End of Silence

October 6th, 2013

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It is almost half a year since my last post to this blog. But now the time has come, and we are preparing to return to Scorpio in Chaguaramas, on October 15. Ever since we arrived in Finland in mid April I have been very busy with the renovation project of Ferry Beach, the property we aquired last year. The weather in Finland this summer was almost perfect and we managed to get even further with the building work than planned. The beach house is almost completed and we even had time to start on some of the projects on the main villa itself.


After Scorpio is sold I will return to smaller craft

It is now time for a well deserved vacation in the Caribbean. However, the plan is to start actively selling the yacht while we are aboard. The length of our cruise will therefore depend on how well the selling project advances. We will sail north in the Windward and Leeward Islands with the goal to arrive in St Martin after Christmas. If we cannot find a buyer this winter we will have to leave the yacht again stored somewhere, as we wish to get back to Ferry Beach before the end of April 2014. The big question in that case will be: should we sail north to the east coast of the US or back to Trinidad. We do not want to leave Scorpio in the Caribbean during the 2014 hurricane season.

Above a view of Ferry Beach with the red-brick Beach House on the right (click on photo). The main villa is hidden by the trees. Below is a closer view of the Beach House.

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Haul Out at Chaguaramas

April 9th, 2013

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The 2012-13 season is now almost over. Scorpio was hauled out today, but we will live aboard for 4 days preparing the yacht for a 6 month rest on the hard. Then we will move to a hotel room for an other 4 days during the final preparations. This year, the season ended earlier than usual, but on the other hand we covered a longer distance than usual instead, about 8,000 nm.

As I have written before, we have hauled out 21 times, and only twice at the same yard, so this must be something like our 19th shipyard. A lot of new things and people to learn to know and to evaluate.

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Happy New Year

January 1st, 2013

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Last year we had an average of more than 5,000 visitors per month on this web site. We would like to thank all our visitors for being interested in our journey.

Happy New Year 2013.

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A Wine Tour to Stellenbosch

December 27th, 2012

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About a week ago we went on a Wine tour. It was a great success and I would like to encourage anybody visiting Cape Town to do the same, even if you only have limited time and/or local knowledge at hand. One day is enough to visit at least three vineyards and it doesn’t have to be expensive. You only need to rent a car, get a map (or a navigator) and do some minor research. Or you can skip the research and just follow our route.

I don’t pretend to know much about wine in general, and my knowledge of South African wine in particular was very limited before we went on this trip. My only preparations, the evening before, included some browsing of an old edition of Frommer’s South Africa and studying and printing of some Google maps showing driving directions.

I had chosen three vineyards in Stellenbosch, based partly on the descriptions in the guide and partly based on their location with respect to each other and the distance to downtown Cape Town – we were staying at Royal Cape Town Yacht Club. Each of these vineyards is different from the other ones, with different architecture, settings and views. All of them were worth visiting and all produce great wine.

Our first stop was at Vergenoegd, only about a 50 km drive from Cape Town, less than an hour. Their main building is a magnificent old Dutch mansion, probably built in the late 1600s. We started the day with a taste of one of their white wines and then tasted three great red wines, rounding up with a port wine and finally bought a case of assorted reds for Christmas.

Our next stop was at Rust en Vrede, in a fantastic setting at the end of Annandale road. Their red wine (they don’t make whites) was chosen by Nelson Mandela to be served at the Nobel Peace Price dinner and one of their wines was nominated as the first South African red wine in the Top 100 Wines of the World. Their restaurant has also been nominated as one of the Top 100 Restaurants.

On the way to our last vineyard we made a stop in the centre of the charming town of Stellenbosch, where we recommend a visit to Oom Sami Se Winkel, a general dealer with an amazing inventory.

We chose our last vinyard Tokara because of the views from its restaurant. Their modern architecture and art exhibition also make for an intresting experience. Tokara produces red wines, white wines, brandy and olives.

From Tokara we could have driven on to Franschhoek, said to be the prettiest valley in the Winelands, but we decided we had experienced enough vineyards for one day.

All wines at all three estates were excellent, and very reasonably priced. It was a good day indeed.

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The Longest Day – Christmas Memories

December 24th, 2012

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In Scandinavia, the most important moment of Christmas takes place around 18:00 on Christmas Eve, at least if you ask the children. This is usually the time Santa arrives and all the presents are delivered. In the rest of the world they have to wait until the morning of Christmas Day, December 25th, as Santa cannot be everywhere at the same time.

The day of Christmas Eve is the longest day of the year; you can ask anybody who has been a child in Scandinavia. It feels like it will never be evening, the time passes very slowly and you are likely suffering from a stomach disease. As a pastime our parents brought us along delivering flowers and gifts to friends and relatives and lighting candles on of the graves of our ancestors. Usually, as I remember, there used to be a lot of snow.

As a tradition, in our family, most Christmas Eves were celebrated at the home of my grandparents together with our cousins. Therefore, when all were present, there were quite a lot of people, 8 adults and 7 children. Usually the children were seated at a separate table, which was a relief, as in those days, if seated at the same table as the adults; children were not expected to speak if they weren’t expressly addressed by an adult.

When dinner was finally finished, everybody gathered in the drawing-room, except my father, who suddenly remembered that he had forgotten to lock the car. Unlucky for him, but Santa Claus happened to arrive when he was away. I think my father never met Santa during all those years.


Christmas Eve 1956


Christmas Eve 1961 – dress code: tuxedo

My grandmother was famous for giving great presents in generous amounts. I later learned that she used to buy them all year around, every time she happened to find something she thought would be a great Christmas gift. However, she tried to treat all children equally, and therefore the boys often got identical presents as did the girls. So when my cousins had unwrapped their Meccano sets, I instantly knew what was inside the same size parcel that had my name on it.

This photo is from around 1960 or 1961. Cousin Micce and I have just received those Meccano sets. But take a look at the style of our clothing, even for kids. Jacket and tie – and still buttoned although the party must have gone on for several hours already. Micce was probably only 7 years old and I must have been 11. They don’t make kids like this anymore, ha-ha. But Micce, those brown shoes …

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Brompton Stupidity

December 21st, 2012

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Some time ago the inner tube of a tyre on one of our folding Brompton Bikes broke – the stiff valve broke off from the soft rubber, impossible to repair. I started to look for a replacement tyre, but the weels are of such a small size that it seemed impossible to find a tyre in South Africa. I looked at Bromptons home page (they are located in England) and found that they do not have a distributor in SA, so I sent them a mail, asking form a quotation for two inner tubes to be delivered in Cape Town. Their reply was astonishing:

– “We do not have a dealership in South Africa. We are unable to ship directly to you as we expect each Brompton to be checked by a qualified mechanic prior to being given to the customer to ensure it is of the highest safety and standard.”

We own two expensive Brompton Bikes. One of them is now useless because of a simple flat tyre. You would think that it would be in Brompton’s interest to keep their customers happy, when it would simply require sending a new tyre by mail. Instead they refuse because, in their opinion, the replacement of an inner tube needs to be checked by a qualified mechanic.

I have never heard of such nonsense before. Surely there cannot be a more simple service task on a bike than replacing a flat tyre! And adding insult to injury, they informed us, that we could contact their nearest distributor in South AMERICA! Thanks a lot, why not a dealer in Japan?

We have had these bikes on board for 12 years (photo above is from Nassau, Bahamas, 10 years ago) and they have been very useful. I have changed the tyres and inner tubes numerous times, but this time we didn’t have a spare on board.

This is apparently how Brompton rewards their loyal customers. Thanks for buying our bikes but we will not send you any spares.

I guess this must be a classic case, where the manufacturer turns down an opportunity to earn goodwill and instead caused a lot of bad will.

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5,300 visits

September 27th, 2012

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Thank you all, very much.

In September 2012, so far with 4 days still left, there have been almost 5,300 visits on our web site. This is pretty impressive, I think, for a non-commercial site, with the main objective to stay in touch with friends and relatives.

We will now be even more motivated to share our stories with you.

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Is Scorpio for Sale?

September 2nd, 2012

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Looking for the right yacht for a circumnavigation?

Look here …

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Resuming the Voyage

September 2nd, 2012

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Hi everybody. This is a heads-up that the long silence at this site is ending.

After enjoying a couple of months of the rather wet and cold 2012-summer of Finland we are preparing to return to Scorpio on Wednesday 5th September.

Here are two photos showing what we have been doing on our vacation from cruising under sail:

Stay tuned ..

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Tsunami Warning – And Then What?

April 14th, 2012

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– Are you aware of the recent tsunami warning?

We had just tied our lines to the quay in the recently constructed harbour at Foamullah island in the Maldives. Two young locals on a moped stopped and told us that there had been a giant under water earth quake, 8.7 on the Richter scale, in Indonesia, near the location of the disastrous Boxing Day tsunami 2004. The government had issued a Tsunami Warning.

Malla and I looked at each other in disbelief. Pirates, political riots, tsunamis. What is next?

Read more ..

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