We get an e-mail from the agent for Westerbeke in SA today asking if our part has arrived which leaves me somewhat amazed that he doesn’t know. I don’t know how the system works here but something is definitely screwy with too many people involved. We learn that the parts arrived over the weekend and are somewhere in SA but we are not sure whether this is Cape Town or Durban. Hopefully they are in Durban as this is only 90 miles away, less than two hours by road.
At least something works today. My passport package gets picked up early from the marina and starts on it’s journey to the British Consulate in Pretoria.
The weather, which starts off unbelievably hot in the morning, clouds over and starts to rain in the afternoon, just as I arrive back at the boat with a load of laundry that I have decided not to dry in the machines but to hang out instead. Typical. The boat ends up looking like a Chinese laundry again inside, damp things hanging from every surface.
Diane, Jim’s secretary in the US continues to battle on our behalf and eventually is able to give us the name of the warranty administrator at Westerbeke and her direct dial line. At last when Mike calls her, she is really helpful and he gets information that he can actually use. She gives him the name of the forwarder in SA and his direct dial. When Mike talks to him he says that they have been waiting for the SA agent to provide them with the name of the clearing agent but when Mike calls the SA agent, they have obviously left for the day. This is the trouble with talking with people on two different continents and very different time zones. It will now have to wait until tomorrow.
We go over to Tucanon for sundowners with Irene, Dick and their friend John, along with Jutta, Jochem and Eline from Chessie. Eline tells me about some truly horrendous sounding shiny, silver, leopard print leggings that the girls are going to wear at carnival in Recife (Brazil) and offers to get me some too. I’m in.
We leave Tucanon and head for the marina entrance to get a taxi to go out for dinner, but Jutta, who has been feeling unwell all day, suddenly feels much worse and we end up taking her back to the boat. The weather is still foul and as we have food in the fridge, we decide to stay in tonight and go out tomorrow evening instead. I force feed Mike some healthy green stuff, much to his disgust (although I allow him to have some decidedly unhealthy fruit cake as a desert) and we watch a movie
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