CARVING UP THE CONGO
OIL AND DIAMONDS DOMINATE THE ECONOMY BUT WE HAD COME LOOKING FOR THAT OTHER PRECIOUS RESOURCE
It’s the end of the rainy season and the water is the colour of Frisco. Stained-brown waves peel down the point, framed by dripping jungle. Somewhere inside all that green is our camp; a cluster of tree houses leading onto the beach. Beyond the bay lies more empty coastline and impenetrable rainforest that spills into neighbouring Gabon. It would be paradise, if it didn’t feel so sharky.
“I wouldn’t be swimming out here,” Max Armstrong says as he paddles past me with a smirk on his face. Max is one of only two surfers out for hundreds of miles, but at least he has a board between him and whatever’s lurking beneath us. Legs dangling, I have nothing but the yellow bulk of my water housing to hang onto.
We are near the mouth of the Noumbi River in the far reaches of the Congo, where wildlife literally oozes out from the forests and the sea. Before coming here I’d read that the area is celebrated for having the greatest species biodiversity in the region and is home to all manner of creatures that crawl, walk and swim. Shortly after Max paddles past, something large thrashes the water a few metres away from me. I decide the angle from the beach is probably much better and swim in.
It’s easy to confuse the Republic of the Congo with its much larger neighbour, the Democratic Republic of
