Whalefish Chronicles: Part 2

The Whalefish rattles and bounces its way across the Transkei’s emaciated ribcage, ashen dust breath-stroking the air behind it.

Our characters daydream that old daydream, eyes cloudy with visions of surf, travel and adventure. Well that, two beers and a couple of aromatic cigarettes. Sportsmen all this buffed, ribbed, bristling crew - chest-puffed proud, at the peak of their physical fitness, and top of their game.

Out the window there’s a certain monotony, a land-shored stoicism.  Disenfranchised earth yields only to erosion – hills undulate endlessly in all directions – luminescent rondavels shake their fists at the sun, every fourth home the same colour. The other two? Dunno. Is that a riddle? Well, how many houses lie between: three or two? Go figure.

I squint through a window to another world. Right angles and sharp corners have been slow in coming to this place. The angular vehicle joins the cinderblocks in corners of the cornerless –in a land where progress has brought more grief than good.

“We’re really in Africa now boys!” The sound emanates from just below the Raybans on Captain Ahab’s face.  An American had definitely made that crass noise – but an oceanographer from San Diego nogal. He’s tall, loud, bearded. He has a remarkably short torso.

Ahab likes his role as captain of the Whalefish. He has captained similar, if not quite as majestic, roadfish on similar, if not quite as majestic, shores. Ah the wily old man of the sea – the wave doctor. He has a PhD in the study of deep ocean waves, knows way more about krill than he’s happy to let on and has somehow managed to get the mighty US government to pay him to study the offshore winds at Elands Baai, and the intricacies of the full bodied taste of Windhoek Larger.

He waves and smiles like Barrack Obama “Yes We Can”ing his way through Portland. The mutual novelty wanes with the sunlight: smiles and waves transform into upturned hands and a children’s choir chorus that only knows one song: “Sweets!”

The plan was to arrive on the coast, find a tree next to a completely undiscovered point break and camp free, in the solace of the stars. The sun disappears behind the hills as the Whalefish rolls up to a boom-gate.  A proudly dressed park ranger eyes the crew quizzically and takes down various details from Ahab, before directing Pieboy the emissary, to reception.

The Monk stretches the stiffness from his spindly legs, Ishmael sits in the back seat and eats chocolate cookies. Wallets are opened, R440 evaporates from them, and Pieboy returns with keys to a 3 bedroom stone cottage, complete with fireplace, bathtub, and no sea view. NO CAMPING ALLOWED.

DAY 2

The feral four wake up decidedly less feral than they had hoped.

“Oh the Humanity!” Pieboy yawns from his double bed, smiling an easy smile. He wakes and waddles painfully to the porcelain with a Wilbur Smith novel in his hand. Pieboy didn’t usually waddle. Come to think of it, he didn’t usually read Wilbur Smith, or even smile in the mornings for that matter, but you could set your clock to his morning poo. Pieboy had a thousand and one ways to describe his poos. A poet of the poo he was.

This one, he announced to his slowly rousing compatriots, was as short and stout as Danny DeVito. The waddle was the result of a good old fashion North Beach beat-down. A 5-foot sand-ceilinged gurgler had deposited him flat on his back in front of the pier. He wasn’t too unhappy about one more night of comfort for his creaky skeleton.

Breakfast is no match for hungry mouths. Surfing and fishing equipment was checked and packed. A monkey riffled through the ashtray, nibbled some butts, and took a crap on the table, as monkeys do.  Humans went surfing as humans do.

Feral kingdom would have to be extracted from this “wild” coast old-school like, with fok-off big pliers. They headed for Gwa-Gwar point. There was zero chance that it wouldn’t be legendary.

The theme song played, this time four heads bopped in unison. Birds exploded from their roadside nests, Hartebees gave them sideways-head. The hills parted to reveal a moshpit of lush jungle and a leg dipping its sexy toes in the dark blue ocean. Three-foot rights funnelled down the point. For the first time on the trip the Monk lost his cool.

Brothers in injury Pieboy and Ishmael, equally useless fishermen both, had been mandated to catch dinner while Ahab and The Monk hit the lip. It would be Pieboy that took the award for heaviest situation of the day, with a truly extreme sports take on fishing. The ocean gobbled up spinners and sinkers at an alarming rate, monuments of failure entangled in the reef, fucking with a starfishes otherwise pleasant day.

Pieboy, characteristically with the biggest spoon in the kit now lodged in a rock, climbs into harms way to wrestle it free. The ocean decides to finish the job it started in Durban. Rod in one hand, cap in the other, he skidded along the rocks, 4 waves in a row, grinning.

The set wrapped around the point and The Monk tucked in, stalling for the tube over the super shallow take-off right in the armpit of the point, carving off the speed to his heart’s content all the way into the beach. He was having the session of his life. Picking off one after another, his new board consummated the matrimony between body and water.

“I’ll always come back here, for the rest of my life. This is a spot bru, I’m telling you, this place is legit.”

It had taken a fair-sized shark, angry as a bulldog, to separate The Monk and his new geographical love. The goodbye had been stressful and hurried, but the connection profound.

With The Monk beaming, Ahab stoked, Ishmael and Pieboy empty handed, soaking wet and on their way to tipsy,­ the mission had struck it’s first vain of good luck. Maybe not unknown, maybe not unsurfed, but for the crew of the Whalefish, the legend of Gwa-Gwar was born.

A new spot discovered pretty much in the back yard. Now it’s just a case of finding somewhere to sleep.