Lobito, Angola

December 22^nd, 2024

Yay! It’s not raining today, although when I went to the pool the cushions were still very wet.

I was excited to read in the Herald that at 9:30 to celebrate our sail in to Lobito there would be “Mimosas and Live Cooking” by the pool.

Chef Ainsley and his team were scheduled to prepare apple beignets and banana fritters “a la minute”. What is “a la minute” you may ask? I had the same question. A quick Google search gave me the answer:

“In the culinary arts, mainly in high-volume restaurants, à la minute refers to a style of cooking where an item is prepared to order, rather than being prepped in advance and held for service”.

Sounds great. I would love to see how apple beignets are prepared. I had never heard of them before, but the idea of 2 of my favorite foods being together intrigued me.

Well I arrived at the appointed time only to find that apple beignets and banana fritters had clearly been prepared in the galley, and they were not going to be prepared by the pool. That was disappointing.

The banana fritters didn’t look that great so I avoided them and took a beignet. Luckily there was a pain au chocolate nearby, so I grabbed that as well.

Well what can I say? The apple was covered in cinnamon sugar and tasted ok, but it didn’t taste anything like a beignet to me. I didn’t sample the banana fritter but was told that it was a banana wrapped in phyllo pastry, and did not taste like a fritter.

So that was all a bit disappointing. Still the mimosas were good, and we could watch our progress as we sailed towards the port of Lobito.

We arrived there at about 10:30, but by 12:30 we had not heard the announcement that we could go ashore as yet. I thought we must have missed it. Then finally the announcement came. The ship had been cleared, but the authorities had demanded a face-to-face contact with everyone who was going ashore and that our passports would be available so that this could be done.

This seemed quite strange. I mean we were in Luanda in Angola yesterday. I am sure we hadn’t strayed too far out of Angolan territorial waters since we left Luanda. I mean it’s not like we have visited a foreign country in the interim. This all sounded a little bit officious to me.

We didn’t have a tour planned, and were hoping to go ashore for lunch. I was getting a bit peckish, but we thought we should let the folks with tours disembark first so they could get on with their day, and then we would try to go ashore and catch the shuttle bus.

The information we had about the shuttle bus kept changing. First we heard it was going to the Terminus Hotel, and then that it was going to the Alfa Beach Bar. The restaurant I had chosen for lunch was a 20 minute walk from the Alfa Beach Bar so we put on out sun hats and walking shoes and headed for the gangway.

Surprise surprise! There was no sign of any immigration officers. We asked the security people at the gangway what was going on and apparently the immigration folks must have become bored doing the face-to-face checks and they had all gone to lunch and had not returned. No need to show anyone our passports.

We got onto the shuttle bus and were pleased to find that the restaurant we had chosen, Batuk, was the first stop. No need to walk from the Alfa Beach Bar.

The Tripadvisor description really doesn’t do the restaurant justice. It is right on the beach; you just walk along wooden planks on the sand to get to your table. The menu is fairly extensive, and we chose grilled prawns and chips. We ordered white wine and our waiter brought us 3 different wines so we could choose which one we wanted. We chose a very light, refreshing wine from the Douro region of Portugal which was kept chilled in an ice bucket on our table.

There was something on the appetizer menu that translated into lupins. We thought at first that meant lupins as in the flowering plant that is involved in the Monty Python highway robbery skit involving give me your lupins. We simply had to order them. It turned out they were delicious lupin beans rather than lupin (or as they say in the US lupine) flowers. However according to my research both the beans and the flowers have the same origin in the genus lupinus.

The prawns were delicious, and the chips were exactly how I like them. So there we were on the beach eating prawns and drinking wine. I was totally in my happy place!

The service was a bit slow, but all aboard time wasn’t until 6:30 and I was very content to just sit there for as long as it took. All in all lunch was a great success. I must say I was hoping for peri peri prawns like we used to get in Mozambique, but these were an adequate substitute. I am still hopeful that we will get good peri peri prawns when we get to Maputo. I am so excited to be going back there. Fingers crossed that the demonstrations stop soon.

Back on board we sat on deck 9 by the pool to watch our sail away. Our departure was delayed, and it was quite dark by the time we finally left the port.

Amber from Amber and the Band was doing a solo performance in the Grand Salon tonight, although it really wasn’t solo because the Band was there playing the music, so it was really Amber and the Band. She is a fantastic entertainer and gave an amazing performance. We thoroughly enjoyed it.

We have 4 sea days ahead of us before our next port, Cape Town.

I have found Angola to be a very interesting country with friendly people, a place where you can really feel at home. I have loved our 2 days here; I have had a great time. I hope the Angolans can continue to live in peaceful times. They so deserve it.