Gate 1, South Africa - Day 1, Cape Town

Yesterdays flights, Air France, were both fine but really long and we fell into bed at midnight (South African time) after less than 2 hours sleep in the previous 24. We were up at 6am for a 7am briefing and then off on the bus. We are a tour group of 25. According to our guide, Renier, it can have up to 40 people. This way we each have a window seat on the bus.
The plan was to go up Table Mountain first but it was clouded over and we would have very poor views so we delayed that activity for the afternoon and headed for the Cape.

Our first stop was Hout Bay where we were entertained by the Cape Fur Seals.

There was a large one, on the dock, being fed, and you paid for pictures with it

but there were enough just cruising around in the harbour to keep us entranced with their swimming skills.

Its a working fishing harbour

and I stopped to watch

the fish being processed by hand.

It was also our first chance to see the outdoor souvenir stalls; paintings

stone and wood carvings

wooden, painted bowls

ostrich eggs and so much more. Renier assured us we would see it all again.

Tessa, Christine, Kristin and I with Hout Bay in the background.

It is now 10:30pm and I have an alarm set for 6:30am so that's all I can manage for tonight. I have so much more. I have edited my 300 pictures from today down to 200. So there are still baboons and penguins to post about........., just from today!

Experimenting with Pot Holder Loom weaving

Some time ago (I don't even remember where or when) I bought a little Pot Holder Loom. They are a kids craft item and come with stretchy little loops that you put over the loom and weave a little "pot holder". I had intended to experiment with yarn but never got around to it. In the week leading up to Christmas I gave it a go and got thoroughly addicted.

The loom is metal and you run the "warp" back and forth to the edges.

Then you weave the "weft" using a metal rod, looping it around the hooks on the other edges. Finally you use a crochet hook to pull each loop through the one beside it and ease the yarn off the side hooks.

The addictive part is the different effects form different yarns and patterns.

Once I got going I decided that everyone in the family needed a set for Christmas!

I called them "soup bowl coasters" for those times that you eat at the coffee table (come on, we all do it)

4 together became a placemat.

I tried "felting" one but it ruined the woven look and still didn't shrink it down to coaster size, so gave up on that idea.

The lake is starting to freeze and it amazes me that people think it is safe to walk out to the edge of the ice.

Leading up to Christmas

The last few weeks have been spent in Christmas preparations and following the Volvo Ocean Race on line. (This is turning into an addiction as I check the videos every day and am amazed at the wind and wave conditions sailing from Cape Town to Melbourne, through the Southern Ocean. Certainly makes Lake Erie, even at its worst, look pretty tame.)

Rasta has staked out a spot, under the tree, in the sun.

Exploring the menu button on the borrowed camera, I found a mode called "Pet Portrait". So I had to try it out.

I started to knit a blanket for the spare room, last spring, one square at a time.

Luckily Mum took it over and whipped them up in no time. Now I am working at sewing them all together so the blanket is ready for all the overnight guests this Christmas.

"Long Point Santa" standing on the beach, hung in the window.

Snow and wind have been the order of the day on the beach.

Sculpting into stationary waves

and icing the trees.

Its making a suspicious humming noise. It needs to be guarded

Fun weekend - no hiking

This year most of my time with my sister, Nicola, has been our periodic days spent hiking on the Bruce Trail. On one of those days I mentioned how much I hate decorating for Christmas by myself and Nicky offered to come and help. Our only agenda item was to get the tree up.
So, right after coffee and breakfast, on Saturday morning, we did just that. And only that. We then took off, to Tillsonburg, to find a pattern for the bed runner that Nic is going to quilt for me.

Rasta giving his approval for

the fabric that we picked out about a month ago, in St Catherines, for the bed runner.

In Tillsonburg we "hiked" the main street and then went into the quilt store, "Cherished Pieces", which Nicola declared her favorite so far; lots of fabric choices, patterns, books, accessories and really nice and knowledgeable staff.

Good prices too. As well as a book that had some lovely runner patterns, Nicola also bought these "fat quarters" as they were beautiful and well priced.

 Lunch at a place called Cup and Cake, a visit to a bakery and good coffee rounded out the visit. It was late in the afternoon when we got home but we walked into the Provincial Park and came out with a basket of greenery and berries.

Wove them onto a couple of wire wreath frames

(the red berries are High Bush Cranberry but I have no idea what the orange berries are)

wrapped in battery operated twinkly lights and

Ta Daa, 2 outdoor wreaths

completed just as the sun was setting.

Next job

was to decorate the tree.

which didn't take long

with 2 of us doing it, and a couple of glasses of wine.

When we had been coming home from Tillsonburg we found a couple of flocks of Sandhill Cranes, in the corn fields near Port Rowan, but I didn't have a camera with me. So, on Sunday I went looking for them with Nicola and Dave's camera. A good chance to see how good the zoom was for wildlife photos.

They were not in the corn fields but driving further along the road I found huge flocks of Sandhill Cranes and Snow Geese.

I found it a bit challenging to capture

moving wildlife

but it was great practice.

Back a home, I finished the next sample for my Monochromatic McGown teaching piece. This one was hooked with 3 blue and 1 white yarn.

More experiments with the camera - shutter and auto

There are not many fast moving things at Long Point in November to test the impact of a fast shutter speed. I did try one day when I was burning leaves

but the leaves were wet and I just got pictures of smoke. Not a good test to see if it will capture a speeding lion or antelope.

I have concluded that leaving the camera on Auto is probably going to give me good pictures and that I am unlikely to get good enough at switching to the shutter and aperture controls by January to make it worthwhile. The rest of the photos in this post were taken on Auto.

We have been getting our usual late fall wind storms. Sometimes the wind howls so loudly that I sleep in the room at the back of the house.

Milkweed in the evening light.

Nic and Dave's camera has an excellent zoom. I could never get this shot with my "point and shoot".

It responds well to pointing directly at the sun

and also has good results in very low light.

Not exactly an antelope but I scared up some seagulls to practice taking photos of moving creatures.

I found it quite difficult. I was using the viewing screen tilted in such a way that I could look down at the camera and up at the birds. There is a switch so I can use the traditional viewfinder so I will have to see if that is easier on a moving target.