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The green machine

Last Sunday I took the new lime-green Skua out for its maiden paddle around Gordon’s Bay. We ducked into the old harbour, sheltered from a cloud burst under the NSRI station for a while, cruised over to Harbour Island and weaved through the marina, and then powered across gray glass to the seals at Seal Cove. The water was very quiet with little sea life evident. I was hoping to spot a whale or two, but there were none to be seen despite the excellent visibility.

The boat feels rock-solid, but lively. Total paddling distance was 14.5 km.

This Sunday, Deon and I each took our Skuas out to the seals (man, can those guys fart in their sleep!) and then around the point to Steenbras mouth. We were looking for whales again, but again there were none. The swell and the reflected waves made for lumpy seas, so we headed back instead of attempting the river entrance.

On the way back, just off the Gordon’s Bay reef I decided to ride some of the larger swells. I caught one easily but was then rolled (see Capsized! place mark on the Google Map below). The water was quite cold and after struggling to re-enter the kayak and having to be helped by Deon before we both got trashed on the reef, I realise that the solo re-entry skill is one I am going to have to practice. It would be very difficult in rough conditions, so a paddle float may be the safe option…

Once again the weather was very fine, windless, glass and azure skies. Total paddling distance was 16.5 km.

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Gordon's Bay from the green machine

The green machine - Copyright Deon Myburgh. All rights reserved.

The green machine - Copyright Deon Myburgh. All rights reserved.

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Murray, VWS crew leader, exits the Squirrel

The latest fire that swept through the Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve last week was nothing short of disastrous. Young veld burnt again and all the eleven-year old veld has been destroyed, so that, in the words of a nature conservation official, “everything between Kleinmond and Paarl” is uniformly less than 3 years old. For biodiversity in Kogelberg, which is not known as “the jewel of the Cape Floral Kingdom” for nothing, this is potentially disastrous as the floral mosaic that ensures diversity has gone, and it means that recently fires have been occurring too frequently. Most of these fires are caused by humans, deliberately or otherwise.

On Saturday I was part of a Volunteer Wildfire Services (VWS) Jonkershoek crew that responded to the fire call-out. We were deployed to Kleinmond and waited there until 4:30 pm before being airlifted, along with the local CapeNature firefighting team, to the peak above Heuningklip. The fire, which had orginally started near Kleinmond and swept north-west through Kogelberg to reach the coast between Rooiels and Kogel Bay, was backing up down to Kleinmond again as the wind clocked around. See the Google Earth track of our fire-fight and photos below.

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When I saw the fireline, I wondered what chance we had. It ran east-west from the peak east of Kleinmond, down into a deep ravine north of Heuningklip farm, and up the other side, and was creeping southward towards the town. Anyway we worked our way south from the LZ and then started to fight the fire down a ridge to the kloof. The CapeNature team was phenomenal. They hit that fireline like Dervishes. With the help of the chopper we had the fire out down to the kloof in about 1.5 hours, a distance of some 2 km. The pilot of the Eurocopter Squirrel was an ace. In windless conditions he put out scores of metres of fire with each run, whereupon the combined CapeNature and VWS teams would suppress another section below that. The VWS team learnt a lot about effective beating and teamwork I think.

The fireline down to the kloof and up the other side. Click for larger sizes.

The Squirrel lifts another bucket over Kleinmond

Next time you see a scrawny little guy in thick, orangy gear with a beater over his shoulder, give him respect. He’s a CapeNature firefighter. These guys have been on duty every second day for four weeks now, fighting fires through the night. And they’re damned good at it. Absolute machines and proud of what they do. If it wasn’t for them the Cape Floral Kingdom would be more of a charred wreck than what it is today. I admire these guys and all the other people that do this thankless job for a living – unreservedly.

What's left of the area around the Palmiet

CapeNature team on the fireline

The long isolation of the Kogelberg area has helped to protect its floral wealth and keep it clear of alien vegetation, and today the reserve represents perhaps the finest example of mountain fynbos in the western Cape. It has a species list of 1 654 plant species, of which about 150 are endemic. Many spectacular members of the protea family occur in the reserve.

Source: CapeNature

As the VWS prepared to withdraw from the bottom of the kloof, the CapeNature team fought the fire up the opposite slope and disappeared into the night, their headlamps bobbing after the crackling flames. There was a mild scare as we bundu-bashed our way through really thick, tall bush down the kloof to our vehicles when we noticed a flare-up behind us. If it followed us with any speed we would be facing a big problem, but we were relieved to see it race up the opposite side of the kloof. However, the fire was now below the CapeNature team, undoing their hard work. We understood later that they may have lost the line because they had to backtrack.

Chopper does its thing

The Squirrel wheels away

Back at Incident Control we were able to enjoy water and food prepared by some unknown samaritans, while all the time wondering how the other team was doing as we surveyed the fiery mountainside. Eventually we were deployed to the golf course to assist the fire and rescue tenders as they stopped the approaching wall of flame short of some powerlines and the fairways. While there we noticed some wonderful people rescuing the small fauna that was fleeing out of the fynbos, including tortoises and chameleons, and lent a hand. I was happy to find and rescue an adult tortoise from an awful death. But I couldn’t help thinking of all the many thousands of small creatures that met their end over these days.

There was a tragic corollary to this story when an exhausted fireman was killed after he took a nap front of his tender and was accidentally run over by his comrades at the golf course. Terribly tragic with so many other dangers about.

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Pausing off Steenbras mouth

There isn’t actually much of the Steenbras River to paddle up, even on a kayak – only about 300 metres. Rather it’s the 13 km round-trip paddle from Gordon’s Bay harbour and the usually benign, but spectacular, rivermouth entrance that is most of the fun. On this last Sunday morning, the paddle was breathtaking. Schools of harders rippled the glass, clouds of jellyfish swayed in the currents and the seals at Seal Cove were particularly laid back, unconcerned by our presence. But best of all was the presence of millions of minnows in the Steenbras, larger ones in the deeper water, clearly visible against the river’s “new” sandy bottom, and tiny ones in the shallows. I assume that this proves that healthy rivers are fecund nurseries of fish. Photos and a Google Earth track follow …

Minnows in Steenbras - can someone identify them?	Visitors from the sea
Approaching the mouth	Steenbras

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Rooiels coast

On this crisp morning, Deon and I launched at Rooiels and paddled out to look for the first Southern Right whales of the season, but it seems it’s still too early. So we settled for a paddle down the coast to Pringle Bay and brunch.

A fairly heavy swell was running and we gave the point break at Rooiels, the scene of an earlier mishap, a wide berth and settled into an easy rhythm. Although glassy, the waves that reflected off the rocky coast made the water confused. We were none too keen to risk the beach break at Pringle Bay, but we found a sheltered, rocky channel behind the kelp beds and landed easily. A short walk followed by a healthy brunch in the sun meant that we were well into a perfect day. Helped by a following sea and a light southerly we powered back to Rooiels, beached without mishap and so exorcised the ghosts. A round-trip of 15 km. It was silent on the water save for the rumble of surf on rock – and thankfully the motorbike fraternity doesn’t seem to do Saturdays…

The Google Earth map follows below…

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To quote Cape Nature’s brochure: “Kogelberg…represents perhaps the finest example of mountain fynbos in the Western Cape”. Approximately 1600 plant species of which about 150 are endemic, are found here. The reason for its near pristine condition has been its long isolation from development and agriculture, although in the last decades ribbon “development” of the coastline has boomed, resulting in the unsightly coastal towns that are common on our coast. A prime example of bad taste and low-density sprawl is perhaps Betty’s Bay, with Kleinmond a close second. One of the results has been the increased frequency of fires in the area mostly emanating from human settlements. Although the ecology is fire-driven, the fires are occurring at intervals that are too short and some species may disappear as a result.

Below are Google Earth tracks of some of the hiking routes in the reserve. With time I will add more.

If the track doesn’t appear in the window above or you don’t want to install the plugin in your browser, then download the Google Earth Kogelberg file and view it in Google Earth (download Google Earth)

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Spring is whale season off the South Africa’s Cape coast.

A Southern Right whale surfaces close to Deon off Steenbras mouth

The Southern Rights cruise the sanctuaries in their hundreds. On this day Deon and I paddled around to Steenbras River Mouth from Gordons Bay half hoping to see some. In the mouth in about 20m of inky water we almost paddled over a pair of adults.

They tolerated us for a while as we snapped some photos, and then slipped away as silently as they had appeared.

Below is a Google Earth track of some of our trips along the Kogelberg coastline.

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For a while we used a triangular sail on the double kayak, but lost it off Rooiels when a line came undone in a nasty south-easter and it proved too difficult to derig from the cockpit. We have plans to rig our own sail of a different design. The kayak is a lot of fun under sail and we have reached speeds of 13 km/h in an 11 knot breeze – but the sail must be manageable when things get rough…

Here’s a slideshow of photos from these weekend trips:

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The fire-scarred mountains between Pringle Bay and Rooiels beckon. Deon gives his best piratanical scowl.

Rooiels from the sea. The mountains of the Kogelberg Nature Reserve rise green in the distance. The reserve is now a World Heritage Site.

Rooiels beach - about halfway. We estimate that we paddled 40+ kms in total. It took us about 5 hours.

Rooiels beach - time for a beer. We would need all that energy despite the apparent tranquillity in the background.

This is some of the most beautiful coastline in South Africa. Unfortunately, bikers roar along the coast road most weekends. Out on the water it's silent except for the reflected scream of the bikes. It's not as if they're enjoying the scenery; how can they at 140km/h? The mentality defeats me...

Kogel Bay mountains. The sea is calm and cormorants, seals, Cape gannets and penguins share it with us. But an hour later the water became confused as the onshore swell and chop reflected off the sea cliffs. We had to paddle solidly for 2 hours to stay upright. A diver tells me later that a dive site north of Steenbras is known as the "washing machine".

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Or download the GPS track and open in Google Earth

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The Palmiet River winds through the core of the Kogelberg Biosphere Reserve. The nature reserve protects the most pristine and diverse fynbos in the Cape Floral Kingdom. There are a number of hikes of varying length in the reserve, but a favourite is a walk up the river. It’s very easy, but beautiful. How beautiful? Here’s a taste…

Kogelberg is now part of a World Heritage Site in recognition of its biodiversity value. The flower photos were taken on 7 November 2004, during a late spring in the Cape.

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