Bay Diving Newsletter #31. September 2007

“All you need to be a fisherman is patience and a worm”

Herb Shriner

Nacala waters have long been known to tease the tourists with displays of leaping tuna and cavorting kingfish that laugh off a lure, and many a packet of boerewors has been defrosted by hungry family members when the great white hunter returns with stories of how big, how many, how close, how almost... Recall the story of the businessman who drove past Fernao Veloso and saw the yellowfin tuna being brought in by the locals. The next month he flew back with experts and investors to set up a five star fishing lodge. After a frustrating day at sea themselves, they admitted they had been a bit too hasty. Other words come to mind.

Local knowledge reigns them in, and one must respect how hard the guys work in their dugout canoes all day with one hand on a line and the other bailing, paddling, smoking, bailing, waving, bailing and pulling in a monster sailfish twice the length of their unstable vessel. Likewise, Arthur is back underwater terrorising the barracuda that visit the Pinnacle at this time of year.

However, where there're good fishermen, there are bad. And here they can be very bad. The alternative to hard work is putting out a weighted net from the shore, splashing around and then dragging said net in to shore, complete with broken coral, poisonous, inedible reef fish, seahorses and perhaps a kilo of small fish that must be divided amongst the gang of twenty.

You would think* that simple mathematics would clear up any confusion. You would think that the reserve, now teeming with fish, would provide a good example of what can work. You would think it would be easy to propagate this success. If anyone has contacts in organisations that would be interested in taking on this real world project in a practical manner - ie, not throwing money at it like the World Bank did when it donated two flashy boats to the Maritime authorities which were promptly overturned, sunk and crashed - involving reef research, education, community involvement and all the other PC cliched catchwords that win contracts, please pass them on.

*After thirty years in Africa I started a sentence with "You would think…" Some people never learn.

Some dogs neither. The very apparent outcome of Jock's skirmish with a Mozambican cobra last year did not deter everybody's favourite softie, Fella from messing with a puff adder. Our diligent guard tied him up as normal at 16h00, oblivious to the fact that the dog had the bloody, swollen head of Muhammed Ali after a particularly bruising round, somehow balanced on a matchstick body. On discovery he was treated with cortisone and antibiotics, a whole episode of Desperate Housewives and a T-bone. Within four days he was back to normal, sporting what he believes is a particularly sexy scar above his eye. This has since been superseded by a few more holes picked up during a scrap with the other boys over the paternity rights to the bizarre looking puppies running around next door with radar sensing ears.

frits Legendary Frits has unfortunately gone to sniff some flowers with his Maker. Having survived being lost in the Mogincual bush for six weeks as a teenager, stabbed by locals on the beach, serious drug addiction and resulting depression, several falls into the sea from a moving boat and countless mauling with other dogs, a too small woman in a too big car drove over him in the driveway. Twice. Like the true soap opera hero he has left his legacy in the womb of an equally stupid, less good looking maiden, so standby for Frits III.

Disregarding the lifetime ban imposed on him regarding naming of our animals, Arthur has bestowed the title of Small Cat on the newest mewling addition which has been employed to escort our latest and greatest chef down to her beach suite in the evenings. Our warmest welcome to MaryAnn. Her parents have been notified of the abduction, without option of ransom, of their prodigy. Nacala cuisine has been revolutionised and inspired. Between her and outstanding trainee chef and lodge manageress, Jacqui, they are responsible for a few extra kilogrammes being lugged around on a few hips. Forget cold beer, guests arrive drooling after a piece of carrot & cashew cake that they read about on a blog or demanding the lamb casserole heard about since Dar es Salaam.

MaryAnn has mastered the buoyancy thing and takes every opportunity to blow off steam underwater and converse with the whales while Jax, undaunted by accidentally shaking hands with a lionfish (half an hour immersed in hot water fixed that up) will soon be going down the same rope.

Its been a season of accidents at sea actually. Simon stood on a moray eel, Andrew patted an electric ray - hilarious viewing if you've never seen a bald man's hair stand on end, Wayne took his camera diving, the boat cellphone went swimming, I smacked my fingernail off while trying to whack a sparkplug out of an unresponsive outboard... Strangely Arthur doesn't feature in this list, and by putting that in print I defy Superstition to give us all she's got. As yet we have managed to avoid any serious problems because we take our diving responsibly and teach our divers to do the same, and I stand by my no drinking before diving policy regardless of how many beers you may have consumed before I was even born.

Nevertheless, it is wise to never get complacent, especially with the discovery of several resident Stonefish (hot water ain't gonna do nothing here) lurking on the reefs. Please sign up with Diver's Alert Network DAN in your region. For sensible cover, advice and medical support at extremely reasonable rates, have a look at www.diversalertnetwork.org

While you're online, go and perv at Ludovic Galko's macro photos taken here. Artistry indeed. http://www.pbase.com/luko/moz

Plans for the rest of the year involve a lot more sailing on by now fully broken in Ietermagog. We will be taking a few days in November to explore more reefs on the way north to the Lurio river. We are waiting for (another) new outboard motor to arrive for the white boat. The Yamaha paraffin motor was going really well until she didn't anymore. She is being fixed in Beira, so for the past few weeks all diving has been conducted off the dhow or Sarah's nemesis, the skiboat, nicknamed The Yellow Peril. Along with that (or maybe because of it), more and more people are braving the Home reef by themselves, learning a lot about navigation along the way (and on the long swim afterwards). This is what diving is about; going and exploring and seeing for yourself what you love about it. Sure a guide can show you the good bits that they know, but you may want to spend 15 minutes with a starfish or gazing at your bubbles in the blue water, and as long as you make conservative choices and treat your buddy like your rich old aunt who hasn't signed the will yet, you'll find this independent option to be one of your most enjoyable experiences yet.

And it means that we can sit on the beach drinking 2M from the new fridge in the diveshop.

Always thinking of you,

Best regards from Arthur and Sarah, new and old staff, and Frits, lounging in a pool in doggy heaven surrounded by 99 virgin doggies serving yellow flowers and meat. Lots of it.

Bay Diving, Fim do Mundo Safaris
New Tel: 82 304 2909 – cellular network on a normal phone, no sms facility
New Tel: 26 500 066 – wireless network, not good when it is windy
SMS: 82 304 2908 – do not expect an instant reply
Email: fimdomundo@teledata.mz – if we receive it, will reply within one day
Website: www.fimdomundosafaris.com

Arthur Telephone: +258 82 5116925 / 82 3042908
Satellite phone: 881631546816
(send a free short message to this number via www.iridium.com otherwise standard costs apply for satellite calls)
Email: waterworks.moz(at)gmail.com
hearn.sarah(at)gmail.com