I suppose you can all recognise these opening words from the song by Simon and Garfunkel called The Sounds Of Silence. The context in which I am using them is about the situation all of us living in South

Every year on Boxing Day (24th December) in St Francis Bay, Eastern Cape, the local Station 21 of the National Sea Rescue Institute hosts Father Christmas. He arrives by boat at a predetermined spot on

Muizenberg Beach in Cape Town on the Cape Peninsula, is where I grew up during the 60's. Beautiful wide beach with white sand, colourfully painted bathing boxes on the beach, the Muizenberg Pavilion behind

By now all you readers must have realised that I love boats, boats and anything that floats! My love of boats started at a young age when my Dad bought a small sailing dinghy called a Pram (called an Optimist

Skipper Peter For the past year and a half I have been the skipper of a canal boat operating from a restaurant on Marina Glades in the resort town of St Francis Bay, Eastern Cape, South Africa. With the

On a beautiful warm autumn Saturday morning we decided to take everyone on a picnic at nearby Helderberg Nature Reserve in Somerset West. The reserve stretches up one side of the beautiful Helderberg Mountain

What is a skim board, you might ask? It is a thin plywood board usually oval shaped with a slightly upturned pointed nose and a flat tail. The top has non-slip tape and the bottom smooth for minimum drag.

When you talk about surfing you think of surfing the waves with a board. I was never any good at board surfing the waves but I was very good at body surfing. For those who don’t know body surfing is the

The Hottentots Holland Mountains form the backdrop to the basin in which the town of Somerset West lies in the Western Cape, South Africa. This is area has many fruit and wine farms due to the fertile

Trek-net fishermen with the day's catch on the beach at Beau Vallon, Mahe in Seychelles. Thanks to judges and curators for this contest. Credit: My own blog and photo.

St Maarten lies in the chain of islands in the Caribbean known as the Windward Islands. Our cruise ship, the Westerdam, docked at Philipsburg, the capital of the Dutch section of the island. Our shore

Petra - Ancient City In Jordan On a cruise from Venice to Durban our ship stopped at Aqaba and we did the bus trip to see the ancient city of Petra. I put together a short video of the visit. Credit: My

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Today it is easy for a vessel to find its way across the oceans and arrive safely at its destination by means of navigation assisted by the use of GPS (Global Positioning System). Just about all ships,

While on holiday at Oyster Bay Resort in Sebastian, Florida, we happened to see a group pf bikers stop for lunch at a restaurant on the waterfront. They rode into the parking lot on their gleaming, beautifully

Normally when a ship leaves the port the port's pilot is on board to make sure it gets out safely. Then the pilot is usually picked up by the Pilot boat and returned to port. Conversely, the pilot is dropped

Marina Glades of St Francis Bay, Eastern Cape, South Africa adjoins the Krom River near its mouth to the Bay of St Francis. Marina Glades Living near here I have seen many foreign yachts come and go over

I have put together a short video of our snorkel trip on the Fury Catamaran in Key West when we were on our family cruise holiday in the Caribbean. Our cruise ship, the Century, of the Celebrity Cruise

When our cruise ship stopped at Seychelles for a day, we met a local called Jimmy who demonstrated how to strip the outer shell of a coconut so that we could take only the inner nut home in our baggage!

While on holiday in Mahe, Seychelles, we were walking along the beach at Beau Vallon in front of our hotel when we stopped to watch and record a para-sail take-off. Credit: My own video material and blog.