Sunday December 8^st  2013,  Agulhas Current, South Africa,  31 55.9S 20 40.8E 

Today's Blog by David (Time zone UTC +2.0)

Filling in time

There are few places I would rather spend a week than in Durban Marina.  For one thing, it keeps you fit. The pontoon is a third of a mile long:

That makes any foray shore something of an excursion, involving walking at least  a mile by the time you get to your destination;  the journey from a taxi to the boat in the rain involves a complete drenching.  And the weather has been wet…….so wet that the fairways and particularly the bunkers at Royal Durban Golf Club (the venue for the second Serendipity Golf Tournament on Friday) had ducks and geese splashing around. There is little ‘casual water’ on the fairways – just the occasional ‘casual dry patch’ on which you may place your ball.

There was at least one golfer among us:

Tuesday, we hired a car and  Terry navigated us to 1000 Hills, a tourist area with scenic views, or there would have been if the cloud base had been above 500 feet.  Wednesday, I serviced both engines while Terry and Peter went shopping. Thursday we followed the ‘’Midland Meander’ a tourist trail west of Pietermaritzburg; this was  at Peter’s suggestion, the principal objective of which appears to have been a visit to Tracy’s Fudge Shop – we also whiled away a couple of hours in a Hide at a Bird Sanctuary counting Blacksmith Lapwings (I told you we were filling in time).  All of this while we waited, and waited, for a weather window.

There was in fact a “weather window” last Sunday 1^st December. However, in order to leave then we would have had to check out of the  Port on the previous Friday and thus cut short our Game Reserve adventure.  Since then the weather had been pretty dismal – and the sea state rough – until quite a large window developed for departure yesterday.  

Fortunately, we were in and around Durban Thursday  morning, having decided to breakfast ashore in the belief that the walk along the pontoon would negate the “Full English” experience at the café.  There, we learnt that Customs would be closed from 10.00AM on Friday for their Christmas Lunch (sic!) so if we wanted to leave at the weekend  we had to check out on Thursday. With a few hiccoughs,  we achieved that quite quickly in company with a dozen other yachts keen to avail themselves of the same window.  A couple of boat crews were out of town and did not get the message and so have not been able to check out.

The announcement of Mandela’s death on Friday was the cause of much consternation and speculation about mass demonstrations etc. all of which largely have come to nowt, in Durban at least but the announcement of a Public Holiday on Monday may further hinder the departure of those not fortunate to check out on Thursday last.

One other impediment we needed to surmount on departure was the facsimile machine in the Port Control Tower.  The process of checking out should result in a fax being sent to the Control Tower evidencing each vessel’s permission to leave port (in other words: that we have paid everything we owe) and without which we would not be allowed to leave Port; said fax machine did not seem to be functioning.  Deepest joy.

Now it is not clear what might have occasioned were we,  having been denied permission, to have made a run for it but fortunately for us, if not for them, it was two other yachts,  ‘Jacaranda’ and ‘Jenny’, that were first out of the blocks yesterday morning and bore the brunt of officialdom.  Many of us listened on the Port Control VHF Channel as they spent what must have been for them a merry 60 minutes reasoning with the authorities by  the radio,  authorities  who flatly denied receipt of their permit (nor the permits for a list of other yachts (Including Serendipity) with whom they asserted that  had checked out).  Fortunately, and frankly to my surprise, reason prevailed over form and they were eventually allowed to leave – as were we,  all once the facsimile machine had been fixed. (Now, where IS that darn paper tray?)

Out of the Window

We have been looking forward to this part. The wind has for some time been forecast to be set fair from the East for most of this coming week, making a single hop to Cape Town a practical option. These conditions are so rare that one local worthy (the OCC Port Officer, in fact) told us that the last person that he is aware that managed  the journey in one leg was Erik Hiscox (Sp?) (Note:  That would have been some years ago. Ed.).  

So we are indeed blessed, for once.  With an easterly wind and – as you will recall  - the Argulhas Current running at 2-5 knots SW down the coast  we should cover the 780 miles quickly -  in 4 – 5 days.  Ahem. You can imagine the colourful language that greeted our determination that there was a 2 knot current running from SW to NE as we left  Durban Harbour – i.e. against us -  and one that stayed against us until dusk. Anyway, at last we have found the current, and now the wind has indeed filled in and we are presently travelling at 11.5-12.0  knots towards our destination.  

All is well with the world right now.  ETA Cape Town Wednesday morning (earlier if the current holds.).