I've always enjoyed visiting unusual places. Sadly, my lovely wife Sandra doesn't always feel like joining me.I was indeed fortunate when she said "yes" to São Tomé.
It was on reading an in-flight magazine that I learnt Taag Airlines flies to São Tomé via Luanda. "Where the heck is that?" asked Sandra - as did most of our friends when I told them. São Tomé, off the coast of Africa, was discovered in 1471. A Portuguese colony, it gained independence in 1975.
Known mainly for its cocoa exports, it has a very small tourist industry. But it's well worth visiting. Apparently, South Africa's very own spaceman, Mark Shuttleworth, owns an upmarket lodge on the nearby island of Principe.
We took off around 3pm on a cool afternoon from Cape Town and arrived in a warm, sticky São Tomé at around 10pm.
Our transfer to our Airbnb took us through very quiet streets, with more stray dogs than cars.
We awoke rather early to the sounds of fishermen calling to each other, and got up to see from our balcony a stunning view across the sea and about six very small fishing boats just below our palm-fringed balcony.
São Tomé is not a very big island. Remembering how quiet the roads had been, we decided to hire a car and drive to the end of the island, which happens also to be just above the equator.
We rented a Suzuki Jimny 4x4, which was delivered to our Airbnb the next morning by a very relaxed Frenchman. I brought out my driver's licence and credit card, to which he said: "Oh, we don't need those. I know you can drive, otherwise you wouldn't be hiring a car, and credit cards are hardly ever seen or used on São Tomé. So only cash, please, to pay."
He gave us the keys and was just disappearing when I asked where I should drop the car at the airport.
"Oh," he said, " just park it near the airport terminal and put the keys under the right-hand front wheel." And with that he was off.
We spent our first few days puttering about, driving on very bumpy roads, drinking lovely local coffee and cocoa and doing some food shopping in the Korean supermarket in the capital.
If you like colonial architecture and old Romanesque churches, you'll love São Tomé.
The day came for our drive to the end of the island. We had about a quarter of a tank of petrol, which we thought would be fine as we'd fill up at petrol stations along the way. We didn't know there are very few petrol stations in São Tomé, and only three outside the capital.
I kept on driving with both of us keeping a sharp lookout for petrol stations. Nothing doing.
Sandra was getting very worried. So was I, but thought it best not to show it - stiff upper lip and all that. She suggested that we turn around and go back, to which I said we didn't have enough petrol to get us back. Best to press on regardless, coasting downhill in neutral.
We eventually arrived in a very small fishing village - no petrol station in sight. Thinking we would have to spend the night there, I went into a little hole-in-the-wall type of shop to ask where the nearest petrol station was.
The old lady in the shop gave me a big, toothless grin and said: "I sell the petrol. How much you want - a full tank?"
She nodded to a little lad, who came scampering out with his elder brother carrying four 5l plastic bottles filled with petrol.
I grinned at Sandra and said: "We are saved!" We took a leisurely drive back and counted our blessings.
We had a number of other adventures while on São Tomé, but will never forget our trip to the end of the island.
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