Sailing a Felluca on the Nile, Egypt
by R.S.King
On the Nile at Aswan
On a day in October we left Inverness station on the sleeper. We were heading for Cairo, antiquities and four days travelling down the river Nile in a traditional sailing craft; an Egyptian felucca. Two days later we were looking at pointy old stones and a very old kit boat near Cairo, and then, after yet another long overnight train journey, we arrived at Aswan to be convoyed by the military to see more Ancient Egyptian Things.
The Old Kit Boat is parked in a boat shed – a museum - alongside the Great Pyramid of Cheops. The royal boat was found sealed in a pit under the museum where it had been for four and a half thousand years after being taken apart and carefully stored in a logical sequence.
The Royal Ship Kit
is shown laid out in the order that it was found in the boat pit below the Museum. Assembled it is very big and quite remarkable.We joined our felluca at the quayside where it was parked under the stern of a very large Nile Floating Hotel.
The Floating Hotel is the usual way of touring the Nile. Massively, they chunter ceaselessly up and down the Nile, in a continuous stream, like lorries on the M6. On board, tourists have every facility and are sheltered from the realities of Egyptian life. People everywhere, hassle by ‘vendors’, Hassle hassle, temperatures high, no rain – or at the most two hours a couple of times a year - and the squits.For Europeans, the predominant obsession is the screaming squits or diarrhea. It became an integral part of our life. Pharohs' Pharewell becomes a conversational gambit. And there is the constant search for and awareness of toilets. We took ‘Immodium’ with us but we were assured that it just acts like a cork and that ‘Antinale’ was better because it cleans the gut rather than immobilizes it. It worked for me! The mnemonic is ‘anti-nile’. Sorry about the digression but if you’ve ever been to Egypt – you’ll understand.
The Falluca
The good ship 'EXPLOPE' (The R had lost its leg in translation) had a shallow draft with a steel hull 30ft long and 14ft beam. This looked as if it had been beaten out of old oil drums and then welded together in a patchwork of odd shaped pieces. In places the hull was quite smooth without too many dents and the paintwork was lovingly maintained. The shrouds and forestay for the 30 foot mast was wire rope tensioned with galvanized rigging screws. Halyards and sheets were of lovely soft cotton rope. It had a centre board operated with a lever which could be pinned at the required depth and the rudder was lengthy and not at all deep. The tiller was correspondingly massive. The last photograph shows the shape of the rudder and how long it is. What it does not show is that its draught is only a few inches so that its centre of underwater area is well aft. This gives high helm forces which need the both the tiller and the helmsman to be strong. In order to make the rudder forces manageable a long loop of cotton rope fixed at each end to the gunwale could be wrapped around the tiller to take the load. Even so the crew commonly lay with their back braced against the gunwale and pushed with their feet. Or vice-versa.
Ashraf at the Helm
The sail, though made out of bits and pieces of cotton, was seen to be something special. As I studied it I realized that it was a sophisticated, highly developed, design. The sail controls were simple. There was a main sheet of cotton rope running through multi-sheaved wooden pulley blocks. The boom and yard came nearly together at the tack separated by about a metre held together by an adjustable rope through a pulley. This important assembly could be let out or released by a tackle depending on the point of sailing. The photograph shows the ability to change the relationship of spar to boom and hence the shape and twist in the sail.
Shape and Twist
Other photographs show that the ratio of the yard to the mast is extraordinary, being about 2 to 2.5 times the height of the mast. I remember from wind tunnel reports that sails of this form shed vortices like an ogival Concorde wing and tend to be more efficient than the high aspect ratio Bermudan rig which is akin to a classic aircraft wing. And so it proved. It sailed impressively close to the wind. See in the photograph how the felluca heads into the wind in relation to the flag flying on the shroud.
Close to the Wind
When we joined ‘Explore’ our baggage went under the deck which was made of removable transverse planks. The space was about two feet deep. Footwear was removed and feet were washed in disinfectant before we lived, sat and slept on large mattresses covered by a large decorated cloth which completely covered the deck area. This meant that we only had access to our belongings at the beginning of the day when the covering was shaken to clean it. We had to be sure that sleeping bags and everything required during the day was to hand in the limited forward stowage. We moored on islands or by the riverside when we stopped for lunch or for the night. There were no toilets on board and many a romantic spot was used for contemplation. We dined on the larger felucca and camped on our own boat sleeping under a canopy under the stars. Cold drinks were kept in an ice box with its mysterious supply of ice. We bathed in the clear clean waters of the great river Nile. No problem here, it is man that is problematic.
The amount of water remorselessly moving down the Nile is awesome and is Egypt. I could not imagine the precipitation necessary to create so much fresh water flowing in that heat under perpetual blue skies. I was told that it comes from Lake Victoria and is fed by the African monsoons. There is so much of the river flowing to the sea that it seems impossible that it can be sustained but water is not short along the Nile and it was used excessively and gleefully everywhere.
The current was with us as we sailed from South to North with the prevailing north wind against us and with no motor to help us. Boat handling was a revelation. The crew sailed us in and out of tight places with precision and only once did they resort to a line ashore to get us away from a tangle of boats. Our ‘Captain’ Ashraf was cut from the same piece of cloth as racing men everywhere and so the sailing was very competitive and joyfully satisfying as we edged in front after hard racing.
Bliss
There were four days of this bliss on a river which was as wide as the Cromarty Firth, its huge volume scarcely contained by its green and sandy banks. And the sun shone.
Thanks to Explore World Wide who did a fine job organizing the many alternatives on offer.
