Asia is and the taxi was US $ 30 to get into town. But we made a deal with the taxi driver. We can hire him each day for US $ 45 to take us anywhere around town all day long. He was very helpful, we'd tell him what we need and he'd take us to the proper store. We found a store that was able to order a new auto pilot for us, we will get it on Sunday, April 15. Hopefully on that day we can get it installed and leave either that day or the next.

It is quite hot and humid here. The town is open with large, good roads and nice looking beige and white buildings.

This area is very arid , but the taxi driver told us that the nearby mountains are very green and beautiful. Hopefully we'll have a chance to look around the country a bit, before we move on.

Again the people are amazingly friendly and helpful. Where ever we go, they like to talk to us. But there is no staring and no pushiness. More amazing, because it seems that 90 % of the women are covered from head to toe in a black gown, including their faces. Some local women have their faces uncovered, but they do wear a scarf. We did see however 2 teenage girls, who wore western style clothing and did not even wear scarves.

I did wear long pants and short sleeves, but I totally forgot to wear a head scarf. It did not cause any negative reactions. However for the coming days I will wear my hat, so my hair will be covered.

For a while I was alone in the vegetable market. No one hassled, but I did get into a conversation with 2 local men, they also were very pleasant and nice to talk to.

Of course, things as usually are unfair to women. Men either wear western style or the local long gown, but the gowns are mostly white or beige. For the women it is mostly hot black. But they do seem to move around freely, it would sure be interesting to talk to them. The men can legally have 4 wives, although it seems that most of them can not afford it. Our taxi driver told us that he can afford only one wife, but he does have 8 children with her. Poor lady!

On the way back home we stopped off for a while at the Hilton Hotel. It has its private beach along the ocean, with green, green grass between the palm trees. All around are the Westerners in skimpy bathing suits. Talk about different worlds.

Max and I will continue the trip into the Red Sea with just the two of us, but we will miss C.J. sorely. His great company, our talks about outdoor adventures and his knowledge of navigation and electronic equipment. Good luck, C.J., enjoy your further adventures, I know I will see you again!