More notes from SA

Greetings,

Ostrich tastes more like beef than chicken or at least the meat is more meaty than chicken and much more tender than beef. Sorry to of missed out that vital bit of detail last time!

Anyway... the hunt for the perfect wave continues, today finds me in Coffee Bay in a backpackers hostel right on Bomvu Beach (idyllic little beach like you'd find in Cornwall just with clear blue sky and sea and dolphins jumping through the surf!).

I am pleased to announce I have now caught my first wave off a point break on a short board!!! Unfortunatley having been sat on my arse in London staring at a computer and doing little else for months if not years I was exhausted after that and have done little else. (also have holes all over my feet from getting in and out of the sea off said points which are invariably v. rough rocks.

Think I'm going soft in my old age (or maybe the Larium's kicking in) but spent last night watching and listening to four African drummers and a fire dancer and wasn't compelled to make sarcastic remarks, bl**dy amazing what some people can do!

I'm actually running well behind schedule at the moment (even though I didn't actually have a schedule but had figured on being at a beach earlier) but Cape Town and more specifically Long Street Backpackers was too good to leave so stayed there an extra four days just chilling out having a laugh. Didn't go to Jeffries (J) Bay in the end as I was told the waves would be better here at this time of year.

Hope all of you in London went out and supported everyone running the marathon (congrates on the 4.25 Sam) and have big plans for the bank holiday. I can highly recomend the Wray Fair up in northern Lancashire on the Monday if you're free and in the area, it will have evreything you could dream of for a May Day fair and it wont get overrun with green lunatics!

No more especially unusual meats to report on though did have my first brye (don't quite know the spelling of the name South Africans give it but to you and me a barbarque with ridiculously large pieces of meat on it) and several dishes I'm told are local to these parts (AKA Africa).

Didn't eat it but I've also had a run in with a ring necked parokeet which is a bright green bird that can talk (a little), it befriended me on the first night here and now whenever I put on my Guinness top he coms over and sits on my shoulder (how cool am I!).

Needless to say I'm having fun and life is good (though I obviously miss you all terribly). Hope all is well back home.

Laters
Jonathan
Internet cafe
Coffee Bay
South Africa

PS. I'll say it again just in case, if you don't want spamming with news from an unemployed bum let me know and I'll stop your suffering!

PPS. Fun as e-mails with attachments and links to games are when trying to avoid work in an office they're a bit of an arse in Africa so if you can try to avoid sending them through to me I'd me most appreciative.
TTFN JP

Notes from Africa

Greetings Ladies and Gents,

I'm now all on my own for the first time since Sean met me off the plane (he was late by the way, something about "African time"!) so I'm now free to vegetate in internet cafes and such like.

You'll have to excuse me if the typing in this e-mail isn't even close to perfect but as

1) the keyboard I'm typing on is in African,
2) I've not typed for a week or so so my typing is a little rusty
3) I'm paying by the hour do unl\ike at work I'll probably not do a spell check!

So, the story so far. I've eaten my first two african animals (or at least food you don't commonly get in the uk) in the ostrich and the springbok, I highly recommend both. I've also eaten all sorts of very tasty dishes local to these parts plus a stupid amount of dried meat (billtong). I've seen baboons, dassies (pronounced dusty without the t, they're 75million years separated cousins of the elephant thought look more like little brown badgers don't you know!), a Himalayan tahr (looks like mountain goat) and everything I've eaten plus a few.

Had my first case of African arse on my first night but it thankfully cleared up in time for my to sample a few cases of african wine on a wine tasting trip and yesterday I climbed up Table Mountain. Unfortunately although we set off with clear skies by the time we got to the top a layer of cloud had settled so couldn't see anything so got the cable car down, I'll probably go back up in the cable car on a clear day to get the views and maybe do the abseil off the top.

I'm thinking of getting a bus out to Jeffries Bay in a couple of days (about 1000km) for a bit of surfing then I'll come back via the garden route, I'm hoping that once I can check into a hostel later this morning they'll have some details for me.

That's about it other that Sean and Bev Roche's wedding, all went amazingly smoothly and I left me speech late enough in the day so that everyone was drunk enough to laugh at anything I said. I was far too kind to young Sean and didn't mention much about his somewhat dubious past but did alude to his scandelous behaviour on the stag weekend, even so the lad owes me.

The ceremony itself was on a spectacular rocky outcrop between two beautiful bays in Arniston (just under 200km east of Cape town) and after it we went down onto one of the beaches for champaign. It was raining (first time since landing) all morning and most of the afternoon but the skies cleared just as the wedding was due to start so we all (about 35 of us) hot footed it down to the sea and it thankfully stayed clear for a couple of hours which was more than enough time, as best man I obviously take full credit for sorting the weather out!

Said goodbye to Sean on Friday (very emotional) and just got dropped of by Xabi (shabby) and Ami who I've spent last few days with as they're heading back to Spain so I guess the adventure really starts here so at that point I must love you and leave you.

Laters

Jonathan.

Internet Cafe
Cape Town
South Africa.