ALGERIA, August 26-27, 2011 City of Chetaibi

Algerian Water border patrol checking us out

Tuesday’s sail gave us no wind, but lovely sunny skies. Tabarka is located close to the Algerian border and it wasn’t long before we were actually in Algerian waters. This was made clear to us with the approach of a very large military boat complete with guns on the deck. We had been ready for our arrival in Algeria by putting up the Q flag on our port side shroud and the Algerian flag on the Starboard. As we watched this large boat approach us at a fast speed, I tried to take some pictures without being too obvious. The military boat circled us and hailed us on VHF. Ken had a very pleasant conversation on VHF answering their questions regarding our destination, and nationality of the entire crew. After bidding us a good day, they were gone! Tuesday’s sail gave us no wind, but lovely sunny skies. Tabarka is located close to the Algerian border and it wasn’t long before we were actually in Algerian waters. This was made clear to us with the approach of a very large military boat complete with guns on the deck. We had been ready for our arrival in Algeria by putting up the Q flag on our port side shroud and the Algerian flag on the Starboard. As we watched this large boat approach us at a fast speed, I tried to take some pictures without being too obvious. The military boat circled us and hailed us on VHF. Ken had a very pleasant conversation on VHF answering their questions regarding our destination, and nationality of the entire crew. After bidding us a good day, they were gone! Tuesday’s sail gave us no wind, but lovely sunny skies. Tabarka is located close to the Algerian
border and it wasn’t long before we were actually in Algerian waters. This was made clear to us with the approach
of a very large military boat complete with guns on the deck. We had been ready for our arrival in Algeria by
putting up the Q flag on our port side shroud and the Algerian flag on the
Starboard. As we watched this large boat
approach us at a fast speed, I tried to
take some pictures without being too obvious.
The military boat circled us and hailed us on VHF. Ken had a very pleasant conversation on VHF
answering their questions regarding our destination, and nationality of the
entire crew. After bidding us a good
day, they were gone!

We were able to fly the spinnaker in the morning, but by
afternoon, we were motoring again. It
was a sleepy day with little to do but read, motor and look for dolphins. We arrived in our first Algerian harbor in
the city of Chetaibi around 7PM. Tying
up along the quay was a bit of a circus and the longer it took, the larger the
audience became. Not very often you see
an American, RED sailboat come into your small fishing harbor. Language being the biggest challenge, we had several
attempts to get the boat secured without hitting bottom along the quay. One gentleman assured me that it was 2 meters
deep along side, but we knew we were touching several times. After a few odd try’s, Ken finally dropped anchor with the bow out and
we secured the boat alongside a cement fishing dock. We had most of our fenders
alongside to protect the boat, and of course, by this time it seemed the entire
village was watching our progress.

Our evening audience

The young girls had so many questions for us (ladies)

There was a younger Coastguard representative that helped
with our paperwork and soon became our boat guard. It was soon apparent that many wanted their
pictures taken in front of the boat and several families tried to place their
small children on our deck for this photo opportunity. We had to keep our gateway closed and kindly
ask them to stay off the boat. This
happened through out the evening and even in the morning before we were
up. (in the morning, I awoke to hearing
someone on the deck and when I went up, found several young boys scampering off
with the Coast Guard rep watching. I
think after I asked them to respect us, he kept others from getting on
board.

That first night in Algeria, Ken and Fred walked to
town to try to secure some food for dinner.
Molly, Paula and I stayed behind to “protect” the boat. The entire Quay was filled with people
enjoying the evening and watching us.
The men did not have any luck getting dinner due to our lack of Algerian
funds and they did not want our US$. After a boat-dinner, Molly, Paula and I walked down the Quay and
had several lovely conversations with some of the younger crowd. They had wonderful questions for us and one
particular young girl was very anxious to talk about women’s rights and
freedoms. We found our entire reception
very warm and they seemed delighted we selected their village to stop for the
night.

In the morning we untied early to an almost empty Quay, and
motored slowly out to start our next days sail.
It was about 7:30AM when we left and we found we were able to sail with
the Jib most of the day. Molly and
Paula were at the helm most of the day taking us to our next destination, Collo, Algeria.