Beached supply boat.

Over the weekend one of the two supply boats to the island broke free of its ropes and drifted onto the beach near the city. It was carrying the usual supplies such as beer, canned drinks, probably bottled water and most importantly, diesel. Diesel keeps the island's generator going and consequently provides electricity to our home. Without electricity our water pump stops and and our packed freezers defrost, potentially ruining our meat supply so I'm somewhat concerned, although I'm told that the other boat will come with more supplies. The island ran out of diesel some months ago and it wasn't fun.

The story goes that those manning the boat at night went out, perhaps to get a beer or so and when it was noticed that the ropes on the one side of the boat, mooring it to the dock, had snapped, it was too late and water was coming on board. A submercible pump was borrowed the next morning and the water pumped off the boat. Now the boat has beached itself on the harbour's beach, it's rudder deep in the sand and no bigger boat near the island to pull it out.

The crew were hauling crates of beer on their heads, through the waves and up onto the road overlooking the beach. Apparently a tractor may be the solution to getting the diesel containers off of the boat. The shenanigans drew an amused crowd to the harbour facing road yesterday, including us, and these are our pictures...

Raining cats and dogs.

The thunder of rain on our sheet metal roof this grey morning is making Zachary's hour of television viewing, or should I say hearing, challenging. I've turned the volume up seven digits, but with the varying pressure of the rain showers on our roof, the television sound is thoroughly unintelligible as only the high pitches, of the puppet characters' singing, break through. He's ended up standing right next to the set.

Milla, the lady who helps clean our house, has just chickened out of retrieving the bucket for washing the floor, which is sitting on the step right outside the back door. I tried stepping outside too, but the bucket is not worth it.

 

 

The main road today

As a result of the torrential rain, I'm writing this blog entry in WordPad and will upload it later when the internet comes back on. There is also no cell phone signal. This rain on Principe is something else and the volume would probably be more accurate to describe as raining goats and pigs, than cats and dogs...and it can continue through the night and day. Milla has just come to show me that our bedroom and bathroom are under water, with the sealing around the aircon and windows giving way to streams of water which are now running down the walls. We've found that our container home doesn't do so well in this hot, humid and rainy climate and we find ourselves putting towels down and re-sealing, often. Anyway, my potty-training toddler has just created a flood of a different kind down the side of his potty, which I need to attend to...

I'm back. Right, for those of you who like a few statistics, I've been told that on Principe it rains between 2,000 and 7,000 mm per year, the heavier and more constant rain sticking to the unreachable, mountainous, south side of the island. Mark tells me that we've had about 250 mm of rain per month since March this year - and it looks like May is working its way towards 300 mm. Apparently, we had over 360 mm of rain at the airport during October last year...

Portugal...a place to return to.

I thoroughly enjoyed our week on the Lisbon coast and can't wait to get back to explore more of Portugal one day. We will definitely go back to see more of Lisbon, and perhaps the North and South of the country, as well as to sip espresso and eat pasteis de nata, which are like little custard cup pastries. As people said, the public transport system is great, and we travelled around quite a bit on buses and trains, three children included.

Unlike our experience in Italy, some years ago, we were welcomed as tourists in Portugal and didn't have one bad experience getting help from local people. I tried out my rough Portuguese and think I learnt a lot about the language, through the intense exposure and necessity!  All in all we loved Cascais and Sintra, enjoyed our time with the old friends we met up with and took some great pictures.

Cascais beach

Our accommodation in Janes

Sintra Palace in the background

Sintra central

Praia das Macas

Time away in Portugal

Two sleeps - as I say to Zachary - until we leave for our holiday away from our Principe home. I'm fast approaching my 'island sanity limit' and can't wait for the time away and some first world lights and action, including...English movies, restaurants, clothes stores, toy shops, cars - not white bakkies, choice, variety... and so the list goes on. Zachary, however, is most excited about the possibility of finding a playground with a slide!

We're meeting up with friends and their two children in Praia das Macas and all staying together in a villa in Cascais, with lovely grounds for the kiddies to play in. Being from South Africa, a novelty for us will be travelling using the public transport system, which we are told by Portuguese colleagues, is efficient and safe. It's been a long time since I've been on a train.

Beautiful Belo Monte

Zachary, Mark and I attended the opening of the Roca Belo Monte Plantation Hotel today. I've blogged before about beautiful Belo Monte, which will give any new readers a bit of background about this plantation estate, but with the estate's renovation, it has new life. Sipping a glass of chilled white wine on the terrace this afternoon, overlooking the spectacular sea view, everything suddenly felt very civilized on our rural little island.

Our family adventure to Principe has its ups and downs, but with the renovation of Belo Monte, I am excited about having somewhere else to go for leisure! It will certainly add to the 'ups'. Weekends at the beach are great, as is Bom Bom Resort, but a little choice when it comes to weekend plans will be excellent. A chocolate milkshake - strangely, an impossibility for us on this island thus far - will be something for Zachary, and his parents to look forward to, one of these weekends to come...

Durban holiday coming up...

On Sunday we begin our journey home, to arrive on Tuesday evening, travel weary I'm sure.With lots of prayer covering us, we'll negotiate five airports over the three days, crossing from off the West coast of Africa, through two islands, down the body of Africa and on to our coastal home. We've done this journey many times now and the thought of doing it again just makes me tired. Although so looking forward to the break from our island existance and to seeing family and friends, the travelling is a mission. At first with our travels was the initial excitement of the unknown, which turned into the anxiety producing known but has now descended into the wearisome state which seasoned travellers through Africa know well. I'm not sure how many more times we'll negotiate this long route, as we have been here 12 months now. I look forward to forgetting Luanda airport...

A photo journal from March 2013 to Feb 2014

Approaching Principe

Sao Tome



Airport



Bom Bom Resort view



Cacao

Airport wood fire bakery

City market inside

City market outside

Local shop

Buying and weighing fish

 

The local currency, Dobra. STD 100 000 = around R50

Festival of St Lawrence



The Papagio river which runs through the city

Santo Antonio is the second smallest city in the world, qualifying as a city because of the Cathedral present and because of the local government, amongst other things.



Portuguese architecture in the city



Here, the trees are taking over...

Most housing is made from wood and on stilts



Our home and the Aurecon offices nextdoor.



Sundy ex- plantation estate house in ruins

 Roca Sundy or Sundy plantation estate, is the largest of its kind on the island. Although in ruins, a community lives on the grounds and have made homes in the shells of the buildings. There are plans ahead to renovate the estate for tourism.

Tucked away is a disused steam engine







Praia Buoy

Belo Monte terrace with Praia Banana below



Praia Macaco