The bad winds have been going on for several days.

Ximen Xiao climbed onto the roof of a two-story wooden building and carefully observed the distant sky. The sky was still dark and unclear, which seemed to indicate that the weather on the sea would not improve in the next few days, which was particularly frustrating for fishermen who were living by the sea.

This is the sea blue port on the coast of the Namib Desert, located north of the Orange River. It is also the city of Luderitz in Namibia. Due to the rich fishing resources in the nearby waters, it attracted a large number of fishing individuals or enterprises, including the old-fashioned fishing companies and the newly established Ximen Fishery Company every two years. They use Sea Blue Port and Whale Bay Port (the port of Walves in Namibia) as the base to catch all living things including sea fish and sea beasts. Sometimes (usually during the off-fishing season), they will also dig some common bird droppings, sea beast manure, etc. offshore, and then sell them to farmers in the river middle area of ​​South Africa to subsidize their own income.

Of course, their biggest income is fishing income, which is undoubtedly. Especially in the area of ​​Hailan Port, the Bengra cold current flows from south to north, and the strong ascending currents form a rich primary productivity, making the seawater outside the Namib Desert rich in nutrients - especially when the upstream is the most powerful from August to October every year - this provides extremely convenient conditions for the growth of hake and horse mackerel.

Faced with the resources given by the God of Heaven, no one would remain indifferent. So, the people of the townships under the Hezhong Regional Administration of South Africa ordered fishing boats from New Huaxia Island (South Africa lacks wood, and the shipbuilding industry is not prosperous, and it can even be said to be none). Then, using Hezhong Port and Hailan Port as a base, fishing for extremely rich fishing resources in the offshore areas in groups. Because the fishing resources in the Namib Desert area far exceed those in the offshore areas of South Africa, most of these fishing boats are concentrated in Hailan Port on weekdays - a small fishing port spontaneously formed by groups such as fishermen, boat repairers, merchants, etc.

Hailan Port currently has about hundreds of permanent residents and is still rising. As for the number of migrant population, it is even more difficult to explain, so it has gradually developed to a point where the Hezhong Regional Administration cannot ignore it. According to rumors, Commissioner Jiao Tangjiao of Hezhong has planned to send officials here to take office so that Hailan Port can be included under the East Coast as soon as possible. Otherwise, the large amount of taxes lost every year will be enough to make people feel distressed.

This is the case with Hailan Port, which is further north and further away. The warm current of Angora flows down from the north and meets the Bengalan Cold River near the estuary of the Kunene River, forming a fishing ground with a considerable output, mainly hake and black horse mackerel as the supplement, and is just adjusted to South Africa. Although the output of this fishing ground may not be larger than that, because most of the production is cape hake, Bengra hake and deep-sea hake. These cods like to eat in the east coast and are more popular, so there are many people squeezing at the Whale Bay Port. For example, the Chengxin Fishery Company run by Zhu Chengdong and Zanparini takes this place as its nest. Correspondingly, the Ximen Fishery Company, which mainly sells black horse mackerel to the river and even New Courland, uses Hailan Port as its home port to fish, and the division of labor is clear.

It was the autumn of the year in the southern hemisphere. Although it was not the best fishing season, it was quite good. Therefore, more than thirty fishing boats of all sizes gathered in Hailan Port. These fishing boats are new and old, big and small, luxuriously equipped, and extremely simple. The total tonnage exceeds 4,000 tons, which is already a huge fishing force. At this time, they should have been very energetic and sailing out to sea to catch the sea area. However, a sudden storm broke the dreams of everyone. All the ships were hiding in Hailan Port to shelter the wind and waves. The fishermen and boat owners either gambling or slept in nothing, and in short, they looked decadent.

The fleet of Baron Krivitz and others was unfortunately involved in this storm, and then rushed into the sea blue port to hide. It has been several days since the captains were frowning all day long, while the sailors were repairing the ships. However, the Baron himself was still leisurely, and he still had time to sit and chat with Ximen Xiao and others in a teahouse.

"Mr. Krivitz, unfortunately, you may still need to be a guest at Hailan Harbor for a few more days. In my experience, the sea will still be unsuitable for adventure in the next few days, especially when your ships are still full of cargo." Ximen Xiao walked down the wooden stairs and shook his head and said, "But even if the wind and waves stop, you should be very careful when you go back. Because recently, pirate activities are becoming more and more rampant outside Angola, those people have focused on the robbery of merchant ships, and the methods are very cruel. I heard that almost no one has survived. The Netherlands East India Company, my country's East African Transport Company, has recently reported the disappearance of ships several times. If there is no accident, it should be done by these pirates. Sometimes they even rob us fishing boats that are making a living. What they do is simply outrageous.

.At present, our government has decided to allocate two faster warships at the right time - yes, you also know that it is the kind of "Star" class light cruiser - to come to the Hezhong area to search and fight against these hateful pirates. But this kind of thing is actually very difficult to deal with. The climate outside Angola is complex and varied, which is very conducive to pirate operations. At the same time, those people can also disguise themselves as merchant ships on weekdays, which is really difficult to distinguish. In addition, there are too few "Star" class light cruisers, which are not enough to cruise in such a large area. Therefore, this round of attacks on pirates is destined to be unsatisfactory. At most, the arrogance of the pirates from Portugal, England and France can be slightly suppressed and cannot be completely eradicated. Therefore, Mr. Krivitz, you should still be very careful and pay more attention to your own safety. Those pirates are robbed by everyone."

In fact, what Ximen Xiao thought more about is another sentence. If you die, who should we sell the horse mackerel that our company's fleet has been experiencing great hardship next time? We can't transport it back to the local area or bypass the Yicheng area on the east coast of South Africa to sell it. If you don't talk about the risks on the road, the price is also very low than what the Kurlans give. After all, they are all Christians. They must eat fish in many festivals of the year (preferably cod). They also like to eat fish on weekdays, so the market is relatively broad. In addition, they are generally very rich and the price given is higher. Therefore, Ximen Xiao and others are more willing to sell fish (of course, salted fish or dried fish) to New Courland. They will only consider selling it to China if they have no choice. There is no way, who has made the East Coast promote free trade? Isn't this free trade? Everything depends on money!

Baron Krivitz sighed when he heard this. Obviously he knew the situation and was very troubled by it. After all, any New Courian merchant ship returning from the east coast would inevitably pass through the coast of Angola, and it would inevitably be impossible to avoid the Portuguese pirates. Baron Krivitz suspected that these people had an indescribable relationship with the Portuguese colonists in Angola, so let's consider them all Portuguese - a huge threat. New Courian was already short of ships, and the number of sailors used together was so large. If a few were robbed by pirates, would it be possible? Foreign trade would inevitably be seriously affected. At that time, the lack of supplies in the colonies and rising prices would be inevitable, which was something that the Prince and the Governor could not accept.

"I would have liked that Governor Beverren had a mobile fleet at hand and could be sent out to carry out the mission of clearing out pirates with the East Coast people!" At this time, Baron Krivitz felt that New Courland should also be equipped with a professional naval fleet, not too many, and it would be enough to have a warship of more than 20 guns like three or four East Coast people.

But then again, there are no professional warships parked in Wendao Port in Kurland. Why is it that a colony with a low status thousands of miles away? Although this colony already has a population of more than 20,000 and contributes a lot of money to the local area every year, the colony is a colony. This innate fact cannot be changed. Can you own several professional warships? This is simply impossible!

The two then talked about the recent development of South Africa, and also tasted the high-end camellia that the teahouse owner ordered from Ningbo, Far East. It is worth mentioning that in places like Hailan Port, due to the existence of the Benguela cold current, there are only a few days of precipitation in the year, so it is extremely dry. Therefore, if you want to drink tea in such a place, you have to be rich. It is really interesting to open a teahouse here. This is probably related to being a seafood wholesaler. Drinking tea may be just someone’s private hobby, but he opened a whole teahouse to satisfy his private hobby.

The main source of drinking water in the local area is apart from some intermittent dry streams, which are used to use the thick fog that spreads offshore at night or in the early morning to artificially collect water vapor. These water vapors should actually turn into rainfall, but because of the cold current, they can never form rainfall and can only exist in the form of fog. It is precisely the existence of these fog that greatly nourishes a large number of weeds and shrubs on the Namib Desert, making the extensive nomadic economy difficult to maintain here. Of course, nomadic natives no longer dare to approach the sea blue and Whale Bay ports where people gathered on the east coast. They are also afraid of being captured and used as slaves for life.

Ximen Xiao has lived in the sea and river for most of the past two years, and is familiar with the situation in South Africa. In his opinion, South Africa, the only overseas territory of the East Coast Republic of China, has only sloppy relations with local economy, but its economic ties with New Courland, New Courland and other places are increasingly close. For example, they export large quantities of livestock, cured meat, salted fish, wine, wheat, flour, cheese, butter and even building materials to New Courland, and then import specialty goods such as tobacco, sugar, pepper, tropical dried fruit, wood, etc. from there; for example, they exported salted fish (the fishery production in New Huaxia Island is seriously insufficient), wine, wheat, flour and other commodities to New Huaxia Island, and then imported a large number of tropical specialties such as coffee, cocoa, sisal, and even foreign goods that are re-exported, and trade is very frequent.

Even after South Africa won the due treatment (the South African Hezhong region is theoretically local, and the Yicheng region will soon be included in the local area in the future), the central government has gradually relaxed restrictions on local industrial development. Many domestic merchants have taken a fancy to South Africa's rich wool resources and planned to set up wool textile factories here for the Indian Ocean and Southeast Atlantic markets. From then on, South Africa's wool no longer needs to be shipped back to the local area in bags. They have already had the right to produce their own wool cloth, which undoubtedly further makes South Africa closely linked to the above two regions.

Of course, this does not mean that there is already a new impetus between the South African region and the local government. In fact, South Africa cannot be independent in any case when it is so close to the local government and there are locally appointed cadres and troops sent. This is actually just the normal development direction of the South African region. Any regional commissioner appointed by the central government must start from this idea. South Africa's future is destined to be in Africa and in the Indian Ocean. Of course, the trade with the local government will not be neglected. After all, it relies on the local area.

On April 19, 1668, the wind stopped and the rain stopped, and the sea was clear. Baron Krivitz shook hands with Ximen Xiao and said goodbye, then took several of his merchant ships to leave Hailan Port in turn and embarked on a journey back. Ximen Xiao called out several of his confidants and asked them to go to the tavern to summon drunk sailors (many of these people were non-nationals from the Old Continent) and prepared to go out to sea for fishing.

This time, their goal is to go fishing cod in the waters north of Whale Bay. In just a few months, the local New Year will be over, and the consumption of cod will increase greatly. Smart people know that it is time to increase the reserves of cod at this time so that they can make a big profit before the New Year. Ximen Xiao naturally had this idea.
Chapter completed!