Cape Town 20.5.06 Hello there! How are you all? I hope everyone is well and the summer in England is beginning to take shape. Is the male population getting in a frenzy over the world cup yet? So what have we been up to? Well after living it up pretty well in the Big Blue hostel and swanning around in the nice Nissan, we were still in search of our vehicle and realistically new that money doesn’t grow on trees! That meant we needed to reduce our spending on wheels and digs for the foreseeable future while we were still getting the truck organised. As if by magic the perfect solution was found in the Big Blue, stuck on the notice board. So we are now in possession of an ageing VW campervan with camping equipment included which we have parked up in a campsite in Muizenburg which is about half an hour from CT. Now just to get the picture clear, we have a bed in the van, a little gas cooker, pots and pans, and essentially all that we could need to be self sufficient for awhile, plus a means by which we can still get around. Excellent! Admittedly ‘Suzie’ as named by the owners, has seen better days (sho is over 20 years old), but she does go from A to B quite adequately if a little nosily, with a dodgy handbrake and only 4 gears! The only down side to this little treat is that after the initial hot start to our time in SA - which we have found out was not the norm for this time of year and even S. African’s were bowled over by how hot it was - only hours after we had found a nice spot in the campsite, the real weather started. All I can say is it doesn’t rain here it pours!!! Imagine the scenario (a common one in England!), cold winds, persistent torrential rain, grey skies, trying to cook outside and soggy clothes and shoes! Yep that’s what we’ve been enjoying for the last 5 days! Camping…..we love it!! We have been very impressed at how much it can rain here. Honestly we’ve had a couple of dry spells for less than an hour each since Monday! Stay tuned though as we have had a real turn of fortune which you’ll hear about in a minute. Now back to the truck bits. Up ‘til now we had seen quite a few things and had a good idea of what we could get, and all in all we were fairly confident we could find something suitable. We ended up looking at a landrover (the one vehicle I had said I didn’t want to have!) which was all kitted out with virtually everything we could need for our trip. Now it was quite abit more money than we wanted to spend, but considering it was such as good truck, only a couple years old and we wouldn’t have to spend further time getting the extras it already had, we thought it needed some consideration. We took it for a test drive and the guy who was selling it (a landrover mechanic called Mark) also took us to a 4x4 off road drive track to show us what it could do, which was very impressive! So after immense discussion and deliberating we decided to say yes (like the man from Del Monte!) and arranged for the bank transfer to start. There were a few bits and bobs that Mark needed to do to get it completely ready and so we arranged to go back on Thursday and finalise things, as well as go through some important maintenance tips. All is good and we can get excited about nearing the point where we can set off! YEEHHAAA. But we all know life can take unexpected turns when you are least expecting it! And this was just such a turn, on Thursday we get a call from Mark saying could we go and see him straight away. HMMM ominous we thought, but didn’t think too much of it. We get there and he tells us that he’s had a problem with the guy who he is selling the landy for. It appears that the guy who owns the landy hasn’t actually finished paying the finance for it and if we buy it, the bank still really owns it and can take it away, so he can’t sell it to us. Boy what a bombshell, especially as the money is winging its way into his bank account as we speak! What are we to do? Luckily Mark is a really nice guy and has been really helpful right from the start, and he says he is very sorry, and to make it up he is going to get us another landy of the same spec and fit it out with all the bits the other landy had and all for the same money. He also says that his mother owns a B&B in a posh part of CT’s coastline (Camp’s Bay) and he’s arranged for us to stay there until it’s all done (4/5 days) free of charge so that we don’t have to stay soaked through in the campsite anymore! So we are now, living it up in a really lovely apartment overlooking the ocean, with TV, on suite, big lovely bed and out of the rain! What a turn around in such a short time! Mark is hopefully going to get this other landy up together and we could actually end up with a better deal than the first one because all the bits he is adding are going to be brand new, not second hand! But being cautious now we’ll wait and see if it all works out before sitting back and celebrating! We’ll let you know how it goes!...... ……Well we are now the proud owners of a green giant of a landy with lots of nice kit on it! In the next blog we'll tell you all about it and have some snazzy pictures aswell! So we will be back in touch in a while to give you an up date before the adventure really starts and we get on the road to Namibia! Take care all and we hope to hear from you soon! Love Kate and Jas xx PS. We have managed to do a few non truck things too!! In between the rain we have climbed up Lion's Head, which is a very big hill across from Table Mountain. Seen The Davinci Code, very good! Gone back to the penguins a couple of times, still very cute! And been to a huge shopping centre called Century City for a little look (you know how girls are!!). PPS. The weather is still wet and cold, but we are getting used to it!