What I miss the most on this trip is civility. No one trusts one another and to be quite frank I want to go home and get away from this. Most people fall into the camps “Love it and want to move there” and the other camp is “Seen it but will not go back”. Alas I fall into the last camp.

Oh well! BA take me home.

Another early start and I am off across the N2 towards the “Private Nature Reserve at Aquila”. The so-called drive is about 90 minutes but in total it took me just under 2 hours including a 5 minute stop for some water and a quick leg stretch. Again, once you get through the Cape Flats you are faced with this wall of mountains.

Work, work, work. I have got to catch up on some bits for MFI before I get home. So today is a rather quiet solitary day in my room.

I have managed to get out in the afternoon to the Kirstenbosh Botanical Gardens. The sun is high and it’s gone 2 p.m. when I arrive. I must stand out like a sore thumb as I am the only person without a cooler box!

Up, early and away and I am down at Bolders Beach by 7 a.m. There isn’t a sole including the workers at the penguin colony. A Chubb security van goes steaming past and stops at the gates whereupon the occupant gets out and leaps over the wall. That is the way to do a robbery, pretend you are a guard.

At the ferry departure point it is a quarter to eight and the group waiting for the eight o’clock to Robben Island has assembled. Only to be informed that the ferry has been cancelled due to a technical fault; someone got out of bed too late more likely.

Here I am in Cape Town at the beginning of 2004 not knowing what it brings or takes. It is more fun guessing than having it all planned and mapped out for you. A nice quiet day is called for with a little sauntering and reading.

I head off up to Kloof to see if there is anything else above the area I visited the other day.

I didn’t expect the length of ride out to Gainsbrain but if I had read the literature I would know.

The VW minibus, standard transport for groups of three to ten people collects me and a group of three from the hotel. In total our little bus group is made up of a guy from one of the RFA ships in the dock…

Well it is almost the end of the year and reflecting back it has been a bit of a helter skelter year. If helter relates to the highs then work and the business has been a high; after all this time last year I was still an employee whilst now I am my own boss. Trips all over the place and new experiences have helped to widen my competencies. Skelter, well the lows must be everything socially or rather that lack of any social or what I call relationships.

Nazeem greeted and introduced me to Robert on my arrival to the foyer. Robert is a fourth generation South African mixed with Welsh, English, Spanish and possibly Dutch East Indian. He speaks very good English and probably more averse to these tours than Nazeem.

There are hundreds of people, families and kids in the breakfast area when I go down but that’s probably due to the lateness.

This time the few postcards I am sending will leave relatively early in comparison to my normal efforts. Those from Uzbekistan were sent on nearly the last day and took over 6 weeks to arrive.

I realise now that South Africa has little culture and it’s almost how I imagine Australia. This I discovered or rather assumed after today’s tour. After venturing down to breakfast in the Holiday Inn, so alike any other Holiday Inn, but that’s the format, so accept it, I head on foot back to the epicentre that is the waterfront.

How exactly do you start a journal when the departure date from London is 25th December. It’s ridiculous as only a week has gone past since my birthday. Amazing that in the last two weeks I have met over a dozen people heading to Cape Town and travelling on Christmas Day.