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The Indian Ocean,

home to the world's
most exotic islands...

..and beautiful and rare wildlife.

I'm travelling through 16 countries
around the edge of this vast ocean

that stretches 6,000 miles
from Africa to Australia.

Steeped in history, the Indian Ocean
is vital to world trade.

It's a journey of extremes,
from stunning islands

across pirate-infested seas,
to remote villages...

..and war-torn lands.

What was that?

This is a journey about much more
than just what's under the waves.

It's about the lives
of the millions of people

who live around this,
one of our greatest oceans.

I start my journey
at the tip of Africa,

and travel up the east coast of the
continent to the island of Zanzibar.

I discover what threatens
the ocean's mightiest predator.

I think they've got something.

And I confront my own fears
on my first ocean dive.

You got me to swim with sharks.

We're stuck in the sand.

On this first part of my journey,
I travel by land, sea and air...

..through a country
ravaged by civil war.

3,500 people live here now?

And ending on the exotic
island of Zanzibar,

with its stunning coral beaches.

My goodness look at this!

I'm at the bottom of Africa.

Somewhere out there, two of the
world's mightiest oceans collide.

Over there is the Atlantic,
but I'm heading this way.

This is the start of my journey
around the glorious Indian Ocean.

It's a huge trip.

It's an enormous challenge,
and it begins right here, right now,

on the rugged coast of South Africa.

The Indian Ocean might be better
known for tropical beaches

and palm trees, but down here,
near the Cape of Good Hope,

the sea churns with life,

and the coastline is dramatic.

There's no neat dividing line
between two great seas.

And the water here is fed by
currents from both the Atlantic

and the Indian Ocean.

As a result, the water temperature

can fluctuate wildly, and there's
a huge diversity of marine life.

This area is a breeding ground

for vast stocks of fish,
sea birds and mammals.

Oh, dolphins, porpoises,
just off to the left!

Across the Indian Ocean,
this spectacular wildlife

is in desperate need of protection.

I hitched a ride on a South African
fisheries patrol boat,

whose job it is
to police these waters.

This pearly beach area,

there's a group of poachers
that live out here, ok?

And they actually swim
from the shoreline

all the way through to the island.

Keith Govender and his team
are targeting poachers

who are after a little known,
but valuable, sea creature.

Part of what we're going to do today
is basically looking

and protecting
a resource called abalone.

Abalone. Abalone in layman's terms
you could describe as a shellfish.

It's become a commodity now
that is wanted in the Far East.

As a food?

As a food, or as a delicacy.

Delicacy is the word, yeah.

And it's become so wanted
that people in South Africa now

are actually poaching it
more and more

to sell off
to syndicates, basically.

What, crime gangs?
Crime gangs itself.

And that stuff gets smuggled onto
the black market into the Far East.

And people will poach
from the shoreline,

where divers would walk into
the water and poach off a reef

and you also have
one where it's sea-based,

where people use rubber ducks.

When you say a rubber duck,
you mean something like this?

Yeah, something like this.

This one's specially designed for
enforcement. And it's super fast.

It's super fast.

The patrol received a tip-off
that poachers had been spotted.

They were hunting for rare abalone,

which is protected
in South African waters.

It was time to launch
the rubber duck.

If we tell you to hang on,
drop whatever you're doing

and you hang on, OK? OK.

No matter what's happening,
just hang on. OK, let's go!

Hold on!

There's something there!

Right hand side.

Right on the starboard bow,
dead ahead!

Coming very fast,
so they won't be able to get away.

Keep this course.

It looked like
we were going to catch

a group of poachers red-handed.

Now you see there the divers
are busy on the rock there

at the moment, as you can see.

But just a few hundred feet

from the coast, we ran into
a floating natural barrier

that could entangle
the boat propeller.

I mean, and if you look at the kelp
here, you can see how thick it is.

My god, look at it,
it's like a tangle of knots!

I can see, yeah, a guy
he's just, sort of, crouching down,

trying to stay out of sight.

There was a third guy.

He's just gone into the water.

So, there's poaching going on
right here, right now.

It's very frustrating.

It's very frustrating. You can
see them. You want to grab them.

You see now they're just getting
equipment and walking away.

And run away.

Now this is Whiskey Bravo, over.

Keith alerted the local police,
who tracked

and caught the poachers.

The trade in abalone has become
a multi-million pound business.

My goodness!

This was abalone they'd
confiscated from other poachers.

It's basically a shellfish.

It doesn't look like very much,
let's be honest.

It's slimy
and not particularly pleasant.

But a plate of abalone
can sell for more than £100

in a restaurant in China.

There's abalone here worth,

I would guess,
tens of thousands of pounds. Yep.

And, bizarrely,
the black market trade in abalone

is linked to
serious organised crime.

But the problem is
it opens up a whole lot of things,

such as drugs,

illegal weapons,
those type of things.

It's connected
with all these other...

it's connected, yeah.
..crime activities.

It's a spider's web, basically.

This is such a weird situation.

Weird story, but it gets even odder,

because what we've been told is that

while abalone's being smuggled out
of the country by criminal gangs,

the same people are
then involved in smuggling back in

a methamphetamine drug
called tik,

which is apparently causing all
sorts of chaos here in South Africa.

This two-way trade
is centred on nearby Cape Town,

where use of the drug, tik,
has reached epidemic proportions.

Abalone is smuggled
out of the country to China,

and the same gangs use
the profits to trade in tik.

Police here have even found
large quantities of abalone,

together with tik,
while carrying out drugs raids.

I headed to Manenberg,

an area notorious for poverty,

drugs and violent crime.

I met up with William Williams,

who runs a local charity that works
with people addicted to tik.

How has tik affected
the community in recent years?

It's almost like people
has lost this whole thing

of caring about other people
and only caring about themselves,

and that the biggest thing for them
is getting the drug,

so if they have to rob their
neighbour, steal from the neighbour,

do anything against their neighbour
to be able to get this drug.

This was a side of South Africa
few visitors get to see.

It was the poaching of an ocean
mollusc that had brought me here,

but almost everyone I met
had a story about the damage

the methamphetamine drug, tik,
is now doing to the community.

It can hurt families,

like just parents and children,

like kids today
when they've used drugs,

then like mothers, fathers, kids,

they use it together.

Almost like meals they use it.

I use it for eight years.

Eight years! I'm 24 years old now.

And what does it do to the mind?

Make you end up like suicidal.

But some of my friends that use it,
they are mad today.

Readily available
and highly addictive,

tik has become
a massive problem in Cape Town.

William took me down the street
to meet a local addict.

But as we walked into his house,
it became clear

it was the neighbourhood drug den,

and the man wasn't alone.

Hello! Is it OK to come in?

Thank you, gentlemen.
Can I sit down? Sit down.

Is that a real gun? Yeah. Oh, dear!

Ah, OK.

These weren't just users.
I'd stumbled into a drug gang.

My name is Juan. Simon. Simon.

Nice to meet you, Juan. Man.

The man was smoking heroine,
while waiting for a delivery of tik.

We use it to smoke.

It was upsetting to see
that a teenage girl

had got caught up with this group.

A lolly?

Another gang member
produced some tik.

Now we're going to show him
now to use this.

They were almost proud to show me

the drug that's ripping apart
this community.

We call him Nongi.

Yeah. Wow!

For how long?

Suddenly the mood changed.

The men started jostling us
and demanding money.

It was time to make a quick exit.

OK, we need to go right now.

Just...

OK, I think
we need to get in the car.

That last situation,
that surprised me.

Suddenly you're into
a situation which is so dark.

You're witnessing people
who've fallen so far down,

and I can't quite believe how far

this situation develops

from something that appears
so simple as poaching abalone.

There is a desperation
for the drugs.

People will go out and get the
abalone, OK, to pay for the drugs.

It's desperate, eh?
Absolutely desperate.

The weird connection
between abalone poaching

and the drug trade in Cape Town...

..was proof that even
in big coastal cities

life is still linked to the sea.

From the Cape,

my journey around the Indian Ocean
was now really beginning.

A commuter train,
through the southern suburbs,

showed me a more affluent side
of South Africa.

But I wasn't travelling far,

as I headed to meet some
friendlier local residents.

I think this is our stop.

I was a bit surprised
to find penguins in Africa,

but there used to be millions
living along the coast here.

I'd arrived during
the moulting season,

when the penguins were waiting

patiently for
their new set of clothes.

So this is quite
a boring time for them.

They have to just wait by the coast

for their new coat.

You can say it's a boring time,
but I see it as time out.

I mean we also need that
as humans, you know,

you need to take time out at some
point, and this is their time out.

Conservationist, Tributin Bueni,

spent two years
studying these penguins,

living alone with them
on a remote island.

Not surprisingly,
her nickname is Birdie,

and she feels that penguins
have plenty to teach us.

We could learn
quite a bit from them.

What would be the key lessons
that we should learn?

Both the male and the female
take care of the chicks.

It's a teamwork,

it's not just a woman's duty
to take care of the chicks.

Oh, I see. I see.

You think there's an equality in the
penguin household. Yeah, there is.

That we humans could learn...
perhaps we boys could learn from.

Mmm, I wonder.

But like many species
that rely on the ocean,

the African penguin
is struggling to survive.

The birds are simply
not getting enough to eat.

Scientists believe that fish stocks,
which penguins rely on,

are taking a hammering in this area
because of the changing environment

and humans overfishing.

So the day we're here

is quite an important day
for the colony here,

because they're going
to round up, or catch,

and collect some of
the really underweight young chicks.

And they're going to take them
to a facility

where they're going to feed them up,

so that they actually
have a chance of surviving

when they're in the water.

In the last few decades,

the penguin population along the
coast has suffered a dramatic fall.

Penguin numbers have dropped by 80%.

They've got one!

They've got a baby penguin just
over here. It's a little chick.

It's actually quite sad to think,
ten years after this,

are they still
going to be there or not?

You know, and it's quite sad
just thinking about it, you know.

You're genuinely concerned
these could be extinct in ten years?

In ten years time.

Looking at how the numbers are going
down now, it's totally possible.

Volunteers from SANCCOB,

a sea bird rescue group,

had set up a local centre
to feed the underweight chicks.

Vanessa Strauss
was running the operation.

At this age, they need
to have a really round belly.

You can see that
he's got a hollow belly,

so he doesn't have any muscle
round his chest.

He doesn't have any fat.

You can just see from him
that he hasn't been fed in a while.

He's dehydrated.
He's not feeling strong.

So, you're becoming the mum and dad,
basically. Yep, absolutely.

Every penguin that we can save
is essential for the survival

of the species.

Look at the size of this!

Little penguin paradise here!

After six weeks of intensive care,
here at SANCCOB headquarters,

the chicks are given training
in essential penguin skills.

Been given a towel. OK.

What are we using this for?

This is a little exercise programme.

We're sort penguin wrangling.

Yes. It's a roundup really.

They need to get fit,

ready to swim far out at sea
to find their own food.

Come on! Come on!

They're really not going to go in.

Oh, there we go! Yes! There you go!

Vanessa has resorted to
a more direct approach.

No, you can't come back!

There are 18 penguin species
in the world,

and 11 are in serious
population decline.

What a wonderful sight!

When their swimming lessons
are complete,

these penguins will be ready
to return to the ocean,

hopefully strong enough
to survive and to breed.

It was time for me to continue
my Indian Ocean journey.

It was a drive of three hours

along the coast towards
the wild and windswept Cape Agulhas,

which is actually even further
south than the Cape Of Good Hope.

I've reached the most
southerly tip of Africa.

Look, it's very rugged along here.

Look at the rocks!

Ever since the late 1400s,
when European explorers

made it around the Cape,
from the Atlantic

round to the relative calm
of the Indian Ocean,

this coastline has always had
a fearsome reputation.

And even now,

with all our modern navigation aids,

some ships don't make it.

Five hundred years ago,
the Portuguese explorer,

Vasco da Gama, left
the southern Atlantic Ocean,

sailed around the cape,

and passed here on the first epic
sea voyage from Europe to India.

Travellers and traders
followed in his wake,

and there are believed to be
at least 200 shipwrecks

along this coastline,

known as the Graveyard Of Ships.

I followed their route

along the coast to South Africa's
third largest city, Durban.

The beaches around Durban
are a holidaymaker's paradise.

Hundreds of thousands of people
come here from across the world

to surf and swim.

Money from tourism is crucial
to many countries

around the Indian Ocean,

but often there are conflicts
between the tourism industry

and those who want to protect
the ocean ecosystem,

particularly in Durban,

where the water just off the beaches

can hide some
very unwelcome visitors.

Now this is a sight.

It's basically a collection of jaws

from the species
which we commonly catch.

And what would this one
on the end be?

It looks like the biggest one.

Well, these are all white sharks,
here,

and they have, by far,
the most impressive teeth.

This is a great white?

Great white, yes.

Look at that in there!

Serrated teeth,
which is perfect for swiftly biting

and chopping away
at a lump of flesh.

Durban spends
millions of pounds defending

its tourists from shark attacks.

Jeremy Cliff,
of the Natal Sharks Board,

took me out to see
his first line of defence,

a system of shark nets introduced

after a series of attacks
in the 1950s,

which killed seven people.

Many people think that the nets
are a physical barrier,

and we put them up
and the sharks stay on the outside,

and we quite happily
swim on the inside.

Well, it's not like that at all.

The nets don't extend
from the surface to the seabed,

and the nets are only
300 metres long.

So it's not excluding a shark
from the area?

That's right. That's right.

It's what?
It's killing some of them?

Yes. It's designed to catch
and kill the dangerous sharks. Yes.

There are 15 miles of nets
along Durban's beaches,

but they don't just kill sharks.

If these nets are designed
to catch sharks,

presumably they're catching
other creatures, as well.

Yes, unfortunately.

That's the major drawback
of shark nets

is that they don't just select or
target the three dangerous species.

They take sharks which pose
very little threat to humans.

We also catch rays and turtles
and dolphins, unfortunately.

Far from being just
a protective barrier,

shark nets around the world
actually kill

thousands of marine creatures
every year.

They also reinforce the idea

that only a sea free of sharks
is safe water.

Back at the Shark Board
headquarters,

there's a cold store room
piled up with dead sharks

and other animals they've caught.

It was a shocking sight, and Jeremy
wasn't keen for us to film it.

But outside he showed me
one shark the nets had caught,

a juvenile great white,
one of the world's rarest sharks.

Yeah,
just under two metres in length.

Our measurements, we exclude
the tail. We measure up to there.

OK.

At up to six metres long,

the great white shark is the largest
predatory fish on the planet.

I sense there's a little
bit of a conflict, really,

perhaps, dare I say, even
within you, as a marine biologist.

It must be tough to do this.

Oh, sure, most definitely.

I mean, the last thing we want to do
is see dead white sharks like this,

but unfortunately
we've got a job to do,

tourism is very important for this
part of the world, and we've seen,

historically, what a huge negative
impact shark attack has had.

It does seem a little bit
of a tragic end

for such an incredible beast.

I don't know, but I feel my feelings

slightly conflicted about it,
cos I fear it

and I really do respect it, as well.

I think that's the important thing,

Simon, is to try and change
this predominant attitude of fear,

towards one of respect,
rather than fear.

I could understand Jeremy's dilemma,

shark attacks
are actually incredibly rare,

but such is the fear they inspire,

tourist resorts will do
almost anything to prevent them.

I travelled a few miles
outside Durban to meet a woman

who's on a mission
to change our views

on this most infamous creature
of the deep.

People don't have
empathy for sharks.

It is the most
terrible, terrible sad thing,

but they are to be revered.

Gail Addison is a big shark fan,

so much so, she regularly takes
her family along to swim with them.

Do you know that
I take my little eight-year-old,

and she comes swimming with us
with the sharks?

We've very specific about
when we put her in the water,

and how she goes in the water,
and that's the same with divers.

Some people might think
that's a bit mad,

to put your eight-year-old
in the water.

Do you know what?
She's grown up with it.

She's grown up swimming
since was one-year-old,

when she learned to swim.

Gail thinks Durban's shark nets
need to be removed,

and that we need to change
our view of sharks,

because, far from being a menace,

sharks are crucial
to the health of our oceans.

Why are they the most
important fish in the sea?

Cos they're apex predators,

and, unfortunately, that means that
they're not used to being hunted.

They're not meant
to have natural predators.

They are the top of the food chain,

so they keep everything else
underneath them

balanced and healthy.

So, it controls
the ecosystem really.

That's exactly what it does.

It keeps it balanced and,
without that balance,

everything starts crumbling.

It's not just her family that
Gail takes swimming with sharks.

She also takes visitors out diving

with the most feared of predators.

I'm a fairly new diver,
and it has been suggested

that I should
get into the water with you

and maybe meet one or two
very small, tiddly, sharks

that don't like chomping on humans.

What's the level of risk?

It sounds quite a scary idea to me.

It's scary, because for all
your life you've grown up thinking

that if you got into shark-infested
waters you're going to get eaten,

and that's not the truth.

I want to go out there and show you
the truth. Let's go bust some myths.

So, it was time to face my fears,
and get up close and personal

with this apex predator.

I haven't dived very much, in truth,

so that adds
to my general nervousness.

Gail promised me
she's never lost a customer.

Before I had a moment
for second thoughts,

it was time to take the plunge.

Go. Two, three, go!

This was actually my first
scuba dive out in the open sea.

Immediately
we plunged into another world.

Gail led me to a shallow cave,

where she hoped
we'd be able to close to sharks.

We got into position and waited.

And suddenly, there they were,
ragged tooth sharks.

Two metres long and armed with
a terrifying mouthful of teeth.

But, straightaway, it was obvious
we weren't on the menu.

It was exhilarating to be so close
to such magnificent creatures.

Gail, we saw sharks.

We did.

You got me to swim with sharks!

I did.

And they weren't really
that interested.

We were just a,
sort of, an obstruction,

a curious obstruction...

Yes.

..that they needed to get past.

But at no time did I feel,
well, threatened by them, really.

OK. They're looking at you.

They're trying to work out,
what are you doing there?

Yeah. You're not competing
for their food.

You're not trying to hurt them.

You're completely confusing to them.

It was an experience
I'll never forget.

But, so long as
we all keep thinking sharks

are the villains of the ocean,

Gail will have an uphill struggle
encouraging people to protect them.

I like the sea.
I'm quite happy to be back here.

Terra firma.

Terra firma.

Less of the terra and more
of the firma, I say. I love it.

As well as
a thriving tourist industry,

Durban has one of the great ports
of the Indian Ocean.

Every year, more than 4,000 ships
from around the world

carry 75 million tons of cargo
in and out of this harbour.

I'd arranged to hitch a ride
up the east African coast

on a container ship
bound for Mozambique.

Feel quite excited.

Never done this before.

Hello!

Hello! How are you?
Fine, thank you.

I was boarding
the Italian-owned Jolly Bianco,

200 metres long and 27,000 tons.

Right, let's go
and meet the captain.

Look at this!

I'm not sure
we're all going to fit in here.

The ship was huge, but it didn't
seem designed to carry passengers.

OK, so this is how
I'm going to travel to Mozambique.

I think I'm going to take a flight.

Goodness me! OK. Let's get serious,
we're meeting the captain.

I found captain Francesco Venicori
up on the bridge,

overseeing the loading of cargo.

Where did you come from before here?

The voyage is starting in Genoa,

it's our home port, Italy.

Right. OK.

Then Marseilles, Naples, Aqaba,
Jeddah, Dar es Salaam,

Mombasa, Durban, then Maputo
and then our way back to Italy.

Loading the Jolly Bianco
took all night.

And then, early the next morning,

we were ready to hit the high seas.

But to navigate the busy exit
from Durban harbour,

we needed a specialist pilot.

So, that's how to arrive.

There are so many ships
plying the Indian Ocean

and using this port that pilots
are winched from ship to ship.

Steady, 039, please. Steady.

So you can go to starboard.

It all looked a bit technical,
so I kept well out of the way.

We were finally on our way
to Maputo, Mozambique's capital,

300 miles up the east African coast.

There's been trade across the
Indian Ocean for thousands of years,

long before the world's
other great oceans were navigated.

Merchants from China, Arabia,

and India
traded across these waters.

The Indian Ocean is once again

becoming the most important
seaway in the world.

One million ships a year,

and more than half
of all shipping container traffic,

passes through it.

The sea lanes of the Indian Ocean

are criss-crossed by oil tankers

from the Middle East, and ships

carrying consumer goods from China.

Wow! Whole canyon of containers.

There were 600 shipping containers
on the Jolly Bianco,

but what on Earth's
in all these giant boxes?

On this ship is the stuff of life.

Sugar, hides, paper,
food stuff, tiles,

paint, roof tiles, fruit juices,
anthracite, mining equipment,

milk powder, tinplate,
ethyl alcohol, canned food,

cotton lint, ceramics, lube oils,

steel, seeds,
tobacco, ingots, rubber,

peptides, electrical accessories,

and other large mining vehicles,
et cetera.

It's basically
anything and everything.

Ooh, a whole car park, as well.

The deck below was also packed.

There's should be
about 270 cars and trucks.

Oh, my goodness, look at this!

This is absolutely incredible.

This shipment of South African
armoured personnel carriers

was being taken
up the coast to Sudan

for the United Nations
mission in Darfur.

It was a stark reminder we were
about to enter a troubled region.

This is enough to equip an entire
army, or a peacekeeping force.

But as trade across
the Indian Ocean grows,

ships face a deadly threat
from the age-old enemy

of merchants and sailors - pirates.

The captain's chart showed dozens
of attacks by Somali pirates,

around this stretch of the ocean,
just in the previous two months.

The Jolly Bianco was heading

for some of
the most dangerous waters on Earth.

Practically all the Indian Ocean.

And you have to take your ship
through those waters.

In the middle.

It must be frightening.

Of course, yes,
it's a serious problem.

30 years ago, when I started
to do this job, pirates are what

you see in the movie and what you
read in some books now, you know.

No ship is safe from attack.

Some of the tactics they use against
the pirates are quite simple.

As you can see,
they've got razor wire, here,

and that's along
both sides of the ship,

and it's really meant to discourage

anybody from getting onboard.

They also put cardboard
over the windows,

so that there's not
light emitting at night.

And that means the pirates can't
see them as they pass at night,

the pirates don't come and attack.

Simple, but effective.

I was getting off the ship before
they would enter the danger zone.

I would be facing
the perils of Somalia,

and the Horn Of Africa,
later in my journey.

I had another night onboard
before we reached Maputo.

The following day, we arrived
in the Mozambican capital.

Maputo is home
to almost two million people.

On the day we arrived, most of them
seemed to be on the beach.

So busy today. Yes, it is.

I'd be travelling through
Mozambique with my guide,

a conservationist
called Carlos Mequaqua.

It's amazing the change

you will see through the trip
up north from here.

In what way?

The beach will be more beautiful,

less people,
and very beautiful water.

We headed north
along the Indian Ocean coast

towards Inhambane,

a long day's drive from the capital.

We've got a few more hours
on the road though, haven't we?

Maybe three more hours.

Three more hours. OK.

Hopefully we're going to get there
during daylight.

But Mozambique
isn't famed for its roads.

Ah, we're stuck in the sand.

Best to let some air out.

It turned into a long night.

Shall we give it a try?

But eventually we limped our way
towards our beds for the night.

7.35 on a Wednesday morning,

standing on a remote beach
in Mozambique,

such a thing of beauty.

There's a Mozambican writer
who said,

'Mozambique is like a veranda
onto the Indian Ocean.'

It's absolutely stunning here.

Carlos had brought me to a village
near where he grew up.

He wanted me to meet some fishermen

who specialise
in a very particular catch.

It's a tiny boat, eh?

Yeah.

The leader of the group
was a young man called Nelson.

They're going.

We followed Nelson and his crew
to where they'd laid baited lines

the previous night.

They're pulling now the line. Yeah.

To see if they've got any catch.

Yeah, man!

I think they've got something.

Yeah, you can see.

You can see it's massive.
Wow! Wow! Wow! Oh, my goodness!

Oh, my good lord! This is big.

Wow! It's a massive shark, eh?

It's huge, isn't it?

Sharks have to keep moving
in order to breath.

Trapped on their line for hours
this adult female shark had drowned.

Rolling around in the surf,
the magnificent shark

became a pathetic
and upsetting sight.

Wow!

Look at that!

But I realised I was witnessing

one of the great catastrophes,

of not just the Indian Ocean,
but our global seas,

as the men went to work
on their catch.

Nelson and his men fish for sharks
for one specific reason -

to harvest one of the most

valuable fish products on Earth.

They're not interested
in the meat on this creature,

they're just interested in fins.

Nelson, how much money
will you get for the fins?

Do you know who buys the shark fins?

Do you know what's done
with them eventually?

In fact, the fins
are usually shipped across

the Indian Ocean and on to China,

where the almost tasteless cartilage
is put into soup.

What's particularly obscene
about this situation is that

the entire trade in sharks globally,

which results in the deaths
of millions of sharks every year,

is to feed or provide fins
for shark fin soup,

a Chinese delicacy
meant to show wealth,

the wealth of the person
who is consuming it.

Just like the abalone I saw being
poached in South African waters,

sharks have become victims
of the economic growth of China,

where delicacies that used to be
available to just a few,

are now in huge demand.

More than 100 million sharks
are being killed each year,

mostly for shark fin soup.

There are now thought to be

just a few thousand great
white sharks left on the planet.

Our oceans face a catastrophe.

My whole view on sharks
has completely changed

in the last couple of weeks.

I've gone from being fearful of them
to fearful for them.

They're an apex predator,

they keep a lid on all other marine
life in our seas, in our oceans,

and we're annihilating them.

We're wiping them out and,

in doing so, we're threatening
the entire marine ecosystem,

because sharks are
the most important fish in the sea.

Even with a small boat,

a fisherman here can catch hundreds
of sharks each year.

But the real damage to shark numbers
is done further out to sea

where industrial fishing fleets
from Asia and Europe catch millions,

slicing off the fins

and often chucking
the body back into the water,

sometimes while the shark
is still alive.

Villagers here
are fishing to survive,

but Carlos is still keen
to educate them

about the need to protect
the Indian Ocean.

He runs a conservation
and education programme

among the fishing communities
along the coast.

First step is to lay on a kick-about
to attract youngsters

to listen to his message.

Carlos is trying to persuade people
not to make their livelihood

by killing the spectacular marine
life found in the Indian Ocean.

He wants them to find other ways
of protecting

and profiting from the sea.

Then at the end of his talk,
Carlos makes sure the music gets

pumped up loud.

These are just the people
he needs to be talking to.

I'm standing here
and I can actually smell fish.

These are fisher people.

If they're not fishermen,
they're the fishermen of the future,

and getting this message across
to them now is absolutely vital.

Even if it is with the help
of a dancing competition.

Mozambique is one of the poorest
countries around the Indian Ocean,

and its tourist industry
is very underdeveloped.

It wasn't always like this.

Two hundred miles further up the
coast, in Mozambique's second city,

Beira, I'd heard I'd find a relic
of tourism from another era.

Oh, my goodness!
There it is. Look!

The Grand Hotel, Beira.

Beira's ocean side Grand Hotel
was built in the 1950s

when the country
was still a Portuguese colony.

It had several hundred rooms,
a huge swimming pool and a cinema,

and it was billed
as the grandest hotel in Africa.

So look at this! It's quite a sight.

This is how it was in the 1960s?
It looks amazing.

But then Mozambique's
brutal war for independence

drove the rich tourists away,

and the hotel fell
into immediate decline.

So, this would have been the drive
up to the hotel. Yeah.

Mangori Felisberto
offered to show me around.

Yeah, this was the main entrance.

Then the reception
was somewhere here.

Wow!

This is amazing. Absolutely amazing.

Looking to the left
and to the right,

you have these grand staircases
that sweep upwards.

And there's this amazing,
sort of, atrium here.

Still has a very grand
feel about it.

The hotel may have been
abandoned by tourists,

but it was clearly far from empty.

In fact, the rooms
have become somewhat overcrowded.

How many people...
how many people live here?

It's about 3,500.

3,500 people live here now? Yeah.

A long civil war followed
independence from Portugal

and the hotel became a refugee camp
for thousands of Mozambicans.

Since then, poverty has driven
many more to find shelter here.

This used to be the swimming pool?

There's a man doing his washing,
his laundry,

in what's left of the swimming pool.

There's little
in the way of sanitation

and all the residents
share one water pump.

Although the conditions
within the hotel are pretty bad

this is very much a community. It's
like a town within a town, really.

There are committees to organise
various aspects of life here. Oops!

The hotel's residents
have even set up a system

of local government
with elected leaders.

Simon. Very nice to meet you, sir.
Joao.

'I met Joao Goncalo,
who's the mayor of the hotel.'

How do you keep order
and prevent fights breaking out

in a community packed into
such a relatively small building?

TRANSLATION: If there are problems,
the organisers have a meeting,

and then we have a meeting
with all the residents.

We sit down and resolve the issue.

We have a head of Social Affairs,
who resolves social issues.

We have a group
who looks after hygiene.

And we have a security group,

who keep guard at night
to keep out intruders.

Mozambique has suffered terribly
in recent decades.

It's still desperately poor, but
here people are doing what they do

even in the face of adversity -
they're getting on with life.

It was time for me to leave
the African mainland.

From the Maldives to Mauritius,
the Indian Ocean is home

to the most famous
holiday islands on earth.

My first taste of island paradise
on this journey

was to be exotic and mysterious
Zanzibar, off the coast of Tanzania.

My goodness, look at this!

This is what I think of
when I imagine tropical beauty

and the Indian Ocean.

For tourists seeking warm seas
and white beaches,

the island of Zanzibar
is a huge draw.

For centuries, Zanzibar was a major
centre of commerce in the Indian Ocean,

connecting East Africa
and the rest of the world.

Jambo!

Merchants travelled here from far and
wide to trade in spices and ivory.

Everywhere here you see
the influence of the traders

who've been drawn
to Zanzibar over the centuries.

There's elements of Portugal,

of the Phoenicians, of the
Assyrians, of people from Oman

and the Arabian Peninsula,
and of course black Africa as well.

So it's really a melting pot
for the entire Indian Ocean.

But Zanzibar
has a darker past as well.

It was also the centre
of the Indian Ocean slave trade.

Dealers sent expeditions deep
into eastern Africa to kidnap men,

women and children,
who they brought here to sell on

to the countries
of Arabia and India.

A church now stands on the site
of the former slave market.

Oh, my goodness!

Oh, my good god.

So, these are the cells
where slaves were held.

So, apparently, in this room, it's
not really much of a room, is it?

But this is where women
and children would have been kept.

So anything up to 70,
would have been crammed in here.

It's quite difficult
to breathe in here even now,

and it's stiflingly hot.

What this must have been like with
dozens of terrified human beings in,

I just can't even begin to imagine.

It's an awful, awful place.

Britain abolished
the slave trade in 1807,

but decades later the Sultan
here in Zanzibar was still refusing

to end the slave industry,

so the Royal Navy threatened

to bombard the city to force him
to close the slave market.

Britain saw Zanzibar as crucial to
its dominance of the Indian Ocean.

They threatened
another bombardment in 1896,

when the Sultan's nephew tried
to seize power from their ally.

The Brits said to him, clear out, we don't
want you here and gave him an ultimatum.

They said, if you're not out by 9am, we're
going to turn up and start a war, basically.

The deadline passed
and the bombardment began.

Within just a couple of minutes
of the bombardment starting

the palace here was ablaze
and, within about 40 minutes,

the Sultan's nephew had fled.

It's officially recorded
as the shortest war in history.

The islands of the Indian Ocean have always
been tempting targets for world powers,

strategically placed
to control the vital trade routes.

It was something I was looking
forward to exploring

on the next stages of my trip.

This is the end
of the first leg of my journey.

It's been an amazing trip so far,

and I feel I've learned a huge
amount, particularly about sharks.

But I've got a lot further to go,

and a lot more to discover
about the Indian Ocean.

'Next time, I explore the
extraordinary Indian Ocean islands

'of Madagascar, Mauritius
and the Seychelles.'

If you're going to try
and imagine paradise, that's it.

'I meet the armed forces
defending paradise from pirates.'

It's the 21st century

and you're going after pirates
in the Indian Ocean? Yep.

'And get a unique taste
of the Indian Ocean.'

Bat? Yeah, bat.
Vampires are not the bat.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd