Exploring the Island

My work keeps me busy for most of the time during the working week and its quite often well into the evening before I have finished researching problems on the web and writing various reports and presentations which I am expected to give. I do however have time free at the weekends and there is a small but active ex-patriot group who create a busy social life.

The weekend begins at 4:00 pm at Donny’s Bar on the waterfront and by the time I get there, usually about 5:30 the atmosphere is alive with gossip and discussing plans for the weekend. Options are a little limited on St Helena where there are virtually no organised events and culture extends to Country Music but little else. The main activities are walking in the hills and sailing or fishing. Mike and Neil are the ring leaders of the walking group and dream up theme walks, ”Breakfast at the Barn” – which I missed,” Lunch at Lots” and the next is planned to be “High Tea at High Hill”. “Lunch at Lots” was a couple of weeks ago.

“Lot” is a massive basalt pillar set on the steep volcanic slopes of the south side of the island leading down toward Sandy Bay. The latter is a complete misnomer, there is very little sand and what is there is black and stony, the bay itself is exposed to the prevailing SE trade winds with large breakers, far too dangerous to consider swimming. It was still raining when 10 of us set off from near the peaks initially through fields of New Zealand flax which was once the islands main cash crop. The flax was processed on the island to produce string for the UK Post Office. Sadly natural fibre gave way to modern synthetics and the islands main industry disappeared overnight about 30 years ago, a blow from which the island economy has yet to recover. As we descended the weather improved and landscape changed to green pastures with cattle grazing then to dry scrub and finally steep rocky slopes with little vegetation.

The path which had been a farm track higher up gradually petered out until we were struggling to find any signs of a path and finally, despite being led by an ex-Army officer with a map, got completely lost on a steep unstable slope. We retraced our steps with considerable difficulty and eventually found the cable.

The cable was a 100m length of old electricity distribution cable firmly anchored to a gnarled old tree which enabled us to abseil down an otherwise impassable rocky outcrop to reach a ridge which led to the base of Lot.”Lot’s wife” is another similar pillar about a mile away across a barren rocky landscape appropriately called “The Gates of Chaos”. It is possible to climb Lot and a small group of us started up using another length of cable, I retired after about 30m but a couple of the more adventurous members of the expedition managed to get more than half way up.

The way home was back the way we had come using the cable to haul ourselves up over the rocky outcrop and then a long steady climb back to the high plateau where we had left our cars.

The following weekend was much more relaxing, one of the group, Ann, is a keen sailor and she has bought a 36ft old steel schooner from a Saint for a bargain price. In the preceding month several of us had spent a lot of our spare time assisting with maintenance and getting her sea worthy. The weekend after Easter was our first opportunity to go for a sail. We planned to sail around the island preferably without using the engine. We met up before dawn at 5:30 on the quay, took the ferry to the mooring and were on our way as the sun appeared above the eastern horizon. After a week or two of fairly persistent rain we were blessed with a fine day and a fresh breeze.

We made good progress beating into the breeze and rounded the Barn, a massive rocky outcrop on the north eastern tip of the island, where the others had enjoyed breakfast a few weeks previously when I was working, after a couple of hours. Sailing down the eastern side of the island was slower as we were beating into a rough sea on the exposed coast Galaxy however is a well designed yacht strongly built and capable of making headway in difficult conditions.

Ann was content to enjoy her boat and left Neil and I to play with the sails to try to get the best out of her. She, “Galaxy”, has been sailed round the world before and has an interesting collection of sails to set on her twin masts. Although the wind slowly moderated we continued to make good progress with the wind on quarter as we sailed around the southern tip of the island and came up to Sperry Island.

Sperry Island is a very dramatic rocky island stack, home to thousands of sea birds who surrounded the boat and were clearly not there to welcome us. 

We had planned to anchor off the next island for lunch and a swim but sadly as we rounded South West Point the wind died away completely and for the next 3 hours we drifted slowly northwards enjoying a leisurely lunch and a bottle of wine. We delayed starting the engine until we calculated that we had no choice if we wanted to get back to our mooring before nightfall when the ferryman would head home leaving us stranded. The engine had only been running for 10 minutes.

“Phoenicia” a replica Phoenician sailing vessel which is following one of the ancient trade routes around Africa and is currently visiting the island. There is however no evidence that the Phoenicians ever came to St Helena which was discovered by the Portuguese in the 15th or 16th century. Well satisfied with our day we retreated to the Consulate Hotel to celebrate our circumnavigation. 

This coming weekend the team are going to sail around the island the other way, unfortunately I have work to do.