At 3:00 am on the morning of November 16, 1982, the crew of the Meisho Maru No. 38 issued an emergency call for help. Their ship had run aground about 1.5 km west of Cape Agulhas, the most southerly point in Africa.
The ship was a Japanese trawler and had 240 tons of tuna in her holds when she grounded.
The 17 crew members all swam to shore safely but the vessel didn't fare as well. In this image, from 1987, you can see what five years of pounding by the ocean can do. A few years ago she split in two and only the bow section is now visible above the waves.
The seas around Cape Agulhas are often stormy as the warm water of the Indian Ocean meet the cold waters of the southern Atlantic ocean. Over the years some 200+ wrecks are documented along these shores.
From Cape Town, Cape Agulhas is about 130 miles or so to the south east if you take the most direct route, about 170 miles if you follow the coast roads from Gordon's Bay on. So you can make the it a day trip from Cape Town if you rent a car.
Having browsed Flickr and other sites for more recent images, I think this one by Andrew Aveley is my favorite (you have to scroll to the second photo). You can see that only the bow section is left and that it has been turned around by a storm some time in the intervening years.
Given the somewht curious name of this ship, I wondered if there was a Meisho Maru 37? I googled and binged and came across the site of marine salvage company Atlatech and found an Otori Maru No. 8, Katsuei Maru No. 58, Nikko Maru No. 25, Yahatu Maru No. 68, and Fukuseki Maru No. 27, all with some form of salvage work performed. Of these, all had run aground except the Yahatu Maru No. 68 which had been damaged when the oil rig South Seas Driller ran adrift and collided with it.
So if you're looking to hitch a ride on a fishing boat out of Cape Town, I'd steer clear of hitching a ride on any vessel who's name ends in ‘Maru No. XX'!
