Saturday 28 April 1984 – Mombasa
#2
I slept like
a log until about 07.00 this morning. The day looked more promising so I went
for a run along the beach.
On the way
back I fell into conversation with one Joseph, the proprietor of a wooden
hulled mini dhow who offered to take me diving on the reef for $3.50 for one
and a half hours. I accepted and we were just pushing off when Freddie turned
up so he joined us, although not for the diving. The boat’s rigging and
construction was pretty primitive but as it was low tide and the average depth
of water was about one metre it didn’t worry me too much. The mast was an old
forked tree trunk, the fork serving as the pulley to hoist the mainsail which
consisted of old fertilizer sacks stitched together.. I was sorry I didn’t have
my camera.
I spent a
very enjoyable hour or so scooting around watching the very beautiful little
reef fish which are so brightly coloured. Freddie couldn’t dive as he has a
perforated eardrum but the water was so shallow that he could walk around and
see the fish. When our time was up we headed back to the shore and there I met
Selima. I had a quick half hour lesson before another squall blew up and forced
me out of the water. The lesson was again spent mostly in the water but my
balance was much better and I learned how to handle the mast and sail.
It was 10.00
by the time I shaved and showered and after such an energetic start to the day
I decided that a bit of brunch would be in order. Nice breakfast – I had plenty
of fruit plus some delicious bacon and sausage with not too bad scrambled egg
washed down with several mango juices and some excellent coffee accompanied by
mini doughnuts. Not bad at all and if I had been trying, I could have had a
deal more.
Back to the
beach after breakfast to finish my lesson, I landed up getting an additional
hour on the house. I really battled to get the darned thing going and was
finally getting the hang of it when I decided to take a break because I felt
buggered. It is amazing how tiring it is scrambling onto a board, falling off,
getting back on the board, pulling up the sail, falling off again and so on and
so on.
I had an
interesting chat with the white Kenyan in charge of the beach franchise and
then decided, foolishly, to have another go. That’s when I discovered that my
recovery time was somewhat longer than one hour. So I came back to my room and
it was pretty hot as the sun was shining. – making the beach very much less
disappointing as the tide came in. I think I may have been right about the
cooling effect of the rain too – it was 26C when I woke this morning and the
temperature went up over 30C during the day.
I finished
off Michael Bentine’s biography which I picked up here second hand for about
$1. while I was doing so, the rain and wind came back in. I strolled down
between showers to say goodbye to Selima and to thank him for his efforts and
had a delicious coconut ice cream for tea. I was torn between the mango and
passionfruit. They did some other fairly unusual flavours including lime and
mulberry and of course Matt’s favourite – dark chocolate.
I bought a
couple more books for $1.20 and came back here to pack and get things sorted
out for another early start tomorrow. I hope we get off OK as there is a
terrific storm on now with thunder and lightning. It will be a bit of a blow if
I miss the Seychelles
flight. I had a bit of work to do, but found it
difficult to drum up any interest, so I ordered the same room service
dinner – and once again it was very good.
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