Preparations for the trip started once I read the article of Peter Morris on the Holiday 23 web site. What he described was so good we could not resist.
Let me warn you beforehand, do not believe what Peter said in his article. Everything he described we experienced as BIGGER, BETTER and more exciting
and beautiful.
Let us start at the beginning; long before we even knew we could sail. (Some people still believe we cannot).
By “we” I refer to my wife X10 (short for Christine) and myself and many Malamute dogs, live close to the Vaal River (Loch Vaal) and used to do some power boating on the river. Sunday mornings we would motor from Rietspruit (next to the old Loch Vaal hotel) to Stone Haven - do a breakfast and motor back. (Why does it now sound so boring?) Anyway - in June 2008 we bought an old Kawasaki Vulcan 1500 cruiser (for the uninformed - a motorbike) in Cape Town. We flew down and cruised back along the East Coast (Wild Coast included.)
First time in 20 odd years that any of us set foot on a motorcycle. Take note that this was in the middle of the winter in the rainy season. The bike trips were an experience and we met some characters along the way.
By then the Vaal River became so polluted that we did not care to go on it anymore. We started doing the breakfast run thing on Sunday mornings on our own. Round about December of 2008 we did a run to Deneysville and ended up at Anchor Creek Marine. George was (as we later learn) as usual on his post at the restaurant with a beer in his hand. He introduced himself and after about 20 minutes made a remark that I should know a Johan Kotze - owner of Windkat. This turned out to be an old varsity acquaintance of 30 odd years ago. Johan was still the same guy. In spirit not a day older than 19 - as I learned later is a trademark of sailors. How George made the connection between us only he would know.
We arranged to go on a weekend with Johan and Nelia (Kerneels as he calls her) on Windkat. It turned out to be more exciting and at the same time more relaxing than a motorbike ride. We were hooked. George offered to take us on all the different possible classes we might be interested in. We started off on Blue Pearl, a Van Der Stadt 34. We were intimidated by the size. We went on to a Van Der Stadt 29, Merlin. The wife did not like the accommodation. I went on my own with George and Peet van de Water on Peet's Holiday23 - what a sail! We did 6.5 knots. A week later we had a late night at the restaurant and went to sleep on Peet's yacht on the mooring. X10 was impressed with the accommodation and the rest was history. Peet is now the owner of Merlin.
As it turned out - three sessions were enough to go solo. First night out we went with Windkat up the Vaal River past Penant 9. A strong wind came up at about 10 that evening. The anchor started dragging. Windkat found us the next morning beached about 5 km's from where we anchored the night before.
Second time out; we ran into a mild storm. The Genoa, (A genoa is the front sail between the mast and the forestay. It is also known as a jib), came loose and X10 jumped up and down on the bow while we were going up and down in the waves, to fasten it. We sailed without any reefing since we did not know how to reef. To be honest - we did not know how to stop in that storm either. Lucky for us it went past by the time we arrived at Anchor Creek.
Third time out; we decided to test the theory that a Holiday cannot capsize. We broach and kept her in the broach; (broach means a sudden instability in the heading of a sailboat when sailing downwind). As we went over X10 grabbed for her glass of wine in the cup holder. When the top window went under and the tip of the boom was dragging in the water we decided that the “impossible to capsize” rumour was a myth and turned into the wind.
Fourth time out; all on our own and I managed to get the anchor rope entangled in the centre board. (I managed it also a few times after that as well).
We did not miss a weekend on the Vaal Dam since January 2009. We managed to compress a lot of experiences into a short time span. In April we were in a 50 knot storm and lost a friend - Hans Simon. May 2009 we took Romy Jane out of the water for the first time to tow her to Lake Kariba.
First mistake we made was to think that we lifted the centre board fully. We lowered the mast while still on the water. This was the second mistake. We could not get her on the trailer and we could not lift the centre board since the mast was already lowered. Lucky for us we could loosen a pulley from the trailer and fit it in the mast fitting where the mast would usually go. This way we managed to get the centre board up without engaging the mast again.
At home we rigged everything up.
Everybody tells you - do not use a (self appointed) immigration agent. I am telling you this as well. I know you will do the same as what I did and use one. I also know you will know as I did never to use one again. Our agent - let us call him Lovemore Sibanda - was well connected. Within 2 hours he had us through the Zimbabwe side. We were about R500.00 poorer for his efforts. We were impressed. Until we came back via the same border and found that we could do it without his help and costs in 45 minutes!
The biggest problem at the border crossing is that we as westerners like to keep a distance between ourselves and the next (smelly) person in the queue. Only to be pushed back as more (smelly) persons help themselves to the space you create. When we came back I managed to do the same to them - I even smelled the same.
Not even 20 km's into Zim we entered the first road block. We were the only vehicle - most probably for the past 20 minutes or so. Nobody is interested in approaching the vehicle after we stopped. The one officer is digging in his nose, the other one his arse. The third one is still indecisive. Will it be his crotch or not? 20 minutes later one came up to my window and asked if I got my licence with me. It was in my shirt's pocket and I took it out. He reprimanded me very strictly. “Sir, I asked you if you got it with you. I did not ask you to show it to me!” I apologize before his bigger insight and knowledge. “GO!” he said. This would repeat itself endlessly. 100 km after the border we went to overnight at Lion and Elephant camp.
Next morning we had a nice breakfast and were on our way - so far so good. We towed at about 80km an hour. The roads were narrow but not too bad. The scenes were out of Africa! Then....120 km's before Harare...
The clutch slipped.... and slipped again... and NO gears but first gear.
We did not know what to do or where to go. On the right hand side of the road we saw a farmhouse, or what was left of it. We turned into the farmyard. A typical 16 year old war “vet” got up from a fire in a burned down lapa where they were cooking porridge. He looked at the yacht in a way that made me worried that I might also contribute to his cause. After explanations he did what every one of his kind in Africa does when confronted with a problem of this magnitude. He took us to the nearest (white) farmer. Ironically enough the farmer who used to live in the burned down house they took from him. He now lives on the other side of the road, running a dairy farm. For some reason dairy farmers in Zimbabwe are untouchable. (Note to self - remember to start a dairy farm in South Africa when back.)
What gave us another insight into the safety situation in Zimbabwe was that the farmer was fishing at Kariba - only his wife and son were home. The nearest neighbours were the war vets - about 5 km's from them. They gave us overnight and arranged for us to take the jeep in to Harare to a place called Zimoco - apparently a Chrysler agency. We left the Holiday at the farm and drove the next day the 90 km's to Harare in first gear at 30 km's an hour.
The people at Zimoco looked grave after inspecting the Jeep. “You have to get a new gearbox. We do not have spares. We do not have a banking system in Zimbabwe. You bring us the gearbox and 800 USD and we fix.” In the meantime the African connection system started working. X10's sister Tharia is the PRO for a big game hunting company, Johan Calitz Safaris. They are working with an environmentalist in Mozambique, Vernon Booth. Vernon's house is in Harare and his wife, Lynn, who is a Pharmacist, is at home. Lynn's got a sister, Ann, on the Vaal Dam at Penant 9. We stayed on at Lynn's house. We drove her bakkie. We put money into her sister's account in South Africa and she gave us the USD in Harare needed to repair the gearbox. All this while the South African counterparts - Tharia and our son - Dan Obedt - were searching for an affordable gearbox. The key word being affordable. All credit
to Jeep Specialists in Pretoria who not only had a perfect second hand gearbox, but who trusted our judgment in Zimbabwe that it is the correct model we needed. None of the other gearbox places were willing to give a gearbox without checking the old one first.
With the help of the in-laws - and Dan Obedt and his friend Fritz from Louis Trichard, the gearbox finally arrived in Harare. In the meantime I could catch up on the internet. Believe it or not - Harare did not have running water, but they had wireless internet! Talk about priorities being in the right places.
Peter Morris visited us in Harare and supplied us with the necessary map and booklet with coordinates of the regatta. We planned to connect to the regatta hopefully before the last day. Peter also sent sms's on his way to Kariba warning us about bad spots in the road just after Lion's Den. We did not need to break an axle as well.
We started the last 300 km's to Kariba early on a Thursday morning. Early enough for the fuel stations to be closed. We were ensured that there is enough fuel in Zimbabwe. This was nothing to worry about. We would get fuel halfway at Chenoi. At Chenoi there was no fuel available. A long queue was standing at one of the filling stations - apparently they expected fuel some time during the day - or week - or month, maybe year or decade or century - nobody cared anyway. Funny enough - the war veterans came to our rescue again. 5 km's outside Chenoi was a filling station with a coffee shop which they liberated from the local (white) owner. They were proud to tell us that they had fuel - enough for the next week! We filled up and I made a note to check on them
when we would be coming back 10 days later. (Needless to say that when the week was over so was their fuel...).
We left in good spirits - only 150 km's to go. Shucks - another road block with traffic cops this time. We were stopped and ignored - as usual. Other than usual a very unfriendly feminine gender thing walked up to us and pronounced that she will have to arrest me because I do not have white reflectors on the front of the Jeep. Arrest - me? When we went through the border I put the safety flares 
(which by the way I did not declare) next to the gear lever for incidents like this. My hand was already moving in that direction when X10 took it in hers. “Ok - there must be some fine I can pay?” “It is R200 sir.” I knew that I had to ask for a receipt. Everybody tells you that you should do that. I also knew that I would get away much faster if I do not. I handed her the money. “You do not want a receipt sir?” “NO - I do not.” “You just want to go sir?” “YES - I want to go.” “Ok sir - you may go.” In
my head I said “Good riddance you pitiable excuse for a human being!” Nothing came from my lips. Like my friend Gerrie always says - “in Africa it is good to be white and rich”.
At Makuti we turned off to Kariba on the old elephant road. The engineer who had built the road followed the elephant footpath. We were stretching our necks to see an elephant but nothing. We saw only the dung and the broken trees. 
The road curved a lot but the surface was good and at 60km's an hour we made good progress. We arrived at Kariba at approximately 1400. Enough time to launch, rig and sail halfway to the regatta coordinates for that day. Or so we thought.
We launched from Chawara harbour. More friendly people you will not get. A tractor launched Romy Jane for which I was particularly grateful since we had about R3000 of water damages to the electronic systems of the Jeep when we took her out. (I said nothing about it earlier since I do not like to talk about it...). The only danger at Chawara - as with the rest of Kariba - is crocodiles and hippos.
We managed to lower the centreboard in no time. We lifted the mast the first time. It was skew to the left. “How is it possible”, I thought. I did not loosen any of the side stays? On closer inspection we saw that the hook thing on top of the side stay slipped to deep into the mast. We had to lower the mast again. After we lifted the mast X10 noticed a lose piece of cable close to the mast on the front stay.
The hook thing of the front stay was not hooked into the mast. It was hanging on the Genoa rope. We had to lower the mast again. I decided not to loosen the Genoa at the bow for this exercise.
Big mistake! When the mast went down the bottle screw inside the roller furler bent. By this time it was getting dark. 
The assistants we got from Chawara wanted to go home and I needed time to figure out how to “un”bend the bottle screw. After an hour with the help of a 4 pound hammer and a rock the bottle screw was straight and we dug in for the night inside the harbour, with the hippos about 10 meters from us. Later that night a huge croc swam between us and the hippos. This was getting better.
The next morning we managed to get the mast up in 10 minutes without any more incidents. (Of course we tied the hook things in place on the mast with insulation tape). 
We sailed proudly out of Chawara Harbour to beach 10 minutes later in the mouth of the harbour. Talk about an unwilling deckhand! You can take X10 to the water but you cannot make her climb into it with crocs all around. The Vaal Dam experience (without the crocs) kicked in. Lower the sail. Down the outboard. Go straight back the way you came in. It worked. We were on our way to Antelope Island.
Roughly as far away from Chawara as the Island on the Vaal is from Deneysville. From there we would go straight over to the Southern side of Lake Kariba. The wind was fair. We were doing 6 to 6.5 knots. We expected to overnight with the regatta on the last night of their trip at Bonde Bay.
We were not used to these distances. We sailed and sailed and the next thing it was getting dark and we were nowhere near Bondi Bay. No problem. The trustworthy GPS in my Nokia 6210 navigator with the downloaded Google Maps and the free MGMaps application on the phone would take us there in the dark. We often sailed the Vaal Dam in the dark.
The only incident was when I nearly collided with the “shallow water” warning at the entrance to Bayshore. But that is another story I do not like to talk about. We lowered sails and started motoring towards Bondi Bay. Depth was about 20 meters and we were doing about 6 knots on the outboard. We had nothing to worry about. Until we heard a loud crack as we bumped into something. The holiday swerved to port. I put on the brakes as hard as I could. We were in the middle of a forest of stone trees! (I used the term petrified and somebody asked me if the trees
were scared. I am still not sure who had the biggest scare).
We had a scratch on the starboard side but no structural damage. X10 had to go sit on the bow with the spotlight. As usual we had some words about her instructions. “Do not tell me there is a tree! Just tell me to go port or starboard!!!!” Women!
They would somewhere find the time to describe the tree to you in detail while you wonder which direction to go! The age old remark - can't live with them cannot live without them applied here. I would not have survived without X10 and her spotlight. We survived in spite of the detailed instructions/descriptions.
At this stage we could spot a camp fire on the shore in front of us. I switched on the radio with the incorrect antenna which I borrowed from Johan and called the regatta. A reply came back that we should not try to enter Bonde Bay since it is too dangerous. We should go to Spurwing Island. I later saw Spurwing in daylight and I was glad I did not comply!) We could hear voices over the water and shouted at the guys to guide us with their spotlights and instructions. We managed to get through the trees and sandbanks, we lifted the centreboard in no time (the adrenaline was still running high) and we beached on the shore with the cats!
These cats were nothing like the luxury lounges drifting on the Vaal. They were built for speed. No cabins to sleep in. There is just a mosquito net between you and the crocodiles. I might be heavy and slow with the big cabin and batteries and solar panel - but I prefer it so.
The next morning we woke up to a beautiful sunrise.
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Needless to say that within an hour we could barely see the sails of the rest. We fell behind so far it was not even funny. The wind died so we had a good excuse to start the outboard.
We were back in Chawara long before sunset.
We showered in the harbour and went to the Spar in the Kariba township to buy matches. This is where we saw the first elephant. In the street in Kariba. People just go to the other side as the elephant came strolling down the street. We did not have the camera with us since this was the last thing we expected.
We had a nice dinner with the regatta at the Cutty Shark Hotel and received a gift for making it to the regatta although a bit late. The hotel itself is on standard and can be recommended. Look at this picture to the right of the Bridge Bar at the hotel. Is it not still very colonial?
At the dinner we met Gary Stafford and his wife from the Quimba Shiri bird farm in Harare. They gave us some more tips on where to go for the next week when we would be on our own. First place we should sleep over would be at Sampakaruma Island.
The next morning we left in a very light breeze on our way from Chawara to the Island.
We were worried about the fact that it was on the border with Zambia. We heard nasty rumours about soldiers who would shoot when you cross the border. Rest assured. It might happen if you set foot on land on the wrong side of the Kariba. On the water itself the border is not clear and nobody shoots at you.
One of the warnings one can take more seriously is that when you anchor for the night, make sure you cannot see the lake itself. During the night strong winds make big wakes and waves and it is in the least not very comfortable. Sampakaruma was 75% under water - the dam was at its highest level. We could not find shelter in a bay and tied ourselves to two scared (sic) trees. After sunset we were shining the spotlight on a huge croc when suddenly some buck came running of the main island over the croc to another smaller piece of the island. The croc scrambled for cover and was as astonished as we were. Our first thoughts were that there must be something much scarier than a croc on the island. Next thing we could hear the leopard snarl. This was definitely a good enough reason to overrun a crocodile.
The next morning we left for Three Finger Bay on the Southern Shore of the Lake.
I used the GPS to get the compass reading when we left in the mornings. I would then switch off the cell phone to preserve batteries and only switch it on after about 5 hours of sailing. My “auto-pilot”, a piece of rubber tied to the tiller arm, was very accurate this day. It did not diverge from the compass reading. 5 hours later when I switched the GPS on I did not recognise where we were. The compass got stuck and we were about 20 km off, already past Three Finger Bay.
I turned back to Three Finger Bay and reached it as the sun was setting. We could choose between a finger full of hippos or, one filled with crocs. We chose the crocs and had a good night's rest!
The next day we set out to Tiger Bay up in the Umi River. We had a fair wind and used only the Genoa since we did not have far to go. At the entrance to the Umi river we met our first “Pirates”. They got away with two cigarettes.
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(Yet Another African Sun Set) |
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win a handbag |
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We took the Hotel Manager, Bill John and the game warden with some unpronounceable name which means “he who works in an office” out on a cruise.
The next day Bill John was taken to hospital with a serious bout of malaria. He took all the hotel keys with him and we had no electricity nor hot water.
We at least had a nice breakfast before we left for Terry's Bay.
When we came into Terry's Bay we were greeted by this picture. What amazing creatures Elephants are. So magestic, so fierce, yet at times so gentle.
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Terry's Bay. Notice that the rudder had been lifted. We did not want it to be broken by some upset hippo |
From Terry's Bay we went for our last night on the Kariba to an unchartered bay at Forthergill Island.
We were sailing past Fothergill to get to the other side between Fothergill and Spurwing Island. At about 5 km from the island on the lake side of the island it suddenly became as shallow as 1.8 meters! I had to backtrack and take a wider berth round the island. We met up with another of those Kariba Pirates - went away another cigarette poorer.
At Fothergill we found a beautiful spot which we dubbed Honey Bee Bay. The reason will soon become obvious. We put anchors both up front and behind us in a very narrow finger of the bay.
As we sailed into this bay some buck drinking water at this exact spot ran off. Since we were early we opened up some wine and relaxed. But not for long. A swarm of bees came after the smell of the wine. X10 is allergic to bees and we had no antivenin with us. We fled into the cabin and closed it up. I terminated the few that made it into the cabin with us. We sealed the rubbish bag and cleaned out everything we thought might attract bees.
After about 20 minutes the bees were all gone. We hung the solar shower on the boom and started showering in the stern. It must have been the smell of the soap but suddenly all the bees were back. We fled into the cabin once again - the only difference this time without our clothes. The next sentence will have to be in Afrikaans - “daar was 'n vreeslike gestekery, gelukkig het die bye niemand gesteek nie!”
I remembered from my childhood days on the farm where I grew up that my dad used to smoke the bees when he collected honey. I had a lot of “Krumme” Austrian Cigars. Truly - they did the trick. After 10 minutes all the bees were gone and they did not return. We had to open up the cabin since the cigar smoke in the cabin affected us as much as the bees.
The sunset was yet again a winner.
On our last day we met up with this spooky image. A Ghostly abandoned Kapenta trawler in the middle of the crossing from Fothergill Island to Chawara Harbour. For the uninformed, a Kapenta is a little fish almost like a freshwater sardine.
We bought some and ate four meals for a total of R10.00. They are fried as is and taste much like biltong. We still got a whole refrigerator full of them. For some reason they do not taste as good in South Africa as on the Kariba.
This photo was taken after we took Romy Jane out of the Kariba. The trip back was not without it incidents.
I will tell about that and about Lake Chivero outside Harare in a follow up.
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