Hello and thanks to all the well wishes we have had from all our friends wishing us a pleasant and safe voyage.

I had the opportunity to meet Terry, our Austrailian crew member last Saturday. Terry was planning some travel down to the Addo National Park
He should be back sometime this week.

I took Terry for a whirlwind tour of the Cape Peninsula. This involved some of the sites like the 12 Apostles of Table Mountan, Hout Bay, Constantia Winelands, whales in Kommetjie, Simonstown and many other sites around our City. Of course with such a hurried visit one can hardly see much, but that leaves room for some more to see on another day.

The rest of the day was spent setting up Ham Radio antennas at home. With the help of James ZS1ROY and Terry I installed a vertical antenna as pictured above as it is my plan to keep contact with Che at home via Ham Radio. I prefer talking instead of the email. Che is licenced to only use a limited amount of frequencies. Radio has some strange properties, different frequencies have different distances over which they are likely to work. Unfortunately the frequecies which Che is allowed to use may only allow for radio contact between us for the first 10 days. After that we may have to rely on other means of communication. Unless we have what is called in Ham Radio jargon, "A good opening" meaning that we would be able to talk over distances much further than normally expected.

Later we went to visit my very good friend Robin Adams who lives in Kalk Bay where we watched THE Rugby match. Even Terry enjoyed watching South Africa's Springboks thump England, especially since they so unceromoniously dismissed Australia from the Rugby World Cup. It was quite a battle getting Terry back to his accomodation at the Zebra Crossings Back Packers as the World Cup victory parties was going full tonk in the City grinding all traffic to a halt.

Our Skipper John arrived back last Saturday. He kept a low profile reconfirming his friendship with his duvet. However on Sunday he was rested and gave me a call. Shaheda and I went to pay him a brief visit in the evening. Shaheda met John's other half, Joy, for the first time and a much longer than expected visit was the result. Unfortunately for John the grind starts soon again as we are expecting the boat to be launched on the 30th October. This means that John will only be home for about 2 weeks before having to depart again.

Keep a look out for more frequent post as the departure time draws closer.

Regards from all of us.