On top of the world!

The Springboks are world champions after beating England in the final in Paris on Saturday.
The result was 15-6 and South Africa was the better team.
Everybody have gone a bit crazy here and we are enjoying the victory.

We also cut down a large poplar tree in our garden.
The tree had already ruined the water and sewage pipes once and caused blockages a number of times for the previous owner and once for us. It had to go! Joggie and a couple of workers from his farm came and helped us take the tree down. So, we had a "chainsaw rally" in our garden around 7.30 in the morning and probably waking up the whole neighborhood (except a few teenagers). Thankfully we (i.e. Rene ;-) went around to our neighbors and warned them the day before.
We now had a truckload with branches and rubble and other garden waste to get rid of. So we filled the farm truck that Joggie brought with him and went to the recycling station. But no luck: we were not allowed in to unload our stuff since we had a truck and that is a too big vehicle. After many phone calls, to managers etc, we were instead directed to another recycling station which would be able to help us. But no luck. Again. Still the same problem: the truck is too big and heavy and is not allowed in to recycling station. While we are arguing with the official working there when a truck, at least twice the size of ours, is entering the recycling station! Of cause this was the truck collecting the rubbish, not dumping it, but the size argument that we accepted as an excuse disappeared...
Last resort was to take the all the branches, leafs etc to the land fill site just outside Cape Town (i.e. the city dump). Luckily this was not too far away. All well and good, we arrive at the land fill site with lots of other trucks and lorries going in and out. Perfect! Now, all we have to do is to pay.
"OK, no problem; where do we pay?"
"Oh, you need a ticket."
"OK, let's buy one then!"
"But we don't sell tickets here and the ticket office is closed on Saturdays!"
"What!!! Can't I pay you?"
"We don't deal with money here! You can come back on Monday"
:-(
I finally got to speak to the manager whom I pleaded with and he did finally let us dump our rubbish!
We would like to thank the guys from the farm and Joggie and Barbara for all the help with our garden. It now looks much better and tidier!

Alex and Tom (my cousin) flew back to Sweden on Sunday after 4 weeks. We hope they enjoyed their stay!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Mamma!
It was my mom's birthday on Saturday.
I didn't forget, I have just been slow on updating the blog :-)

Insurance policy

I discovered 2 errors on our insurance policy for one of our cars.
It stated that we didn't have an alarm and immobiliser fitted, but we do have both. It also said that the car is parked behind a locked gate at night, which it is not. One of these is "positive" and one is "negative" for the premium we pay, or so I thought.
It turns out that it is only the "negative" error, that the car is not behind a gate, that affects the premium and makes it more expensive! :-(
First I was surprised, but after thinking about it for abut 1.2 seconds I realised that it always works this way with all insurance companies and banks!

The BIG weekend!

It is now Tom and Alex last week in SA and they finish their work experience today Friday.
It is only the holiday part of their visit left.
So we are going on a road trip this weekend. About 1100km is going to be covered along the coast and the garden route. Tom and Alex are going to Bungee jump from the Bloukrans Bridge and we are going with them. Well we are driving with them, not jumping! The Bloukrans Bridge has the highest Bungee jump in the world.

We are also going to stop by at the Cango Caves outside Outshoorn on the way, should be fun.  

It is also semi-final weekend in the Rugby World Cup and South Africa's Springboks are favourites. Not only to win the semi-final against Argentina but to win the whole World Cup. BUT they have to play the semi-final first. Let's hope they don't forget that.

Another good thing with the weekend trip is that we will have the opportunity to meet up with our friends in Knysna again; Pete and Jan and hopefully Bridget and Dewald too. I might be also able to play around of golf.  

1 year! So far so good...

It is now 1 year since we moved to SA and arrived in Cape Town!
This year has passed extremely quickly and we have achieved so much...
We want to say "Thank you" to all our friends and family for your support!

Last but not least: A belated happy birthday wish to Pete and to Charl!