Sailing

Diving with an alpha flag

The vast majority of new divers in Cape Town know where Long Beach in Simon’s Town is. Irrespective of the dive school you choose for Open Water training it is in most cases quite likely you will do at least one dive at Long Beach. There is a very good reason for this: it is diveable in most conditions as is usually the last place on the coastline to be blown out. It is a safe environment and a perfect place for training as it is by far one of the easiest shore entries around.

Divers enter the water as a rubberduck speeds past

Although it is known to all dive trainers as a training site, very few visitors know this and not all water users (boaters, kayakers and paddle-skiers) are aware of your presence in the water. The average boater does not know the tell-tale signs of bubbles divers make, and why should he? But being struck by a paddle-ski, a propeller, or the keel of a sailboat is going to hurt you and it could easily kill you.

It is not too often that boats buzz by the beach, but on occasion the Navy boats as well as paddlers, and fishermen drive by as well as visitors to the coast with their recreational boats. Even the NSRI uses this beach for training of their boat crews on occasion. Part of a skipper’s training is to be aware of things floating on the surface: buoys could indicate nets, for example, that would snag the propeller, and thus boaters are trained to avoid or approach carefully any such flotation device.

There is no evidence of a surface marker buoy

So why do most divers dive without any form of warning to a boat that they are there, and why would they do so when part of what they are teaching new divers involves ascending in random spots all over the area? “We seldom ascend during a dive” is most often the answer as to why yet there are several surface skills, training ascents and the constant risk of an unplanned ascent by a new diver coming to terms with buoyancy (or in some cases having a mild panic attack and dashing to the surface).

The simple answer is that it is not required by law in South Africa to tow a buoy or alpha flag… But then it’s not law that as an Open Water diver you can’t go to 50 metres during a dive. You are taught not to exceed your training level, your logic will also most likely tell you it’s a risky plan, but if you are foolish enough to try who would stop you?

More divers entering the water without a buoy or flag

It is fortunate that the dive industry is largely self-regulated and as divers we are free to explore the ocean at will. Scuba diving is a very safe sport and provided you stay within the guidelines of you training agency you will have thousands of safe and enjoyable dives. When doing a boat dive, the skipper will typically erect an Alpha flag to indicate to other boats that he has divers in the water (if your skipper doesn’t do this, it’s time to switch dive charters to one that’s more safety conscious).

You could dive without a pressure gauge – but that would be foolish – you could dive without a mask, but then you would see very little, and you could also dive without an alpha flag, but none of the surface water users would see you or know you were there. Would that not be foolish?

Long Beach by accident

Most of our shore dives with Tony’s students are done at Long Beach, behind Simon’s Town station. It’s a plain little beach in a beautiful setting. Instead of trying to get all fancy with the camera to show you what it’s like, here are some photos I’ve taken by accident over the course of many dives there. My camera bumps against my leg as I exit the water, and sometimes an interesting moment is captured.

Because the beach is sheltered behind the harbour wall, it’s a popular site for dive training and other water sports. We often see novice (and experienced, but they’re less fun to watch) kayakers taking to the water here.

We also often see sailing boats and little dabchicks when the wind is up. I don’t have any accidental photos of them, though!

Long Beach seems to be popular even when the weather is questionable.

Just south of Long Beach is the Admiralty Beach, which is prohibited to the public. For that simple reason, it seems incredibly alluring. There’s also a very interesting shallow rocky reef just off the beach, where one can end up by accident if one’s navigation skills are questionable.

Fence between Long Beach and the Admiralty Beach

For Long Beach, which is not by any stretch of the imagination suitable for surfing, this is a very large wave. Fortunately we managed the difficult entry and exit successfully!

Friday poem: Pretty Halcyon Days

I trust you are having some of these, at this time of year!

Pretty Halcyon Days – Ogden Nash

How pleasant to sit on the beach,
On the beach, on the sand, in the sun,
With ocean galore within reach,
And nothing at all to be done!
No letters to answer,
No bills to be burned,
No work to be shirked,
No cash to be earned.
It is pleasant to sit on the beach
With nothing at all to be done.

How pleasant to look at the ocean,
Democratic and damp; indiscriminate;
It fills me with noble emotion
To think I am able to swim in it.
To lave in the wave,
Majestic and chilly,
Tomorrow I crave;
But today it is silly.
It is pleasant to look at the ocean;
Tomorrow, perhaps, I shall swim in it.

How pleasant to gaze at the sailors,
As their sailboats they manfully sail
With the vigor of vikings and whalers
In the days of the viking and whale.
They sport on the brink
Of the shad and the shark;
If it’s windy they sink;
If it isn’t, they park.
It is pleasant to gaze at the sailors,
To gaze without having to sail.

How pleasant the salt anaesthetic
Of the air and the sand and the sun;
Leave the earth to the strong and athletic,
And the sea to adventure upon.
But the sun and the sand
No contractor can copy;
We lie in the land
Of the lotus and poppy;
We vegetate, calm and aesthetic,
On the beach, on the sand, in the sun.

Make a SEA Pledge tomorrow

A couple of weeks back Tony and I took our weary selves off to OMSAC to listen to a talk by Dr Anthony Ribbink of the Sustainable Seas Trust (SST). He and his team have spent a good couple of months on the road, travelling the length of South Africa’s coastline from Sodwana to Saldanha. They have been visiting yacht, boating, angling and diving clubs, and any other organisations related to use and enjoyment of the oceans.

Their aim is to encourage water users and coastal dwellers to make a SEA Pledge: a promise to take concrete, measurable steps to live in a more sustainable manner, decreasing their negative impact on the planet and increasing their positive impact. These pledges don’t have to involve massive steps – in fact, promising to do something that’s actually attainable will probably make it easier for you to keep your pledge! Examples of pledges could include:

Walking, cycling, taking public transport or sharing transport to work at least one day per week
Recycling the water from washing dishes to use on the garden (and using a biodegradable detergent, of course!)
Turning off lights as you exit rooms in your home
Using energy efficient lightbulbs
Eating sustainably fished seafood (from the SASSI green list)
Recycling glass, paper, and plastic
Safely disposing of expired medications and broken electronic equipment
Starting a worm farm in your garden for wet waste, to create compost
Purchasing a reusable water bottle and using it instead of buying bottled water
Showering rather than taking baths
Buying fruit and vegetables that are in season, and grown locally

The possiblities are only limited by your imagination. The best pledges are specific and list actions to be taken. Saying something like “I pledge to live sustainably and respect all living creatures,” while charming, will make it difficult for you to evaluate objectively in a year or a decade’s time whether you actually made a difference and kept your pledge.

This Saturday, 3 December, is the day chosen for individuals to make their SEA Pledges, co-inciding with the United Nations climate change talks (COP 17) that are taking place in Durban at the moment. If you’d like to make a pledge, you can visit the SST website to make one. Visit the Sea Pledge page on facebook for more. You can also participate in an event that is aimed at raising funds for SST. Indigo Scuba in Gordon’s Bay are doing boat dives and holding a braai on 3 December to raise funds for SST.

SST will also be delivering a petition to the United Nations asking the body to protect oceans and coasts. Everything I know about the UN makes me think it’s mostly fairly toothless, but one HAS to engage with governments and international bodies as well as taking action (i.e. a SEA Pledge!) on one’s own.

The Sustainable Seas Trust is a remarkable organisation that I am very glad to have heard about. Their work is far ranging and what I liked about their projects is that they recognise the complexity of the conservation issues related to the oceans. They work with coastal communities who would otherwise be forced to harvest (often illegally) ocean produce to survive, and through their SEAS Centres they provide education, skills training, healthcare services, and dignity to local residents. By uplifting the individuals who live close to the coast, the SEAS Centres will have a positive effect on the coastal environments that were formerly stressed by having to provide subsistence livelihoods to coastal dwellers. If you’re looking for a charity organisation to donate time or money to, or an organisation to support by means of your company’s social responsibility programs, SST is an excellent candidate. Go and browse their website to find out the full scope of their activities.

Bookshelf: The Devil’s Teeth

The Devil’s Teeth – Susan Casey

It’s rare for me to take as complete and instant a dislike to the author of a book as I did in this case (Elizabeth Gilbert of Eat, Pray, Love fame is the only other example I can summon to mind). Susan Casey is a magazine journalist who counts employment at O Magazine among her career highlights – but this isn’t the reason I took a dislike to her… Keep reading.

I suppose I am looking for a book about sharks that doesn’t exist. Briefly, here and there, this was that book. Casey describes the Farallon Islands, remote and hostile rocky outcrops some 50 kilometres from San Fransisco. Like our Seal Island in False Bay, the Farallones are home to many marine mammals and a large number of great white sharks (some of epic proportions).

Casey describes the birth of her obsession with the islands (she watched a TV show) and the sharks that call them home, as well as their history as a source of seabird eggs (they are an important nesting site). She recounts various visits she took to the islands, culminating in a long stay in 2003.

Casey’s ruminations about how dirty her hair was, what she packed for the trip to the islands, how clueless she is about boats, and how obsessed she – personally – is with white sharks are uninteresting, but her descriptions of the sharks themselves, the research being conducted with them, and the individuals – incredible to a man – conducting that research, are at times rewarding. A keen objectifier of men (like Elizabeth Gilbert, actually), Casey spends a lot of time describing the rugged good looks and well-defined musculature of the various researchers and scientists she encounters – really classy, and respectful of them as scientists and individuals rather than as eye candy. HA! I did wonder more than once if a continuation of this line of thought could explain how she managed to secure a stay on the islands despite them being officially closed to visitors…

Fascinating nuggets are, however, gleaned here and there. The predations at the Farallones generally do not involve the breaching we see at Seal Island, perhaps because the sluggish elephant seals living there do not require the same degree of exertion as frisky Cape fur seal pups do. The attacks mostly take place at high tide. The observations of Ron Elliott, a commercial diver who harvested sea urchins at the islands (the only one who dared) are fascinating – he’d see sharks on almost every dive he did, and hid from them under the rocks where necessary. Upon climing into the water, he’d duck straight under his little boat so as to avoid presenting an interesting silhouette from below.

On two occasions orcas killed a white shark at the island (in one case by holding the shark upside down until it drowned); after both predations, the other great whites vanished – just disappeared en masse. This is intriguing. Many marine mammals pass by – the islands are a popular whale watching location and up to 60 blue whales have been sighted at once. One of the researchers even became the first (and I think only) person to observe humpback whales copulating there. Apparently it takes two… Plus an assistant!

Something else I discovered here that I didn’t know is that the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, one of the foremost aquaria in the world, has had great white sharks on exhibit on several separate occasions, starting in 2004. They don’t keep the sharks indefinitely – they grow fast – but they’ve managed to keep five sharks mostly happy and healthy, before realeasing them (tagged) back into the wild. The reasons for release varied from increased size, increased aggression, to refusal to feed.

Ultimately, this book is an account of a tragedy caused by its author, who seems unaware of the extent of the damage she wrought, and hence unrepentant. She forced herself – there’s no other word – into a delicate web comprising the predators, prey, and the scientists who observed their interactions, and then tore down part of the web by her very presence. Because of her stay on the islands, Peter Pyle, the researcher in charge of the Shark Project on the Farralones, lost his job. Thanking him profusely in the acknowledgements doesn’t really cut it, especially after quoting Pyle elsewhere in her book as saying that he loved the Farallones, and being on the islands, “more than life.”

Aside from shutting down an entire shark research project singlehandedly and causing a ten year veteran of the project to lose his job, Casey also misplaces a borrowed sailboat and breaks the law repeatedly and with gusto. If I’d made such an utter fool of myself, I wouldn’t have written a book about it, but she glosses over her responsibility so thoroughly that I suppose some readers may fail to ascribe to her the blame she deserves.

Buy the book here if you’re South African, otherwise here. Actually, don’t buy it – this woman doesn’t deserve any support at all.

Movie: Waterworld

I used to be the biggest Kevin Costner fan this side of the Atlantic. I watched all his early movies, Robin Hood being a particular favourite. Somehow I never got around to seeing Waterworld… Tony’s prompting, and its presence in the bargain bin at Look and Listen, caused me to remedy this recently.

The premise is that the earth has been covered with water, and almost all memory of dry land has been lost. Not much is made of this, but it appears that some humans have started to evolve gills that enable them to breathe underwater. Costner’s character, a nameless mariner/drifter, is one such individual.

The film was made with an insanely large budget – a fact which becomes apparent early in the movie – and was panned by critics. Despite that, I enjoyed it immensely, and it wasn’t just Kevin Costner in his half ponytail and dangly earrings!

There are some spectacular action sequences, both in the floating cities that the inhabitants of Waterworld congregate in, and on the open sea. No marine life is featured except – I think – a basking shark, that is caught and eaten.

I was disappointed that there wasn’t more underwater footage. At one point the Mariner takes Jean Tripplehorn’s character down to see the sunken remains of a city, using an open-bottomed diving bell. Apart from that, and brief views of the Mariner swimming like a dolphin, the rest of the action is on the surface.

Tony was particularly taken with the gadgets and contraptions that the Mariner has rigged up on his ship. All of it is put together from found objects, looks very scrappy, but works like a charm. The Mariner’s vessel is a three-hulled craft that he pilots at great speed. I think this made Tony nostalgic for his sailing days!

We were amused to see that the ship the villain was using as his base was the Exxon Valdez, the remains of the enormous tanker that ran aground off Alaska in 1989 and caused one of the most environmentally devastating oil spills in history.

You can get the DVD here if you’re in South Africa, otherwise click here. It’s entertaining and action-packed, if that’s what you’re after!

Bookshelf: Marine outposts and shipping

There’s a romance and fascination to the structures that we build to try to tame the ocean, and a sense of awe demanded by the scale and industry that modern harbours project. Learn about the development of modern shipping, about lighthouses, and more with this list of book recommendations for the shipping buff.

Lighthouses

Harbours and shipping

The Complete Yachtmaster