Nyali Bridge, Mombasa - Gateway to Adventure

The setting for my stories about Bob Dukes, Commercial Officer and Aide to the Governor, is the fictitious island of Mazita, just off the coast of Kenya. As some of you may have guessed, Mazita is loosely based on the island of Mombasa where my younger sister and brother and I spent an enchanted childhood.

My father, who was a single parent, trusted us to be daring but sensible. Mothers are great (I am one myself) but they do tend to worry about their children and restrict their freedom in order to keep them safe. We missed our mother when our parents separated, especially as she had moved 350 miles away to run a dairy farm. However, the upside of being motherless was that we were allowed to roam freely and have adventures all over the island. On our own – with no parent or adult along to tell us what to do.

We all had push bikes. As I was the oldest, I had the worst bike. It was an old black sit-up-and-beg Raleigh, with no gears. My sister and brother were lucky enough to come along at the end of the post-war austerity period. Theirs were up-to-the-minute brightly enameled bikes with racing handlebars and labor-saving gears. Looking back, I suppose it was fair that I had to peddle twice as hard as I was twice as old as my brother and four years older than my sister, but it did gall me at the time.

Our bicycles were our magic steeds which carried us off the island to the mainland of adventure. The gateway to this magical territory was the Nyali Bridge, the bridge in the photo above. In my stories I call it the “Samaki” Bridge. It was a pontoon bridge, a floating bridge which went up and down with the tide as it ran in and out of Tudor Creek. It was floored, if that is the word, with thick wooden planks which lifted up and down as vehicles drove over them.

The bridge was just over 1,300 feet long (400m). This is a long way for three young children to cycle on a narrow strip at the side of the bridge, with only a low railing at saddle-height. We were too young to see the dangers, and the swimming club which lay on the other side was a reward for the hard ride.

When the bridge was dismantled in the 1980s’s, the two ends on their concrete standings were left in situ. The spirit of the old bridge now lives on in what is a quay for coastal dhows traveling down from Arabia and India. I am glad that part of this old bridge remains for I remember the rumble our family car made as it crossed the bridge in the dark after a trip up the north coast. The comforting sound of a day well spent would wake up three sleepy, salty children, tired after a day at the beach, with its promise of home, supper and bed.