Shit Cruising and Other Peculiarities of Anchoring in Dakar. Senegal Under Sail

The peculiarities of anchoring in Dakar. Shit cruising 😉 Prologue AAAA!!!! OOOO!!!! Go on, get out of here! I yell at the top of my lungs, leaping around the mainmast in my underwear and waving my arms. Boom! Boom! Clang! Clang! Crash-bang! echoes the mast as a metal saucepan strikes it. But this song and dance only has an effect on our neighbours in the anchorage, who nervously try to call an ambulance for me while sheltering in their saloons. The loon, meanwhile (which turned out to be a cormorant), damn it, merely glanced lazily at me from the lower spreader and then gazed dreamily into the distance again... Different kinds of shit activity There’s shit diving—when, after diving into azure waters and feasting your eyes on corals and colourful little fish, you surface in a state of magical bliss... Meanwhile, some lovely people on the boat next door have emptied their holding tanks—full of shit, pardon me. And it all swirls around you like baby sea turtles. And then there’s shit cruising. That’s what we have today. That’s when you step out on deck in the morning and realise there is, in fact, no point in being there, because these amazing birds (God bless them!) have emptied their bowels straight into your cockpit. And now they all merrily carry on shitting from the mast. The fact that you are leaping around in nothing but your knickers, yelling and banging a saucepan against the mast does not bother them in the slightest. They couldn’t care less that our deck already smells exactly like the neighbouring half-dead hulks of long-abandoned yachts. With a sigh, I go below to put on at least a skirt—it somehow feels awkward to drive pterodactyls out of the house in my scanties. Now comes Operation Anti-Shit. My elder junior crew member and I spend half the day psyching ourselves up for it. We have already prepared a scraper to scrape off the shit baked dry by the sun while it is still dry. Then we’ll wash away the residue with seawater, after which we’ll wash the seawater off the deck with fresh water, remembering all the while to conserve the latter. The transparent sprayhood (or rather, it was transparent a week earlier) Other peculiarities of the Dakar anchorage 1. We have already mentioned the shit cruising. 2. If the wind blows even slightly offshore, your windows fill with the stench of sewage and rotting fish from the nearby fish market. The seaweed decaying at the water’s edge makes its own contribution. The shoreline at the CVD anchorage 3. No matter where the wind blows from, it brings brown sand that makes all the sand-laden winds of the Canary Islands look like child’s play. Sand inside and out. It coats the shelves and beds and clogs the pores of the sail covers and dinghy. 4. The water in the bay is, naturally, filthy. You shouldn’t swim in it, and you wouldn’t want to anyway. A Frenchman from one of the yachts had to dive into the sea for some reason—all the little cuts and scratches he had acquired over the course of his arduous yachting life became infected. 5. Large quantities of “handkerchief-like” seaweed (like rectangular 50 × 70 cm scarves). The fact that it floats everywhere is no big deal, really. Even on the anchor chain, the greenery looks rather cheerful. But when the seaweed blocks the sewage outlet, that’s worse. It means half a day of adventures and, probably, diving. That happened to our yachting friends from this boat: But that is where the unpleasant peculiarities of this anchorage end :). And now for pure Senegalese local colour: 1. Morning, afternoon and evening, strictly by the clock (at 5:00, then 5:30 just to make sure, then once again, followed by 14:00, around 17:00 and 19:30), a thunderous cry rings out: “OOOllaaa-AAAA! Allahu akbar! Ummmm—aaa!” Three times over. The mullah is in charge of the wake-up call and summons the population to prayer. Loudly, through a loudspeaker, and with such inspiration that evil spirits flee in terror from the mosque and its surroundings. 2. Weekday mornings differ from weekends in the loud honking of car horns, sounding almost continuously. Well, that’s how it’s done in African, Asian and, I suspect, Latin American countries—you drive not by the rules, but by sound. Whoever honks loudest goes first. They have no time to bother with traffic lights or giving way to traffic from the right. A Dakar minibus, otherwise known as a shared taxi. The fare is 100 francs (about 12 roubles). 3. In the evening twilight, after the mullah’s wailing and the prescribed prayers, the African choruses begin. Male and female voices sing African songs rhythmically, each taking their parts. Sometimes almost until dawn (on Friday night into Saturday, the last voices fall silent around 6 a.m.). I imagine people sitting in a circle—fishermen, their wives, children, tongues of flame (although more likely there’s some neon lamp dangling from a wire), and dancing to drums :). I’m always terribly curious to see it! But the water taxi doesn’t run at night, and if you launch the dinghy, you’ll have to spend ages cleaning it afterwards. 4. There are no pushy visitors. Fishermen scurry to and fro, but they don’t press their catch on you, and traders-cum-beggars don’t pester you. Once, a customs launch came alongside the yacht. The officers came aboard, stood in the cockpit, checked our papers and said, “You may stay in Senegal for three months. Thank you. Goodbye.” “Korvette” Not far from CVD is the wonderful Korvette restaurant, serving French and Russian (!) cuisine, with cool air, beautiful surroundings, and the most delicious cappuccino in the world. They make it with the freshest natural cream, prepared just moments before. The owner’s name is Natalia, and she is wonderful! In 40 years of living in Senegal, Natalia has seen a great deal—she survived, raised a daughter, and made exclusive clothing for ambassadors’ wives. For the past 30 years, she and her French husband have run this cosy little restaurant. The entrance to La Korvette restaurant by the CVD anchorage in Dakar Talking with Natalia and other members of the Russian diaspora enriched our everyday life at anchor in Dakar. Natalia, owner of the Korvette restaurant, with our young sailor Lada In the next few days, we’ll be leaving for the mouths of Senegal’s rivers. They say you can follow them 100–200 km into the interior of the Dark Continent. Yachts and birds at the CVD anchorage The sign for the Korvette restaurant