Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did.
So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. --- Mark Twain

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Mossel Bay

Having visited the Cango Caves the next stop was in Mossel Bay. To visit the museum that exhibits the full-size copy of the ship in which Bartolomeu Dias in 1488 made a journey from Europe here, to the top of Africa. Namely - to celebrate the 500 th anniversary of the journey - a copy of the ship was built in Portugal, and this ship started its journey from Portugal on November 8, 1887 and arrived at Mossel Bay on February 3, 1988.

The ship found its place at the Maritime Museum in Mossel Bay, where everyone can visit it.

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Its length is 22.5 meters and a width of 6.62 m. The team consisted of 17 men (formerly there were 33 team members on Dias)



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A view to the crew sleeping quarters. Rear - the door on the left takes to the kitchen and the door on the right leads to the toilet. Originally it had been one large room.

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Some more interesting information about the ship of Dias.

The museum of shells was in a separate building.

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A house made of shells.

And another historical object – more than 500-year-old "Post Office Tree".
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This is the place where seafarers of ancient times left each other messages. The first message is known from the year of 1501, the message was inside an old boot and the boot was tied to the tree.

Gordon Bay - 50 km from Cape Town. Nowadays.

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Caught my eye in the street.

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But this picture is in the courtyard of a car service.

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And the picture of the dog is from the same place. Which means that I am back in a service. In the Car Service.

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The bus is up and the gearbox has been off for several hours already.

The problem was that already while driving in Swartberg mountains I noticed underneath the car oily patches. Which meant problems with the seal that was changed in Swaziland.

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As the distance back to Swaziland to the service would have been 1800 kilometres and the cost of the diesel 180 euro – this solution was not acceptable.

So the car is up, and nothing to do but wait for the best.

And at the end of today's story – a picture of the inhabitants of the ocean.
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