Today has been sunny and calm on the Atlantic west coast of southern Africa. No swell, just soft ripples and reflections, and the most beautiful colours in both sea and sky.
The final sector of this cruise, Cape town to Southampton, has now begun. This means we are over the halfway mark of our cruise. Our next port is Walvis Bay, Namibia. We arrive early tomorrow morning. We have booked an excursion called Sandwich Harbour by 4X4 tomorrow afternoon. We are really looking forward to the wild life. It's been a beautiful 20-25C today, and will start to get hot again from now as we go through the tropics again and cross the Equator within the next week.
With the new cruise sector has come a new art teacher, a very enthusiastic woman from the Lakes called Pam. She has a very interesting story of being a physio, retiring, having a stroke and then taking up art on a cruise ship. She isn't a "professional" artist, nevertheless I really like her style and bubbly personality. She spent the morning's session revisiting various techniques, using bits of sponge, sticks, cotton buds, cotton cloth, alcohol gel, cling film and salt. I am very happy to say that art has suddenly become very playful. I enjoyed this morning's class so much, I went back this afternoon and painted a springbok while Khachik was in the gym. I am happy with my springbok too. What a delightful way to while away a few hours.
We dined with a new couple tonight. They were called Maggie and Alan, from Aberdeen. Lovely people, retired academics who have done lots of cruises over the last 20 years. They were able to advise us a lot about future cruises. (Alaska, Eastern Europe and South America to name a few!) After dinner we went to the Curzon Theatre for a Four Seasons tribute act called "Walk like a Man" - Loved the two decades worth of memories stirred up by the music again. Even got all emotional, although i don't like to broadcast it, so please don't tell anyone. The theatre was chock full, and I also hesitate to admit that there was lots of singing along and almost, but not quite dancing in the aisles - by that I mean one or two people got up and moved in that direction, but then changed their minds.
We have another immigration process for a new country in the morning. After South Africa the mood around immigration procedures is in general a bit "low"! Khachik and I weren't badly affected because we weren't in a hurry, but some poor folk were left queueing in the heat for hours, 5 hours. So, our plan will be to take it easy again. Our face to face inspection will luckily be after breakfast because our excursion is not until early afternoon. (Smug smile)
We are back in the cabin now ready to sleep, just going to watch a bit of telly, thought about Luther but then it got a bit scary, so I'm now flipping between Live at the Apollo and a travel programme about Namibia.
Will say bye for now xx
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