15:55S 5:43W

Tales of Amok's Adventures
Mike Jones
Sun 7 Feb 2010 20:43
Hi shore side Rope Catchers

YES WE HAVE ARRIVED AT ST HELENA !!!

Yes I have been allowed out for good behavior and a chance to stretch my legs.

After nine days of beating to windward from Ascension Island and dumping the rubbish in the landing quay bin, we literally fell to our knees and kissed the ground, no I didn't trip over my laces.

The usual round of police, immigration, port control and customs left me gasping for lunch at 1600 hrs, a quick visit to Anne's Cafe left me somewhat distraught after being confronted with graffitti on a casual visit to the gents.

Staring me in the face scribbled on the wall was the name "Scott Fell Smith 2/O", could this be the same upright gentleman well known and loved of Perth fame ???
Could this be from a visit of the Australian replica of the "ENDEAVOR" ten years hence me hearties??

Moby and Meercat took photographic evidence to confront the villain on returning to Perth.
What else was I going to find???

SHIPS IN THE NIGHT a well abused phrase. The coloured and white navigation lights carried by ships tell a story in the blackest of night: how big they are, what direction they are going, what operations they are involved in.
A whole story to an experienced eye or even the eyes of the feared monster to those less experienced.

People met in passing are much the same, the colours and configurations they show indicate their character good or bad. Those met en route have been a unique lesson in light recognition.

We had the greatest of pleasures earlier of meeting Laura's 2nd or 3rd cousin; a David Clarke and his wife Doris, over a pot of red tee (yummy) we compared notes on family trees and our various relatives and I can honestly say I have never been so overwhelmed with pleasure at meeting a relative.

David is a very slim, sprightly 77 years with a very young wife. David, now retired, was once Postmaster General amongst other things.

we are still plagued with problems with the cooker and the generator, and have now called in the cavalry, Ie the local boys who hopefully will be able to help us. Pandora and Toby have been doing water runs today to fill up our tanks before we depart for Cape Town. There was a big fund raiser today for a local lad who is in Cape Town receiving treatment for cancer, the fund raiser was to gather enough money to be able to send his family down to Cape Town to support him.

St. Helena has a wonderful set of steps up a hillside, called Jacob's Ladder, it makes the Falmouth Version and the Perth version both look very tame in comparison. This is 699 steps directly up a hill, no landings, no benches, just straight up. The kids did it yesterday and the 3 of us did it today; Mike stayed on watch at the bottom. (Watching for what exactly we are not quite sure).

take care me hearties, more coming soon, once sanity returns when cooker and generator are fixed.

xxx

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