Journey to Atlantis (11 page)

I COULDN’T BELIEVE IT.

First, Doug decided he didn’t have a suitable pair of hiking boots, or any proper hiking equipment. When I suggested he just wear his sneakers, like me, he said, no, he might sprain an ankle. We went to see Greta, who was up early and running on a treadmill. She looked very fit. She advised that we carry adequate water and salt tablets, to avoid heat exhaustion. Don’t forget a first-aid kit too, she said. And don’t forget the ant traps.

It was only a hike. But Doug concluded that we’d have to make a trip into the city first, to a hiking shop, where we could get properly outfitted. The drive would bring us closer
to the trails into the hills anyway, he said. So, we climbed into his fancy jeep, buckled up and headed for the city.

It was a nice drive. We sped through the countryside, which was very beautiful. There were little towns with old houses and churches, and monasteries on hilltops here and there, just like in books. Doug put on a baseball cap and sunglasses when we left the house, and gave me the same to wear, so that we would look just like any two Joes, he said. I put them on and smiled. I felt a little bit like a movie star.

After an hour or so we reached the city, which looked pretty fancy, with beautiful old buildings and an enormous cathedral by the water. Doug pointed out lots of things, including a giant yacht in the harbour, which belonged to him. He said he would like to show me around the city some time. Hanging out with him like that made me forget that he was a famous person. The moment we stepped out of the jeep and entered the hiking shop … that all changed.

You would have thought he was the king. When we entered the shop and he removed his hat and glasses, the shopkeepers flocked to us, asking how they could help. Doug told them what we were planning to do and what he thought we might need. In a flash they disappeared and reappeared with boxes and armloads of boots, backpacks, climbing rope, tents, sleeping bags, dried food, cooking utensils, gas stoves, and so on. One employee even carried over a small kayak. I couldn’t believe it. After an hour or so, we were both standing in brand new hiking clothes — boots, hats, watches …
the whole shebang. We each had a new backpack filled with dried food, medical kits, anti-dehydration drinks, spare socks, and many, many things which I couldn’t ever imagine using. Doug insisted on buying pretty much everything they offered. We piled the stuff into the back of the jeep, waved goodbye to the admiring shopkeepers and drove away.

“Whew!” said Doug. “All that shopping made me hungry. What do you say we stop for a bite to eat first? I know a nice little restaurant nearby.”

It didn’t surprise me that the nice little restaurant was really fancy, nor that the waiters made a fuss over us, but I was concerned with the sign on the door that showed a picture of a dog crossed out.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

Doug translated the sign. “Absolutely NO dogs allowed in the restaurant!” he said.

“Oh. Well … maybe Hollie and I can wait …”

“No, no, it doesn’t mean us,” said Doug.

He was right. The waiters treated Hollie just like any other customer and even set a place for him at the table, although I insisted he stay on the floor. So they brought him a plate of sausages and finely cut meats and laid it down on the floor in front of him, with a napkin. Then one waiter opened a bottle of spring water, filled a bowl with it, set the bowl down on the floor beside the plate, and stood there and waited while Hollie ate.

The breakfast was amazing. I ate way too much, and it made me sleepy (it was my bedtime anyway). The new
clothes were making me a little itchy but I was almost too sleepy to scratch. I looked down at Hollie and saw that he was sleepy too. Then Doug insisted I try their coffee. So I did. After I put a couple of spoonfuls of sugar in the cup, the coffee tasted pretty good. And so I had another cup. Then another. I had no idea what I was in for. By the time we left the restaurant, I was ready to run circles around Hollie all the way up the mountain.

It was almost noon when we parked the jeep at the top of a hill, where the road came to an end and a narrow trail disappeared into some dry bushes, rocks and trees. There was a loud, high-pitched sound in the air, like a soft siren, coming from the tops of trees and echoing everywhere. It was strangely pleasant. It made me think of the desert, though I didn’t know why, except that I really wanted to see the desert. Doug said it was the singing of tree frogs. Then, when we stepped out of the air-conditioned jeep, I realized for the first time — it was scorching hot! With our new itchy clothes, new boots and heavy packs, we were in for a tough hike.

But it was a dry heat, which was not so bad, especially as our new wide-brimmed hats kept the sun off our faces. I wished I could have put a hat on Hollie, because he had no protection at all, although he cleverly walked in our shadows. Every time we stopped to drink our special anti-dehydration drinks, I gave him some water.

But we didn’t see any goats. I kept looking for them and watching Hollie for any sign that he smelled them, but the trail was steep and the hike so much work for him he barely
had a chance to sniff. I had read that you would smell the goats before you would see them, and so I kept sniffing the air for them, but smelled only our new clothes.

After a couple of hours of climbing we sat down to rest. Doug searched through his pack.

“I didn’t remember how beautiful it was from up here. What’s this?” he said, as he pulled out a strange looking tool.

It was shaped like a spoon with a lot of holes. I stared at it and tried to remember.

“Ummm … maybe it’s a sieve? I’m not sure.”

“Well … I suppose we should cook something. Here’s a nice looking soup.”

We dug out the little gas stove, poured the soup contents into a pot and filled it with water. Doug checked his pockets.

“Hey, Alfred, do you have any matches?”

“No.”

“Me either. Shoot!”

It didn’t matter; there was no gas in the stove anyway.

Three hours later, we reached the top. The view was absolutely amazing, but there were no goats. We were so tired we just flopped down and didn’t move for about fifteen minutes. Then, slowly, we raised our heads, drank more anti-dehydration liquid and licked at our dry soups. Hollie was sleeping. I figured I’d have to carry him down the mountain. I looked over at Doug, licking his soup and looking tired and kind of thoughtful.

“Doug?”

“Yah?”

“Do you believe in Atlantis?”

“Atlantis? Sure. Why not? I don’t think it’s a city under a bubble somewhere, like some people think. But there are lots of temples under water. I have seen some myself. There are cities under sand too, even whole pyramids. And I’ve seen ancient temples swallowed up by jungle in Central America. We shot some movies there.”

“Cool.”

“So … yes, I think it exists …
somewhere.
And you’re probably headed in the right direction.”

“I hope so.”

I stared out to sea. It always fascinated me to see the water from such a height. You could see the curvature of the earth. It made the world seem smaller.

“Why do you suppose that nobody’s found Atlantis before?”

Doug shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe because of expectations.”

“Expectations?”

“Well, if you are expecting to find a city under a bubble, you’re not going to pay much attention to one that isn’t.”

“Oh.” That was a good point.

“But promise me something, Alfred?”

“What?”

“If you do find a city under a bubble, come and tell me before the whole world sees it, okay? I’d like to see it first. Okay?”

I laughed. “Okay.”

“Good. Actually, I’m glad to know that
somebody
is looking for Atlantis. Now, I suppose we should get our carcasses back down the mountain. You know what we forgot to buy?”

“What?”

“Ant traps.”

The moment we stood up and started down the mountain I picked up a strong smell; it was like being inside a barn full of stinky animals. Hollie rode in my backpack and stuck his nose out stiffly and made his quietest growl, which always sounded like a tiny electric motor. But we had only the smell — no goats.

There were crevices here and there, and sharp jagged cliffs, but they were not places where any creature could climb, not even mountain goats. Or so I thought. The smell was so strong towards the cliff, I just had to lie down, crawl to the edge and peek over. As I inched my eyes over the very edge of the cliff and nervously peeked down, which was a dizzying experience, I saw surprised faces looking up at me, whiskered faces, with goatee beards and curled horns. How they could be standing there I just could not understand.

The goats were not happy about having been discovered and started to move. I wished they wouldn’t because I was sure they were going to fall, and I felt terrible about it. It would be my fault because I had scared them. Well, miraculously, they didn’t fall. Neither did they fall when they scurried across another impossible precipice and up an even steeper cliff. Like big fat birds with long skinny legs, the
goats disappeared. Their smell lingered though, and so did my amazement.

It was dark when we returned to the jeep. We were exhausted and starving. I was dying for pizza. Doug said he knew the best place. So we drove there. But the employees and customers made such a fuss over Doug we couldn’t seem to place our order. Finally we went somewhere else. This time, Doug waited in the jeep while I went in and ordered. I was beginning to see how difficult the life of a famous person could be. It was sort of like being an outlaw.

We stuffed our faces and drove back to the cove where Hollie and I returned to the sub to sleep. The next day Doug met us on the beach with a big smile. He was holding up one of the local newspapers. On the front page was a picture of the two of us coming out of the hiking shop in our ball caps and sunglasses. The headline read:

Later, as we climbed into the dinghy to leave, Doug shook my hand firmly and asked me to promise to visit on our way back home. I promised. I was beginning to understand something Sheba had told me. She said it was the interesting places that made you travel somewhere, but the people that made you go back. How true.

“DID YOU GET HIS autograph, Al?”

“Uh … no, I never thought about it.”

“You spent a couple of days with Douglas Nickels and didn’t even get his autograph?”

“He’s just a regular guy … well, except out in public. You wouldn’t believe the fuss people make over him.”

“I think I would. Do you realize he’s married to Greta Sachs, one of the most beautiful women in the world?”

“Sheba’s more beautiful!”

“Al. Are you telling me you met Greta Sachs too?”

“Yes, but Sheba’s more beautiful and a
lot
smarter.”

“I will tell her you said that. But Geez, Al, what did Greta Sachs say?”

“Not much. She really wanted some ant traps but we forgot to buy them.”

“Unbelievable! So what’s next? Where are you sailing next?”

“Well, I think I should avoid France, because they’ve got the biggest submarine fleet in the Mediterranean. I think we’ll go south from here, towards Italy.”

“I’m looking at the map as we speak. Looks like Corsica and Sardinia are in your path.”

“I know but we can sail between them, through the Strait of Bonifacio.”

“Italy has submarines too, you know.”

“Oh yah. Well, maybe I should stick to North Africa. It’s pretty nice there and it’s a lot less busy.”

“Okay, but avoid Libya. The newspapers say there are terrorists there.”

“I will, though I don’t believe everything the newspapers say.”

“Better safe than sorry, Al.”

“True.”

Ziegfried was the voice of caution.

I decided to sail for Tunisia for a chance to peek at the greatest desert in the world. It would have been nice to sail through the Strait of Bonifacio, but that was just too risky.
The north side was Corsica, a large island belonging to France, and the birthplace of Napoleon. The south side was Sardinia, a large island belonging to Italy. Both would have been patrolled by navy and coastguard ships, possibly even submarines. In fact, according to my guidebooks, there were twenty-four NATO bases on Sardinia. Yikes! But Sardinia also had a few incredible things, such as a herd of miniature horses and the world’s only albino donkeys. The miniature horses really were horses, not ponies, even though they stood only three feet tall. How I wished I could have seen them. But they were too far inland. I didn’t see how we could get there.

The problem with the donkeys was that they were on a smaller island, Isola Asinara, that also just happened to have a maximum-security prison. It was little wonder I had a bad feeling about that place.

Something else Sardinia was famous for was its caves. They were cut out of cliffs that dropped into the sea. Since we were going to sail so close to the island anyway, I thought maybe we could take a peek at the cliffs as we went by, maybe even get Hollie out for a run on the beach.

From a distance, through binoculars, the caves looked like black dots on a white birthday cake. I entered the twelve-mile zone a bit nervously. Why would one island have twenty-four NATO bases anyway? Canada was part of NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and maybe that would work in our favour if we were stopped. We crossed the line
before dawn and I raised the Canadian and Italian flags while it was still dark, just in case we were being watched as the sun came up.

Five miles from the cliffs I hadn’t picked up much on radar, just a few fishing boats. For an island with twenty-four NATO bases it seemed strangely quiet. And then, from the north came a radar beep, and it was coming in too fast to be a ship. Yikes! A helicopter or a plane! We didn’t even have time to dive. Well, we could have dived but would have been spotted from the air anyway, the very moment we appeared on their radar screen. It was a good thing we were not submerged, and were sailing with proper flags. We were at least legal.

It was a small plane. It flew right over our heads, made a turn and a second pass, taking a closer look. I stood on the portal and waved. I wanted to show them we were friendly. The plane dipped its wing, a way of saying hello. That was a good sign. They must have identified our flags. Was it the coastguard? I couldn’t tell. Maybe it was just a pleasure craft. Would they report us? Probably, but I couldn’t know for sure. What to do — take the chance and go see the caves, or play it cautious and leave the twelve-mile zone? What would Ziegfried do? I looked down the portal at Hollie, wagging his tail and staring up expectantly. “I’m sorry, Hollie. There will be other beaches. We’ll find another one.” I turned the sub around. Less than an hour later I was glad I did. Radar revealed two ships leaving the shore in our direction, but
too far away to catch us before we reached the twelve-mile zone. Then, just as we were leaving the zone, the plane flew over us once again. This time I got a closer look at it with binoculars. It was the Italian coastguard all right. I waved again as we left their waters. They dipped their wing. Ciao!

We would have to visit caves somewhere else.

Tunisia offered the best opportunity to see the Sahara. The desert wore a collar of mountains along its northern border, hundreds of miles thick in places. But in Tunisia, in the Gulf of Gabes, the Sahara reached up a thin finger and touched the sea. It was the one spot where we had a chance to see it, if we were lucky.

Also in the Gulf of Gabes was the island of Jerba, where fishermen still dived for sea sponges, although it was a dying tradition. And, there were reports of a sunken city! Could it be Atlantis? Probably not.

Gabes, a coastal town on the mainland, was the gateway to Chott El Jerid, a large salt lake that supposedly sparkled like jewels but was as barren as the moon. It was a place where you could see mirages. I wanted to see that too!

It took only a day to reach the coast of Tunisia. In the Atlantic, a day’s journey didn’t take you very far. In the Mediterranean it took you everywhere. But we were now two days at sea without a break. I hadn’t slept at all, and Hollie hadn’t been out for a run. The coast of Tunisia made a sudden downward turn, like an elbow joint, and went south for
about six hundred miles before straightening out on the border with Libya. In the darkness of night, with our lights on and a hot breeze coming from the desert, we went down the coast, keeping an eye open for traffic and ready to flee at the first sign of trouble. Just a couple of hours before sunrise we reached the island of Jerba, the Land of the Lotus-Eaters, according to my guidebook, and the very island where Odysseus and his crew were bewitched into never wanting to leave. As beautiful as it might be, I didn’t think we would have that problem.

The periscope revealed a makeshift breakwater — just a pile of large rocks tossed into the sea — a wide beach, and not a soul. I surfaced and opened the hatch. Seaweed went out and inspected our surroundings. Hollie and I climbed out, moored the sub to a rock and hopped onto the beach.

Hollie was such a smart dog. He never barked in a strange place. Nor did he run far away. We went down the beach about half a mile, back up, and down again. The air was hot and dry and very pleasant. The sand was warm beneath my feet. The sky sparkled like a chest full of jewels. It felt wonderful to be back on the continent of Africa.