Sudan

Our first view of Sudan - Khor Nawarat. It doesn't look like much because it isn't. Mainland Africa is obscured by a mixture of clouds and dust. This is in the "convergence zone" where all the winds screaming north and south just go up. It's an oasis of calm. Gray and dreary we did not see bright cerulean skies until Suakin.

A few "Seabird" boats are here. Left to right: Le Tub, Glide, Margarita and Anima. Our first good night's sleep in weeks.

Beauty can be found in odd places, like this yellow flower on a desolate island.

A rare group shot behind a pile of conch shells. They don't get many visitors hereabouts. The only other visitors were a pair of Eagles.

A sign we're in Africa - a clay pot! The other sign was a pile of rusty .50 cal machine gun cartridges.

If you look carefully, you'll see that every shell has a hermit crab in it. It's like a moving crab carpet on the beach, all of them in some sort of crabby rush hour.

Our next stop was Marsa Esh Shiek Ibrahim. Guess what we see? People riding camels! We must have arrived in the Nubian Desert. The bushes in front are partly hovels. People do live in them. Life is hard here. We have it so good' back home.' Though these people are unbearably poor, there was always a smile and warm greeting. This overnight anchorage provided us needed shelter from the raging Red Sea northerlies which are infamous in this part of the world.

More shelters in the background., complete with colorful Arab fishing dhow

We didn't know just how colorful. The gunboat arrived the next morning and proceeded to shoot it up, just about 100' away. It turns out it the boat was from Yemen and full of smugglers. They'd smuggle stuff to Sudan and Africans back to Arabia. We had no idea at the time and stayed below as we did not want to join the festivities. We wish we had more action shots but we didn't want to take any shots ourselves, if you know what I mean. TIA - This Is Africa. Actually, they were just firing into the water but there is nothing to get one out of bed faster than gunfire. At least, it sounded like firing into the water. We did see the dhow towed away by the militia.

The smugglers left a pile of stuff on the beach, which the locals looted with gusto. Here they're making off with an extension ladder.

Our next stop was Suakin, the main check-in place for Sudan. As you can see, the old part of Suakin has seen better days.

Capt Hub went to the top of the mast to fix stuff and took some brilliant photo's. The boats viewed below belong to two of our fellow convoyers.

Suakin was a major slave trading center for the Arab world. Supposedly the last shipment found its way to Arabia just at the end of World War !!. A lot of misery went through this port in the 19th century bound for Jeddah. Suakin is where Colonel Gordon had his H.Q. They like guns here, even fake ones.

The never ending struggle to fix the outboard.

The place looks like Berlin during World War 11. These buildings are built of coral and quickly deteriorate. Maintenance does not seem an Islamic virtue.

Not too many restaurants here though this sign purports to be one. A brief look inside sported a few tables and chairs but little else. The best treats were from street vendors who sold deep fried falafel which soothed any munchies (groan). Hot freshly baked bread which resembled pita was in vast quantity sold off wooden stretchers.

We love a market and this vegetable bazaar was all we could want. Permission was asked prior to photography! Some said yes, others an emphatic No. Kids always wanted their picture taken.

Women of course refused the request to indulge in a photo op. Most needed to be taken surreptitiously. The women of Sudan wore extremely bright colors as opposed to Arabia. Since there are so many different tribes, so goes the difference in outerwear. .

Gordon's Gate, as in "Chinese" Gordon, the martyr of Khartoum. An interesting montage of 19th and 21st Century. The gate survives because it was built properly, by the British Army. They came here to stop the slave trade.

Here's the Captain arduously transferring diesel into our main tanks. Those 20 liter jugs are heavy especially when there are as many as twenty. We took an extensive amount of extra fuel which was carried on deck. The Red Sea packs a punch with head winds and the only alternative is to motor. hence, all the diesel.

We took a couple of bus trips into Port Sudan. These are the suburbs. Yes, people live in these tents. They are not refugees, they just live this way. If you look, you will see many more tents off into the distance. Note the field of parched sorghum in the foreground. Did we mention its a very hard life.

Water is a rare commodity.

When in Rome.....Attempting to be incognito or at least blend in if only slightly. Sometimes it pays to abide by the local customs.

The grain and pulse bazaar. it was amazing what you could find behind these modest storefronts.

The egg man. you would think that everything would be cheap by Western standards. Actually, for these folks it was Ghalee (expensive). Most produce was shipped in from Khartoum Therefore oranges were five Sudanese pound a kilo. Each 2.8 lbs was U.S. one dollar.

Tourists were usually charged 'a wee bit more' than the locals.' That was fine with us just as long as it wasn't five times more. nothing like helping the economy. It is fortunate if you can speak a little Arabic. Luckily, I got by with limited phrases and the basic market lingo. Everyone appreciated at least trying the language and even helping with pronunciation.

These small motorized rickshaws were the ideal for getting around town. Cheap and efficient.

This was taken while scooting along in our tuk tuk (rickshaw). Its about as close as we could get to taking candid shots of the locals.

These amazing brilliant oranges reds and ochre's were seen only on these particular ladies who got off our bus. Unfortunately, it is taboo to capture the human form either in painting or photos.

This fair young damsel is part of the same clan. Note the dazzling gold coins which embellish her head covering. Although veiled, while on the bus from Port Sudan to Suakin, she gave me a warm smile. Her eyes said it all.

After a long hard day at the bazaar, its the ole feed bag.

We left Suakin during a short weather window to head North. Leaving the anchorage is the early rising fisherman hugging the coast.

Brief interlude with the Net while bashing our way to windward. Being in close proximity to a cell tower on the coast gives us the simple pleasure of instant e mail. Might add that a great cup of java makes one smile. Usually we use our sideband radio which can take quite a bit of time to connect. Such are the whims of technology or lack thereof.

After some islands and reefs, our next stop was Khor Shinab, a bay cut deep in the Nubian Desert and reached by a narrow meandering channel. Here is a panorama, showing Le Tub as the speck under word "Tub" and a tree as the dark blob under the word. We mention the tree as it is the only tree we've seen in Sudan so far.

This is the bleak Nubian Desert. We didn't know for days that there are mountains in the distance, so thick is the dust in the air.

The pictures above were taken from the top of Quoin Hill, named in the 19th Century after the wedges used to elevate naval cannons. Getting down was much harder than the climb.

123....Awwww

Another shot showing the enclosed bay as well as the bleak Nubian landscape. Quoin Hill is at the right end of the bay and you can see the little blob that is the tree and the 2 boats if you look really hard.

The sun rises over the thick layer of dust that is the Red Sea. We ended up spending a week here while the wind raged. We finally escaped but have been clawing our way north while waiting for the wind to abate and even turn southerly.

As the seas outside the extensive anchorage calmed, dozens of youngsters and young men appeared from absolutely nowhere. As far as the binoculars could scan through these myopic old eyes, we could see that fishing nets were employed along the reef.

A fishing camp and a Toyota. Its amazing to see such emptiness and then up wheels a vehicle. The guys on the left are drinking tea.

What appears to be a father and young son netting on the all too close reef at sunset.

The rule of thumb is when coastal cruising get the earliest start as soon as its safe to clear your anchorage. This usually means prior to sunrise and follow 'your tracks back out', i.e. , one's GPS pattern if you are lucky enough to have a chart plotter. This new anchorage called Marsa Oseif was only 8 miles North but put us closer to our upcoming 'weather window'. We tucked in only to find that this has been a Sudanese refugee camp since around 2000. Not from Darfur, but from the Egyptian border. Nearby is some disputed territory which transposed these unfortunates to an area deemed Sudan.

The public facilities, built over the water, made from a makeshift box.

Woman in orange. Houses are built from whatever floats or blows in.

This young lady is fully veiled and it looks like she has writing material. Don't know if she came down to the water to study or hope that we would come ashore. Could only speculate. This camp looks like it needs a lot of assistance.

Bay also used as a bath house for the women and children.

All taken with a telephoto, sort of like wildlife photography. The feeling that I was eavesdropping or peering unwanted into their lives as an intruder left me wondering what in the hell am I doing here. I believe it was the helplessness of not being able to personally provide them with a better life. Free from hunger, free from rootless ness, disparagement That hopelessness that so many refugees must feel when estranged from the familiar, home. And, all a better life means is having enough food in your belly, roof over your head, medical treatment, fresh water. Free of fear.

We're in Egypt now but hope to upload the last of the Sudan material in a day or so. Stay tuned.

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