Shop Till You Drop (your wallet!)
'Sarf & West mate, Sarf & West'
Pete Bernfeld
Sat 25 Feb 2012 03:07
Best buy will be a new battery for what will be the onboard nav system, the old but trusty Packard Bell PC. It, the battery, is available, but the wrong model was sent to the shop by the supplier. Hopefully next Tuesday it will be in my hot and sticky hand. So that's me just about up to the credit card limit then! Oh yes, I also have two thirty metre lengths of polypropylene rope, not exactly marine grade but it'll do for a temporary furling line and the second reef in the main. At A$6.90 a coil, can't beat it!
Queensland may be the 'Sunshine State' but as Barry keeps telling me, it is the rainy season, and boy has it been raining! Never mind, he's been running me around the place. I've checked out a couple of anchorages and it is possible to anchor right in the middle of the Brisbane CBD! Most marinas don't exactly welcome lives boards, but then I can't afford to be in a marina anyway!
Of interest to those coming to Oz this coming sailing season, food prices are slightly less that NZ. I reckon that a decent week's shop could be done for A$85-90, and that would include a couple of bottles of wine. Clean Skins wine ( unbranded) can be had for $2.99, and a case of non-imported beer was $28 (4X). There are Aldi cut price supermarkets here, but of course getting to them may be a problem. Pasta in particular seemed really cheap, as did some veg. Coffee shops tend to be expensive and are best avoided, but the Bazza is putting me up so I though I ought to buy the auld bugger a coffee or two at the very least!
I met up with Helen and Gordon yesterday. Good to see them again, next time will probably be in Malaysia, this weeks version of the plan is to get to Brisbane before next October and tuck myself away until April/May 2013, then up to Darwin and onwards to Malaysia by Christmas 2013.
Just to repeat a request for info I made on the other blog, any Hareidi ladies like to give me their thoughts on problems that might be encountered working in a research facility with male co-workers? If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can't help! Emma the Agent has received the manuscript of 'Eliezer 2' and seems to be enthusiastic. Hey ho, life for the moment is good. It probably won't last, but if it did I'd probably only get bored.
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