Fibreglass work again?

28 Jan. 13

I swopped my files onto a new laptop today since my old one has been giving me grief and this one also has a longer battery life. Now I can sit on the boat type my book and update my blog for a few hours whilst the battery is charged. My old laptop only allowed me fifteen minutes before it needed charge. This one has about three hours. We bought this one a while ago to use for our navigation and it doesn’t have another job so we decided it would be okay to use it for my stuff. My old one is still working so I donated it to the boys for their computer games.

31 Jan. 13

We were sitting in the cockpit, each in our own thoughts when Lola asked the boys what they enjoyed and disliked most about living on Yrumoar. Rauen struggled to find his words but Kyle, who always has a lot to say, started and told us he enjoyed the fact that there is no rush anymore. He gets up in the morning when he wakes up and we don’t have to rush about and get ready for school, rushing through breakfast, getting into the car and rushing off to work. What he dislikes he wasn’t sure about but eventually decided that he did get bored when he had nothing to do and all his battery power on his playstation was gone.

Rauen found his words and informed us that he also loved the slower pace at which we lived. He told us he was never bored and really enjoyed having nothing to do sometimes.  What he disliked was being asked the same questions repeatedly whenever he met someone new. The one particular question that he hated was, “what do you eat?” He thinks it is a stupid question and doesn’t know what his answer should be.

Lola explained that she also loved the slower lifestyle and getting to spend so much quality time with her kids and husband. I would love to meet this husband, he sounds like a cool guy.

For me it is the fact that your life is no longer ruled by a clock or a calendar. It’s a feeling of freedom, even though it isn’t really freedom. That word is a fallacy and should be scrapped from the English language completely.

10 Feb. 13

Went onto facebook today to find out if Amy ended up safely in Scotland. She left about a week ago on her gap year having a short stopover in Amsterdam. She doesn’t have a new phone number yet and has to get a bank account before she can get a sim card so I can’t call her to find out if she is enjoying herself. Hopefully she manages to get some form of work there and gets herself sorted soon.

 From our side nothing much has changed and we are still sitting here in Durban. We ripped the rotten steps that lead onto the coach roof off and started making new ones. It was a tough messy job on the foredeck. I missed my table that I had made when Yrumoar was on the hard in Richards bay. Working on your knees on the deck is back breaking and a table would make things a lot easier.

 

 

Our starboard engine alternator has also packed up and overcharges the batteries. We drove around from spare shop to spare shop hoping to find a replacement but eventually had to admit defeat and ordered one from Volvo. It is fascinating how ridiculously priced boat parts are. A standard alternator for a fancy car like a Mercedes is under a thousand rand. Even a Volvo alternator for a Volvo car is under a thousand rand. But for the boat, no, suddenly the price jumps from one to seven and a half thousand rand. Ridiculous and ludicrous that’s all I can say.

We are getting tired of Durban now and I haven’t had any joy in the job department.