TRI

TRI. Type Rating Instructor.  Certainly not my first kick at the can.  I've instructed on numerous types, and I considered instructing on the Aerospatiale Super Puma to be the height of my career. I wrote numerous groundschool and powerpoint training presentations on the type and it's various systems, and in addition to aircraft training, running guys through simulator sessions at our training facility in Stavanger, Norway.  A full motion simulator with phenomenal graphics, you could subject crews to scenarios and emergencies you could never replicate in the actual aircraft, with the added bonus of being far safer, as even mundane training manoeuvres pose risks to operational aircraft.  My first exposure to simulator training was my initial type endorsement on the venerable old Sikorsky S61.  I was forever convinced.

As opposed to training on the aircraft, where emergencies are typically announced with "Simulated.....", and you "pretend" to deal with the emergency, one heads into the simulator environment fully prepared to do an extremely realistic day's flying.  The weather is generally crap, it's pitch black night, you have a tasking, you've flight planned and calculated fuel loads, you ask for and copy clearances on the radio, the noises and shakes and vibrations are all accurate.  You forget you are in a sim.  On a night approach to a offshore oil platform, the crew was subjected to an engine failure on short final, and came up a little short.  They landed on the deck but so far back that as they settled, the aircraft started to tilt back, eventually tilting backward right off the deck.  As the aircraft went ass over tea kettle into the dark abyss, one of the pilots literally started to scream.  Realistic scenarios that you must deal with in real time, honing one's crew cooperation skills and workload management, even the oil companies appreciate the proficiency one gains in a sim environment, and most contracts nowadays demand yearly sim recurrent training, some even bi-annually.   And it's jolly good fun!

I was pretty excited about transferring from the Super Pumas to the new Italian AW139.  Fast, sleek, powerful, and most importantly, very popular.  All the oil companies are demanding AW139s and the manufacturers can't keep up, even the training facilities are having trouble supplying sufficient AW139 pilots.  As popular as the aircraft is with offshore operators, it's also a highly sought after Search and Rescue and Medevac platform.  A popular type means more opportunities, more work, more job security, more cool places to be posted to.  With the new endorsement firmly in hand, after a month long course and simulator sesson just outside of New York, and some time flying the type on the line, it was time to pursue the TRI position once again.  That box is now ticked.  Next step is the TRE, or Type Rating Examiner, which requires a Transport Canada Check Pilot to "monitor" yours truly subjecting another student to a yearly "Check Ride", or Pilot Proficiency Check, a stressful yearly affair for all commercial pilots.  Basically assuring a proficiency standard, to make sure a pilot can be trusted to safely pilot passengers around, that he knows the emergency checklist and aircraft systems and limitations and performance, and all the rules and regulations, and weather, and decision making, and crew management, etc. etc. etc.. 

I've spent the past tour on training flights with an experienced TRE, having me train him, as he makes every mistake he's seen made over his long instructing career.  It's the most fun I've had in a helicopter for a long while, and considering I'm having fun just strapping myself into my seat, you can bet I was thoroughly enjoying the TRI Conversion to Type Training.

And somehow I'm still managing some mountain biking around rural East Africa and snorkelling in the Indian Ocean and coffees at the Old Boma.  Life can be a splended thing!

The world is your oyster...

Rumours abound in touring.  Over the years I've shared a cockpit with Scots and Irishmen and Finns and Norwegians, Swedes and Aussies, Brits and French, Russians and Uzbek's, Romanians, Belgians, South Africans, Americans...no doubt forgetting a few, as the company fills posts with whomever has the experience and endorsements to satisfy customer requirements, irrespective of nationality.  I have to admit, the varying perspectives are almost as intriguing as the exotic locales.  Lasting friendships without borders are forged over shared experiences and airborne adventures, but these offshore contracts are generally short term affairs, and your new found mates spread across the globe to enviable, as well as some very unenviable, contracts.  One does one's best at staying in touch, and through this network you often hear rumblings about a new contract in some exotic sounding locale you'd REALLY like to visit.  Pouring over google images and CIA's World Factbook, and letting one's imagination run wild, is an enjoyable past time for most of us touring nuts.  But many of the rumours are just that, some are proposed contracts that never materialize, and some, we just don't win the bid.  Some.....well, they send someone else.  We sign on, agreeing to go where required, within reason, as there are limits to the risk one is willing to accept.  Some will gladly fly military personnel to forward operating bases in Afghanistan or ride in armed convoys to and from work through the slums of Nigeria, for the financial incentives are quite attractive.   For myself, it's the opportunity to travel and experience the world, with far more intimacy than visiting these places as a tourist would allow.  I'm quite content to stay on in East Africa....but there's some very interesting rumours cropping up.....

Scorpions too!

Okay, I was well aware there were black mambas, scary looking spiders and hordes of malarial mosquitoes, flies galore and monster cockroaches and every variation of moth, but scorpions too?  Found this feisty little guy on my desk today....

If you rate creepy crawlies and snakes and spiders, or even cleanliness and hygiene, anywhere on your list of concerns, Africa is probably not for you.  Though it is nice to get away from North America and watch your priorities shift.  I doubt I'll ever see things quite the same.

Last night's training sortie was a hoot!   I do wish we flew more at night.  Nine years of EMS, plus flying the venerable old Sikorsky S61 two hundreds miles out into the North Atlantic year round night and day, hones one's skills to a very high level, but unfortunately those skills are perishable.  Even with three thousand hours on the ole gals, after a few years of flying autopilot equipped Pumas, and a few years of flying in mostly sunny skies,  I have to admit I'm struggling to be as sharp as I'd like to be.  The oil companies didn't care if it was day or night, whether it was clear or one hundred feet and an eighth,  five knots or sixty, but statistics have shown, night flying is far more risky than during daylight hours.  Safety conscious managers (or perhaps insurance auditors) have gotten their hands on the whole mess and night flights offshore are mostly verboten these days.  I miss the challenge.  Last night was fun.  And to put the icing on the cake, I'm finally moving into a training role on this new type, the Italian AW139.  I've been instructing for years, on top of my line flying responsibilities, on numerous types.  It's a pleasure to share a rather respected level of experience, and it helps keep me sharp as well, not too mention.....I get more flying!  I spent today running the aircraft through all kinds of engine failures and fires and chip lights and transmission and tail rotor failures, etc. etc..  so I'll be able to take guys out to do more of the same.  Admittedly far more fun than flying back and forth to rigs!  Tomorrow more of the same.  I'm smiling.....

Brisk walk

After a stirring breakfast of fresh mango and instant coffee, I treated myself to a brisk hike, melancholy be damned.  With dark skies threatening, I headed seaside, smart phone in a waterproof bag....just in case.  Everywhere smiles and waves and greetings in English and Swahili.  I do wish they kept the greetings simpler, as I cannot remember them all, or their many responses, and I default to "Mambo!" with the required response "Poa!" depending on who throws theirs into the pot first.  A local doctor told me he won't use his rudimentary Swahili when dealing with the locals, for as soon as they hear one word of their native tongue, they assume you must speak the language, and get quite frustrated when the rapid discourse sure to follow is met with a blank stare.  I see this everyday.  But still I open my mouth and try my best.

Flying tonight.  One has to maintain a level of currency, and night flying to offshore platforms present special challenges.  We mitigate those with procedures and training and recurrency flights.  That's what's scheduled tonight. I'm just looking forward to getting behind the controls to slip the surly bonds of earth, at least for a little while. 

Nearing the end of my tour, and looking forward to heading home.  Two more Sundays of sipping coffee and watching monkeys at the Old Boma....

One of those days....

Probably just homesick.  I'm missing my daughter something fierce.  Every tour, roughly the same time frame in, depending on what's going on, I seriously question living and working abroad.  If I was flying more, busier, I probably wouldn't mind so much, but the inconveniences, and being away from home, does wear you down.  I'm making the most of the experience, but today, I'm wondering....

I've been here before, I know it'll pass.  

Just one of those days.

Most days, I love Africa.  Today, I'm missing Canada. 

Rain

There's something about the rain.  The alarm on my watch is beeping but I'm already awake, listening to torrential rain beat relentlessly on the sheet metal roof of our hotel.  While East Africa is generally dry, the rainy season brings lush greens and dark earth.  Perhaps it is the promise of a quiet day, an excuse to not go for a walk or run or trip to the beach, a day to drink coffee hidden from the deluge and read, or perhaps the rain adds to some romantic ideal in my head of living abroad, somehow exasperating the exotic nature of the experience, as the ceiling fan rotates lazily above my bed and I think of the fresh squeezed guava juice waiting for me downstairs.  I like rainy days.

Touring.  The inconveniences are many, but the rewards are vast.  Before the rains came, with the sun cooking the dried foliage as thoroughly as my pale skin, hearing drums and chanting off in the distance, I grabbed my camera and sought out the source, and was amazed to find multitudes gathered to witness a dizzying array of traditional dances from all over East  Africa.  I sat and roasted with the locals and let the drums and chanting wash over me, and captured what I could with my NEX-7. 

Coffee beckons, it's time to get up.  The rains have slackened but I doubt we'll see the sun today.   If it wasn't for the rainy days, what attraction would the sunny days hold?

Just a job....

Good bit of flying today!  Actually over six hours, which is half of what I flew the entire six weeks of last tour!  I'm in a good mood tonight!   You never know what you are going to end up with, for you have bases where a hundred hours plus per tour is standard, to bases that fly considerably less than even we do in Mtwara.  You don't have that much say in your postings, but I'd like to think most pilots do what they do to fly, and high flying bases are very much sought after.  We were often flying seven hours a day in Turkey.  I loved every minute of it!

Unfortunately I have met more than a few that just view it as a job and income, and it always makes me a little sad.  I remember a gas station in Cayuga,  Ontario, not far from where I grew up, and there was this huge blown up photo of the owners son, standing in some Northern Ontario muskeg, with an old Bell 47 helicopter on floats behind him.  I knew the first time I looked at that poster.....that's what I want to do!  It was a decade later, and I found myself flying Bell 47s in Northern Ontario.  You have to have the dream before you can start chasing after it.

Well over 10,000 hours and nearly thirty years later, the novelty isn't even starting to wear off......

Chicken riding!

This is the before shot....

Figured my Canadian pastiness could stand to use a little sun, poolside at the Old Boma in Mikindani, with a good book and some real coffee.  I really wasn't long under that African sun, but the discomfort around supper time made me regret it.  Today I'm sneaking from shadow to shadow, and rehydrating with the air con on max.  I won't offer any post-photos. 

The monkeys were out in force, providing plenty of entertainment.  While I was in the pool, one monkey dropped onto one of the many chickens walking about, and the monkey is screeching and feathers are flying everywhere, and eventually the chicken broke free, and the monkey disappeared into the brush.  The chicken continued strutting around clucking seriously pissed off while we wondered if the monkey was actually intending to eat it or was just trying to take it for a ride.

Missed out on a medevac flight.  There's so little flying here, the crews fight over who gets to go when something pops up, but it was well inside of the day crew's hours of responsibility.  I watched in envy as they flew overhead headed out to the rig a little while later....

You have to be somewhere...

I was recently told that I was an adrenaline junkie, and I get more than a few comments about my personal safety in the places I travel too, or in my choice of career, but to be quite honest, there's really nothing to it.  Sure, I might be a tad more adventurous than some, but I am not reckless.  Being prepared and adaptable is all that's required.  I've read Robert Young Pelton's "The World's Most Dangerous Places", the CIA's "go to" guide for agents abroad, but you won't find Tanzania or Romania in there.  I'm not exactly going to war zones.  The book provides some very good input on how to best keep oneself out of trouble, or to reduce the risk, but to be perfectly honest, the knowledge gained applies anywhere, for you can get yourself into just as much trouble in Winnipeg as you can in Mombasa.

I'll admit that I was nervous when I first dropped into Baku, Azerbaijan.    I had spent time in Norway and France, so it wasn't my first time out of North America, but I was definitely uncomfortable heading to this historic ancient city on the Caspian Sea.  I didn't need to be.  Fear of the unknown is not a very practical fear, and the more I experience, the more I realize that the unknown is where things start getting interesting.  You quickly realize that people are living their lives much like anywhere else, getting to and from work, putting food on the table, providing for their families, and while you may stand out from the locals, you realize that you are a source of curiosity rather than a target of aggression.  Smile and wave and be friendly and you'll get far more warm, genuine smiles in return than you'd ever get in North America.  You realize people are just trying to live their own lives, that not everyone is out to mug you, swindle you, rob you, kidnap you, bomb you...or whatever irrational fear the media has lead us to carry with us as excess baggage we'd all do well to discard.

Fearing things that might happen is a stressful byproduct of being human.  Considering how much time one wastes worrying, and how infrequently those worries actually come to fruition, I believe you are much better off relaxing, enjoying yourself, and to just deal with shit when and if it happens.  While such an attitude could develop into a feeling of invincibility and see one take undue risk, a little common sense and forethought can still allow for some good relaxed, worry-free adventures. 

As a pilot who spends a great deal of my career preparing for the things that could go wrong, training for engine failures and bad weather and any imaginable sort of malfunction, if I spent any time worrying about all those things I'd never get off the ground.  You fly, you relax, you enjoy, you follow the procedures set out, and you know, from experience and training, that if and when something does go wrong, you are as prepared as you could possibly be.   Statistically flying is far safer than driving to work.  When you travel; don't flash money, avoid mobs, avoid dark alleys, avoid stumbling home drunk in the wee hours.  I've broken all those rules, but here I am!  The annoying stuff that you worry about while travelling, missing a connection or losing baggage, just adds to the adventure.  Imagine if nothing ever went wrong?  First off, life would be pretty boring, but more than that, how would you ever learn, about yourself and how you cope?  The more you are faced with, the more you are tested and challenged, the more troublesome situations you shenagle yourself out of, the more confidence and forbearing you take with for the next situation.  Zombie apocalypse?  Bring it on!  Death and taxes, gonna happen anyway.  Does anyone really think they're going to live forever?  Face the facts and enjoy the ride.

Volleyball

Flew two trips this morning!  Woo hoo!

But it's not all fun and games.  Well, actually.....

I quite like beach volleyball, but as in many doomed relationships, the attraction isn't exactly mutual.  Twice weekly, a varying array of ex-pats and locals meet at a nearby net, spread over uneven, rough, gravelly dirt as opposed to "beach", and play volleyball until it gets too dark to see, and swatting mosquitoes takes precedence over volleying the ball.  There's a few people who always turn up, some dropping by to just give it a try, a few Germans who take it far too seriously, and some who are quite happy to catch the ball and throw it back over the net, or perhaps kick it, causing the exasperated Germans to stomp and grump providing us with even more entertainment.  Forget the beach volleyball scenes from Top Gun, this is far more Benny Hill.  It's good exercise too, but when I showed up fresh from six weeks back in Canada, proudly boasting of my new kick-ass beach volleyball shoes, within twenty minutes of the first volley, came down with my foot somehow askew, and tore the ligaments running up the side of my left foot.  I began to wonder if volleyball didn't love me back.

After hobbling around and groaning for most of the tour, I decided to give beach volleyball one more go when I got back this time, my foot had healed up nicely.  I made it an hour into the game before coming down from a spike and badly twisting the ankle of my other foot.....I think it's safe to say our relationship is over.



A common toy that you see in Mtwara is an empty water bottle, with wires stuck through it for axles, and blue plastic bottle caps on those wires for wheels, and a string tied around the neck so the child can pull it along making car noises and smiling happily.  They appear to be quite happy, and are so quick to beam a huge genuine smile at you, it makes one wonder if we are somehow doing it all wrong in the West.   While walking near Stanley's old residence in Malindi (limping due to my sprained ankle),  I found some boys proudly pushing this home made beast.....

They seemed extremely happy to have garnered the interest of the limping mazungu, and posed for the shot above for some ice cream money.   Kind of humbling, considering my love for the best of everything.......

Touring Gear

I like gear.  I like helicopters.  I like helicopter gear.  Pilot gear.  The headsets, sunglasses, kneeboards, leather jackets, flight suits, pilot watches, flying boots, survival knives, flashlites. The better gear a helicopter has, the more buttons and gauges and dials and levers and cool looking doodads, the better I like it.  The cyclic and collective on the AW139, the Italian helicopter I'm now flying, has buttons all over the place. I wouldn't mind if it had a few more.  Touring internationally flying helicopters?  Well, there's even MORE gear involved!

When you consider that we spend over half of our lives, six weeks at a time, and more with training and extended tours, living abroad, having the right gear AND packing within airline limits is a tricky art indeed.   I figured I'd share the experience......

First, you need your work gear.  This will include all the cool pilot stuff, like an aviation headset, a good old David Clark for yours truly, a couple of uniforms (they have us dress up like airline joes, looks quite silly in my opinion, I'm all for nomex flight suits), work footwear of some sort, for I've seen everything from black sandals and socks to black running shoes to black dress shoes to black flying boots, as long as they're black.  I got no end of ribbing for showing up in Romania with boots that were dark brown.  I have black Magnums now, they're SWAT boots, so I guess I could handle abseiling into a hostage rescue situation if the need should arise.  And climate weighs heavily into what you need as well, for winter in Kazakhstan will require some serious cold weather gear and a poopy-suit, a divers drysuit modified for piloting (added zippers and pockets and velcro for more gear!), and that added bulk will probably require a suitcase in itself, or you could be posted to many of our bases a stones throw from the equator where flip-flops and shorts would better suit.   Most bases have daily laundry service, so you really don't need much, depending on how much variety you like in your day to day apparel.  Pack accordingly.  Running week long sim sessions in Norway, and hitting the town every night, I liked wearing a leather jacket out, but it doesn't take much travelling to figure out how impractical they are.  Goretex shells and polar fleeces are the way to go.

I treated myself to an Omega Seamaster Automatic when I first made Captain on the S61.  One serious pilot watch, I'm still amazed at how those tiny mechanical gears, springs and weights can keep accurate time simply from the movement of regular activity, but do you really want to be showing off an expensive watch in the back alleys of Mombasa?  I now wear a G-Shock pilot model (GW3000B) while overseas.  It's extremely durable, updates automatically from satellite signals, solar power charges the battery, it keeps time in two time zones, has a stop watch and alarm, and if it's ever stolen, it won't my hurt my wallet nearly as much as losing my Omega.  And it looks sort of cool.

Yeah, that's me.

 

In hot climates I leave all my cotton at home and go almost exclusively with Under Armour Heat Gear....cool, quick drying, and packs light, from t-shirts to gitches, and even socks when I bother wearing them.  Besides my uniform, the only pants I take are Columbia zip-off travel pants/shorts, the lightest weight fabric I could find.  Some flip flops, some hiking sandals, a nylon/travel baseball cap, my Ray Ban flying shades, classic Aviators of course, plus some sport shades if I go for a run or some beach volleyball.  Steer clear of polarized lenses as they suck in cockpits with computer screens for your instruments, not ideal for smart phones and digital camera screens either, but I must say, they are great for flyfishing!  I have a Galaxy SII and I just buy sim cards with data plans where ever I go, topping up as required.  If you pop the back off my phone a half dozen sim cards will fall out, and I've had to mark them so I can remember which country each is for, but it's far, far cheaper than roaming internationally with a Canadian carrier.


I give luggage far more thought than I should, but when you live out of the things and travel as much as we do, they have to meet some considerations.  While most of us travel enough to get "Gold" status on the airlines, getting us into the priority lines for check in, security, boarding, lounge access, etc, it also gets us additional baggage allowances.  So I can check three 30kg bags if I wanted, but the last local airline in Tanzania only allows one 23kg bag and charges $200 for each additional bag, so I keep it down to one.  I've never really been posted to one base for long enough, or with enough confidence in returning, to leave much behind besides some toiletries and uniforms, so taking everything for six weeks to/from and keeping under 23kgs with one checked bag is a balancing act.   Do I take the snorkeling gear, the survival knife, and some Canadian maple syrup, or my travel guitar, multitool and granola bars for the tour???  You can't take it all.

The first thing I did was check maximum baggage sizes for check in and carry on, readily available online for all the airlines.  It took me a few tours to discover that Air Canada's limit was higher than most of the world, and it seems the airlines are ever more stringent on confirming that you are following their rules, and I've been stuck repacking and making sad faces to get my luggage to the next destination in Romania and Tanzania, which adds stress to an already long day, so I go with the smallest and lightest airline limit now.  My nylon suitcase was left on the ramp once in pouring rain in Istanbul, and everything inside was thoroughly soaked, so I bought the lightest weight hard shell Samsonite that was right at the maximum limit for checked luggage size.  It's so lightweight I was worried it wouldn't last, but it's got hundreds of thousands of air travel under it's belt and so far it's holding up admirably!  Put a bunch of gawdy stickers on it so you can find it quickly when you collect at destination.

Carry on is tricky, for me at least, as some airlines only allow 8kg, and my carry on weighs nearly 4kg with nothing in it!  I'll be replacing it with something lighter as I got caught again on this trip.  When you are travelling around the world, often with four or five legs, often through third world countries, you'd do better to just assume your checked baggage will be lost and be pleasantly surprised when it actually does meet you at your final destination.  But that means carrying a few changes of clothes, and valuables you don't wish to lose and need, like your aviation headset, and your laptop, and camera, and ereader, and...and...and....it doesn't take long to exceed that 4kg.  You are allowed an additional smaller purse or laptop bag, in addition to your roller carry on, but it has to be very small and light.  I'll be honest, I get stressed packing my shit.  Somewhere like Romania where anything can be bought is one thing, someplace like Mtwara were you can probably find toothpaste but little else, is an entirely different matter.

I'll admit to loving my Kindle, with it's free 3G network access and wireless, I can download books anywhere in the world, and I read ALOT, and paper is heavier than one thinks.  Throw a few magazines in your carry on at each stop as you travel and see how heavy your bag is when you arrive.  Admittedly I have a thing for knives.  I think they're cool.  I spend most of my time at home in the woods, either hunting or fishing or snowshoeing and hiking, and after numerous survival courses in Canada's North, I couldn't imagine heading out without a knife.  Flying over rural Africa enroute to Dar es Salaam?  I may never, ever need the thing, but I feel far better having it handy.  I've got a bunch of them, but I'm now carrying a Gerber LMF II, designed for U.S. Air Force aircrew as a survival knife.  You can even lash it to a stick and make a spear!  How cool is that?  I was carrying ESEE knives, anyone in the know is well aware of these survival tools, but I found the high carbon steel, while crazy-ass sharp, rusts far too quickly.  Leatherman now makes a "Skeletool", a bare bones multitool that is small enough to carry everyday as a pocketknife, and can open beer bottles.  Very important.  It's always on me.  A small aluminum Pelican 1910 flashlight, bright enough to check the float bottle pressure and tail rotor gear box gauges on the AW139, is usually in my pocket, and handy for the numerous power outages in Africa.  I did carry a travel bug net, but every hotel where you would possibly need one, has one, and if you keep the doors shut and air con on, you don't even need to pull it down. 

Now depending on where you are, you probably need more entertainment than your laptop and ereader can provide, so depending on where I'm going and the whole baggage weight chestnut, I like to have swim gear and snorkeling gear, a frisbee, running gear, my TRX to exercise, fishing gear, a deck of cards, a camera and a big ass lens if a safari is on the plate.  Binoculars for the same reason.  I have Swarovski 8X32s that are quite simply stunning, but I'd cry if I ever lost them, so I generally just carry a tiny pair of Steiners unless I KNOW I'm going on safari (or possibly hunting...fingers crossed).  My goretex shell is ridiculously lightweight and stuffs into a tiny bag I can keep in my pack all the time. Speaking of packs, I've had a few broken zippers and torn straps so I go exclusively with Maxpedition packs now, and I've got such a variety I never know which one to take, but their Condor-II seems to best fit my needs.  I'm hoping no over-zealous check in girl ever gives me grief for using it as my laptop bag, as it does exceed the maximum allowable ever so slightly.

Lots of gear. I'm having fun.  Can you tell?

Mombasa, short but sweet....

There are rumours of more work in Kenya.  I've been around the helicopter business long enough to know, until you are actually doing something, there's isn't much point in getting excited about the possibility of doing it.  It'll happen when it happens, if it happens.  So, I'm not holding my breath, but I certainly would welcome a return to Mombasa.  While I get a thrill pulling pitch and pushing over the nose and having those churning blades pull me up into the sky, I have to admit the adventures and experiences all the travel of touring affords me is seriously cool.  The monkeys in the trees of Nyali Beach with the impossible blue balls, that had us giggling to no end, to the daily traffic jams to and from the airport, and thinking I could make a photo book of just the whimsically painted "Matatus" blazing around.  Think about the Mystery Machine van from Scooby Doo, this is public transport in Mombasa, with one guy hanging out the door doing his best to drum up business as they cut across lanes in complete disregard for anyone else, with brightly coloured themes and slogans painted all over them, from "God is Great" to "Snipers Rule" or "Spanish Guitar" with an image of Hendrix, even "On God We Trust" under a huge painting of a magnum .44.  The positive "Be Hopeful" to the "Wasi Wasi Wenu", Swahili for "Your Worries Are Not My Worries".  I could just watch and read Matatus all day.  Then there was the crocodile farm a short walk from our housing, where for $5 you could buy a chopped up goat and toss him bit by bit to scary-ass crocodiles, and one monster who had claimed many, many villagers.   There was the go-karting on the roughest track I've ever been on, my arms numb from buzzing after a few laps, to the popping and hissing and sparks and eventual pop and flames from ones air conditioner unit in the middle of the night.  The cafes and perfect cappuccinos and guacamole burgers, which one pilot ate EVERY NIGHT.   Kitesurfing and riding camels on the beach, the old Portuguese fort, and museums, and shops selling incredible masks and brass compasses from another era.

It was a good tour.

Safari 2 of 2....Elephants!

 

In the late 1800's, a Lt. Col. John Henry Patterson was sent to Kenya to build a railway bridge across the River Tsavo for the British, to connect Uganda and inland Kenya with the port in Mombasa.  The "Uganda Railway" was also to become known as the "Lunatic Express", but that moniker came long after it's construction.  A pair of lions plagued the Colonel's project, killing some 135 workers before Patterson finally got the better of them. It's a well known classic story of hunting, "The Lions of Tsavo", written by Patterson himself, and Hollywood even made a movie about the story with Val Kilmer and Micheal Douglas, "The Ghost and the Darkness".   I wanted to see that bridge!  We figured if we got away early enough, we could make the 3 hour drive and manage to spend some time in the Tsavo area and still be back in time to cover the night shift, and they said there were many, many elephants!

So after our pre-dawn feed, we take the road once again in our trusty Toyota.  Traffic is light, apart from some large trucks with no cabs barrelling down the highway, right out of a Mad Max movie.  I ask about the reflectors in the bushes along the road from place to place, and I'm told they are to let travellers know there's fuel available there, cheap.  Truck drivers coming into Mombasa from Uganda, the Congo, Rwandi and Burundi know how much excess fuel they have on board, being so close to their destination, the ports of Mombasa, so they sell it roadside to these entrepreneurs who turn a profit with their old jerry cans.  Besides the fuel hawkers, in the brush and desert far different from the lush jungles to the south, you'll see families huddled around piles of coal for sale, seemingly in the middle of nowhere.  And as we climb the plateau to the Tsavo area, averaging some two thousand feet above sea level, you feel the cold, the first time I've even considered putting on a sweater in Africa.

Soon we are in Tsavo East, driving the dirt trails through the brush, when off in the distance I see movement, something large, dark, moving at a good clip, and it takes me a few minutes of watching  before I figure out that I've been looking at the backs of elephants moving through the brush parallel to our trail.  We gas it, hoping the road eventually curves in towards them.  Luckily it does and we stop, and wait.  We are all surprised when the herd comes out of the brush right on top of us, and we clear their path in a panic.  It was far closer than I had hoped!  We see more elephants that day than I could possibly imagine, even stopping to photograph a small antelope, and upon hearing a noise behind us, we turn slowly to find an elephant feeding twenty feet behind us, and we hadn't even seen him!   One mock charged the vehicle, kicking up dirt in our direction, and yet another trumpeted quite loudly, ears flapping, when he finally realized how close I actually was.  Please check out my photo album, with the link at the upper right, for photos galore.

All in all, I returned to Tsavo, spending a few days driving and walking, booking myself into a lodge right in the reserve, after the contract was over of course.  I awoke to elephants lumbering to the water hole just yards from my room's veranda.  And yes, we saw lions as well, a large female, mouth dark from blood, over a small zebra, while the parents bayed remorsefully a few yards off, and the wild dogs and vultures not far away, slowly making their way towards their next meal.

Walking from the toilet near the reserve gate, a huge male baboon headed in the opposite direction passed me by maybe six feet.  He seemed not to care about my presence, and I almost tipped my hat and wished him "good afternoon".   It was an adventure I didn't want to end.

Safari 1 of 2

The first thing that jumps into most minds when Africa is mentioned is "safari".  I was more excited than a schoolboy on Christmas eve when I first found out I was headed to East Africa, but thoroughly disappointed to find out there were no animals to see anywhere near our base in Mtwara.  Sure, Tanzania has some of the greatest wildlife areas in the world, but none within range of where I was posted, that the work schedule would allow....just the odd monkey and black mamba snake, and goats and chickens.  Luckily Kenya had a couple of reserves within day trip distance from Mombasa, and some new high end binoculars I had bought with my Dad just previously in Toronto got put to very, very good use.

Myself and another pilot secured a Toyota offroad SUV, and after a bowl of cereal in the dark, we headed out of Mombasa into the Kenyan countryside.  A ferry ride and an hour of driving later, we paid the required fees and hired a guide, totalling roughly $30 each, and headed into the hilly jungles of the Simba Hills Reserve on a foggy, drizzly Kenyan morning.   Bouncing along rough dirt tracks, it wasn't long before we came across the first African wildlife I had ever seen outside of a zoo in North America, giraffes just off the track peaked at us from behind some tall trees.  It was beautiful, and quite humorous, as their long necks slowly exposed their heads from behind the trees, quick to duck back when they saw us watching, but they eventually relaxed, and sauntered off with that famous seemingly uncoordinated gait of theirs.  I was awestruck, and while we continued to come across giraffes throughout our stay in Kenya, I always stopped whatever I was doing, whatever I was thinking....and just watched.

And it just kept getting better.  We came across fields of Sable, apparently an animal rarely seen, with their gorgeous facial marking and long swept back horns, and huge, menacing, snorting Cape Buffalo, who Ruark, the famous hunter wrote, "look at you like you owe them money", and  multitudes of playful baboons swatting at grasshoppers then quickly stuffing them in their mouths, their babies frolicking and playfighting, totally oblivious to our presence.  And we kept coming across giraffes, all day. 

 

 

We then hired an armed guard to hike with us deep into the jungle to a distant waterfall, with an AK47 on hand for either irate buffalo or even worse, armed poachers, a serious problem in this neck of the woods.

I was really getting into the entire Indiana Jones aspect of it all when a school bus of French students showed up to hike into the waterfall with us.  Their incessant chatter dampened the experience but they certainly surprised us by stripping down to bikinis for a photoshoot under the waterfall.

Fully aware that the human spirit is never satisfied, I got it in my head that I needed to see an elephant.  We saw the ass-end of one sticking out of some trees way off in the distance, but I didn't think that really counted. 

After asking locals where we might best find elephants, the next time we were able to sneak away from Mombasa had us heading down remote trails far to the south, where the bizarre image of a tall fellow walking along using an old faded and cracked traffic cone for a hat will never leave me. We hiked further into the jungle, when our guide spotted elephants on the move far across the valley, working their way down a steep mountainside.  Even with my overpriced Swarovski binoculars, the elephants were tiny off in the distance, but watching the broken grey line of adults and babies, just occasional glimpses through the jungle and large baobabs, it felt like being a part of some time before man, and I was awed.  It was surreal.

I needn't worry.  I was to get very much closer.