12th April
It’s 2pm and we have had a successful day so far. We managed
to get the final prices for our product and I am only waiting for a few answers
before I place the order for our new products. We contacted our managing agent
who told us our non-paying tenant has had his furniture removed and is expected
to move at the end of the month, the outstanding money he owes will be taken
from his salary on a garnishing order.
Our alternator that was in for repairs will be ready next
week and I worked a lot on the websites and blogs again.
Both boys knuckled down this morning doing school work and I
sent a mail off to Rauen’s school to ask for confirmation of his lab work
dates.
Last night Barry and I brain stormed a bit about ideas on
how to move the new product range and I
spent a few hours researching the different methods we discussed,
getting prices for show stands, and marketing materials.
In between this I made a delicious beef stew for lunch and
boys are now busy washing the dishes.
Not sure what’s going on in Durban at the moment but the
wind has a serious chill to it…everyone is wearing a T-shirt on the boat, a most
unusual occurrence, and we have once again refitted the duvet inner so can
sleep in relative warmth…Sunny Durban haha!
The strangest thing happens when you go away from the boat
for a while, you forget the basics about this life. Rauen got back and it was
immediately visible that he has been away, he launched the dinghy yesterday
without replacing the plug, luckily he spotted it and we hauled it back up and
put the plug in before it filled with too much water. Then on getting back from
shore he dropped the painter lines into the water and had to retrieve them
before being able to tie up to the boat. It’s the little things that we do
everyday that seem to be forgotten, luckily within a day or 2 it all comes back
and life goes back to the way it was before.
On Sunday we are going out for a fun sail, that means
tomorrow will be spent packing all the small items that have been left out away
as we head offshore for the day. We are back to full crew so this shouldn’t
present too much of a problem…I’m actually kind of excited!
15th April
Yesterday we went for our fun sail. The wind had been
howling the night before so we knew the sea state would be less than
comfortable but got up early and prepared the boat. We soon realised that the
9am start time would be too late for us to exit our mooring as the tide was
going out swiftly and had only 20cm under our keel.
We dropped the lines quickly and hit bottom, luckily just
skimming and then leaving a trail of mud behind us for half a mile as it was
swept off by the water rushing over the keels. Having not heard the briefing
and having no idea where we were meant to be headed we decided to motor really
slowly up the channel and wait for the other yachts to catch up.
After an hour or so we started seeing them and asked someone
where we were going, to North beach and back, came the answer.
So we hoisted the genoa and headed towards the harbour mouth
now running at about 6 knots. We asked permission to leave on the radio without
incident and headed offshore.
The waves were steep and relatively big so we had a bumpy
ride for about 20 minutes then decided we had had enough so turned back towards
the harbour. Once we had turned around the waves came from the right direction
and the sail was a lot more comfortable and even faster…oh the difference the
wind direction makes.
I usually do the radio calls and always want to do them
early, normally reprimanded by Barry, so yesterday I decided to wait until we
were just outside the harbour mouth, actually at the break water before I headed
indoors to call port control…but the radio was dead. No power.
I checked the switch, checked the fuse was not blown,
switched the radio off and on again to no avail. We had by now crossed the
mouth and we on our way down the, luckily, empty channel. I found a previous
flight plan with the towers phone number and tried 4 times before finally
getting a reply. I got the okay for entrance even though we had already passed
the first starboard channel marker and we sailed on in. Just after I had
finished speaking to the port I checked the fuse once more, found some
corrosion, cleaned it off and voila the radio was operational again!
We slowly motored down the channel towards our mooring,
contemplating what we would do when we reached the end, the tide was still too
low to get back onto our mooring. In the end we decided to drop anchor in the
deeper water outside the front of the yacht club and wait for the tide. Once we
were hooked, we lowered the dinghy and Rauen and Kyle headed off to the club
house and bought us all a boerewors roll and coke for lunch.
At half past 2 we decided the water would be deep enough and
upped anchor and headed back to the mooring. We got on without a hiccup…perhaps
this is the start of trouble free sailing, it’s about time after all the
mishaps we have had up to now!
16th April
Yesterday was the big grocery shop again, we got up early,
am being very early for us lately, then headed to the yacht club for a quick
shower before heading to Spar and then Oxford. By 10:30 we were back at the
boat, unloading the dinghy full of food.
Once we got it all unloaded we made some ham rolls for
lunch, then Barry and Rauen went round to the front of the boat to try and
repair the mooring line that decided to break off. After an hour of trying they
gave up for the day and returned then the boys headed up to the yacht club to
play a bit and watch their daily TV, a 30 minute episode of Naruto.
When they returned we started up the motor as we got very
little power and watch a few episodes of 3rd rock from the sun
before heading to bed…a simple but effective day.
20th April
The last few days have seen miserable rainy weather, we have
headed over to the yacht club 2 days in a row in the pouring rain as I have had
work to do up there. We attempted getting Rauen to Chess Club on Thursday night
but failed as we went to the wrong address. I called the guy on Friday and got
the right address for next week. Rauen has also entered himself into the Kwa
Zulu Natal Chess championships to be held on the long weekend. We will see how
he does and he will officially get a ranking from Chesssa, the official Chess
organisation of South Africa. Needless to say he is very excited and we have
been Chessing it everyday!
Barry has been working on his book and is nearing the end,
about 10 more foolscap pages to go and he is feeling nervous anticipation to
putting it out there, so look out for it and buy a copy when it gets released
in the next month or so.
Otherwise, it’s been business as usual. School in the
morning and again in the afternoon, I have had a contract job the last few days
which should finish next week so I have been hard at work and Barry has been
putting the finishing touches on his book. No more than the usual.
23rd April
I have been hard at work this week and should be finished my
assignment by Friday. So we have made the trip up to the yacht club so I could
check files and do physical inspections everyday. We have also been struggling
with power so have had to run the motors last 2 days, but decided we wouldn’t
today, which meant a bout of 30 seconds this evening.
We also took part in a real yachtie story this week. Some
friends of ours Tom and Jan on Sv Ambler did the crossing to Brazil this
season. While they were here Tom mentioned he is looking for 2 new winches. As
we had 1 that we intended on selling or swopping along the way we showed it to
him, but it did not suit the classic look of his boat so he declined.
Anyway, on route to Brazil they stopped in Saint Helena and
found 2 winches perfect for their boat that a resident there had salvaged.
Unfortunately the guy in Saint Helena would only sell 1 of the winches to Tom
as he was using the other to hoist firewood and said he would only swop it but
he had to have one. When Tom got to Brazil he emailed us, offered to buy the
winch if we could courier it to False Bay where another set of mutual friends
on sv OZ are currently getting their motor repaired. Oz is doing the crossing
in a few week’s time and could take the winch with them to Saint Helena, swop
the guy for the classic winch and deliver the much wanted winch to Tom and Jan
in Trinidad later in the season.
So we couriered the winch to Oz, he received it this morning
and it will be swopped in Saint Helena in a few weeks. Talk about a round about
route to get a much needed part. Hopefully the second half of the process goes
as smoothly as our sending it off to Oz!
7th May
The last 2 weeks have flown by. Jan and Dave, old friends
came down the weekend on their bikes to see the Harley Davidson show in
Margate. We had a great time with them on Friday and Sunday night as they were
in Margate for Saturday. When they left on Sunday, we had geared up bikers in a
dinghy rowing across the bay…hilarious.
Rauen took part in the Kwazulu Natal Chess Championships, he
did well considering it was his first competition and he had to learn how to
use the clocks and write down the notation. Next time he will do better once he
has the hang of that…but he is enjoying the chess club while we are here and
starting to get ranking points, so he is happy.
Yesterday at about 11:50am Barry wrote the last sentence of
his book. The task now comes to me for editing and then probably a few rewrites
and more editing but we are polishing the manuscript now which means we are a
lot closer to publishing than we were a month ago. As soon as the book launch
happens we let you all know!
Once we had had lunch yesterday, we decided to go to town
and buy a celebratory pizza. We bought a few cold drinks and some bread etc as
well, all the while having Barry and Rauen banter about being in the company of
a “famous Author”, most amusing.
But being as it is life took a rather unexpected turn when
we got back to the yacht club. Barry headed over to Graham and Paul, two
friends sitting outside the club house, and told them his book was complete and
he wanted to celebrate this evening…Graham promptly turns to me and says: ”So
you beat him to the publishing then?”
Now I’m really confused, I say :”Beat him?” “Yes, I see your article is
in the sailing magazine this month.” Well, blow me down with a feather, Barry’s
15 minutes of fame is gone and suddenly I’m a more famous author than he is.
Late last night when we lie in bed Barry says: “I’m so
confused…am I lying next to a famous author or are you lying next a famous
author?” “I am next to the Most famous author” I say and he smiles, and says
goodnight. It sort of reminds me that the world is full of 15 minutes of fame
moments…One minute you’re in the number 1 spot and the next you’re
replaced.
So everyone, go out and buy the May issue of SA Sailing
magazine, the article written by me: “The Renaming of Yrumoar “is on page 24!
10th May
We went out and bought the sailing magazine, it is wonderful
to see a beautiful picture of Yrumoar in the glossy pages!
Today is back to bad weather, I am busy editing Barry’s book
at the moment and seem to have found the problem with our starboard engine, we
will order the replacement parts on Monday and see if we can get it working
again.
I had a meeting with yacht club this week, to discuss the
audit report I made and I think I will be getting another contract for some
more work from them, so that seems to be working out at the moment. I will know
next week after the committee meeting.
Tom from Ambler aslo managed to finally get Paypal to work
so could pay for the winch that is on its way to St Helena.
All in all a great week!
