Chapter VI: Exposure

 

Mike Retford thumbed over the last page of his magazine, and then let it fall against the steering wheel. He had read every article in it twice, and then all the adverts, and if he was forced to sit idle much longer he might well succumb to the final indignity: the crossword – which he would be unable to complete and would have to watch later as Libby finished it in two minutes. For the hundredth time, he wondered exactly how he had ended up in this God-forsaken place...

On the far side of the roped-off service area, the last of the team's cars pulled away towards the marshals' post and time control, their race-tuned engines raucous and uneven as the turbocharger anti-lag systems cut in and out from idling speed. Yet still Libby did not appear.

They had met at a party back in Oxfordshire only three weeks earlier. He had just graduated from medical college and she was one of the few females he had encountered in five years that was not either on hospital staff, or a fellow student. Elizabeth Caffrey was two years older than him, but with a much greater knowledge of the world. She worked as a junior engineer, he discovered, for a large race preparation firm outside Banbury. Although he had little interest in motor sport, and she none at all in medicine, they had hit it off in the odd way that sometimes happens.

A more formal dinner date followed, when it emerged that Libby's team was due to leave for a major event in north Africa and he had resigned himself to never hearing from her again. But then matters started to move quickly and not entirely under his control:

The rally team comprised four competing cars with their drivers, and also a large logistics support and servicing crew divided into two groups, eleven trucks and 4x4 vehicles in all. The rota was to include two qualified medical personnel, and it appeared that one of them had dropped out at the last minute. The next day, a courier-delivered envelope arrived on Mike's doorstep, containing travel documents, tickets, a handwritten note from Libby with the single word “Please??” on it – and an advance cheque for more money than he had ever seen in one place in his life. Two days later he was in Tunisia.

Any illusions he might have had about a romantic sojourn abroad were soon dispelled. Five days of gruelling travel through the heart of the desert meant no time for dalliance and little privacy, as the service convoys leap-frogged from the end of one timed rally stage to the next. But to his surprise, these conditions made him even more attracted to Libby and not less.

The object of this affection came striding into view. She was almost as tall as he was, with short fair hair and some pretensions to a figure, even under shapeless blue overalls that were emblazoned with corporate logos. She ducked under the sun canopy and slid into the passenger seat.

“Hi honey – I'm home.”

She had been doing mechanic duties all day and it showed. There was a long grey smudge of oil on one side of her face and her fingernails would not have borne any inspection.

“You are a very dirty girl.”

“Yeah I am. And you love that about me. Any patients today?”

“Not since Archie dropped the torque wrench on his foot this morning. It's not broken but he won't be doing the hokey-cokey any time soon. How'd it go in Service?”

“Had to do a gearbox change on Luigi's car – which is my department as you know. Seventeen minutes flat, even without Archie to help.” She slapped a fist into her palm. “Nailed it!”

“Well done you.”

“My God but it's hot out there.” Libby turned down the collar of her overalls and fanned it.

“I dunno how you stick it in all that fireproof gear.”

“I'll let you into the secret. I'm not wearing any underwear. Check it out...” She toyed with a zipper pull.

“You wouldn't dare.”

“I might.”

A sharp rap on the windscreen and the zipper was returned hastily to its normal position. Mike rolled down his window to reveal the amiable bespectacled face of the team's technical manager, Dieter Voss.

“A word with you, Doctor... ah, and Elizabeth, there you are also I see.” He handed over a sheaf of printed e-mail messages. “We have a little job for the pair of you I believe.”

Mike studied the papers, acutely aware of Libby leaning in and reading over his shoulder. Her hair was tickling his ear and it distracted him.

“I don't understand. Okay, so there is a bird lost in the desert – but what has that got to do with us?”

“This bird is no ordinary bird, it seems.” Voss took off his glasses and polished them. “It is a bird that has thousands of followers on Facebook, and so our main sponsors have become interested and have asked the team to 'step up' as they put it. It would be a useful PR coup for them if anything could be found...”

Libby interrupted. “Yes – and for six million a year into your competitions budget, whatever the sponsors ask for, the sponsors get!”

“Quite correct Elizabeth, quick on the uptake as usual. There are some co-ordinates on the last page.”

Instead of a standard sat-nav, the much modified 4x4 was fitted with a fourteen inch touch-screen display that occupied most of the nearside dashboard. It was similar to the multi-function chart plotters normally installed in marine craft and currently displayed the updated positions of all the team vehicles. The mapping also showed strings of waypoints that differentiated the graded road surface - known as the piste - from virgin desert sand that looked, to unaided eyes, exactly the same. Libby keyed in the figures and then sat back, scowling.

“This is more than ten kilometres from here!” she announced.

“Then you had better get going. It will be dark soon. They believe the unfortunate creature has died from some cause, but we are to recover the tracking unit - an instrument of some value, I understand - and if possible try to find some evidence of what may have happened. Keep me informed by satellite phone, when you can.”

“But Dieter, this isn't fair!” Libby protested, “Everyone else is ready to pull out and by the time WE get down to the coast, all the hotel rooms will be taken. You know what it's always like.”

“Hmm... I will see what can be arranged – but you are right: any crew members that arrive late might be compelled to share a room.”

“I see.” Libby's face cleared suddenly as the implications of this sank in. “Oh, I SEE – share a room, yes well... we must all make sacrifices for the good of the team, mustn’t we?”

Mike was struggling to keep a straight face as Voss walked off. “Dieter is the only German I ever met that has a sense of humour.”

“He's Swiss – which probably explains it. Okay... pull up behind the trucks down there, I want to get my overnight kit. And then I'll take the wheel.”

Mike made no comment at this. Libby was an experienced desert driver and in fact had done some of the development work on the factory's new prototypes. HE, on the other hand had acquired something of a reputation for wandering off-route onto the soft stuff, and the phrase “Digging out the Doctor” had already become a watchword in the team for some laborious and repetitive task that could not be avoided.

Libby returned, carrying a shoulder bag and a bright yellow valise case that she stowed under her seat. “I looked at the large-scale maps. We can backtrack for about five, then turn north and across this big shallow wadi to the other side. After that we'll just have take our chances with the terrain.”

“What's a wadi?” asked Mike.

“A dried-up river bed.”

“And what happens if the river appears while we're crossing it?”

Libby gave him an indulgent smile. “Darling, there hasn't been surface water here for thousands of years. I reckon our chances of getting over safely are fairly good.[1]

Five kilometres down the eastbound piste, and Mike twisted a control on the map screen to zoom in. “We want to turn off to the left somewhere around, er... right here.”

The 4x4 swerved violently one way then the other. Libby caught the tail-slide and executed a perfect four-wheel drift that ended just in time for the front axle to be aligned with the bank of the wadi. She dropped down two gears and they crossed slowly and without incident.

“A little more advance warning with the navigation next time, genius.”

Mike let out the breath he had been holding for almost a minute. “Damn but you're good.”

“I'm not just a pretty face, that's for sure.”

“I think your face is adorable.”

“Behave yourself.”

Now their route lay up and across a steep slope. Libby gave the engine maximum revs and the locked differentials whined and grated as sand and gravel fountained from the tyres.

“Get on up there, old girl, you can do it...” she muttered.

Right on the point of stalling, they reached the crest and emerged onto a narrow plateau of striated rock. To one side, a series of stone outcrops had been smoothed and eroded by the ever-present wind into fantastical curved shapes. The way became narrow and then petered out altogether. Libby let the 4x4 roll to a stop and switched off the engine. She reached down and opened the yellow case.

“What's that thing?” Mike asked, pulling a daysack from one of the side lockers.

“It's a thermal imaging camera. Supposed to be for detecting hot-spots in the suspension and braking systems, possible points of failure, but we're almost always too busy to use it. Ready? Let's see what we can find...”

They began to search just as the sun finally dipped below the western horizon. Shadows of opaque purple reached down from rock buttresses, confusing to the eye. Mike tried to peer beyond them.

“The target point was only two hundred from where we stopped, but I can't see anything along here.”

They walked on, with Libby scanning the terrain: up, down and sideways. Suddenly she halted: “I've got something... there, just below that overhang.”

On the camera's built-in display, a small orange dot glowed dimly among the other thermal signals. They hurried forward. At the base of the rock wall, an untidy pile of feathers, barred brown and white, lay in the dust.

“Aaww, what a shame.” said Mike, sadly.

“No, he's definitely still alive.” came Libby's uncompromising response.

“How do you know that?”

“Wouldn't show up on the thermal camera, otherwise.”

Mike un-shouldered his bag and knelt down. His examination was methodical and unhurried, while Libby fumed with impatience beside him. At length he sat back and scratched his head.

“Well... this is a bit odd. I can't find any bones broken or other obvious injuries. There's some bruising above the left scapula but it wouldn't be disabling. I measure a very weak heartbeat and its rate is way high – over 280. A human would be in the ICU with that, but it could be normal for birds.”[2]

“Don't you know?”

“No I don't. If there was a lecture on avian cardiology at doctor school, I must have missed that one.” He peered into his bag. “Dammit – we should have brought a blanket or something to wrap him in. Those talons are needle sharp...”

Libby stepped behind him. “Do not and I repeat, NOT, turn around under any circumstances.”

Fabric rustled and her overall appeared over his right shoulder. Mike took it and began to bundle the unconscious osprey in its folds. He heard her footsteps receding and risked a backwards glance. Now THAT, he thought, would make a popular picture on Facebook.By the time he reached the car, she was dressed more appropriately in jeans and a pale red tee-shirt. He opened the back door and laid his patient on the stretcher platform that occupied half of the rear load space.

“You peeked!” said Libby, feigning outrage.

“I'm a Doctor – you haven't got anything I haven't seen before.”

“Oh, is THAT so? And how does this one compare with all the others you've seen?”

“I couldn't say without taking a much closer look at it.”

“Patience, lover – good things come to those who wait.”

“Pfft - you've been saying that for six days.” While continuing with the banter, Mike began to search through lockers and shelves. He passed various items forward as they were found: “Hold that, please... and that... and I need some of this and one of– where the hell is it? Okay, good...”

“What's all this for?” asked Libby, looking down at two sealed packets of narrow plastic tubing.

“I think our osprey is suffering from acute dehydration, more than anything else. It's a very dangerous condition for humans and probably even more so for a bird. If I can get him set up with intravenous fluids on a drip, he might – just might – have a chance of making it through the night.”

“And you've done this before, right?”

“Well, I've SEEN it done before,” replied Mike defensively, “which is almost the same thing.”

An hour later they were back on the graded surface and able to make better speed. Picked out in the headlights, the rally service area was deserted with only tyre tracks to show that anyone had ever been there. They were already being covered by drifting sand.

[1] Recent observations using a combination of LANDSAT imagery and remote sensing radar have revealed patterns of extensive prehistoric watercourses in the western Sahara Desert.

[2] Basal heart rate in birds is extremely variable. For a medium/large raptor it would be around 175 beats per minute.

Chapter V:  Double Sunrise

Reported location: N29º 10.4' W008º 11.3' Activity level: 8. Ambient: 22.7 DegC. Days since reset: 64. Daily VMG: 7.8 km/h. Erratic and unexplained course changes.

The eagle owl was in no hurry. It could see that I was not flying at full speed and it had the legendary patience of its kind.[1] There was only one chance for me to escape but it was a desperate throw...

Away to my right, small whorls of blown sand were being picked up on a strengthening wind. They began to form a brown veil of airborne dust that grew more dense as I watched. If I could only reach it, my pursuing nemesis would be unable to attack - but if the dust storm subsided before I covered the distance, I would have no other options left.

Flying as hard as my damaged shoulder would allow, I angled down and into the curtain of sand. Grit clogged my nostrils and eyes and I could barely see. The wind increased again and with it the whole column of sand began to rotate: I was borne away on a scorching updraught, helpless and disoriented. Time and direction ceased to have any meaning. Of the predatory owl that had been chasing me there was no sign and I never saw it again.

I have no idea how long the sandstorm lasted, but it was a great while. The wind did not start to drop until long after darkness had fallen, by which time I had been carried far out into the desert. Eventually the air around me cleared, but there must have been a load of dust at higher altitude because I had no sight of stars or moon that night. And daybreak was to be even worse.

I awoke in a cold dawn to be greeted by a horrible image: the desert stretched away to the east in an empty vista of low dunes towards an indistinct horizon, and above that were two suns - one above and slightly offset from the other.[2] I just stared at them, my beak was hanging open for I had forgotten to close it, and I felt physically ill.

At this point I should perhaps mention a few things about how we do our long-distance navigation. Our direction of travel is given by the position of the sun where it rises and sets on each successive day. (We can use moon or prominent stars in the same way, but the sun works best.) The interval between sunrise and sunset is critically important: we have an internal sense of elapsed time that is very accurate, and the comparison of sunrise timing and its angle to the zenith gives us our position in the world.

(You may have heard stories that we have “magnetic beaks” or some other twaddle of the sort. This might be true of other birds, but all I can tell you is that my beak has never pointed in any direction other than straight ahead!)

Length-of-day is not just important for navigation - it governs many aspects of our existence: when to migrate, when to build a nest, the right time of year to mate and lay eggs, and can even tell us which fish might be available to catch. So you can see that having two suns in the sky was a dreadful conundrum: I didn't know which one was real, or even if they both were! Panic began to take over: I was alone in a featureless desert with no clue as to where I was or where to go next.[3] 

After calming down a bit I headed in the general direction of south-west, at low speed and with many rest stops. My shoulder was still painful through all of that day and most of the next. There were no landmarks that I could orient on – just the infernal desert, going on and on...

And even in such a seemingly empty place, there were unexpected dangers. That night I roosted on the desert floor, perched on a low pile of sand-worn stones. I had taken a good look round and there was not another living creature as far as the eye could see. Yet early in the morning, I heard a curious scraping sound from the very stone that my legs rested on. I stood up and from under the stone crept yet another animal that was new to me – but not to my ancestral instincts. Obeying them, I pulled my head right back and extended my wings away from it. In the pre-dawn light it looked light-brown, apart from its darker lower legs and small, inoffensive-looking pincer claws. But the feature that had triggered my defensive posture was the ghastly thing's segmented tail, recurved and engorged with venom. [4]

I wondered if it was blind as it cast about left and right, sensing my presence but unsure of what I was. The tail arced forward and then back, slow and menacing. There was only one thing to do...

I put my foot on it, driving it hard into the sand and held it there with my full weight for a good while. And the really horrible thing was: when I lifted my talon again, it just turned round and scuttled back under the stone. That was two more useful life lessons: (i) scorpions can be found anywhere in the desert, no matter how remote, and (ii) they are a lot tougher than they look.

Towards evening of the third day after this incident, I began to see higher ground on the horizon. Gradually it took form and I saw with growing excitement the unmistakeable shape of encircling hills that had been locked in my mind from birth.

Ishrahan was there!

The heat and pain had sapped almost all of my remaining reserves but I pressed on. Hunger and raging thirst meant nothing now: once I reached the groves and streams of Ishrahan, there would be plenty of water and fish, and my long journey would be at an end. The final miles took me over a series of rocky outcrops that formed the eastern border of a great low-lying basin. My shadow rose to meet me and I landed on a wide ledge, at the very end of my tether but still eager for the first sight of my new home.

How can I describe for you now the horror and dismay that I felt in that moment? I looked down and saw, not the lush wetlands and waterfalls of my imagination but a scene out of some demented nightmare...

Where the great river should have run, a wide angular canyon slashed across the landscape. In place of water-meadows there were harsh fingers of drifted sand. The fair woods of Ishrahan were nothing more than low bastions of shattered rock and stone – and between them, ravening monsters snarled and spat, hunting back and forward over the plain and bellowing to one another in the clouds of dust they kicked up.

I had made a terrible, fatal mistake. I had expended all my energy in coming to this dreadful place and now I would never leave it alive. Even if the monsters did not get me (and as I watched, two more went past, crackling and emitting blue fire) then I would quickly succumb to thirst, for there was nothing to eat or drink as far as the eye could see.

My talons tightened their grip as true fear started to get the better of me, and the ledge I was perched on crumbled beneath them. My last memory was of falling and then everything went black.

Final reported location: N20º 31.6' W012º 12.0'   Activity level: 0.   Ambient: 27.3 DegC.   Days since reset: 70.   Daily VMG: 0.0 km/h.   No activity.    Deceased or PTT fault.

[1] Carron may have been unlucky. Two species of large owl are recorded in the Draa: the Pharoah eagle owl Bubo ascalaphus and the much bigger and more formidable Eurasian eagle owl Bubo bubo hispanus which is very uncommon and only properly confirmed at the upper (eastern) end of the valley.

[2] The “twin suns” mirage is extremely rare, but several examples have been well documented – most recently one in China, in 2011. Like most mirages, it is caused by the refraction of light through air layers of differing density, usually due to an extensive temperature inversion.

[3] Carron's distress at the phenomenon is understandable, but his situation may not have been as bad as he seemed to think. The sun's disk subtends a visual angle of half a minute of arc (approx 0.0087 radians) At the latitude of the Sahara Desert, the vector location error caused by such a discrepancy in the sun's apparent position would be only about 12 kilometres at most.

[4] This description seems to match the Sahara scorpion Androctonus australis – an extremely dangerous species, about 8cm long, which deploys a fast acting 4C-C neurotoxin by stinging.

Chapter IV:  Anti-Atlas

Reported location: N36º 7.3' W005º 20.7' Activity level: 9. Ambient: 19.5 DegC. Days since reset: 55. Daily VMG: 0.2 km/h Local movements only.

You call it Gibraltar. We call it “Cape Disappointment” - and with good reason.

Out in the straits, the wind had shifted to a gusting half-gale out of the south-east. There could be no crossing in such conditions and I had no option but to wait it out. And I wasn't the only one...

Large numbers of migrating birds were in the same case: all loafing around on the Rock and getting in each others' way. I spotted several other ospreys but did not approach them, for already squabbles over perches and roost sites were frequent as the delay caused tempers to become short. I saw a young honey-buzzard try to land in a shrub “owned” by several brown vultures: it got a severe thumping for its temerity and flew away out over the bay, crying piteously. Fresh water was in short supply and food was not to be got: I looked down at the waves thrashing along the base of the crag and the long harbour breakwater, and tried to imagine what it would take to catch a fish down there.

It was three days before the weather relented even slightly, by which time I was almost at my wits' end. Conditions were still far from ideal: I watched some storks make the attempt using their high-soar-and-long-glide technique. Some returned, skimming frantically down-breeze over the Spanish side to shelter. Two of them did not make it back at all. However, I had spotted that many of the smaller birds were making the run successfully, by flying hard at low level – just barely above the water – and “tacking” away from the stronger gusts.
We ospreys are powerful fliers when we need to be (it's all that fish what does it) and I resolved to try the same method.

It worked. But only just.

By desperate effort, I managed to make my landfall at the other side, on a hill just north of the airport. If I had missed it, the wind would have carried me far out to sea with no hope of recovery. Still and all, I had finally made it to a new continent – although this was a bit of an anti-climax as the new continent (or at least, this region of it) looked very much the same as the southern part of the old one, with the same birds, plant life and terrain.

The wind was different, though. In place of the comfortable northerly airstream that I had enjoyed almost every day since leaving Scotland, there were hot drying winds out of the east, gritty and inconstant. After a rest day to recover from my exertions in the straits, I skirted the big bustling airport (scary place!) and continued southwards. The countryside seemed pleasant enough, green and fertile, but human activities were always evident – and sometimes on a colossal scale... Not far to the east, the same wind had raised a gigantic wall of dust that extended right up to the cloudbase. What this was I could not tell from such a distance but it was clearly a place to be avoided.[1] 

Another place to be avoided loomed ahead. They were the highest mountains I had ever seen in my short life, so tall that their summits gleamed white with snow even in late summer.[2] The massif could not be flown but there were lower passes around its flanks – and my previous experience meant that I had no intention of using them this time!

So that was yet another diversion: out to the west and round the end of the range before I could resume my proper course.

For Ishrahan...

The land to the south of the mountains was very different in character: dry and sun-bleached. I came over what would have been a wide river valley – at some other season when it might have had a wide river in it. Now, there was only a meandering muddy trickle, nothing like drinkable. I was set to pass over when a sharp glint of reflected sunlight caught the corner of my eye. I did a quick wingpoint-turn (a tricky aerobatic manoeuvre and one that I was quite proud of at my tender age) and glided down.

There were some small human dwellings, seemingly abandoned; an odd-looking tree just beyond them; and a long narrow trough of (fairly) clean water fed by a spigot at one end. I landed on its rough stone coping and took a sip.

“Drink freely. There is no other water here, and I can spare it for thee.”

The voice came from behind me, rather high-pitched and affected in tone. I turned to see one of the most extraordinary birds I had ever encountered.

It was sitting on a T-shaped perch under a small but elaborately embroidered canopy - a falcon of moderate size, but impossibly well-groomed. Not a feather was out of place and they shone in tones of russet and grey. On one leg, fine leather strips were decorated with golden trim and stones of blue and bright,[3] and around its neck hung a tiny silver bell.

“What are you?” I said, startled by such an apparition and forgetting my manners as a result.

“My name is Mahmud al-Kahin ibn Haroud Falku-Francorchamps the Third.” He looked at me expectantly.

“What happened to the other two?”

“Oh, never mind. Thou art an osprey, an infidel from the far north as I well know. But what art thou staring at over there...?” My attention had been taken by the sight of the tree I had spotted from above.

“There are sheep perched in that tree.”

“Saving your presence,” replied the falcon, “but those are goats.”

“They look like sheep.”

“Doubtless – but they look even more like goats.”

“Goats can't climb trees!”

“Thy wisdom almost rivals the words of the Prophet himself,” came the sardonic response, “yet it seems that they are up there nonetheless.”

I was starting to think that thirst and the heat had begun to warp my senses: a falcon wearing jewellery, and goats in trees! What kind of mad place WAS this? [4] 

My companion had found a single feather that was marring the perfection of all the rest, and he preened it carefully before continuing:-

“The beasts are in the tree for two reasons: to eat its leaves - such as are left, and to watch out for the giant owl.”

I shook my head to clear it. “I'm sorry – I thought you just said 'giant owl'”

“Precisely so. Not merely wise but perspicacious also. Know then that in these parts lives a monstrous owl - much larger than thee - with eyes that glow. The men of the village hate and fear it, believing that it is some kind of demon-owl and they throw stones if it appears, to drive it away.” [5] 

I didn't buy the 'demon' part of this story for a second, but I considered the capabilities of an owl that was bigger than me and it was a sobering thought. But there was another problem approaching: more immediate and familiar than mythical owls, for I could see four men walking slowly up the path from the valley. They were dressed alike in long white garments with leather jerkins, and they had guns. I was searching frantically for somewhere to hide when the falcon piped up again.

“Be at peace. I do not think they will shoot thee - and I am quite certain they will not shoot ME.”

“How so?” I asked, taking nervous glances toward the path.

“There is no shooting of birds here, especially birds with talons such as we. The head man of the area, the Sharif, does not permit such activities and he punishes severely. It is contrary to their Holy Book.”

I dipped my head to indicate suspicion and glared at him: “You seem to know an awful lot about humans and their habits.”

“Why so I do, having lived with them and studied them since I was out of the egg. They are dangerous and unpredictable beings to be sure, but the Sharif - that is him there, with the little red hat - looks after me and oft-times we go hunting gerbils together along the valley, which is good fun and also educational.” [6] 

“Gerbils? Gerbils?” I had had just about enough of this nonsense. The meeting needed to be brought to order, and the sooner the better. “What lies beyond those pointy hills over there?”

“The desert.”

“And beyond that?”

“There is nothing beyond that, except more desert. It goes on forever - or so I am led to believe.”

I was about to make a comment about some of the things that this bird seemed to believe, when the group of men arrived. A piercing whistle rang out and the falcon took off, reaching them in two swoops where it perched on the red-hatted one's wrist. The rest of the party gathered round, making soft admiring noises and even stroking the falcon's head. It was sickening to behold.

Eventually the falcon was rewarded with a piece of meat which he brought back to the perch and began to eat, with what I thought was excessive delicacy. The men were discussing something among themselves and several times pointed in my direction.

“What is happening now?” I asked uneasily.

The falcon looked up from his meal. “They have recognised thee by reason of the internet.”

“What is an internet?”

I have no idea but seemingly thou art on it.”

The group started to move towards us, still arguing and pointing. No matter how well-intentioned these humans might be, they were getting too close and I took off towards the sharp-ridged hills behind the village. By now it was early evening, and the eastern sides of the steep gullies below were in inky shadow. I perched on a leafless bush just below the ridge line to collect my thoughts. This might be as good a place to roost as any other, since the only sizeable tree was back down in the valley – and IT was already full of goats. As the land cooled, small gusts of wind began to blow in from the desert, picking up blades of dry grass and flicking them away.

I looked around and then paused, holding my breath: at the very edge of my peripheral vision something had moved in the shadow area under the hill. I stared down there for minutes, wondering if I had imagined it. Nothing happened and I relaxed again but, all the same, I shifted position slightly to give a better view in that direction. It was a tiny move, but fortunate...

Something struck me a mighty blow on the shoulder, knocking me to the ground. A huge round-winged shape was already turning above me as my feet scrabbled for purchase on the loose soil. Desperately I flapped and scrambled to the top and launched into the air as a fountain of dust and stones exploded at the spot I had just vacated. 

The attack had been launched without a single sound. If it had not been for that first movement in the shadow, I would have been taken completely unawares. Now my only hope of escape lay in pure speed, for no owl that I had ever seen could outpace an osprey in level flight. I tried to accelerate but pain was lancing from my injured shoulder and my flight muscles would not seem to respond.

Out over the open desert, I risked a look back. My pursuer was behind and well above me, holding a major tactical advantage. All it had to do was wait.

[1] The Ouad-Zem open cast mining complex near Khuorigba, Morocco is the second-largest surface phosphate extraction in the world, producing some 70 billion tons of material annually. 

[2] The highest peak in the Atlas Mountain range is Toubkal (Ar: Tubqal) 4167 metres. 

[3] Lapis lazuli. A blue semi-precious stone (tectosilicate), fluorescent under UV at 365 nm. 

[4] The author first visited the Draa Valley in 1966 as a 14-year-old boy. Like Carron, he was amazed to see numbers of goats clambering about in trees and even jumping from one branch to another. The same behaviour can still be seen there today. 

 [5] Owls are considered birds of ill-omen across the entire region, as being harbingers of bad luck - or worse. 

 [6] Falconry has been a popular pastime in north Africa and the Middle East since early medieval times. While hawks and falcons were (and regrettably still are) taken from the wild, captive-bred birds with a listed pedigree have been the most sought-after and can fetch enormous prices. In the Berber dialect of the area “falku” is generally used for any diurnal bird of prey other than an eagle.

Chapter III:  Unprotected Species

Reported location: N43º 15.3' W000º 33.1' Activity level: 9. Ambient: 21 DegC. Days since reset: 43. Daily VMG: 10.0 km/h

Self-confidence is a wonderful thing. Mine had been growing with every day that passed, so when it came time to cross the next major stretch of water [1] I was more than ready for it. The wind was fair, visibility was good, and the flight took me only a couple of hours with the far shore in sight from the outset. I did not stop but pressed on: south and west as instinct directed: a good day's flying achieved before my next big decision came up.

There were two possible routes: the first, sensible enough, to follow the coastline with all its inlets, hills and valleys, and other terrain. I remembered how much extra time I spent when I had done this before – but there was an alternative: the direct route southwards would save days of extra migration time and there would be no diversions or obstacles to be avoided....

But this meant flying over the ocean itself.

Some preparatory work was in order. I found a rocky cliff and circled high in the updraught it provided. Far below I could see tiny pink humans frolicking on a beach in the late summer sunshine (some turning from pink to red as I watched) and all indulging in their favourite pastime of making as much noise as possible. The sea itself was quiet, with a long rolling swell offshore, and no high cloud patterns that might indicate an imminent change in the situation. All my innate weather-senses combined to tell me that these were perfect conditions for a night flight, and I decided to go for it.

I started from fairly high altitude, going well, for the wind was stronger away from the shore and it was behind me. The sun set early and – bang on schedule – a bright harvest moon rose to light my way. Below me, a small group of seabirds heading in the same direction caught my attention: they were moving much faster than I, and yet only made occasional wing movements to do so. Intrigued, I spiralled down to that level and made an astonishing discovery:-
Just above the sea surface a layer of cooler denser air had formed. By flying along the boundary of this, I got extra lift from my wings – as if a set of springs were pressing me upwards. The horizontal wind shear sent me forwards on what felt like one long continuous glide, but with no loss of height and almost no effort required on my part.

The water was black, and laced with silver shards of moonlight. My free ride southwards continued all night, a strange dream-like progress with no sound but the gentle rush of air over my own feathers. I cannot tell you how much distance I covered, but it was a lot – because as dawn broke, there was high land on the horizon. I turned south-east and headed towards it, crossing the shore around mid-day. A rather special day because, that evening, I caught my first fish - and lost it again.

The brightly-coloured fish was swimming in circles, confined in a small pond set in an immaculately-manicured garden. I grabbed it in a single motion (first time, too!) and perched nearby to eat. A man came out shouting and shaking his fist at me and, startled, I dropped my meal and flew away over the rooftop.

Presumably he wanted the fish for himself. I hope he enjoyed it.

The following morning I headed towards the distant mountains, since there seemed no way to go around them. The land below was green and fertile, with many vineyards on the lower slopes making a striped contrast to the arable fields. By afternoon, these had given way to more open and rugged countryside, with silver-trunked pines predominating.

Ahead, I could see a wide valley leading up towards a pass between several peaks. This was an obvious route as it would require less height gain over the remaining distance – something that is always tiring. I was joined by many other migrant birds, all funnelling up towards the pass: a large flock of swallows passed to my right, moving fast on flickering wings and constantly chittering to each other, the way they do. Larger species: storks, cranes and many raptors, made a more sedate progress but all in the same direction. It was a peaceful and idyllic scene, so when two of the little swallows tumbled and fell, I didn't immediately associate this with the loud bang that had come from the ridge up ahead. 

A sparrowhawk went down next, its wing smashed, and the other birds veered away in a panic. This brought them (and I) towards the west side of the valley and a whole volley of shots rang out. I looked down behind me and saw little puffs of smoke rising from the ground there too: we had flown into a trap and there was no escape! [2]

 I swung away left and drove forward with short wingbeats, losing precious altitude for a gain in forward speed. There was a deafening report below and something fanned across my face. It was clear that remaining in the air was tantamount to suicide and I scanned the rock-strewn hillside below for some kind of refuge as more shots rang out.

Moments later I pitched into a thorny bush just below the top of the reverse slope, weakened with fear. There were several other small birds there – none in much better state than myself – and another osprey, a young adult female. By her accent she might have been from somewhere far to the east and her comments were difficult to understand – not least because she was in a ferment of rage:

“... curse them all with damn! If I could, I would make shit on them from great height... maximum fishy shit, what does never wash out!” She peered down at me. “Do you be injured?”

“I don't think so,” I gasped, “they missed me. But why do they shoot at us, in such a place?”

“Bah!” The female tucked her head in and risked a look back at the shooting line. “Is same every place where mountain make us come low: shoot bird, shoot beast, shoot anything... bastards.”

Minutes passed and then there was a sudden lull in the fusillade above. 

“What is happening now? I can't see...”

She cackled with glee: “One of the fools has shooted himself by drunken accident. He is being helped away and the others put mock on him with gesticulation, the finger right up.”

“I wish they may all shoot themselves, or each other.” I muttered.

“We cannot remain us here. Soon the sun will be away and then they will hunt through tree and bush, kill birds that hide, every one.”

“But WHY?” I asked, “Is it to eat?”

“Not for eat. Just makes kill for enjoy, calling sport... But see now – one has made images of others on small shiny box and all gather to make watch of it. Now is our escaping chance...”

There was a steep v-shaped gulley running down the southern slope, shadowed from the setting sun. We took off together, flying hard down and away. A few desultory shots followed us but already we were almost out of range. The female was larger and stronger than I and soon disappeared into the distance, weaving in and out through the tree-tops. I kept flying while there was still enough light to see before finding a straggly pine to roost in for the night. Huddled close to the trunk and not knowing if there might be unseen hunters behind every bush, I barely slept at all that night.

South of the mountains, the landscape broadened into a vast plain, arid and airless in the late summer heat. The baked ground produced rising columns of air, and I saw large birds taking advantage of these to gain significant altitude with little or no effort, spiralling upwards almost out of sight. Envious of this performance I tried it a few times myself, but our wings do not really have the best shape and profile for soaring flight and I found that it was good fun but not really worth all the trouble and time.[3] Such low level winds as there were still favoured a south-western path and I exploited these instead.

Over the next days I made good progress but I was becoming concerned at having no sight of a coast to follow. My instinctive navigation abilities were improving with each leg of the journey, and I found that I could now get a good positional fix from the sun while in flight – rather than having to wait until it had fully risen. This was an important skill-development: it meant that I could make an earlier start each morning, rest up during the hottest part of the day, and then continue late into the evening before roost. There was only one real problem...

I was getting very thirsty.

As nestlings, we obtain all our water requirements from our food. And in migration mode, my body generated water as a by-product of stored fats being broken down to provide energy for flight. It is a good system but not quite sufficient, and so occasional drinking becomes necessary. And oddly, it was humans (who had done me little good up to now) that provided the answer to this...

As I finally approached the coast in the south-west, I passed over several large patches of ground that did not seem to be farmland, although they were well covered with short-cropped grass in strange linear patterns. I could look down and see, on each pattern, small groups of people waving metal sticks round their heads and cursing audibly. (I had no idea what this activity might be, but by that time I had realised that nothing done by humans made any sense whatsoever.) Occasionally, one of them would push a small white egg into a hole, at which point there would be more swearing and they would give each other money.

The only interesting thing about this whole pantomime was what happened when it was over: once all the people had left in the evening, jets of water would emerge from some hidden source and be sprayed around the entire layout. This was a wonderful discovery: it meant that I could get a drink AND bathe my feathers as well which improved their condition no end. In the same place, I also found some small lakes that contained easily-caught fish – though the fish were woefully small and rather tasteless. Nonetheless I remained there for almost a week, resting up in a small woodland by day. Nobody came near me there and the only danger was of being hit by one of the flying eggs.

The rest was very beneficial but it wasn't bringing me any closer to Ishrahan. All good things must come to an end and, two days later, they did.

The wind changed direction.

Editor's notes:-

[1] The English Channel, presumably.

[2] In southern Europe and around the Mediterranean, the weapon of choice for illegal bird hunting is the 12-gauge repeating shotgun. These cheap and widely-available firearms are made in Turkey and the Middle East, usually incorporating pump action or gas-blowback designs. They hold either 7 or 8 cartridges in a tubular magazine, enabling a withering rate of fire to be maintained.

[3] The efficiency of soaring flight is dependent on several elements in a bird's wing shape and layout. Eagles and vultures have “high lift-to-drag ratio” wings that are lightly loaded at low speeds. Osprey wings have a higher aspect ratio (around 9.2), and a different lift-to-drag factor: these give better performance (higher optimal speed) in flapping flight.