Yammoussoukro and the "Vatican"

Since I have been flying around Africa for the last Thirty years I have become very used to chaotic slums and rusted tin shacks and general squalor of most African cities, and although I have flown into Yamoussoukro in the Ivory Coast on several occasions in the past I have never been there with the visibility being more than about 5000 meters.

Two days ago however the visibility was as good as it gets and I was treated to this fantastic view of the Cathedral and the city center, it took my breath away.

The cathedral at Yamoussoukro, known as the Basilique de Notre Dame de la Paix in english, our Lady of the Peace

I took the above photo from the cockpit as I flew over the Church

The following info I found on the Internet - Fascinating!!

Incongruously situated in the West African bush, the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace (French: Basilique de Notre Dame de la Paix de Yamoussoukro) in Yamoussoukro is the largest church in the world.

The Ivory Coast (Cote d'Ivoire) is only 20-30% Christian, with the remainder adhering to indigenous animist religions (25-40%) and Islam (35-40%). The great basilica was the project of the Catholic former president of the Ivory Coast, who wished it to be a monument to himself.

Côte d'Ivoire president Félix Houphouët-Boigny chose his birthplace of Yamoussoukro as the new capital of his country in 1983. As part of the plan for the city, the president wished to memorialize himself with the construction of what would be the "greatest church in the world." The president commissioned a stained glass window of his image to be placed beside a gallery of stained glass of Jesus and the apostles.

View from the basilica. Photo: John Spier.

The basilica was constructed between 1985 and 1989 at a cost of US$300 million. It was intentionally modeled after the Basilica of Saint Peter in Rome, whose size it intentionally surpassed to become the largest church in the world. The cornerstone was laid on August 10, 1985, and was consecrated on September 10, 1990, by Pope John Paul II. Like its model in Rome, Yamoussoukro's basilica is not a cathedral. The nearby Cathedral of Saint Augustine is the seat of the bishop of the Diocese of Yamoussoukro and the principal place of worship for the city.

The basilica has aroused much international controversy, for the lavish building glittering with Italian marble sits in the middle of an impoverished African city where only a minority of homes have running water and adequate sanitation, and the cost of the basilica doubled the national debt of Côte d'Ivoire. Despite this, many of the country's Catholics are proud of their monument.

I will be back in South Africa in a few days to have the Boeing 727 serviced and should be returning to Monrovia approximately the 6th of next month - June.

Weekend in The Eastern Freestate, Bethlehem, Clarence, Ficksburg and Rosendal

After having just returned from a lovely weekend in Namibia, we accepted an invitation from Crause (My youngest brother who owns an Air Ambulance service and a flight school in Bethlehem) to spend a weekend in the mountains of the Eastern Free state.

We took the bike down in order to really enjoy the scenery and nature and it was really a good time of the year - right at the end of summer to enjoy the rich colours of that part of the world.

The first night was spent in Bethlehem and we were joined by another two friends Francis Smit (Doctor) and Spik, both old recce boys. The next day we cruised through Clarence the little arty village that had its Easter Bazaar on the town square,
On the outskirts of Clarence we buy drinks and biltong.

to have a lovely lunch on the Caledon river (the border between SA and Lesotho) with a majestic view over the Maluti Mountains.

After lunch we rolled further south through Fouriesburg to the village of Ficksburg where we parked the Bike at a new Boutique Hotel "The Morrison"
The Morrisson Hotel in Ficksburg

that belongs to an old friend of ours, Nick van den Bergh from the days when both Juanita and myself were flying for Executive Outcomes in Angola and Sierra Leone.

We were then given a lift in Francis's car to Nick's game farm a few kilometers outside town on a gravel road where we spent the night and most of the next day, enjoying catching up on old days with Executive Outcomes and doing a game drive with a fantastic surprise where Nick took us to a high point on his farm where a small monument is erected for the guys that was killed in Angola and Sierra Leone. We then had a real farm brunch on the neighboring farm where Bonny, Francis's wife, farms with a Jersey Dairy.

After lunch we hoped to take a leisurely drive to the town of Paul Roux where Juanita's Mother's ashes was recently placed at the feet of her parent's graves, this did not work out so well because we had a mishap by losing Juanita's handbag followed by a damaged oil sump from


Between Ficksburg and Rosendal with Visierskerf in the Background

driving on a bit of bad gravel road and we had to call for help to be saved by Crause who had to come and retrieve us from Rosendal.

We spent the night in Bethlehem again and returned home on Easter Monday keeping well away from he busy N3 and routed via Oranjeville in the middle of the sprawling Vaal Dam. Luckily the bike was fixed the next day and is going well again.

Weekend in the Desert

On Friday the 30^th of March while still in bed Juanita and I decided to quickly go and visit Johan Jr in Windhoek Namibia for the weekend, we called him and he initially said that he is not around since he has to work on Saturday, flying freight to Walvis Bay on Saturday but phoned back a few minutes later and said that his boss has offered that we fly to Walvis with him and that we could then spend the weekend in the desert and return on Sunday evening! Half an hour later we were on our way to the airport.

Friday evening we had some of the best meat on offer in Namibia at Joe’s Beerhouse in Windhoek and early Saturday morning we were at Eros Airport for the flight to Walvis Bay in the Bay Air Cessna Caravan while Johan Jr. was going to follow us an hour later with a Cessna 210 with the Freight, but the famous desert fog on the coast had other ideas and we ended up taking off in two aircraft about two hours later, when it was reported that the fog was burning off.

Here Juanita is boarding the Caravan

The flight from Eros airport the city airport in Windhoek to Rooikop at Walvis Bay is an hour long and probably one with the most dramatic scenery in the world, starting out over the Khomas highlands and then the change to the Namib Desert ending up on the Atlantic ocean.

We had just touched down in Walvis when Johan Jr. taxied in to meet us on the apron and we quickly transferred our bags to the company Uno and was cruising up along the Long beach between Walvis and Swakopmundt. We just quickly popped in to see what the “Burning Shore” house looked like where Brad and Angelina Pit decided to have their baby.

Jr. booked us rooms at the Deutche Hause in Swakopmundt but before we checked in we went for lunch at the Tug Restaurant on the beach.

We had a fantastic light fish lunch almost suspended above the Atlantic Ocean and washed this down with a few Gin and Tonics. We then had an afternoon nap and later the evening we wandered out on the beach and ran into the crew of a beautiful old DC-6, that was having dinner on the Pier in front of the Strand Hotel. The Captain was Flippie Vermeulen and the first Officer was Tinus Dreyer and one of the Air Hostesses was the daughter of the owner of the DC-6, Chris Schutte. We chatted with them until midnight.

Juanita Johan Jr. and the famous Captain Vermeulen.

One of the stories Captain Vermeulen shared with us, was how, just two months ago he ran out of oil in another DC-4 in Chiredze (Buffalo Range) in the South of Zimbabwe, and had to spend a few hours there waiting for oil to be flown in from Polekwane in South Africa, and there he met Louis who popped in to pick up an injured patient and fly him to Harare.

On Sunday morning me and Jr had a game of squash after breakfast and after a light lunch at Café Anton and a quick drive around the desert to look for an old artist friend of ours that has lived about 10 Km from Swakopmundt we stopped briefly at the Martin Luther Tractor that has recently been restored,it was time to start returning to Windhoek. This time we went inland of the dunes from Swakop to Walvis and was flown back by Jr. and his colleague Riaan van Dyk.


All in all a great weekend - we returned home on Monday morning to resume work and will have fond momories of the beautiful scenery and pleasant people of Namibia.