Wednesday, February 02, 2011
The less said about the night the better. The swell curled around the island and without the shelter of the breakwater it was an uncomfortable one indeed – I am going to have to dig into the depths of my lazarette locker later today and get out my kedge anchor in order to set that and make the next night better (the kedge is set off the stern of the boat and is used to make the boat lie at a certain angle to the wind, in this case I’ll set it so that the stern is facing the swell; thus reducing or eliminating the side-to-side rocking of the boat. Arita had fared just the same so all of us weren’t quite at our best the next morning. I’d forgotten to close the main hatch and it had rained at some time in the night so I had a bit of drying up to do before we could depart for the climb. We left just after 07:30 so that we could do the climb in the relative cool of the morning rather than the midday heat, we were cooled and delayed a bit by a passing shower but that was to our advantage, further cooling the air. After a short drive up the hill we found a place to keep our mopeds and started the walk up the well-defined trail. The vegetation changed as we climbed up the hill, the path taking a long and swooping route to make it easier. We were soon under the canopy and the forest was strangely devoid of all noise and the undergrowth was minimal – even the typical insect abundance was missing. I did tell myself that it was time to hit the stair-master and other torture machines at the gym when I returned as it was more arduous than I’d expected. I did have a lot of water for us in my backpack but 4 litres is a weight that really doesn’t make a difference. But, after a couple of a stops to catch our breath and cool down, we made it to the lower rim of the caldera and looked down into it. The view was impressive but won’t make a great photo as there was just a lot of green verdant vegetation to be seen. We noted the steep path going down into the crater and opted to skip that part of the planned hike and made our way up to the very top. This was another steep path (also labelled as “difficult, use with guide” in the literature) and about a third of the way up the final ascent Lauren and Rob decided that they had had enough opted to wait for me to climb to the top and share the pictures. I gave them my backpack and, armed with my camera, tripod and pocket knife, I clambered my way to the top and was rewarded with a wonderful vista of the island and of Oranjested. The view into the caldera was even more impressive, but because of all the greenery and lack of reference objects I am certain that the pictures that I did take won’t do it justice. After the descent we rode the scooters around the whole island, from the botanical gardens then the oil facility and NW end of the road and then back through town for lunch and then to the cannon battery at the White cliffs. By the time we’d filled our stomachs and camera memory sticks it was almost 4pm and we went to the docks to return the scooters and get back to our boats for the evening. Just after 7pm the Dutch Coast Guard came by in the dark and wanted to board the boat in order to inspect my papers. I warned them about my kedge anchor (kindly loaned to me by Rob as mine was buried very deep in the locker) and they told me that they’d seen it so I opened the side gate but something went wrong as they drifted behind me in order to line up their approach and I knew that they’d run over and fell foul of the little mooring ball behind me. They turned off the engines and drifted slowly while the attempted to free themselves to no avail. Rob navigated the dinghy out to them to assist and I realized that they only way to get this done was to go in the water, so I donned flippers and mask and went over to see if there was anything I could do. Rob and I managed to cut away the mooring ball and most of the line (they had 2 neat dual directional props on their huge Zodiac RIB) and I swam back and quickly showered on deck, by which time they came alongside. They checked my passport and papers and just asked if I had current flares and fire extinguishers aboard and didn’t bother going below. It took about 10 minutes, but mainly because their “new guy” had to fill out forms from my paperwork.
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