Exams over !! and it's holiday

Both my kids have finished their exams for the year - Kate-Lynn her final year B.Ed degree and Mark his 2nd year Engineering. Wow, well done brats!! So Kate-Lynn is snapped here jetting off to Cape Town for a few days to join Mark. I will then fly in on Thursday and we will all drive Mark's car back to Durban over the weekend so he will have it here for the holidays. We're going to try and make it back in 2 days so will stop over at Plettenberg Bay, Storm's River or Jefferies Bay, depending how the road goes. Should be a fun road trip again.

Into the Blue Sky

Durban's blue skies yesterday was an opportunity to get a clear photo of our World Cup Football Stadium from the air, while on a breakfast flight to Pietermaritzburg before work.

Awarded my Wings today

Today was an awesome day as I completed my flight test and was awarded my wings - National Pilot's Licence in our Sling airplane. My instructors Brad (left) and Noel (right) congratulate me on the achievement. Thanks guys for your guidance and great training. Check more photos on my flying blog here.

Mom turns 79

Congratulations to my mom on reaching the ripe old age of 79!! Next year it's the big one! Here she is with her brothers and sisters-in-law and good friend Jean at the Durban Country Club where we enjoyed a spectacular dinner.

40 year Reunion - Kloof High School Matric 1975

So I started another Facebook group today.. this time for our School Matric 40th reunion intended for a date to be arranged in 2015. Can we be planning so far ahead, and can it really be so many years in the past since we left school!! I have looked over the past few years for school friends on Facebook with little success. The only ones I have some contact with are my friends Greg and Ingrid Boothe over in New Zealand and Linda Peterson (now Rethman) I bump into at our local Spar from time to time. So I have found Shelley Cooke today - both she and Linda helped organise the 1990 - 15th year reunion which was a huge success, and I will delve into old records and see if I can recreate the class lists again. I was in Form VI A (Standard 10) which would now be called Grade 12 and I think there was up to a D class.... a huge project, particularly as it seems my generation don't seem to be particularly computer literate or on Facebook. So if you know anyone from Kloof High School in the 1970s, they are all welcome to attend and they may have brothers or sisters who were in Matric in 1975. Click on the link to the Facebook group here, join and let's chat and make this happen. I'm also on cell 083-7033329.

Kate-Lynn's first job

We were out celebrating with a sushi-feast last night as Kate-Lynn scooped her first job for when she completes her teacher training B.Ed at the end of this year- and it's a lecturing post at her training college. Wow that's awesome and a great achiement!! Well done big girl and another milestone.

So we were out celebrating the big news.

New life in Durban for our Sling

Our new baby has arrived (well my instructor Brad and I actually flew it back to Durban from the factory at Tedderfield Airfield in Johannesburg). Here Llewellyn, Kate-Lynn and I welcome the plane to Light Flight School where I will complete my NPL training in our plane.

Come check it out!!

You're invited to a bring-and-braai on Sunday at my Flying School, Light Flight in Cato Ridge to check out our new plane. Will be flying in the am but the plane can be seen any time from 10am and I will light fires from 12.30.. so please come and be part of the excitement.

Damascus, Syria

For some reason most of my photos of beautiful Damascus seem to have been overwritten by later pics with the same image numbers as my Damascus pics, so I seem to have lost them.

Having toured Jordan, which itself was incredible, we took a taxi up through Jordan on the road to Damascus from Amman. It was ridiculously cheap, like R200, for a 2 hour journey that took us into another country and border crossing all for that price.

Here are my only images of the border crossing and subsequently our palacial suite in the Al Shahbandar Palace Hotel in the old city in Damascus. (pics to follow.. my external drive is suddenly not working)

Al Shahbandar Palace Hotel in Damascus

Petra - incredible temples in the rockface

Red Sea at Aqaba

We met a great bunch of people on our tour to Wadi Rum and then together on to Aqaba where we stayed at the Bedouin Gardens (hostel) for 8JD each sleeping on the rooftop under the stars overlooking the Red Sea, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Sunset over Egypt seen from Jordan across the Red Sea

Desert safari in Wadi Rum, south Jordan

What an experience - cruising the desert with a group of foreigners and our Bedouin hosts, climbing rocky mountains and dunes and bedding down in a desert tent camp; finding a hedgehog in the sands and enjoying a feast (braai cooked underground)... and meeting our host Tyseer in Wadi Rum.

First views of the Jordan desert and Amman

First view of the Amman residences from the Citadel

Work is in the street

Hole in the Roman wall

Desert everywhere en route to Amman

Stopover in Dubai - Emirates everywhere

Misk Hotel, Amman - one of the better Hotels we stayed at

A culture experience describes our first glimpses of Jordan and it's capital city Amman.. house/boxes everywhere and not a blade of grass/flowers anywhere.

Journey begins on Emirates to Dubai and Amman

Drinks on board our direct flight from Durban to Dubai then connecting flight on Emirates to Amman, Jordan. The adventure begins.

The Road to Damascus

Next week we fly to Amman, Jordan, via Dubai and will spend a week in Jordan and the Dead Sea and then travel up on the road to Damascus for another week. Exciting stuff. We were going to Beirut but the embassy savages don't want South Africans there so you have to either have a familymember or friend there who will vouch for you before they will consider giving a "general security" approval. So we switched airtickets to Jordan and the people have been amazing and friendly. Through the website Couchsurfing we have free accommodation and will even be picked up at the airport. Amazing hospitality thanks.

Another Birthday!!!

oh dear, another birthday gone!! You can see the flying.. cool headsets for the plane as well as aviation related magnets and magazine. We all enjoyed a great family dinner.. just missing Markie boy... but got some super cards from the kids... love you brats.. all made my day so special, even D-Tox was there!!

Twins turn 11

We enjoyed a great morning at Giba Gorge yesterday for the twins' 11th birthday. Here's Kate-Lynn, Calvin, Caitlin, and Llewellyn having fun while I snapped the pics.

Calvin (right) with his friend Chris

Caitlin and Teddy

Llewellyn shows he can do it

The Phoenix hasn't risen

It is not often that a ship of the size of the Phoenix is wrecked on our coast. The last I recall was the Aimie Lykes in 1970 when I was still a schoolboy. The latest is the Phoenix which ran aground this week just up the road (or should I say beach) from Durban. Brad took the day picture and we all took a drive up last night to have a look. Amazing sight! The ship was en route to being scrapped, but made it's own way to an early graveyard after breaking anchor and drifting ashore. It seems like they will be pulling her off the rocks and sinking her offshore.