Cape Town

Piet's travels around the world are continuing: for his new project in South Africa he went to Cape Town for 4 days. The aim of the trip was to meet some of the Shell staff in country, combined with a visit to a seismic vessel that was in port. The vessel was acquiring seismic data in the concession Piet is working on, and just finished the job. A number of close-out meetings were held, and Piet had a chance to visit the vessel, the first time after nearly 25 years in the oil industry.

Cape Town is a beautiful city, very pleasant at first glance, but everybody is warning for a high level of violent crime, and ensuring that you don't wander off into a dangerous situation. There is, however, one area that is always safe: the Victoria and Alfred Waterfront, a tasteful development of the old harbour area with many restaurants and shops. The hotel provided a regular shuttle service, so Piet and his colleagues had several meals there.

The weather was great, a welcome chance from the never ending winter back home, with sunshine and temperatures of some 25 degrees. Luckily Piet had the whole Sunday off, and they took the opportunity to walk up to the Table Mountain, the main feature in Cape Town. This was a very nice trail, through Platteklip Gorge, and on the flat top of the mountain. The views were stunning over the city, and also towards the Cape of Good Hope in the south. They descended with the cable car, and got into an open double-decker bus, that took a long detour back to the hotel.
In short: a great trip, and Piet has to go again next week!

View on Cape Town from the seismic vessel

Cape Town Waterfront: restaurants, shops and Table Mountain in the distance

View on Cape Town from Platteklip Gorge

View on Cape Town from Table Mountain

 View towards Cape of Good Hope

 Bo Kaap, a colourful old neighbourhood

A little bit of spring

After the snowy period (see last post) the weather was a bit more pleasant.... for only a day or so. Then temperatures dropped again, with a cold wind, unpleasant snow showers and slippery cycle paths. It turned out to be a real winter that lasted some 5 weeks, and people were starting to get depressed from the continuous cold and lack of sun. Fortunately the past weekend temperatures rose to some 5 degrees, and on Sunday the sun shone all day, so the whole city was outside: it felt like a little bit of spring.

Beau spend most of Sunday in his paddock next to our house, Mary did some gardening, and Piet got his first 100km+ bike ride in. We are  looking for some more of this! 

Paula and Beau walking to our house

 Beau is looking for the pony's in Wapendal

 Beau in his paddock: looking forward to spend a lot of time here!