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Somalia, here we come

Somalia, here we come

Author: Kingsley Holgate
Date: 2018-07-13

Concern grows amongst the crew and our families - for good reason. Somalia is widely known as 'the most dangerous place on Earth'. A travel warning is issued by both the US and UK governments and a British security source warns us in no uncertain terms not to attempt the journey, making it clear that 'should you get kidnapped, the likelihood of a successful extraction or rescue is virtually zero'. Then we get news from a reliable contact based in the northern port city of Bosaso,that apart from the danger of an attack by Al Shabaab (the militant Islamicterrorist group active in Somalia), or kidnap and ransom, there's now an added risk from ISIS operatives who are coming across the Gulf of Aden from Yemen and setting up bases not far from the route we plan to take, and are even land-mining some of the roads. "Hmm, not ideal," says Ross, poring over a map of Somalia.

A great send off

Ross and Anna, Bruce and Mike traipse up the beach to fill the symbolic Zulu calabash with Indian Ocean seawater from the most easterly point on the South African coastline, then join the rest of the team at Kosi Bay mouth in the beautiful iSimangaliso Wetland Park.

As part of the expedition send-off, we hand over wheelchairs to a special-needs school in Zululand and launch the educational Elephant Art programme at Abuyeni School opposite Tembe Elephant Park, home to one of the last remaining gene pools of 'big tuskers' in Africa. As the heavens open with the first of the summer storms and in cracks of lightning and thunder - elephants huddling in thickets from the lashing rain - the Landy convoy crosses Tembe Elephant Park to reach the old Muzi border gate, then turns east, down the deep, sandy track that follows the border with Mozambique.

Crossing into southern Mozambique, we find the meandering, 'make-your-own-way' sand track to Maputo is fast being replaced by an almost complete Chinese-built highway. We reach Maputo Bay in the late afternoon to find a massive, nearly finished Chinese-built suspension bridge looming overhead. What a sight! Jeepers; imagine the old days of the Catembe ferry - an icon for travellers going north - now gone forever. It certainly marks the end of an adventurous era.