Fast Sailing and Stuffed Camels

The last part of the season’s adventure took us across the bay of Tunis to Cap Bon and then south to Kelibia and across the Bay of Hammamet to Monastir where we will winter.
We experienced the best sailing of the season during this time averaging 8 knots for the forty miles from Sidi Bou Said past the Ras el Fartass, no joke, to Cap Bon and the same for the final 15 miles from El Kantaoui to Monastir. All this was done with a fresh breeze, close to beam reaching with full sail, flat seas and sunshine.
Kelibia port is a massive and busy fishing harbour with little room for pleasure yachts, although we were made to feel welcome by both the Police and the Capitainerie. Mooring, water and electricity cost about 10.00TD per night (£4). We are berthed alongside four deep but the harbour is well protected and devoid of swell apart from fishing boat movements evening and morning. The port is dirty and the water putrid but there is interest and spectacle here. Strolling around the immediate environs of the port we were struck by the accumulation of plastic bottles, paper and other rubbish and dirt. The Tunisians don’t seem to have a strategy or public service for collecting rubbish from streets and public places. Home owners and shopkeepers wash the pavements outside their properties and a street cleaner sometimes sweeps the road gutters but nothing else seems to get done.
A taxi ride to the north of Kelibia on Cap Bon lies Kerkouane and the remains of a Punic town unearthed as recently as 1952. The settlement, with a population of 2000, dates from the 4th century BC and has been remarkably well preserved since its demise during the second Punic war in the 2nd century BC. The size of the houses, the wide streets, the town planning, architecture and the construction of the buildings suggests a sophisticated society with a high standard of living.
The remains of the houses show a layout with a central courtyard, not that different from the Arab dwellings of today and a partial upper storey. They are complete with sanitation including hip baths and basins still retaining their original water resistant murex purple dyed rendering. Lead pipes connect sink and bath and drain the bath to external gullies.
Many nearly intact opus signinum (a kind of compacted earth render) floor coverings inlaid with a mosaic of tiny stone fragments exist today some 3000 years since they were laid. The museum houses artefacts of pottery, exquisite jewellery and metal coinage that further emphasise the sophistication of these people. To visit such an ancient relic was a truly remarkable experience enhanced by the fact that we were the only tourists on the site.
We were very happy to have our first phone call on our Tunisian SIM from Miggy’s sister, Jane Gillbe. They are coming to stay with us for a couple of days in November having visited Tunis, Carthage and Sidi Bou Said on the way.
It’s not that the flies or the filth that drove us away from Kelibia and we did enjoy the authenticity of this wholly Tunisian fishing port and the lack of tourists but it was time to visit some of the sanitized ‘Zones Touristique’ of Tunisia. These are areas dedicated to the tourist where you can drink alcohol in a bar or restaurant on the street, at tourist prices mind you, without having to sit inside out of site and where street cleaning and rubbish removal services do exist.
Our course took us past Hammamet town where I spent my first package holiday some forty years ago! Things have changed massively since then with the development of the whole coastal strip with hotel complexes, albeit reasonably low rise.
Marina Jasmine and its surrounding development was completed only five or so years ago and is the largest and most spacious yacht harbour in Tunisia. It is spacious and the services are intact and well maintained. It was the first day of low season and the price per night was only £12. After the multitude of flies in Kelibia it was refreshing to find only the token fly to slaughter. It is clean here if not to say sterile. The Zone Touristique immediately around the Marina has unoccupied shops and restaurants and the main drag outside comprises five storey flats built in a long line and masses of souvenir shops.
We were able to access the internet at the Marina for the first time for ages and we had 25 emails including news from family, Ted and Iris, Ian, Jon and Genevieve and Paul and Pauline. Great to hear from you all.
The next port of call, El Kantaoui, although a recent Zone Touristique development, has been nicely planned along the lines of an Andalucía village. Unlike Mammamet Jasmine it is not soulless and there is much activity in the bars and souvenir shops around the dock sides. The Marina is not as spacious and serviceable but the place has character. Having said that there is little here that is truly Tunisian.
Finally we reached Cap Monastir Marina and, after a good deal of wrangling and a few threats about going to press issued, of course, through smiling lips Captain Jalel Ben Salem came up trumps with a splendid berth for us for the winter. He, his secretary Corin, Berthing Master, Marjoub and assistant and diver, Makhram (the latter two please forgive our spelling if you read this) are really extremely helpful, efficient and friendly. The diver ties two bow anchor lines (if one is stern to the dock) to whatever anchorage points he has on the sea bed as this apparently is the best method they have devised for keeping the boats secure during the northerly storms that we are going to experience during the winter. In fact we had one in the last day or two with 40 knot winds and we are still intact and in place!
Miggy’s birthday and the end of Ramadan coincided. Miggy, amongst most generous gifts from others, received the iconic Tunisian souvenir, a stuffed camel from me; not a real one I might add as that would be smelly. Miggy wishes to thank all who sent birthday greetings by phone, email and card. Our friends, John and Annie Corden, who christened Miggy the ‘small and noisy one’ came up with a great card the inscription on the front of which read ‘Happy Birthday to a girl who brings beauty and joy to the world......with lots of noise’. At the end of Ramadan the area became alive with local Muslims frequenting the cafés, smoking themselves to death and, for all we know, having sex during the day!
Others who may sail in our wake in the future will be well advised to read this next piece as the regulations for Visas are not adequately or fully explained in the Imray Pilot book or, indeed, in the most recent edition of the RYA’s C2/05 publication ‘Foreign Cruising Vol 2’. On entering the Country by yacht one’s passport is date stamped and one is entitled to stay for up to 3 months. To extend ones stay, at the end of 3 months one must either obtain a Visa at a price or leave the Country and return. The price of the Visa is 10TD (£4.00) per week for the remainder of the time one remains in the Country after the initial 3 month period.
Monastir was founded by the Phoenicians in the 10thC as a port. Julius Caesar camped her in 46AD before the battle of Thapsus. The town’s main attractions include the 10thC Ribat, the oldest and most intact of its type, the adjacent Grand Mosque and the walled Medina.
Monastir’s most famous son is former President Habib Bourguiba, founder of Independent Tunisia. Although now entombed in his grand mausoleum, he is omnipresent through his golden statue as a boy, his mausoleum, his controversial and vast modern mosque, the seafront esplanade and, indeed, the Marina in which we lay.
It is interesting to note our cruising statistics for the season if only see the remarkable similarity to those of last season:
2007 2006
Distance logged 1764 NM 1768 NM
Ave speed 5.25 Knots 5.25 Knots
Under canvas 27% 28%
Motoring/motor sailing 73% 72%
Days at sea whilst In commission 34% 33%

The remaining days in commission were spent either at anchor or in dock with raised glass in hand in a toast as always to:
ABSENT FRIENDS.