There he goes...

Ahead of his trip to China, Danie was let off work a little early yesterday.  He works hard and has very little time off to relax and enjoy life.  His phone rings 24/7, which is exhausting.  So, yesterday was a much welcomed early day for him.  Jake and I met him at his house and we decided to go through to Kalk Bay to do some fishing off the harbour wall.  The weather was perfect.  It's often very windy on Kalk Bay's side, but it was calm and warm.  The sea was gentle and it was just such a relaxing afternoon together.

Jake's tackle box is a bit of a mess, he's good at lots of things, but house work isn't one of them.  He had some fresh bait in a bag too...

 There they are, my two pork sausages, sticking out their tongues as usual.  Laila came with for the outing... 

 Jake's fresh bait...

 Since he's the fisherman, he has to cut his own bait.  Judging by this photo, he doesn't really enjoy this part of fishing...

The fish was still frozen, so he had to work hard to get it cut through.  And yes, he was warned about 17 times not to cut his fingers...

Once the bait was on the hooks, they casted and then began the waiting game...

 And wait we did...

 It's a very tiring thing, waiting for a fish to get hooked on your line.  The waiting is painstaking, actually...

  But there are lots of pretty things to look at, like these cormorants searching for their dinner.  I hope they had better luck than we did... 

 Jake gave up fishing over the harbour wall and tried inside the harbour instead...

 Me, I just take photos and enjoy the company of my guys...

 All excited because someone else had managed to catch a fish of edible size... 

 So back to his rod he went.  Jake's pretty good at casting, I think.  For a little guy, he's not bad.  Every now and then he makes a mistake and ends up with knots in his line, or bird's nests in his reel, but it's all part of the learning...

 Once our fishing was done, much to Jake's disappointment, we headed home to drop Laila off, before going through to the Cattle Baron for a quick steak supper.  YUM!  The sun was low and the air warm and Danie pulled over so I could take some more photos.  That's Muizenberg beach below.  Danie's suburb is just slightly to the left, for those who don't know Cape Town.  Nice and close to the beach...  

Anyway, while I'm feeling a bit down about saying goodbye to Danie this morning and 10 days feels like a very long time today, I know he's going to have an amazing experience and the time is going to fly by.  Literally.  He's travelling with his colleague, Leroy, so has company too, which is always nice, especially in a country like China.  So, they land in Shanghai tomorrow and have tickets to go to the F1 in Shanghai on Sunday (very jealous).  On Monday and Tuesday, they'll be in training for a new machine that their company has bought; Wednesday and Thursday they're is going to explore the world's biggest plastics expo (sounds thrilling) and then they're off to Beijing for 2 days to go and see the Great Wall of China and have some down time before braving the long trip home again.  They fly out of Shanghai on Sunday and land back in Cape Town on Monday evening.  I had initially wanted to go with Danie, and make a bit of a holiday out of the trip, but unfortunately it wasn't possible.  It probably worked out best that I'm here with Jake back at school and so many extras on the go at the moment.  Still, can't help being a little jealous that Danie's away and I'm stuck here.  Although, from the pictures above, is there anywhere else in the world I'd rather be?

A little personal note to Danie:  I miss you like crazy already.  Enjoy every moment of your trip, learn lots and take plenty of iPhone photos for us of everything you see and do.  It's going to be so good for you to have a break and a change of routine.  Don't miss us too much and come home safely!!  We can't wait to have you back.  I love you!

Sue XXX

PS:  Dinner with the girls tonight, I can't wait!