Cape Town [finally]

Well, a month down the line, and here I am in Cape Town. After so long on the ship in the same room, it began to feel like home. The days stopped dragging as we approached the equator, and I settled into a routine of eating, sleeping, watching the wildlife and cycling. I also spent a couple of hours a day trying to convince my Dutch Reformed Church Afrikaner third mate that all living things evolved from slime mold, which provided much entertainment for both parties. Check out my almost-infinity pool:



I didn't have such a great time during my short stay in Namibia, and it was funny how relieved I was to get back into my 10 foot square living room back aboard ship. The highlight of the 1 day sortie was seeing Namibia's Skeleton Coast. The 30km road from the port to the nearest town of size, runs north sandwiched between the coast and the desert. In the morning, the sea was almost entirely obscured by thick fog which rolls in from the Atlantic and across the impressive sand dunes of the edge of the Namib desert. On the return journey the fog had retreated about 100m back from the shore line, shrouding a half dozen of the many shipwrecks that give this eerie coast line its name.

The Polish Catholics take easter very seriously indeed. Although I suspect they are at least partly motivated by the excuse to take time of work and drink vodka. Which everyone did, without exception. I discovered a new hidden talent winning the shooting competition and beating two ex polish infantrymen to take a bottle of vodka. It was slightly worrying to note how much vodka had been consumed by the participants, and I felt slightly afraid to participate, until I discovered that it was only an air riffle.

Last sunset from the bow of the ship


A Namibian Dolphin



Flying fish off the Ivory Coast


It's the first time I've been back to Cape Town since spending a few months here during a gap year 9 years ago. It's been fantastic to see Kathy again after 3 months apart, and we've had a great holiday here so far, pictures to follow soon.

So I think that a health update is in order. The ride has been very much up in the air for months now, but over the last few weeks, my health has really improved again, and I am definitely going to give it a shot. I have decided to scale down my expectations slightly, since I am still recovering from this pesky virus thing. Whilst the aim is still to Cycle as far as possible from Cape Town to Malawi, I am going to set my self the initial goal of cycling the offroad part across South Africa from Cape Town to Pietermaritzburg, which is the first 2300km stage of my route. I hope you don't all think this is too much of a cop out and is still worth sponsoring! Provided I get that far, I will take a few days rest and make a decision about whether I am able to continue.

Kathy is in Cape Town with me for another few days of holiday, before heading back to Malawi on Saturday. From the weekend I will be staying alone in Cape Town and doing some bigger distance training rides before hopefully setting off about 10 days from now.

I have been able to upload the rest of my photos now, so there are plenty more on my flickr page.

Watch this space for an update in the next week or so.

Thanks for reading,

Alex