Page 395 - The Tigris Expedition

Five Months for Us, Five Millennia for Mankind
starboard was South Yemen, also with border feuds, and the old
and famous port of Aden, also closed.
Norman was strongly in favour of taking advantage of our
present favourable position to head straight through the narrow
Bab-el-Mandcb strait and continue up the Red Sea. But since
neither of the two nations flanking the Red Sea inside the strait had
responded to our request for landing permits, we unanimously
agreed on altering course for Djibouti, the tiny nation that had
welcomed us to land on the African side of the strait.
On 28 March we saw the blue mountains of Africa, and that night
we steered by the lights from the shore. Long before daybreak we
passed the lighthouses outside Djibouti harbour, and dropped
anchor. As day broke we found ourselves riding with a huge
battleship of some sort as our nearest neighbour. The sun rose and a
small yacht came out of port and guided us in, under full sail, past
the flagship and other units of the French Indian Ocean fleet. The
ancient harbour seemed packed with warships that were there to
protect neutral Djibouti from intrusion by belligerent nations
fighting each other all around. This mini-republic had just been
granted its independence from France. Officers and men on all the
naval vessels were lined up to welcome peaceful Tigris as I shouted
‘sails down’ and turned the tiller for anchoring. Norman climbed
the mast and made a masterly performance of riding the yardarm
down to deck all alone, as the rest of us worked at rudder-oars,
punt-poles and anchors.
To receive us in Djibouti and collect our films were Bruce
Norman and Roy Davies from the bbc. They brought with them
from London the news that under no circumstances could we land
in Ethiopia on the African side, inside the Red Sea. Massawa, where
I had loaded the papyrus from Lake Tana for Ra I and Ra //, and
where for this reason I had hoped to end the Tigris voyage after an
estimated five more days of sailing, was in a state of siege. The city
and the port were in the hands of the Ethiopians, supported by
Russians, but the entrance and the surrounding coasts were held by
Eritrean liberation forces and any trespassers would be shot. But
Roy triumphantly handed me two letters from the North Yemen
authorities. One was from Mohamed Abdulla Al-Eryani, Ambas­
sador of the Yemen Arab Republic in London. The other was from
the Minister Plenipotentiary, Mohamed Al-Makhadhi. The first
confirmed North Yemen’s interest in our expedition, expressed the
warmest wishes for its success, and referred to the Minister. The
Minister wrote: ‘I can assure you of our fullest cooperation at all

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