Babelas! (A party or two to remember!)

Went to a great party two weekends ago. It was Rene's sister Jules 40th birthday.
Jules had arranged for all her close friends to come and celebrate with her at a B&B outside Hermanus. It was a good location and no one had to drive after the party; we all stayed at the B&B. The food was good, great people and too much to drink! (If there is such a thing ;-) Perfect! The main thing that changes with parties when you get older is that the music do NOT change and your hangovers get worse. This hangover lasted a day and a half! Perhaps one reason is that you never have the luxury to sleep in to the afternoon as you did as a student. Thank you Jules; we had a great time!

And last weekend it was another birthday party. It was Fraser's turn to turn 40. (Just kidding Fraser, it is still a few years to go ;-) Any way... Some times you (I, that is) never learn! Too many drinks again! Or perhaps it is just lack of sleep (again)!? However we had a great time, South Africa won the rugby and the braai was excellent. Thank you for everything Nicole and Fraser! Also want to say thank you to Chandre and Clinton for letting us stay with them. The breakfast alone was worth the trip!

The game of golf the next day was everything but excellent!

I am now looking forward to the Scandinavian Golf tournament which is played on Atlantic Beach on Friday. I will need to improve quickly and stop mixing pars with triple bogeys to have any chance!!!
I will also need to drink less on the following braai to avoid headache the next day. Have I learnt my lesson?

The weekend they arrived

Last weekend was great!
Nothing beats old friends company, good food and a glass of wine or two. I and a couple of others (no names mentioned ;-) probably also had too many glasses of wine, if there is such a thing. Things never got out of hand, and I felt fine on Saturday morning, until I moved!
Ouch!
But things slowly improved even if it was a very "quiet" group that did the wine tasting tour in and around Slanghoek outside Worcester.

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The golf, on Worcester GC, on Sunday was won by the Knysna boys (Dewald and Pete) who had practiced a lot before this event.

I think we should also keep the golf as well as the general get together as yearly tradition! I am already looking forward to next year, but without the headache.

My cousin Tom and his school-friend Alexander, arrived on Sunday. We picked them up on Monday after they had stayed a night at the Big Blue Backpackers in Cape Town. (Monday was a Public Holiday in SA)

Tom and Alex started their work practice at Scentpac (http://www.scentpac.co.za) on Tuesday. It will be interesting for them to work in a South African factory. The staff is almost 100%
female with only 2 guys working there. It is now 50% more men at the factory. I think Tom and Alex have already received a few proposals of marriage from women who wants to escape to Sweden! :-)

This weekend we are going to visit Table Mountain if the weather is
nice and also go to Onrus (http://www.fallingrain.com/world/SF/1/Onrus.html (it is outside Hermanus)) and I hope we will be able to spot some whales. It is whale season at the moment here in SA so the chance is big. http://cybercapetown.com/WhaleWatching/

Tom and Alex want to go shark diving but I don't know if there will be time for that this weekend... I will stay on land and have no desire to get up close with the sharks.

We will also try to squeeze in another braai or two!

Knysna run and more...

I did it! I ran my first half marathon in Knysna last weekend! 21km!
It was OK and my least problem was the distance. (I am not trying to boast, or perhaps just a little bit ;-) But let me explain; on the plus side is that the run starts in the forest and is situated quite high up so you have a fantastic view when you come out of the forest, after about 10 - 11km. The race is also well organized with transport and a big tent at the start which serves fruit, muesli-bars, coffee, hot chocolate, tea etc. You don't need to eat breakfast beforehand! There are also gas heaters at the start since it normally quite chilly in the morning. The atmosphere is also good.
On the negative side is that you have to be there a long time in advance, 2 hours according to the organizers. I would try to arrive later... It is not chilly; it is freezing cold, -1C someone said. -1 for 2 hours, standing still, not being properly dressed, i.e. not wearing a polar Gore-Tex and fleece suit, is no fun. Running stuff and a tracksuit doesn't cut it. The gas heaters are a good idea, but there are thousands of runners and about 10 heaters... So, you are lekker stiff when it is time to start running! Thankfully all walkers had gathered at the starting line so you couldn't run anyway until after 1km. Worst was that I had to do 2 "pit stops" during the run. This is best to avoid. Luckily most of the run is done in the forest, if you get my drift! (Were do you go if you have to stop in central Göteborg?) I don't know how to blame the organizers for this... wait perhaps the long wait at the start... ;-) Seriously; it is a very good run and I did enjoy it (except for the cold). It was also Rene's 3rd and fastest half marathon so far.
That local beer Mitchells after the run was also GREAT!

The BIG reward after the run was that we had a braai to look forward to. (Note: braai is SA talk for barbecue)
So later, at Janet and Pete's place we had a food and drinks. Bridget and Dewalt who also lives in Knysna was there. It was great to see every one!

I also played golf at Simola. Had a lie in, with a tee off time at 7.50. It is an absolutely stunning golf course. And it is a very playable course for the normal golfer, but it not easy.

Thank you Janet and Pete for letting us stay with you!
Check out the photos from Knysna. It is Jan and Pete's little daughter Erin, 6 months, who is on most of them.

Weekend in Knysna

Approved

We submitted an application for a mortgage/bond last weekend so that we can buy the house we have found. So we have been waiting for the broker to come back to us this week. Late on Friday they phoned and said that we have been approved by one bank. I guess I was not as excited by the news as the person on the other end of the phone would have hoped, because I asked if they had heard anything from any other bank; I wanted to compare interest rates! Anyway, we got one approval and the interest rate is -1.8% below "prime" here in SA. This is not a fantastic rate but it's not a bad one either.
And I am glad that we have a broker dealing with the banks for us. I don't like dealing with banks in general and especially here in SA. My problems normally starts at the door since I am not (yet) a permanent resident and I don't have a green ID book. You need your ID book for everything in SA and you only realize this when you don't have one. They are more fond of their IDs than we are in Sweden! I didn't think that was possible! I have however managed to get a bank account, thanks to some friendly bank staff. Someone must have realized that they can make money out of me too since they charge you for everything and anything. I really like one change that our bank has introduced for our overdraft facility. They charged you if you used it (the overdraft), but they have now decided to charge you even if you don't use it, but the charge is lower! Hey presto! This is good for me! They lowered the charge! But wait a minute... I didn't use this overdraft facility! Hmmm... I guess it sounded to good to be true. But you can get rid of the charge if you sign up for a special account that they charge you even more for. Brilliant!

I played golf at De Zalze in Stellenbosch on Saturday. I was supposed to play 2 weeks ago but it rained away (so we went looking for houses instead ;-) Beautiful course with fast and difficult greens. I really need to play and practice more; it is no fun to be cr@p at golf. The highlight was to birdie the number 13 par 4 (268m/295y) with a tee shot over water. You can be brave and try to drive the green but it is all over water! My final score? I rather forget about it! ;-)

Rene ran another race and broke her personal best for 10km! I better start running too!

We finished the weekend with a nice and relaxing lunch at Seidelberg wine estate. Absolutely beautiful, stunning views from there. We also tried some cheese at Fairview next door...

Rain, cold and an offer!

Winter is here and the weekend rained away in the Western Cape.
The golf I had planned was canceled and course was closed, so I didn't get to play.
We were still very lucky if you compare with all the homeless people in Cape Town who do suffer when it is wet and cold... (Snow, ice, hail hit hard)

I "sniff" have "sniff" a cold. Started with a very sore throat and "sniff" now the nose is running to "cough cough". I think I feel the cold even more here than in England and it is never this cold in Sweden, at least not indoors! What central heating?! We are lucky that we did buy two radiators!

We decided to go house hunting again since it was raining and we did find something interesting again. To make a long story short: we have now put an offer in. For real! So we just have to wait and see! Very exiting! The seller have 48 hours to decide if the offer is "good enough"!

Golf and Mothers day

I like golf but I have not played as much as I would have liked since I arrived in South Africa, despite the good weather. I even played more in the UK were I was a member at Surrey National GC.
However, I have played and I did so on Saturday at Mowbray GC with Martin and Fraser. The golf was very, very slow but it was enjoyable since we had fantastic weather; not too hot and sunshine. The golf itself was the opposite to the weather: bad! But we are not giving up and are playing again this weekend at De Zalze which is supposedly in beautiful shape.
I also played at Atlantic Beach 6 weeks ago and enjoyed some stunning views. Check out the photos from Atlantic Beach and Mowbray

Golf in SA

It was mothers day on Sunday and we celebrated Barbara (Rene's mom) with tea and scones together with Rene's family at her sister Julie's house, which is only a stone throw away from us. (All other mothers was also celebrated!)
We later went house hunting again together with Joggie & Barbara. We saw quite a few houses but nothing that was worth putting in an offer on. We finished off with an early dinner at The Ocean basket! Yummy prawns and calamari!

My running practice have been going well and I have not had much problems with my calves as I have had previously. I have also been thinking about running my first half marathon, but it is not going to happen this coming weekend since I pulled a muscle in the back of my thigh! :-( Not very nice at all! So I have to play golf instead. Poor me! ;-) The race I am practicing for is not until 14^th July in Knysna, so I got time to heal.
My friend's Peter & Jennie ran their first half marathon last weekend in Gothenburg; the Göteborgsvarvet! And they did finish with very impressive times; 1.43 and 1.57!

I caught a shark!

We went to the Beach House in Onrus, outside Hermanus this weekend.
We had a nice time and Barbara, Rene, Julie and Lil went to the Arabella spa for treatments. This was Barbara's birthday gift from last year. They all liked it and say that they can recommend it. I would personally like to try the beautiful golf course again!

I went crayfishing with Joggie and his friends on Saturday morning when the girls went to the spa. The weather was beautiful and calm but I still got a bit "sea sick"... Well I didn't get sick but I didn't feel that great. Perhaps the red wine and Cognac from dinner the night before was part of the problem?! However, I did feel better after a while and "pulled" some nets and i happened to catch a Pyjama shark! It was quite small (45-50cm) stripy and still alive and we did put it back in to the water. That was much more fun than catching the crayfish, if you ask me!

We also did some house hunting on the way home to Cape Town, but more about that later!