24 December 2024

Choices

You have heard of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Now you can apply that principle to me - Yorkshire Pudding this Christmas Eve.

CHOICE ONE

The flight to South Africa was trouble-free. Straight down to Johannesburg then an internal flight to Cape Town where taxi driver Mohan Lal was waiting to whisk me down to the docks. 

"The Jolly Puffin" is a more substantial boat than I had imagined. I guess it needs to be if it is expected to tackle the notoriously temperamental  waves of The South Atlantic.

Several other bloggers and blog visitors were waiting down on the quay and there was much handshaking and hugging before we were shown to our berths. I am sharing a tiny cabin with Jennifer from Florence, South Carolina. If has been a terrific delight to meet her after so long.

No doubt we will know each other a lot better after the voyage ahead. Six days to Tristan da Cunha. We are on our way. As Rod Stewart sang, "We are sailing stormy waters/ To be near you to be free". The ocean is quite placid right now - let's hope it stays that way.
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CHOICE TWO 

I caught the number 81 bus to the suburban village of Dore. There I alighted and soon afterwards entered "The Devonshire Arms" for half a pint of Timothy Taylor's Ale before beginning my two hour walk home. Half of that walk was through Ecclesall Woods - a swathe of ancient woodland to the south west of the city. Then I was into the affluent suburbs proper, crossing Dobcroft Road then passing Dobcroft Primary School and onward to Button Hill and Carterknowle Road.

It was very mild with not a drop of moisture in the air and milky cloud cover above. I had not had any lunch so this evening I was looking forward to the slap-up Bangladeshi takeaway curry I ordered. We ate it round at Frances and Stew's house with the little ones tucked up in bed waiting for the trip-trapping of reindeer hooves on the roof.

These four  pictures were taken today...

"The Devonshire Arms" in Dore
Gorillas in the woods near the ruins of Ryecroft Mill
Signpost in Ecclesall Woods
Typical suburban house on Button Hill

2 comments:

  1. Well, those are both darn good choices . Try and do both of them or better yet, you do one and I'll do the other.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Gorillas wearing Santa hats and tinsel garlands? No wonder they look so grumpy!
    Like you, I went for a 2-hour-walk, but in much less beautiful surroundings - just through the not at all affluent suburb of Eglosheim, across the rather featureless fields to Freiberg and on to Benningen, from where I took a local train home.

    ReplyDelete

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