January 31, 1998

Subject: I am alive and well
Date: sometime in Jan 1998 20:11:46 UTC
From: MPilert@yahoo.com


Hello to all of you out there in cyberspace! After a long lapse of e mail service here, I have been on a very long trip, and have not been home to check my newly reinstated e mail in about 17 days. I have been operating mostly along the Zambezi river again, and the big news there is this rainy season is a real soaker. The Zambezi is so far over its banks that a large portion of the crops for that entire region are destroyed. Those poor farmers have had it rough these past few years. First it was the war, an all the land mines, then it was drought, now it is flooding. Throw in a few locust swarms, and we've got a real problem here. I've been working mostly with FOOD FOR THE HUNGRY, WORLD VISION, ACF, and of course USAID, who provide direct funding for my flights. The flooding has also caused a lot of transportation problems. The roads were terrible before the rains came, and now many of them are impassable. The ferry crossing over the Zambezi is closed because the road is washed out just before the dock. The newly opened bridge at Sena/Mutarara (the one that was blown up by Renamo forces) is closed because of another wash out. That leaves only one crossing of the Zambezi for the whole country, the bridge at Tete. All this rain has also made the flying increasingly more difficult. Flight visibility has been a problem, but worse than that is the fact that many of the remote airstrips that we service have become soft. The ones with good turf have been growing grass so fast that the local people cutting them with machetes cannot keep up. I had to leave a team of German agriculturists in Gorongosa because the grass was so long that I probably wouldn't have been able to get a fully loaded plane off of that strip. A few days ago I had a trip for World Vision out of Tete to Mutarara. From there their agricultural team went by road up to the Malawi border. I didn't have anything else on my flight schedule that day, so I took the road trip with them. The World Vision Land Cruiser was stuck so we borrowed one from Doctors Without Borders. All of these NGO people really help each other out. It was an interesting day for me, and a pleasant change from flying all day. World Vision does a very good job with their agriculture programs. It was a pleasure to work with them. On the flight back to Tete, the weather had cleared enough so that we we were able to do some sight seeing along the Zambezi. Saw some Hippos, and a really beautiful waterfall that cascaded down a cliff into the river. I slept one night out in Caia (on the Zambezi). There are no hotels in this little village. I stayed in the ACF camp (Action Contre La Faim, the French relief organization). While in Caia I had a chance to visit the clinic/Hospital there with Claude the ACF doctor. The facility is quite primitive. They are trying to treat many of the malnourished children, and it is sad to see so many kids in such poor health. There are also many aids cases being treated there. On Sunday of that week I was in Beira, on the Indian Ocean. I had the day off. I went with some missionary people I know to a little mud hut church outside of town. The service is all in the local tribal language, so I didn't understand much, but the singing that those people do is incredibly beautiful. It was very interesting to hear the drumming, and other percussion instruments. It was a good Sunday morning. That afternoon the weather was still windy and rough, but I decided to go to the beach anyway. I went down to a popular restaurant on the beach. I hadn't been there ten minutes when I noticed a commotion on the beach. Someone was in trouble out in the surf! No one was getting to her. I quickly stripped off my shirt and sandals, I could see she was face down beyond the breakers, and when I got to her the situation did not look any better. I got some help bringing her in. My friend Derrick from FHI helped me do CPR on the beach, but she didn't make it. She was a young Mozambican girl about 12 years old. I didn't feel like eating after that so I just went back to my guest house, for a rest. I have been appointed Instructor Pilot for AirServ, so I've had a new pilot with me to train. His name is Holm Tran, originally from Viet Nam. We have enjoyed working together, and he is doing quite well. I will soon also have the designation of Senior Base Pilot, and will also do the company flight checks here at the Quelimane base. Soon I'll be going to Nelspruit, South Africa to pick up a Cessna 206 that has been getting an engine change. I'll fly the plane back to Quelimane, and we'll use it here in our operations. I hope to have a couple of days of R & R in Nelspruit. That's the news for now. More later. Mike

January 3, 1998

Subject: Happy New Year
Date: 03 Jan 1998 20:11:46 UTC
From: MPilert@yahoo.com


Hello all of you!

I know that I told you that I would be out of touch until Jan 14, but I had some cancellations, and am back in Quelimane Today (Fri.) thru Tues. Morning (7th), so if you have time drop me a line and let me Know how your Christmas was.

Here is what it was like for me: Dec 24 I left Quelimane with four French friends from A.C.F. We flew 2 1/2 hours up to Pemba, and checked into the Nautilus Beach Resort on beautiful Wimbe Beach. We immediately went for a swim in the crystal clear waters. the wind blew quite hard the whole time we were up there, and really took the edge off the harsh tropical heat. That wind reminded me of the Hawaiian trade winds, and I even rented a wind surfer, and was able to do some nice sailing. The bungalows that we stayed in were the best that Pemba had to offer, and were comfortable, although they couldn't keep the water on. They did provide washing water in buckets.

We had a nice seafood dinner, and then headed off to the local church for the Christmas Eve ceremonies. They start at 7:00 and go until midnight. There are all sorts of events, including many different singing groups from several of the local tribes. The singing was really special, each tribe singing in their own language. We stayed for about an hour, and then went back to the Nautilus for a sound nights sleep.

On Christmas morning we awoke to a beautiful hot day, and the wind came up and cooled us down. The nice sea breeze blew all the way up the island chain every day. The local gaff rigged sailing dhows are really able to cover those islands well with that wind, they really go. We spent the next couple of days enjoying Wimbe, and seeing the Pemba area.

On the day of the 27th we got on the boat that we had arranged. this boat was owned by a Frenchman that had moved to the area with his Doctor wife, and two children. The boat was a converted fishing boat. Very basic. We slept on deck in the bedrolls that we brought. There was a primitive shower and toilet. We cooked on a charcoal fire on deck.

We were able to buy some nice shrimp, lobster, and fish from local fishermen. The Lobster divers were very colorful. These guys had a small sailing dhow, and home made diving masks, made from tire innertubes, and glass. They were able to get some fine lobsters.

We arrived at Ibo at sunset on the high tide. On the way we passed through some mangrove islands in a small channel that was only two meters deep at high water. We cooked some squid and went to bed.

The tide went out, and the boat was on the bottom resting at a 30 degree angle. That made for an interesting nights sleep on deck.

The next morning we explored the island which is quite a throw back in time. There is a huge old fort there, and there was once a large settlement there, but it is crumbling now. The goats and chickens ran freely through the buildings. A small population of fishermen lived in the village, and there was not much to be bought in the very small market there.

Spent the night in the Ibo harbor again, and in the morning after another walk about the old settlement we headed out on the high tide for Matemo, the next island north. There was a beautiful beach, with a good reef for snorkeling. From there we headed south past Ibo back through the mangroves which had many pelicans, and other birds.

We spent the next night on Quirimba. There is a large coconut plantation there owned by an old German guy and his wife, who had been there since 1936. He invited us to his house, which was all decked out for Christmas with German Knickknacks, and a Christmas tree with candles on it. We had a beer with him, and them headed back to the boat for dinner and another night sleeping on the slant. I was getting used to it now. In the morning We met again with Herr Gestner, who gave us a tour of his plantation, which covered most of the island. He had a few cows, and even grew his own coffee. As we drove through his coconut trees, he spotted a monkey up one of the trees, and promptly shot it for food for his dogs.

The next day we went back to Pemba, stopping at yet another island to cook lunch, and swim. We arrived in Pemba at sunset. I met some guys from Zimbabwe, who had driven up in a Land Rover. One of them Was quite sick with Malaria, and was recovering from hepatitis. I agreed to fly him to Biera in the morning (we had an extra seat)

Happy new Year,

Love Mike

December 23, 1997

Subject: Holiday greetings
Date: 23 Dec 97 20:10:33 UTC
From: MPilert@yahoo.com


I am off to a small island in the Indian Ocean called Ibo. I'll be there for the whole week before New Years. The snorkeling is supposed to be quite good there, and the beach I hear is one of the best in the country. I could use a little break. My schedule has been quite hectic, and a little tropical beach time is just what I need. I'll be taking a c-210 with four French people that work in a remote village on the Zambezi called Caia. They really need a break.

Bob and Robin, I heard that you were in Mexico not long ago, how was it? Keith I hear that you will be doing some work in Costa Rica. I've been down there twice, and I like it real well. Let me know how it is for you.

The rainy season is upon us here in Mozambique now and up here in Quelimane is one of the wettest places in the country. This town is known as the malaria capital of Mozambique. The rain makes the dirt airstrips soft and muddy. This job gets more challenging all the time. The VOR's and NDB's go off and on all the time (along with the water and electric at my house) The instrument approaches get interesting, when you lose the nav aid half way through the procedure. GPS is the only way to get around, but we have no GPS approaches, except for the ones I make up myself. Out here you have to be versatile.

HAPPY NEW YEAR,

Mike

P.S Please give my best to Stan.

December 13, 1997

Subject: More on Mozambique
Date: 13 Dec 97 20:10:33 UTC
From: MPilert@yahoo.com


Hello out there in cyberspace! Again I've had quite a week out there in the bush country. I did spend a few days in Maputo last week. I've been here for six weeks at least now. I am really getting used to the lifestyle here. When I first got here I really felt out of place. All the beggers and street venders seemed to sense this and really hit on me. Last week I was walking home from our office and I just seemed to blend into to crowd. Nobody bothered me, and it was only when I looked down at my hands that I realized that I wasn't black.

Today (Sunday) I just got in from a weeks trip. On Thursday I had to do an emergency Medivac flight from Tete to Harare, Zimbabwe. I was staying up in Beira when I got the call. the Norwegian organization NPA has their base of operations in Tete. They are one of the biggest de-mining operators here. (The country is littered with land mines left over from the war) At first I thought that he was injured in an explosion, but when I got over to Tete I found out that he had a severe alergec reaction to a bee sting. These medical flights come up from time to time. The medical care is pretty bad here. We do a lot of work for the US embassy.

Cheers,
Mike

December 7, 1997

Subject: Descartes and other humor...
Date: Sun, 07 Dec 97 10:05:27 UTC
From: MPilert@MAF.Org


Descartes

I am, therefore I think. That's putting Descartes before the horse.

Descartes walks into a bar. The bartender says, "Would you like a beer?" Descartes says, "I think not." Descartes disappears.

Descartes described how his father taught him how to swim by throwing him into the Seine: "I sink, therefore I swam."

Misc.

Two men walked into a bar. You'd think the second one would have seen it.

You know what the problem with a lot of people is? Overpopulation.

Rule of thumb for evaluating computer technology: If it works, its obsolete.

Cheers,
Mike

November 30, 1997

Subject: Mozambique newsletter: November
Date: Sun, 30 Nov 97 09:11:03 UTC
From: MPilert@yahoo.com


Happy Thanksgiving!

This month has ripped by, we have been busy again.

We have had a couple of medivac flights this month. A lady in Quelimane needed an emergency appendectomy, and we had to take her to Harare, Zimbabwe at night in our Cessna 206 for the surgery. We were able to respond quickly with our Quelimane based aircraft. A man had a bad car crash out in the bush, and was brought to Quelimane for treatment, severe paralysis, etc. Quelimane does have a hospital, but it is very limited. We were able to fly this man out in our King Air.

We had a real tragedy at our program up in Entebbe, Uganda. Our director of maintenance had his house broken into. He was sleeping at the time, and when he heard noise, and went to investigate, he was shot in the leg, severely shattering his femur. His family was then terrorized an beaten. Tony was medivaced to Johannesburg, where he had surgery to rebuild his leg. He is doing better than expected. He will have to spend a few more weeks in the hospital in Jo'burg before he'll be able to be flown back to the States. It will be a long time before he'll be able to work again.

There is a bad Cholera outbreak in Maputo. There are so many people living on the streets there, that sanitation is a big problem. The epidemic has infected thousands of people. I have been very careful with food and drink in Maputo.

Up here in the north country there is an outbreak of plague. It seems to be mostly in the Morrumbala area(about 100 miles west of Quelimane. Something must be done to control the rats that are spreading this disease. There has been talk of aerial spraying. They want to spray rat poisen over some of the badly infected areas. This sounds crazy to me. How can you keep rat poisen out of water and food supplies? How can you keep children and unsuspecting adults from contact with it?

This week, I have our new International Chief Pilot visiting from the home office in Redlands, CA. Rob and I have been covering a lot of the country in the King Air, and also the Cessnas. We're taking a good hard look at as many or the operations in this program as we can in a two week period. Mozambique is the largest of all the AirServ programs. I like Rob a lot, and we're working well together.

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. I made it back into Quelimane just in time for Thanksgiving dinner. from up north in Nampula, where Rob and I had flown the King Air, and spent a day and a half. We stopped on the way down at a little dirt strip, Maganja. ADRA has an agriculture program there.

On the previous Tuesday I had flown in three large frozen turkeys that I was able to get in Maputo. They were imported from Japan, of all places (very expensive}. Our friends at World Vision arranged the party, which included all the Americans we could find in the Quelimane area. We had people from several NGOs and a couple of missionary families. Everyone brought a dish. What a feed it was. I especially liked the Apple and pumpkin pies baked by Peggy, our pilot Bill's wife. It was a real trakitional Thanksgiving gathering. I wonder where I'll be for Christmas.

This Month of November brought me my 50th birthday! Yes I know, I can't believe it either! Thanks to all of you that sent cards, and e mails. I just happened to be up here in Quelimane, and the good folks here threw me a nice party. Our cook Martins made a really good fish dinner.

We have a new atalite TV system here in Quelimane, so now people look forward to their duty up here. I don't have TV at my home in Maputo. I saw some of the Davis cup tennis today, but haven't found any football yet. American football that is. There is lots of soccer, and rugby. Cricket matches are plentiful. CNN news has been very good to have.

I'm off to Chimoio today an a trip for World Vision. I'll fly back to Maputo on Wednesday and spend a day in the ofice catching up on paper work, then I'll be northbound in the King Air again.

Cheers,

Mike

November 2, 1997

Subject: October Newsletter
Date: Sun, 02 Nov 97 08:44:48 UTC
From: MPilert@yahoo.com


Happy Halloween good friends!

I have just returned from Tanzania. I found a nice orange pumpkin up there, and I've just carved my first African Jack o'lantern!

My trip up to Tanzania was a week's stay for a World Vision delegation, attending a cashew production conference. World Vision is working on cashew growing programs in the Nampula area of Mozambique. Mtwara, Tanzania has a very successful cashew program, started with British International aid. Production per hectare is very good due to hybrid trees. It was quite interesting seeing the grafting process.

Mtwara is just 22 miles north of the Revuma river, the border between Mozambique an Tanzania. The only way to cross this border on the surface is by dugout canoe. This town has a real frontier atmosphere. It is the deepest port in East Africa, but is not so busy due to the remoteness of the area. Years ago it was a big center for slave trade. The place has a lot of Arab influence. Now, cashew production is the major industry.

Kendall, my other King Air pilot came with me on the trip. Since we had so much time waiting on the delegation, we arranged a Land Rover to take us down the coast to Msimbati, a beautiful beach on a peninsula near the border. There is a Marine research project there, run by Frontiers, a British organization. Last Christmas, I had visited their other station located on Querimba Island, a remote little place near Pemba, Mozambique.

The crew at Frontiers were great hosts. They invited us to spend the night, and arranged snorkel, and scuba gear for us. Kendall got to make his first scuba dive. The diving was superb. They have their own compressor there to fill the tanks. The water was crystal clear with some fantastic coral reef! There are many varieties of hard,and soft corals, and the fish, beautiful!

The house that Frontiers used for a headquarters is made from cut coral blocks, built by an eccentric Englishman in 1942. It is quite an interesting old building. We ate lots of fresh fish. We spent a memorable two days there.

It was hard to leave that place, and return to Maputo. It is so much cooler down south here in Maputo. Maputo is safe most of the time, but one does have to be careful. Carjackings are common. The U. S. Green Berets were visiting the Marines here in Maputo recently. they were right in front of the guard post and had their 4 wheel drive truck hijacked by thieves with AK-47s. How embarrassing!

I had vacation earlier this month. Joanna came to visit, and just as were were to leave to go to Botswana, they had a big hailstorm in Quelimane. Several aircraft were damaged at the airport, including one of our Cessna 206's.

The wing damage was not too bad. It was patched up, and Joanna and I flew the King Air up to Quelimane, spent the night, and the next morning ferried the plane to Nelspruit, South Africa for airframe repairs. We stopped in Buffalo Range, Zimbabwe for fuel. It was a beautiful flight over the Zambezi River, the Chimanimani Mountains bordering Mozambique and Zimbabwe. We left the Cessna in Nelspruit, and were off to Botswana.

We flew on Air Botswana to Maun, a little town on the edge of the Kalahari desert. Maun is a good jumping off point for going to the Okavango Delta, which is where we were bound. The Okavango is the worlds largest inland delta (5,792 sq. mi.) It is a maze of channels and islands all fed by the Okavango River flowing out of Angola. The Delta is home to quite a variety of wildlife.

We spent a day in Maun checking out trips into the delta. We booked a trip into the heart of the delta. We flew by Cessna to a small strip at Gunn's Camp, spent the night at the base camp, and the next morning loaded up our mokoro (dugout canoe) with tent, camping gear and food for a 4 day bushcamping trip. I must say that this is by far the best African trip I've had.

Our guide poled the mokoro through the swamp past herds of zebra, wildebeest, giraffe, kudu, impala, buffalo and elephant to name a few. The birds were especially enjoyable, incredible waterfowl!

The bushcamping on Chief's Island was just gorgeous. One morning we had an elephant just hanging out for hours at our camp. One night we had a hyena in our camp. One day we took the canoe into a hippo pool, and got frighteningly close to a bunch of hippos.

Every day we took long game walks, which I especially loved. Most game reserves in Africa won't let you walk at all. We usually walked at dawn while it was still cool. The Okavango is a really hot place, but the air is dry as a bone. One morning we walked almost right up to a small heard of buffalo. We had to back off. They can be very dangerous!

Every day, in the heat of the day, we would stop the mokoro at some deep and wide place in the river, and have a swim. The water is incredibly clear and clean. We did have to be careful of crocodiles! We did not carry any drinking water. We just filled our water bottles from the swamp! The water here is constantly filtered through miles and miles of grass, and papyrus.

After a week in the Delta, we flew to Johannesburg, and spent a day shopping.

Next we returned to Nelspruit, and picked up a car, and headed up to Kruger Nat'l park. I've been to Kruger before, and it is an excellent game park. Especially suited to self guided safaris, if you have your own car. food and Lodging are reasonable. We got so close to the lions, I could have reached out and touched one.

After a few days in Kruger we were off to Swaziland. we spent one night on the way down in the Drakensburg mountains. It reminded me of Colorado.

We spent our first night in Swaziland in the old mining town of Piggs Peak. The next morning we went to Mlilwane wildlife sanctuary to spend a couple of days. This little park is very relaxing. We were able to rent mountain bikes, and go on a bicycle game safari, what a treat! Biking down the single track trails viewing the animals. We rode up to a really huge crocodile at the edge of a lake.

Our last stop was the Mkhaya Game Reserve, where we were able to get some fantastic views of rhinos. The mothers with babies were the best.

It was a really good trip, I was really in need of a vacation.

Aloha 'till next month,

Mike