The Experience of Chagos

Imagine this: the world around you shows water to the horizon. It is gently rolling, calm and deep blue, the light blue sky above the horizon dotted with a few pristine white clouds. Then the eastern horizon gets a fringe. As you approach, the extent of this fringe becomes apparent: it stretches in a long line in front of you. The binoculars show long, low islands, covered with extensive coconut forests. Approaching the designated pass on this western side, anxiety balls in your stomach as you see all the breaking water: along the whole stretch of islands is reef which will destroy your boat in minutes. However, the Raymarine chart-plotter / Navionics chart is accurate and you get through safely.

The beauty is astounding. Around you the water turns from deep blue to lighter sapphire to aqua and the brightest turquoise, then back again as you move into greater depths. You are in an atoll: in this case, Peros Banhos Atoll of the Chagos archipelago. If you had a bird’s eye view of the atoll, you would see a chain approximately 15-miles in diameter; the reef (the chain), a green/brown thread in the aqua waters, is almost continuous, bar a few passes and is bejewelled with long, slim green coconut islands circled by narrow sparkling white beaches and sand spits.
How can you get here? Well, the only way is to sail: the Chagos archipelago, apart from Diego Garcia which is a naval base, is uninhabited and provides none of the usual tourist means of access. Our sail from the Seychelles was glorious: for the first time, consistent currents and winds in our favour so the sails worked hard and the motors less than usual! With no pirate worries after the first 2 days, within a week we were at the islands, having experienced little in the way of bad weather besides a few squalls typical to the area…. but these come up really quickly and one needs to be prepared to put in reefs or drop the mainsail to deal with the winds which, in our experience this time, did not reach more than 30 knots. The worst part is dealing with the grumpy, lumpy seas afterwards (and the grumpy engineer husband who cannot believe that he can’t find a way to control our motion in these waters)!

We had obtained a permit from BIOT (British Indian Ocean Territories) for a month in Chagos. This allowed us to anchor in certain designated areas and in addition laid down many rules, accompanied by the threat of (massive!) fines for lack of acquiescence: no anchoring outside the designated areas / no scuba diving / no spear fishing / no keeping or cutting coral or plants / no catching coconut crabs, etc.

So we sailed south and put our anchor down at Ile du Coin. First jobs: Irene went off to check on the set of the anchor (snorkelling) and Rolf sat on the bottom of the sugar scoop to prepare the fish (mullet… i.e white fish - yay!) caught in the pass. This provided Irene with some thrilling moments. As she returned to the boat (anchor was fine…. we love our over-sized Rocna anchor!), she was delighted to see great numbers of large fish in agitated movement at the port side. Her delight was decidedly tempered by the arrival of a black-tip reef shark… which was rather more determined than agitated. Her delight completely dissipated when she realised that the food source for the feeding frenzy was coming off the boat: essentially, Rolf was chumming the water, with her in it!! Chagos lesson #1: do not clean your fish off the back of your boat, unless you are trying to summon the sharks.

Above the Chagos waterline are beautiful small islands; many are out of bounds and we explored about 10 of those allowed. Very dense in the interior with coconut palms, layers of huge fallen fronds and coconuts (rotting) and incredible numbers of hermit crabs (tiny to pretty large and of a great variety of colours) to pick your way through, they are very interestingly different from other forests and provide a cool (albeit exceptionally humid) high canopy under which to make your sweaty way forward and look out for the small areas of hardwood trees, odd fruit trees and huge coconut crabs which occur in large numbers on the islands. The small beaches (generally covered at high tide) have soft, white sand and are great to explore as the tides bring in coral and shells (not allowed to collect), as well as interesting things to scavenge: Rolf was like a happy boy playing in a junk yard when he salvaged endless floats, hooks and pieces of line for Ketoro.
The sea also washes up FADs: Fish Aggregating Devices, these float at sea with nets or logs underneath which attract small fish which in turn attract bigger fish; at the surface is a big sealed electronic device which transmits its position to the owner but sometimes the electronic parts get new owners when stripped out by yachties who find the FADs washed ashore (they also contain a large number of D-cell batteries). We were given a great show when we came upon 7 small sharks that had trapped a bait ball of small fish in a corner of a tiny island with its reef; when the sharks were satiated and more listless with their hunting the trevallys and other predator fish moved in; the red-foot boobys nesting in the tree above watched.
Ile du Coin is the biggest of the islands in Peros Banhos and was the centre of the copra industry that thrived here for about a century (see Chagos history at the end of this blog). The original plantation buildings, complete with homes, small jail, church/school, cemetery and water well are derelict and moss-covered but provide a fascinating picture of what it might have been like: the original home of the manager of the plantation huge and stately, all buildings with massive walls and with roofs falling in; the jail with its 4 doors still holding strong but roofs again clearly a weak point! Some of the railway is still evident, as are the railway trolley-cars, and the pier's remains tell their own story.

The other left-over is the donkey: donkeys were originally used for various functions at the copra processing plant and there is one survivor (a few generations on). A very healthy male, it is surely nonetheless lonely and honks (hee-haws!) at visitors to the island; we thought it a shame that BIOT have not made an attempt to give him company (human even), perhaps by moving him to Diego Garcia to be amongst equals on the US military base there?!

We found a wonderful community of yachties. At no stage were there more than 9 yachts in this atoll, usually less than 5 at a particular anchorage, but the other sailors were welcoming and friendly, leading to many evenings of sundowners on a boat, group walks (and beachcombing!), dinghy excursions together to distant snorkel areas, and in our case invaluable help from the others who have spent many seasons in the areas to which we are heading. A great friendship was established in this short time with a couple who became mentors to us.

What about underneath the Chagos waterline? Well…. my, oh my…. WOW. With no human pollution or disturbance and no commercial fishing (except for illegal Sri Lankan fishing boats occasionally) the reefs and waters of Chagos have developed for many decades just as nature intended. The corals are truly amazing: soft and hard corals, massive, healthy and of huge variety of type and colour, they grow alongside and on top of each other from near the beach out to the drop-off, where the resultant complex 3-dimensional gardens have the most fascinating topography. With and around this the many fish (small, large, colourful, camouflaged, fish-shaped and exceedingly oddly-shaped) swim, play, eat, clean each other, catch others or hide from their predators in a world totally intriguing to us. We were sorry not to be able to scuba dive but the snorkelling was so wonderful that we did not really miss it: and our breath-holding improved enormously as we dived down to investigate what was hiding under the huge plate corals or in the holes and caves. (Unsure why diving is disallowed, we assume it is because, as with spear-fishing, there is increased potential for accidents and health problems which clearly are hugely problematic in this remote place…. and would necessitate assistance from the navy at Diego Garcia, which is why we signed our bank accounts over to them when applying for our permits to Chagos!)

Also under the Chagos waterline…. sharks. Reef sharks, mostly black-tip, some white-tip, some grey, are prolific but each seems to have its own reefs/areas that it prowls constantly. And every area has at least one shark. So wherever and whenever you go to explore the reef, you will encounter sharks (we saw sharks on every outing except one). Reef sharks are not aggressive to humans (apparently) but they are very curious and circle a few times as they check you out. But you know what? They are sharks… and one is very respectful of these incredible beasts! You don’t want to be too far from your dinghy when a shark is curious so….. Chagos lesson#2: pull your dinghy with you when snorkelling. On one occasion Irene waited longer than Rolf to end her swim and turned to see a shark, more aggressively curious than he should have been, approaching at speed, not more than 2 metres away (he was probably intending to bump and move off???) Getting into an inflatable from in the water is not an easy process and is generally not achieved briskly or graciously. The speed of Irene’s exit from the water on this occasion is something of which to be extremely proud. Her grace and dignity, however, reached new lows as she found herself at the bottom of the dinghy, spluttering, fins entangled with snorkel somehow. Rolf, having seen this coming before Irene did, was standing in the dinghy and beating down on the water with our trusty hard plastic baton (Irene’s knight in shining armour; however, this was an encouragingly improved reaction from him as he is usually expected to be seen laughing uproariously on such occasions). We developed our own Chagos rule #3: two people plus dinghy present a united front worthy opponent to a shark; emitting low-pitched growls appears to deter them and finally with baton on nose they will be further discouraged and pick on a less confusing target!

Then again, under the waterline.... lunch! Trying to avoid the tinned beans, we are still living off the land (as it were) and catching fish for the pan. Tried to catch fish from Ketoro and lost 2 lures at speed (“what happened there?” expressions on our faces) then pulled in a ... black-tip!! Oh my: newbies to sailing, newbies to fishing, newbies to shark-handling... Happily, at this stage another sailor came up to us in his dinghy; a single-handed sailor for the last 24 years, this man is clearly not a newbie and proceeded to do dental surgery on the shark (from his dinghy) to get the hook out; we were delighted and the shark apparently so too, swimming off at speed with most of his teeth and gum intact: no metal fillings! We have had some success with catching squid off the boat and are becoming adept at not allowing these angry meals-to-be to shoot their black ink all over us / the boat / the dinghy. It is no mean feat to turn these guys into restaurant-style calamari rings…

Having mentioned to another yachtie how generally unsuccessful we are at catching fish (other than sharks, apparently, and tuna, which are stupid enough to catch themselves), he took us out on his dinghy to show us how it is done. Rod each. First line taken: Irene fought (wo)manfully with this huge thing that felt, half-way through, as if it had got a lot heavier and immeasurably stronger .... she successfully pulled in half a huge Trevally, with the shark (other half in belly) still attached to the fish and another 3 circling fast and close (picture: we rocking and rolling in tiny dinghy); the shark had to be discouraged with the back of the gaff after which he tried to jump in the dinghy (he knew where to get the rest of his supper)! All too exciting really, from then on we were all slipping around in the bloody water at bottom of dinghy and trying not to fall out. Seriously trying not to fall out.

Settled the nerves etc then off again; Rolf's line taken, shark on end, shark won and kept the lure. Rolf's next lure taken again and he pulled in a whole, non-sampled Trevally ... many suppers with one-and-a-half trevallys!

Above and below the waterline: turtles and dolphins. In abundance. On one occasion our dinghy was joined by a pod of dolphin that came from all sides to swim and play in our bow-wave. With 10 at any one time having fun, we could not stop, so drove up and down many times, accompanied by these giant glistening bodies shooting past and up and in front of us: seemingly smiling! Well, we were too, and particularly when we stopped and hopped into the water with our snorkel gear to swim with them, finding there were at least 30 in his pod, circling below and around us. A treat of a lifetime.

Chagos sounds like all fun-and-games. Well, it is, really; except sometimes the fun is tempered by anxiety brought about by your isolation and exposure to Mother Nature and her powers. Even within the atoll we had massive storms: some led to threatening situations on anchor, on a lee shore with gale-force winds (anchor watch all night, finger poised over the throttle switch: tense times; several yachts have become damaged in this archipelago) and some were experienced just in transit between anchor spots a few miles apart (F9 winds inside the atoll: testing).

When in Chagos, your daily activities are particularly intertwined with the environment and this experience has reminded us to appreciate our planet’s cycles and the impact we can have. Our memories of the Chagos archipelago are awesome.

Summarised Chagos history: (we apologise if there are inaccuracies in this history, but hope that it gives a picture of the background, political machinations and subsequent miseries that dictated the lives of those on Chagos). Initially visited by Portuguese explorers in 1743, the Chagos islands were subsequently claimed by France a few years later. France leased the islands to two Frenchmen who established Copra plantations and a small fishing industry – exporting mainly to Mauritius. Workers were mainly slaves. Around 1810 – 1815 subsequent to the defeat of Napoleon, Britain took over Mauritius and Chagos from France.

Britain appeared to honour the lease of Chagos and in 1834, with the abolition of slavery, the workers were freed of slave status and became contract workers for wages. The leases and concessions appear to have passed hands and in 1883 the copra oil interests on Peros Banhos and Diego Garcia merged into a private company which recruited labour from Mauritius, Madagascar and Mozambique.

By 1945 the British military presence was withdrawn, about 60% of the population had been born on the islands and in the late 1950’s the company was purchased by a Seychelles group with the result that many islanders left for Mauritius and were replaced by workers from Seychelles. The copra plantations struggled financially and some islands were abandoned. In 1965 the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) was created by Britain to provide sites for joint US / UK military facilities. Initially the BIOT comprised of transfers from Britain’s crown colonies: Chagos Archipelago (from Mauritius) and Aldabra, Desroches and Farquhar island groups (from Seychelles). Britain bought out the private contractual rights of the Seychelles commercial interests in 1967 and started evacuating the residents (about 500 workers and their families) on grounds that they were simply temporary contract workers. Evacuations – mainly to Mauritius - were completed by 1973 and in 1971 the US military started building on Diego Garcia. At present the sole remaining component of BIOT is the Chagos Archipelago which is uninhabited by civilians and with Diego Garcia occupied only by US military personnel and a small number of UK military personnel.

Britain evidently paid compensation to the various interests involved and also paid a grant to Mauritius to assist with re-settlement of the evacuees. However, the resettlement appears to have been largely unsuccessful, with the re-settled Chagos ex-residents living in poverty, and litigation against Britain commenced almost thirty years ago. Recent news suggests that the British High Court has found in favour of the former inhabitants of Chagos and negotiations are underway on how the matter is to proceed.