We had been given to understand that, despite the civil war, things weren’t too bad travelling though Angola. How wrong we were. Reading through my diary I feel more frightened now than I was at the time and, I think, we were incredibly naive (and lucky). But we did get through it.
We started off by getting our Land Rover on a boat at Pointe Noir to go to the port of Lobito in Angola. Then it was taken off. Then it was put back on but we had to pay a lot more. Eventually, on the 9th August 1975 we set sail for Angola:
We managed to dock at Lobito. During this time we: 1) Caught a bus to the Governor’s office to try and get permits (passing through checkpoints manned by young teenagers armed with AK47 and similar guns). 2) We met, and were entertained by, the the officers of two ships: Clan Macintosh (we watched a film with them) and Kinnard Castle. Again, a lot of help and kindness given to us (as well as a lot of beer!) 3) Watching some of the fighting around the port from the harbour:
We were denied permission to land so were sent back to Pointe Noir:
But the ship called in the the main port of Luanda:
We managed to get permission to enter the country but were told that ‘If you get killed it is your fault, this country is in the middle of a civil war’. We had taken the precaution of loading as much fuel as we could in Point Noire (including some of the water cans) to ensure we didn’t need to refuel in Angola. We then headed out of town.
Our aim was to get to Lobito keeping behind the front lines of the warring factions. We just went as fast as we could. In one town we slept in the Land Rover in case we needed to make a swift exit – the fighting was very close.
After getting lost (the maps were 64 miles to the inch) we somehow crossed the battle lines and drove up the the front post of the opposing army. They were quite surprised to see tourists driving out of the battle zone in a Land Rover.They stripped everything out of the Land Rover looking for guns etc. Pete spoke to the commanding officer (both able to speak a little basic French) and we were allowed to continue, complete with all our fuel that we argued for (not easy when they have guns and we don’t!)
We hammered south as fast as we could. We had kept our cameras packed away so we couldn’t be accused of spying but at this overnight stop I took the one photograph:
On the rest of the journey to the border with South West Africa (now known as Namibia) we passed thousands of Portuguese refugees camped by the roadside as well as long convoys of trucks, coaches and cars.
We eventually made it to the the border on Friday 29th August 1975 …