Sailing around the World, ( presently in Cape Town. )
A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Sun 9 Jan 2011 00:52
|
FRIDAY 7th
JANUARY 2011
07.30hrs Skipper hopped out of the scratcher
and wandered up to the shower rooms to have a shower and shave. it was a
beautifull
morning and Herman from " Destiny " was also there
getting in a good start to the day.
Talking about good starts, We had a great start to
our christmas holiday in Ireland when we flew into Dublin on Thursday the 9th of
December
and our daughter " Leah" collected us and drove us
back to her house in Sandymount around 5pm, There skipper met his new
grandson " Jamie " for the first time, ( Aileen
having already met him last year ) ahhhh, what can you say !
adorable, thats what.....
Later , while the dinner was cooking, Leah, her
husband Johnny, our other son Stefan, Caroline and skipper walked the 200
meters to " Slattery's"
pub and had a few pints of Guinness before
returning to the house for dinner, It was 18 months since skipper had a pint and
these few pints
tasted like nector. We had a wonderfull
evening and stayed the night in their house.
On Friday the 10th of Dec. we drove down to Cork
and skipper attended an I.C.C. dinner held in the Royal Cork Yacht
Club.
this club was founded in 1720 and is the oldest
Yacht club in the world. Kevin Dwyer presented a slide show at that dinner
of his 2 months
on board " A Lady " last year, It turned out
to be a very entertaining evening, and thanks to Eleanor Cudmore ( commodore of
the Southern region
of the I.C.C,) who arranged the dinner and got so
many people to attend in freezing conditions.
On that subject, freezing, we returned from a
lovely 32 degrees , to be met with this Ice age stuff. Not only that, the
economy was also freezing,
Ohhhh, our poor little country, what has happened
since we left, oh so depressing, none the less , the Irish were often down
on their luck before
and managed to dig themselves out of
trouble. Skippers thinking here is simple, If Berty the Bo**X did not fire
Charlie as minister for finance
and replace him with Biffo, then we would
never have seen this mess. right !
On Saturday 11th , we went to our friends house in
Coachford, Margaret and Bob How had their annual bash and as usual it was a
great day out,
The house is a large old Georgian house set nicely
on a south facing hill overlooking the valley and streams below. not to mention
the
trees and old castles, normally skipper would spend
a few hours shooting with Bob, but the weather was too flippen cold so we
dropped that
idea for this year.
Going and comming to the house was slow due to all
the snow and ice everywhere. Having survived a trip around the world, it would
be
a travisty if anything happened to us while at
home on holiday. But , you know murphys law.
Enough of Christmas for now, Back on the boat,we
stored the provisions purchased yesterday and skipper was happy that the
computer
was working well again,
around midday, we set off for Immigration and
Customs , we had to get our clearances for the departure tomorrow. All this took
a couple
of hours and and when we were finished , we
traveled off to the chandlery to get a new fly screen for the forward cabin,
which we ordered
before we went home , This we fitted on our return
to the boat and were really happy with the thing when we were
finished.
we completed the provisions and stocking up ther
boat for the next 3 weeks as provisions are not great in St Helina. and are very
expensive
in any case.
Sham & Emily took their car over to the Royal
Cape Y.C. where they could leave it untill they return early next
month.
The Royal Cape has reciprocal rights with the Royal
Cork and the Royal St. George.and is a lovely friendly club.
Later, we walked the few hundred yards to the Cape
grace Hotel for dinner, we sat outside on the terrace overlooking the
marina.
the weather was warm and the food was good
value,
We had lots of laughs and swapped stories about all
the people we know at home and some of the funny things that
happened.
and the not so funny things like " Charlie Andrews
" Life can be a bitch sometimes, But But, we have to keep
going.
We met Casey, Hidie and Steaurt from " Wild
Tigres " and exchanged lots of hugs and kisses, It was great to see them all
again.
we said good bye to Anna & Udo from " Destiny",
our German friends, they were leaving the boat and returning home in a few days
time ,
having spent a year on the boat. It was sad to see
them go .. almost like part of the family........ but, but , thats life
again..
Later , it was great to sit in the cockpit and have
a night cap and look out past the well lit up " Cape Grace " hotel, through all
the mast's
and dock cranes at the hugh shimmering " Ferris
Wheel " with all its bright lights against a dark blue night sky
behind.
It was enough to send a shimmer down the spine,
Can you recall a few months ago, a young English
Bride was murdered here in S.A. while on their honeymoon, well they were staying
here
in the " Cape Grace " hotel.
Ohhhh, that " Ferris wheel " reminds Skipper of the
Mill Wheel in Midleton distelleries, where he and his sister " Deirdre "often
spent holidays with his uncle and aunt and cousins,
Uncle Dennis worked in the distelleries and their
house was part of a large single story Georgian House , The Croketts lived in
the other half
and Barry Crockett is now the head distiller there.
The house was slap bang in the middle of the distelleries and right next to the
"Mill Wheel"
so all night we listened to the slow rumbling of
the wheel rotating , which provided all the power for the plant. Just
so simple..........
and Uncle Dennis used to take skipper fishing in
the Mill Race with plastic bags, the mill race was a bye product of the
mill stream which fed the mill wheel and all we did was shut off the water in
the mill race, climb down into it and pick up the stranded " Trout " and put
them into
the plastic bags, It was certainly
a alternative style of fishing, and lots of fresh trout for the
tea........
When skipper got older, he would still visit Dennis
in the distelleries, but no more fishing, well not in the mill race, but fishing
drops of whiskey
into our thirsty trottles. Ohhhh some fond
memories.
Thats all for now.
Signed :- Stephen Hyde (
Skipper )
|