MarineTrek 01 - Mozambique 2003
In 2003, Mitch Rankin and I completed a 100km unassisted MarineTrek along the coast of southern Mozambique. Drawing inspiration from polar adventurers, we converted two fishing skis into marine sledges and spent six hours a day finning in open ocean while making our way down the coast from Inhaca Island to Ponta da Oura.
Our ambition is to build on this expedition concept and push it to the limit, while constantly exploring other ways to experience and access the wonder of the deep blue. Below is an article on the expedition written for the South African edition of Men’s Health published in June 2004.
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Shoal Searching - Marine Trekking in Mozambique
As we pushed our marine sledge’s out towards the edge of the drop off in Hell’s Gate, I felt a growing sense of apprehension. The viz was grim, three meters max, with heavy particles and sediment, the light spooky, ideal conditions for an ambush. Dropping off the lip of the ledge, the thump of big fish bolting for cover signalled our appearance had not gone unnoticed. This was big game territory, liquid in nature, yet governed by the same primordial ethic, African style.
Suddenly, two huge king mackeral or “couta” appeared out of the murk, eyeballing us imperiously from below. As Mitch shrieked in delight at this promising sign of life, I took note of the green coldish water and the hundred or so kilometres that lay between us and Ponta Da Oura. Was this a localised phenomenon, a function of the massive outflow from Maputo Bay, or where we in for a long cold haul with limited visibility?
Fining deeper, through the crashing surf zone and out past the back line of waves, the golden and green coastline of Mozambique unfolded away to the north and south like a ribbon of permanence between the ever changing blues of the sea and sky. A warm confidence flooded my system The marine sledges, each laden with 70kgs of supplies and equipment, had handled the surf zone beautifully. Marine Trek One was a go!
A year earlier, inspired by the efforts of extreme adventurers such as Mike Horn and Ranulph Fiennes, I had unsuccessfully scoured the Web for man-hauling type expedition packages to the South and North Poles. Not only were the options limited and expensive, the guided aspect detracted from the purity of what drew me to the concept in the first place – exploring a pristine wilderness on one’s own terms, unassisted, with minimal interference. Having grown up on the coast of Natal, my exposure to snow was limited, hardly the ideal credentials for mounting an unassisted polar expedition. So the idea was binned.
One morning, not long after, I had a novel idea so simple and pure that it felt instantly right – forget the snow, work to your strengths and your passion! Trade the ski’s for fins and go pull a sled in the sea! Genius!
Based on years of experience gained through competitive spearfishing and freediving off the coast of South Africa, Mozambique and Tanzania and competing in endurance based adventure races such as the Namibian Solo Desert Challenge, I felt pretty confident that the concept was doable. Sure current would play a part in our progress, and a big swell might have us sitting on the beach for days, but one could plan for all of these contingencies. As for sharks, the lions and leopards of the sea, the chances of being attacked by one of these beasts were real, yet highly unlikely.
With the idea taking shape, my attention shifted to finding an expedition partner. While the thought of doing the trip solo had entered my mind, it felt premature – with some many unknowns, it would up the risk to an unacceptable level. It had to be the right person, someone who in addition to being up to the physical demands of the trip would be great company. Top of my list was Mitch Rankin, an ex-Para bat, accomplished free diver, and great friend. When he smiled enthusiastically after hearing me out and bellowed “Baulders I’m in”, I knew the odds of pulling of the expedition had risen exponentially. Resourceful, patient, and sagely optimistic, he would prove himself to be the ideal expedition partner.
Having successfully disgorged ourselves from Hell’s Gate, we now faced the reality of being totally alone in a pristine, wild marine environment, with one overriding imperative – to reach Ponta da Oura, some 100km’s to the south, inside 10 days and in one piece. All other calls – how far to swim each day, where to free dive, where to replenish our fresh water supply, when to film, where to camp – would be made on a daily basis depending on wind and swell conditions, and progress made the previous day.
The close of our Day 1 saw us beaching at Ponta Macumbo ou Majumbo late in the afternoon, after nine hours at sea. Exhausted, we worked for three hours to get our camp established and to feed ourselves. This was a revelation – having focused primarily on the marine aspect of the trip, we had underestimated the physical energy required for the land-based component of the expedition.
With the sledges weighing in at around 100kg’s fully laden, the energy required to pull these up the beach was significant. Pulling them alone was almost impossible, especially up a steep bank. Taking stock over a ration of wine later that night, we made a mental note to allocate more time and energy to these tasks. While nothing dramatic bar the couta encounter had transpired, we had seen a fair share of reef fish and turtles, and had proven to ourselves that the concept was doable. Now we had to repeat the process for a week and trust that the viz and our odds of encountering awesome marine life would improve as we went further south.
Immersed in an unassisted expedition for the first time, I became conscious of a tingling emotion in my gut, subtle yet ever present. Strongest just before we launched in the morning, it took some time to work out what it was – a physical maifestation of fear, the kind that keeps you vigilant and focused. Mitch felt it too, a shared sensibility that lay coiled in our bellies like a restless serpent itching to strike. As the expedition progressed we became increasingly tolerant of its presence, this paradoxical sense of dread and elation, and would eventually miss its passing when the trip came to an end.
Day Two saw us push the limits too far. Setting off relatively late, we finned hard over scattered reef in around 40ft, pushed by a light North Easterly. Arriving at Ponta Chemecane in the Maputo Elephant Reserve around 12pm, we anchored the sledges in shallow water and set off to explore the surrounding reef. This was to prove foolish, and twice that afternoon the sea serpent would bite hard.
Almost as if in answer, Mitch touched me on my shoulder. I had somehow missed him, swimming further north, scanning the wrong quadrant. “I’ve just seen a massive raggie, good spot, should we get the craft?” he asked, unaware of the venom coursing through my veins. Vaguely in shock, I meekly nodded and begun the swim back to shore, at which time the serpent struck again. The sledges had disappeared!
Within seconds, images of Mitch’s drowned mutilated body were replaced with those of the sledges lying on the bottom of the sea or broken against the rocks on the beach, with all our precious gear. Sprinting shoreward, I caught a glimpse of a red bag, although my relief at locating the craft was instantly tempered by the realisation that one sledge had been capsized by a big swell. Had we tied everything down?
A frantic inspection revealed that nothing significant had been lost. As the relief flooded through me, so did the exhaustion. Hitting the beach soon after, we both experienced the shakes as our low blood sugar levels set off alarm bells. Ripping open a dry bag we scoffed a loaf of bread that we had bought at a market in Santa Maria the day before we left and vowed then and there never to anchor the sledges shallow or to split up again unless absolutely necessary. In addition, we would need to be vigilant about drip feeding while at sea, as we had both clearly run out of fuel.
For the next two days we made steady progress down the coast into a very light South Westerly wind. Turtles and dolphin were abundant. Diving down on a large school, I witnessed a huge male on his back glaring up at us, clearly intrigued by our presence. Small flying fish, with their wing fins tucked tightly against their stocky bodies cruised past us, occasionally hyper-spacing if we charged them. The welcome appearance of fish eagles signalled that we were now trekking parallel to Lake Piti, a massive inland lake system still inhabited by crocs and hippos. When not airborne, these awesome birds would strike a pose on a large piece of driftwood on the beach, their white chests clearly visible from the sea, indifferent to
Anchored up off Ponta Dobela in around 60 ft of water, we found a hotspot full of reef fish, and within an hour of hunting had speared a small couta of around 8kgs. That evening Mitch prepared a legendary meal of couta sashimi, complete with wasabi and soy sauce served in the inspection hatch of the sledge, followed bya main course of couta nuggets, chunks of fresh fish cooked in olive oil with salt and pepper. After four days of marine trekking we had found a rhythm that was as sweet as it was wholesome. “Baulders, I think we should just keep going down to Cape Vidal” Mitch remarked cheerfully as we sat around the fire. Without any constraints on end dates, we would have.
The visibility however remained problematic. Green and cold, reminiscent of Cape waters, it was rich with plankton particles, making fish tracking difficult and underwater photography with a strobe almost impossible. It also increased the likelihood of attack. Although we had only seen one ragged tooth shark thus far, it was highly probable that the Zambezi and Tigers sharks that regularly patrol these waters had seen us and chosen to remain undetected.
Only after reaching Ponta Da Oura did we get confirmation that we had just swum through a massive plankton bloom that stretched as far up as Madagascar, a natural phenomenon which occurs when nutrient rich cold water from the polar regions wells up form the deep and displaces the warmer and cleaner surface water. Ironically, the favourable winds that helped us on our way also helped to keep this colder water along the coastline.
On Day Five, approaching Ponta Chechababini just north of Ponta Mamoli, we noticed a thin ribbon of white stretching out to sea at a 45% degree angle from the point. Indicative of shallow reef surrounded by deeper water, our fish tracking instincts flared up, and were further inflamed by the fact that the water looked as if it was finally cleaning up.
I will never forget our first dive down into the coral garden that flourishes inside the protection of that outer reef. Having swum over kilometres of sand, the sheer diversity of the corals and marine life that occurred there blew me away. Like hyped up kids at a birthday party, Mitch and I stowed our Rob Allen railguns on the craft and spent four amazing hours freediving and exploring. This was what Marine Trekking was all about! Watched by a curious shoal of pike who would glide by every so often, we observed, filmed and photographed fish of all varieties scuttling and darting between corals of complex shape, colour and size, like animated jewels in a coral city. Finally the reality of having to get ashore tore our focus away, and we slowly headed in to dry land.
On reaching Ponta Mamoli, the northern most luxury camp north of the South African border, the tone of the trip changed subtly. We were no longer alone, and the serpent that we had discovered and befriended over the last five days left us, leaving us both strangely depressed. Unable to camp on the beach, we were warmly welcomed into the camp, put up for the night in one of their chalets, and treated to a phenomenal three-course meal. Such generosity is rare, and yet we had experienced it more than once on the trip, as others, relating to what we were doing, had opened their arms to us. Still we missed our serpents and all that they had come to symbolize, and arising relatively late the next morning, we worked our way out through a difficult surf zone to see whether they were still lurking in the deep.
They were. With GPS marks for Bass City, a well-known scuba destination in around twenty meters of water, we headed out approximately a kilometre and a half offshore in a steadily building North East wind. Finding reef with a GPS when moving slowly is difficult, as the closer you get the more the directional heading sends you in the wrong direction. The visibility did not help either, having deteriorated to a miserable 5 meters. Resorting to paddling the sledge back into the wind to get some speed, I quickly bailed over the side when within a hundred meters of the GPS mark and then drifted down for a minute before taking a deep breath and finning down into the gloom.
The marine contact I then experienced at around fifteen meters was remarkable. Descending at around a meter a second, I almost swam headfirst into what I thought was a large Zambezi shark, aggressively flexing its back as it turned quickly to the right. As I back peddaled for the surface, my breath-hold cut short by the rush of adrenalin in my body, I realised it was one of the huge resident potato bass after which the spot is named. Arguably the poor visibility affected my judgement, but I could have sworn he was around two hundred kilograms! Almost simultaneously I heard that collective thump of underwater tails as a massive shoal of fish bolted in unison, momentarily appearing and disappearing from view like ghosts into the night.
Back on the surface, the reality of diving in very poor visibility in wild marine territory had my serpent in a writhing knot. Somewhat spooked and wary of what might be lurking unseen below I called Mitch over, but by the time he reached me, we had been blown off the southern part of the reef. With less than ten kilometres to go, and no sign of cleaner water, our expedition was pretty much history. The next day, after a difficult launch and uneventful morning at sea, we arrived at Ponta Da Oura in time for a lunch of prawns and espresso, Portuguese style. After seven days, our time with the sledges and serpents was over.
Looking back, I can only feel a sense of accomplishment and quiet confidence in what we experienced and achieved. While completely insignificant in scale and meaning relative to what others have and will continue to achieve in the pursuit of adventure and the unknown, it gave Mitch and I a taste of what its like to write a novel adventure script and then make it happen.
Along with the serpents, our new friends and travelling companions, I belie there is no limit to where marine trekking as a concept and expedition sport can go. With thousands of isolated marine parks and stretches of coast to explore around the globe, one could marine trek for ten years solid and only experience a fraction of the options on offer. I’m not quite sure what the marine trekking version of the Seven Summits is, but if we can invent one and inspire others to join the quest, it will be worth doing. I have no doubt that collectively we can add to mankind’s appreciation of the dynamic marine realm that without which we would not exist.