What an amazing time ... Paul, in his haste to grab his sailing gear, managed to toss two left sailing shoes into his sailbag. Then, our guest Analize from Santam, was keen to experience the full adventure of off shore racing - The PG Glass crew, always happy to oblige, promptly found some 50 Knot gusts and threw Maji on her ear - nearly tossing Joy and Carl overboard in the process. Carl - dunked to his midriff in freezing water, bravely kept Joy aboard. 

Joy (still in her dry clothes!)

When Paul decided that ou r VIP guests had endured enough 'excitement' he called for a tack. The brand new starboard sheet, still very soapy, wipped itself loose. We stayed on a little longer to sort the problem out. Once we were safely out of the wind, Joy demonstrated her sailing prowess by taking the tiller and steering us safely home. We started the engine at the entrance to the harbour.

Annalize from Santam - All her fault - she was egging us on to find more breeze!

Oh did we miss Lindsay, Our obssesive/compulsive fixer upper of all things mechanical. Lindsay has an uncanny knack of checking and then re-checking everything. To the point where the rest of us abdicate responsibility of things (like diesel) to him - just expecting everything to work when we need it.

Carl being charming

Joy, still at the helm, noticed that everything had suddenly become very quiet. Paul and Wavy looked at each other and said 'diesel' simultaneously. With a now very still engine, the crew contemplated sailing on to our mooring - before the 40 Knot South Easter caught up to us. Actually, things went really smoothly with a brilliant bit of parking under sail only. (Why is there no one around when you get it right - and always an audience when you get it wrong?)

Joy at the helm - an old hand at this!

Safely ashore, wet clothes were exchanged for dry, and two excellent bottles of red wine were quickly uncorked. Even our Ceri took a longing look at the Captain Morgan and coke before declining. A brilliant evening was had after that - with Ceri deciding that in future she would be responsible for ensuring the diesel tanks are alwys kept topped up.

Now this is what I call client relations ...

The crew and owners of PG Glass Majimoto welcome Mr Mark Hamilton-Payne (MD PG Glass) and Joy Cochran from PG Head office in Johannesburg. We hope the Cape Doctor is kind to us when we set sail this afternoon and look forward to taking you on a cruise - Majimoto style!

I know this is a SAILING site: but some news just has to be shared! :wink:

Original story courtesy of SA Rugby.net

The magic muti of Nelson Mandela and Ellis Park worked for the Springboks again on Saturday as John Smit’s men beat the All Blacks 40-26 in their Tri-Nations rugby test match played at Ellis Park.

Click here for our blow-by-blow coverage.

At South Africa’s 1995 World Cup “Field of Dreams” and once again inspired by Madiba the Springboks scored five tries to two to keep alive their hopes of winning the tournament and also halted a run of eight successive All Black victories in a super-charged performance that brought centre Marius Joubert a hat-trick of tries.

The 14-point victory, in a thrilling match in which the lead changed hands five times and the All Blacks led 10-0 after seven minutes, means the Springboks and the Wallabies will be playing each other to decide the 2004 Tri-Nations at the Absa Stadium in Durban next Saturday.

Scorers were:

South Africa 40: Tries by Marius Joubert (22 min), Breyton Paulse (34 min), Joubert (38 min), Jean de Villiers (79 min), Joubert (92 min). Percy Montgomery kicked three conversions and three penalties.

New Zealand 26: Tries by Mils Muliaina (6 min) and Joe Rokocoko (62 min). Andrew Mehrtens kicked two conversions and four penalties.

Very cold, windy and wet in the Cape this weekend while warm windy and dusty over the eastern parts

Updated: 12 August 2004

The south-western and southern Cape is still recovering from last weekend’s flood that occurred when a low pressure system was sitting over the Cape while a series of frontal systems were passing through this area. It was not long ago when significant snow fell spreading to the southern Drakensberg.

Another series of frontal systems associated with the upper air trough is expected to pass though the south-western Cape this weekend. These systems will cause very cold and wet conditions that will be accompanied by gale to strong gale-force winds due to the steep pressure gradient that will be caused by the low pressure system which will be positioned south of the Cape on Saturday, 14 August 2004. Although the system seems to be moving rather fast, the freezing levels will be very low with the availability of moisture, snowfalls are expected to set in from the west later on Saturday. Bearing in mind that the ground is still saturated in some areas around the Cape, even moderate rain might result to local flooding over flat areas.

Strong winds are expected over the central parts of the country tomorrow, Friday 13 August 2004, and Saturday 14 August 2004. Most areas will tend to be windy and dusty; fires will also spread easily under these conditions. People are advised to be cautious.

Despite Lindsays best efforts to get the crew onto the water ....It has been hard enough just floating to work over the past few days. The good news is that the floods should start drying out from tomorrow ...