An Adventurous Journey to Tristan
Report from Kelly Green with additional photos from the SH Diana
Writer Nick Schonfeld and photographer Julia Gunther have been planning for several years to visit Tristan. This was to be the year of their planned six months stay, but getting to Tristan proved to be more complicated than expected.
Gerry Repetto welcomes Julia and Nick to Tristan with the promised bottles of 'Black Label'.
Plan A for visiting Tristan is normally to travel on one of the regular fishing or cargo vessels. However, as there are only nine or ten voyages per year and limited passenger space, private visitors may have to give up their places at short notice to higher priority passengers such as medevacs. This is what happened to Julia and Nick. There was space for one but not both of them on the scheduled pre-Christmas ships.
Time for Plan B. They booked a passage on the cruise ship SH Diana which departed Cape Town for Tristan on the 20th November 2023, in the hope of being able to land when she reached the island. It turned out that when they got to Tristan on the 27th November, the swell was too heavy to allow ship to shore transfers. Would they have to continue with the ship to South America?
Plan C was to see if Nick and Julia could be transferred to the MFV Edinburgh, which was then fishing off Inaccessible Island, to be picked up later by one of the island's RIBs. This worked, but it was five days before the Police RIB was able to collect them, by which time the Edinburgh was fishing around Nightingale.
Julia and Nick in one of the SH Diana's zodiacs.
Transferring from the SH Diana to the MFV Edinburgh off the vertiginous coast of Inaccessible Island.
They finally set foot on Tristan soil on Friday 1st December, to be welcomed by Kelly Green, their host Debbie Swain, and Gerry Repetto, who they had met earlier in the year at the Tristan Association's Annual Gathering in Southampton, UK. He had promised them that if they ever made it to the island he would have a cold 'Black Label' waiting for them at the beach! A promise well kept!
Nick and Julia arrive in Calshot Harbour on the island's Police RIB.
The two ships that Julia and Nick experienced were as different as chalk and cheese - the one providing luxury accommodation, spacious saloons and gourmet food, while the other is a working fishing vessel with two-bunk cabins, a small passengers' mess and simple meals.
No doubt they will have a tale or two to tell at their next Association Gathering.