A walk on the wild side...
Rhapsode
Tue 9 Nov 2010 10:02
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Still at Sao Nicolau.
The check in with the local policia maritima was
straightforward except that my copy of the pilot book said all that was
necessary was to pay the fee, no further paperwork required. Things have changed
since that was written (and it was well into the post-Nelson era) and he needed
all the paperwork. We have to return today to complete the process.
Then an aloguer to the national park Monte Gordo.
It took us a few moments to get our bearings after we were dropped off and found
ourselves in a tiny water museum complete with drinking gourds and the hat /
rolled up cloth that the locals put on their head when they are carrying big
containers of the stuff.
Once up in the park we decided to follow the Ruta
Principal. It took us forty minutes to do the first kilometre - unfit sailors as
we are. After another kilometer the boys decided they wanted to reach the summit
of the highest point on the island - Monte Gordo. With one and half wobbly (no,
not knobbly!) knees and a recent recovery from a painfully sore bad back I
elected to stay on the Ruta Principal which we had been told was the best of the
routes. Rain was forecast. They would catch me up.
Once the boys had started their ascent my path
levelled off so my pace quickened. It didn't matter much I thought, the path was
good and wide and the boys would also speed up. It was a lovely walk - part
wilderness part cultivated with maize. The path was still high so yooks (Look
here Nelson - this is a landlubbers term and nothing to do with you. If I
want to call a forest of eucalyptus trees yooks then I will!) and pines
profilerated. Beautiful wild flowers added colour.
At the western end of the path, before it returned
from whence we came, the vista quite suddenly opened up. I could see the beaches
to the southwest, and the string of islands we passed on our our way from
Mindelo. The sky was deep blue and the sea the same. I could even see the island
of Sao Vincente some forty miles away it was so still and clear. The park
keepers had even provided a little seat for people to use as they gazed about in
wonder.
After twenty minutes or so I set off again but it
took quite a bit of searching before I could find the path. The good and wide
path disappeared into an overgrown and not always clear small track. Brambles
mostly at ankle and calf length cut into my legs and large cacti growing into
the path impeded progress so that on occasions crawling on hands and knees was
the only way to go. I drew arrows, marked stones, tied knots in plants,
etc. - all good boy scout stuff I thought to let the boys know the way I'd
gone just in case they thought that dad had got lost.
All was well until I got to a dried up ribeira. The
almost non-existent path became non-existent and appeared to have merged with
the river bed. I scambled down for fifty metres or so until I came to a drop of
three metres. Being conscious of the clouds building on the peaks behind me it
was an easy decision to return to my almost non-existent path. I did not want to
be on this river bed if the rains came - it would have been a raging torrrent
within minutes.
Back on my path I searched around and found the
continuation up a steep bank on the other side. It had not been used for a long
time and was hard to spot so I drew a very big arrow up the bank as I scrambled
up.
I came across a small stone house with a woven
roof guarded by a tethered donkey. The owner came out - an old man - who
after some conversation and a little sign language confirmed that I was on the
right track. I told him that two more persons, my sons, were coming along behind
me. I hoped he would find a way of telling them that he had seen me. The old man
and his donkey had subsistence living. No water, no electricty, no telephone (I
switched on my mobile to check - no signal). He had a fews ears of maize
growing. Maybe he had a chicken or two but I didn't see any.
Sometime later I came across two men with dogs. The
dogs didn't like my presence and growled whilst I stopped to chat (sign chat
mostly with a bit of Spanish thrown in for good luck). Yes, I was still heading
in the right direction tho' the path ahead was even more overgrown. One of the
men point to my scratched legs, muddy shorts and sandals and then grabbed hold
of his thick trousers and shook them at me and then pointed to his boots. The
message was more than clear - stupid foreigner, why are you up here in this wild
country wearing such flimsy clothing. I said I was a stupid tourist but of
course I didn't need to - they'd already worked that out. Anyway I also told
them that M & A were behind me and hoped the message would get
through.
Onwards and downwards and eventually the area
became more and more culivated until I popped out more or less where we started.
I went into the tiny visitors' centre and freshened up and then walked on to the
little shop and bought some biscuits and then sat... and sat... and sat. No sign
of the boys. I began to get worried and so walked back up to the visitors'
centre ready to declare an emergency if they were more than an hour late. That
plan wasn't going to work - they were shutting up shop and going
home.
So I went back down to the roadside to wait and to
get an idea of the frequency of the aloguers. Tarrafal was at the wrong end of
the road - the main town of the island Ribeira Brava was further inland. A
couple of them passed but then nothing.
And still no boys. The clouds had descended almost
covering the park in its entirety. Suppose they were lost in the clouds? Suppose
one of them had slipped and fallen - how was I to alert an ambulance? How on
earth would they be able to find the boys if they had missed the path and
wandered off into the wilderness? I was a worried father.
I saw a figure emerge about half a kilometre away.
It looked like Michael cos he was walking down the side of the road carrying a
back pack on the hard part whereas the local people simply traipsed happily down
the middle. But if it was Michael then where was Andrew? More
worry!
It was Michael. They had been worried about me -
losing my way down the dried up river bed and not able to get back up or even
had gone off in completely the wrong direction. He had gone on ahead to catch me
in case I'd decided that I should get back to boat in case the wind had got up
and the boat was drifting onto the rocks or even out to sea!
The boys had seen my arrows and signs but weren't
sure they were mine. They'd missed the one marked on a rock which said 'M &
A - arrow - Dad' and more importantly had missed the big one on the bank of the
river bed. Like me they had followed the river bed down to the three metre dropb
but had then carried on - all the time worrying that I had gone down there and
had got lost or worse. They got to a ten metre drop and foir a while found
themselves stuck between that drop and the three metre one they'd passed.
Eventually they managed to scramble up it but by then the lowering cloud cover
was making it dark and made finding the almost non-existent path difficult. They
decided that they were not on the Ruta Principal at all and thought that the
best plan was to return wence they came, eventually getting back on ther good,
wide path and back to the starting point all the time worrying about what had
happened to me - whilst I was sat on a wall worrying about what had happened to
them.
What a lot of worry in one afternoon!!
Then we worried about not getting an aloguer back
to Tarrafal and wondered where we would sleep that night!
But all was well. We hired one that was going home
to Ribeira Brava and had to pay double and a bit for his trouble. A small price
for the relief it provided!
When we got back to our dinghy we found our boat
boy asleep inside it. I never discovered why his flies were undone
tho'.
Back to boat for a freshening swim in the sea and
spent the rest day retelling each other the tales and worries of the
day.
And decided that next time wed be better prepared
and have A Plan!
Happy sailing.
P, M & A
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