Provisioning the boat

27^th August

Yesterday was an unbelievably fantastic day especially considering it was grocery shopping day!

It started off with a pleasant row across the river to the yacht club for a great shower, all the boys had hot water for the 1^st time since we arrived, and a pleasant row back to the boat.

We then loaded our backpack for the 4km walk to the Pick ‘n Pay in Greenfields. When we were walking home last time we spotted a sign that read “Giant Hambuger R 17.90” so had predecided that this would be a great lunch outing and as it about half way to the mini mall it would be perfect for the day.

The Burger joint, officially a Truck Stop, did not disappoint. It was typical south African Truck Stop complete with wire fencing through which to order. The sign read “Do not sleep in the shop. You may be robbed” This did not deter us from our mission, to obtain 4 Giant Burgers. We ordered found a table and sat down. The food was fantastic!

We walked the rest of the way to the post office where we were to collect Barry’s book. This was very exciting and we opened it in the post office and showed it all the staff who had been awaiting the package almost as eagerly as we had.

We then headed over to KFC for a quick soft serve ice-cream and on to Pick ‘n Pay. We had a lot to buy to restock the boat back to capacity but were undaunted as we collected 2 trollies and headed through the aisles.

About an hour later as we went through the tills I chatted happily to the teller, who wanted to know who I was buying all this food for. We got onto the boat subject as the piles of stocks clocked through the till point. When I paid the bill I said goodbye and turned, but was called back to wait for my gift. A slab of MilkyBar crackle chocolate. Now I was impressed, a chocolate for shopping at their store! Greenfields Pick ‘n Pay are fantastic. We then took our loaded trollies and headed out the store, we decided to stop at the bottle store and call the taxi to collect there, where there is less traffic.

Once back from the store, we lit u a smoke and a gentleman, who we would later discover owns the Greenfields Pick ‘n Pay offered to arrange a lift home for us on the house! Wow, service way beyond the call of duty. Cruisers, this store really takes care of their customers!

Today was a quieter day, spent on the boat, I did a little trading while the boys caught up on some school work. There is a lot of really bad weather expected for most of the this week and the whole weekend so I will be knuckling down and putting the final touches on Barry’s book so it can be available to buy from amazon next week!

29^th August

We are expecting huge wind this weekend, starting tomorrow morning at 2am so we decided to get the epoxy work out of the way today, we cut cloth, cleaned the previously grinded surfaces, and laid it all up, the bilges, the rear cockpit locker and our experimental mould for a toilet component we would have to order from Australia.

 

Once done, we had a quick Hamburger lunch and headed over to the yacht club for a shower. We were going to get cigarettes today but decided that shopping at 4:30pm would not be fun, with the crowds and long queues so we will head out in the howling wind tomorrow instead.
 

East London's Hidden Gem!

13^th August

Yesterday was the most fantastically positive day we have had in a long time. Now don’t get me wrong, we usually enjoy ourselves, but yesterday seemed more positive, or just we enjoyed it even more than usual…if that is possible.

So why all this positivity?

Well, to begin with I closed my trade on the stock market….up. Great news, slowly getting the hang of this thing.

We had the most beautiful dinghy trip down the river….and I mean beautiful. Here’s a slide show. Kyle had a lesson in steering the dinghy on the way.

 

Then we got an sms from Billy at the Bluff Yacht Club who asked if he can rent out our mooring while we are not there…more great news.

A few drinks in the cockpit and Bryan asked if he could pick us up on Wednesday for a tour…great day!

14^th August

Yesterday we went to the East London museum. The main theme of the museum is…well, East London. There are all sorts of things about East London there. We got there at about 10am and Barry had a little bit of a hangover so suggested we do breakfast/lunch first. We ate at the museum restaurant, The Ceolocanth  Café, the coffee shop was a bit much for me, I prefer regular food rather than a decoration on a plate type meal. I ended up with eggs, ham and cheese on toast, we found a regular toasted cheese for Kyle, Rauen had another version of breakfast and Barry a pita burger. The food filled us but was not anything to write home about…so why write here?...I ask myself but there had crazy comments all over the place on blackboards.

We headed into the museum and bought our tickets. The array of artefacts in phenomenal, we looked at meteorites pieces from various sites around the world, watched a small video on meteors and discovered what they are made of, we browsed a shell collection to match some of the greatest around I’m sure, we looked at life size replicas of endangered or high risk species of local fish life, the largest manta ray caught in the Buffalo River harbour [6.2m diameter] a giant clam and other undersea creatures. The next room was dedicated to the Ceolocanth. A previously thought extinct fish that had been wiped out with the dinosaurs but was discovered to be still alive by an East London lady, Mrs M Courtenay-Latimer in 1938.

This fish is rather fascinating in that it gives birth to live young, it had fins that resemble arms and it can trace it’s history back to pre-dinosaur days.

From under the sea we went to on the ground animals and browsed examples of all the local species of mammals and birds, followed by all the local insects and butterflies and then our favourite…the reptiles…well my least favourite and the boy’s actual favourite.

We continued through the different rooms of the museum to discover the next section was dedicated to rocks, precious stones and fossils found in the area. The oldest trace fossil of a “modern” human was found here at Nahoon point and the actual fossil is housed at the museum, it as 124 000 years old.

Rauen and I joked about learning the chemical equations to some of the rocks, they could get crazy long and complicated, I am sure the picture on his blog says it all!

We went from the local rocks to the birds of prey, and a second bird room, full of international species and the only known Dodo egg left on earth!

With the lower level completed we headed up the stairs and needed a few minutes break. We sat down and looked around at what was in store for us!

Once refreshed we started at one end of the floor with ship wrecks. We all know the dangerous wild coast, one of the most treacherous pieces of sea in the world…right here where we had to take off from. The artefacts  include the maps of sunken vessels, they split it into 50 years a time and the dots cover the entire open sea space around South Africa, the maps go along the wall, from 1795 – 1984 and the wrecks are listed in tiny font around the edges…scary stuff.

So with all these wrecks comes a pile of goodies, we looked at ship compasses, wheel houses, old china and goodies from shipwrecks, even a little treasure from the famous Grosvenor wreck. The most famous shipwreck in recent history, I mean 1991, I remember the incident myself, had to be the Oceanis, a passenger cruise liner, and there is a whole section dedicated to it, with lifejackets, flotsam and passenger stories along with a small dedication to the rescue crew, the ships that saved everyone as there were no deaths when the ship went down!

From ship wrecks we went to progress, the harbour progress over the last 2 centuries, with scale models and old photographs we saw how the harbour developed as well as the Dolos, the specially designed cement structure we use at harbour mouths for breakwaters, it too was designed right here in East London, by an ex-Rhodesian to boot!

Next was the indigenous people, the clothing the Xhosa’s wear, the beadwork, the story of the locals, the traditions of the people and of course that includes the apartheid era, the poor education, the special “homeland” areas, the trade done between Xhosa farmers and Afrikaaner shop keepers.

Interestingly the San people are almost extinct today due to the Xhosa and other locals taking them for farmer workers or killing them for hunting in their territory.

Following the local inhabitants we continued on to the colonisation of the East Cape, the 1800 ‘s period dress and housing, onto 1900, 1910’s, 1920’s and 1930’s, the German settlers and the transportation of the day not to mention the farm implements and finally the living beehive where we could safely see how the bee’s make honey and the hive is organised.

 

We headed for the exit, only to find a 3^rd floor downstairs covering the wars fought in SA with big guns, and coats of arms, soldiers uniforms etc.

An interesting museum, with loads of stuff to see and learn. We got a taxi back to the boat and all took an afternoon nap after the excitement and tiring day!

15^th August

Yesterday we were collected by Bryan, an old friend who lives here in East London, he kindly gave a lift to the post office to get Barry’s book redirected to East London as we were unable to get it collected inDurban.

 

With that done, he dropped us at Hemmingway’s Mall for an hour and a half while he went to see a client, then it was off to his place, on the scenic route in Gonoubie. It is a beautiful area and we had a delicious quiche made by his wife Irena.

We spent a great afternoon catching up and time flew by so fast it seemed we had only just got there when we had to leave.  We hope to see them again before we head out, and with the weather as it is we may be here at least another week or more, so there is plenty of time.

This morning, the weather let up for the day so we took the chance and headed off to Nahoon Point. We decided to go there when I picked up a tourist information brochure at the petrol station and discovered it was the site of the discovery of 124000 year old foot print fossil.

The brochure mentioned there was a hike, a cave and some blowholes out there so it seemed like a great touristy thing to do. We got up this morning and donned our hiking gear, shorts, T-shirts and crocs and headed off.

We went through the museum first and spotted this shark eaten surf board…We decided surfing here is  not for us.

 

We had a fantastic burger at the restaurant and headed off on the wooden walkway.

 

With a map in hand we turned right to find the cave and blowholes. The first 20 minutes was casual, Kyle and I picked up a few beautiful shells on the unspoilt beach we were walking along and all was going comfortably smoothly. Then we turned a corner and discovered cliffs. Was this part of the plan? No, but we kept on the now invisible pathway towards the cave.

 

We came across a huge pile of rocks and Rauen and Barry clambered across trying to find a route over them, Kyle and I followed all be it intrepidly.

Once over the first set of rock climbing we headed up the wooden walkway into the cliff face and ended up spending the next 2 hours rock climbing, in slops I might add, with a sheer cliff to the ocean on the left and a cliff into the sky on the right. We had heaps of fun as we did the adventure trail.

After 2 hours of climbing we came across the blowholes and then the cave and spent a while admiring the unspoilt, fantastical landscape, the view of the ocean and the cliff faces. All a little in awe both of the magical trail we had just completed and of ourselves for actually doing it.

Having climbed the mountains for more than 2 hours we looked ahead and saw the swimming beaches on the horizon ahead…so we decided to just continue walking. We scrambled further along the mountains and across huge dunes that slide off a cliff to the sea and eventually reached flat ground about 2km further.

 Having walked that far we just continued…and continued…then stopped for a waffle and cold drink at the beachfront Wimpy and headed back on to the road. 2 Hours later we reached Yrumoar. Yip, having paid R100 taxi fare to the hiking start point we ended up walking home a good 12km.

 

We are all a little tired and stiff, but we all agree that was the best, most breath taking, spectacular trail we have ever been on. EastLondon’s hidden gem…if you haven’t been here you are missing out!

The Sea Experience in Port

8^th August

We have spent the last 2 days on board. Yesterday morning we rowed over to the yacht club for a much needed shower, the dinghy ride was an experience, the wind had already picked up a little and coupled with the tide made for almost no progress in a forward direction, we eventually had 3 of oaring on 1 side and Barry alone on the other to make slow progress, we ended up bumping into all the bouys on the way past and after 20 minutes or so managed to tie up to the dock on the other side of the river. A quick shower and a faster but still not plain sailing row back left us all a bit worn out.

We then did a bit of school, and added a few ropes to the boat in anticipation of the strong blow today.

I spent the night tossing and turning, waiting for the wind that never arrived. I got up early and the wind arrived, I must say the harbour is rather protected but there is a fetch and eddies were and still are all over the place. I spent the day working on our website, I have added to the homeschooling portion of the site and started adding lesson plans for homeschooled children. This will be a long process as there are loads of lessons to write, and they all come with worksheets, lesson plans for parents/teachers as well as summaries for study purposes. So for those needing help with homeschooling it is at hand, and will be added to on a regular basis.

The boys again did school today and this evening we are all a bit tired owing to the effect of the rocking motion on board today, the wind is expected to switch tomorrow and will be howling from the NE, which blows directly into the cockpit…I am glad we are safely tied up at the moment, those seas outside are huge.

9^th August

This morning we got up with no real plans, the wind is still howling, but we feel safely tied up so no big problem. Then at about 11am Barry says, let’s take a walk to the restaurant down there, pointing down the river. I say I don’t think that is a restaurant but okay.

So we head of and find the way, walking out and a few blocks to the Fish market building, here there are fisherman, who we saw returning to the harbour on Thursday afternoon, filleting fish. We bought a carpenter and got it filleted, a few shrimps and some seafood mix and decided to make Paella for our visitors on Sunday, there will be 12 of us on the boat so it is going to be a bit of the tight squeeze…but at least it is some adventure!

12^th August

Aunty Max, Lorraine, Sade︠ and Josh came over for lunch yesterday. The wind was still blowing like crazy and we ended up putting the motor on the dinghy and getting across to the yacht club as the stairs down the dockside proved too complicated and scary for Aunty Max.

Sade and Josh climbed aboard from the dockside and we chatted on board while waiting for Barry and Rauen to return with our other visitors. Unfortunately, Brian and his wife and kids decided not to come aboard so I am hoping to see them at another date perhaps at one of their places.

Barry made Paella which was fantastic and we had boerewors rolls for the non-fish eaters…including a roll for me, but when I tasted the paella I was amazed…no roll was needed!

We spend the afternoon chatting, Aunty Max brought some photos of a birthday party my mom had held for one of the kids and we spotted the kids from way back when and named them. I showed them photos of boat repairs we did and a few videos out at sea.

Aunty Max really enjoyed the paella as she doesn’t often get to eat seafood as Sade doesn’t like it…glad we got to treat her!

When it was time to go, we did the return trip on the dinghy and everyone got wet…the bumpy seas and wet dinghy ride made for an authentic afternoon at sea!

First Impressions

4^th August

We arrived in East London a few days ago so here’s our first impression…

Ghost town!

What, I hear you all saying?

Well, we got off the boat onto Latimers Landing to find it derelict and deserted. No promised showers, fuel or water. An “Enter at own risk” sign marks the dockside and we are pretty much alone.

On the other side of the river a small yacht club stands, we headed over there and spoke to a few people, a surreal experience as they had no real interest in meeting or chatting, a few words were exchanged and we headed back to our boat.

 

Last night the yacht club actually had a function and from over on this side of the river it looked quite festive, so we dressed up warmly and headed across…but almost no-one spoke to us, we felt spare and excluded and once we had decided to return to the yacht someone finally paid attention but by then we had made up our minds and left anyway.

This morning we woke full of expectation once again as we were due to be collected by some old friends of mine, friends I hadn’t seen in nearly 20 years. We once again donned up and got ready, Ryun contacted us to try and help with our failed navigation equipment and we got remote assistance. We are currently testing it and will chat to him again before we head off to make sure we can actually use the AIS and GPS for the next leg.

At 11:30 we left the boat and clambered across the boat we are moored alongside to get to shore where we were being collected by Lorraine. She arrived spot on time and took us on the official tour, passed Daisy Demelco’s execution spot and the beach fronts before arriving at her mom’s house.

There we had a most enjoyable afternoon catching up with old friends, we chatted about our childhoods and the places we lived. We caught up on the family news and the local gossip. We had a great lunch and giggled all afternoon before heading home just before dark.

So here’s my actual impression of East London, if it weren’t for great friends this place would suck…but since we know some people here it turns out the place could just have some charm after all.

5^th August

This morning we got back to school, Kyle began his Grade 7 syllabus having already completed Grade 6 before Rauen headed to Joburg and I got busy with some computer work that had to be done today.

Once we were sorted we called a taxi and headed to town where we did some grocery shopping, filled the diesel and posted some documents to Johannesburg. We stopped at Wimpy for the special of 4 burgers, chips and cokes for R100. What a bargain!

The taxi service here was friendly and efficient, yes my impression of this small coastal town is improving by the day!

7^th August

Yesterday we did the taxi trip again, to refill the now empty diesel containers that we had refilled out tanks with.

On Monday, the driver, Sharon, had been the owner of the company and had offered to show the boys her marmoset monkeys, so when the driver arrived we were whisked off to Sharon’s house to see them.

She has 2 gorgeous marmosets and a houseful of parrots, cockatiels, budgies and exotic birds. Some were tame and came out of the cages others were not so friendly.

 

 

Once we had seen all the animals we went downstairs to see all the cars, her husband, Raymond, loves car, hot rod cars. So there were numerous of these in the back garden all in various degrees of completeness and some race ready…they race drags on weekends.

We had a cold drink with them then headed on our way. We managed to get the diesel, our cigarettes on the other hand were more complicated and we only got 7 boxes…we will see if our trip to the museum yields any success in that department.