Day 5, Year 6 Move to Tuzi Gazi Marina
Date: Friday, October 29, 2010
Weather: Sunny; Winds W 8-12 am, SE 5-10
Location: Tuzi Gazi Marina, Richards Bay, South Africa

We made the ‘big’ move from the International Wall to a slip in the Tuza Gazi Marina early this morning. We asked the boats on the wall to hold on to our lines and walk us back until we could turn. Five minutes later we were in slip #49 in Tuza Gazi. Chris and Geoff of Shambala, Ed and Lynne of Constance, Xolani (pronounced Kolani) and Hebron from the marina, Uli from a big powerboat, and our new neighbors, Juan from Spain and Jane from New Zealand, were all on the dock to help us in. I guess it takes a village to make sure Windbird is safely docked! As soon as we were in safely, we walked back out of the marina and back to the International Wall to help Constance do the same. And then later Armelle T moved over, so the wall is once again just one-boat deep leaving room for new boats that will be coming in. We now have electricity and water and don’t have to walk across someone else’s boat when we want to go somewhere. Getting electricity was not as easy as we had hoped as we did not have the right adaptors. The shop here that sells them wasn’t open today so Xolani loaned us an adaptor until late afternoon when the guy who owns the shop selling what we needed showed up. Unfortunately, while Mark was running up and down the pier getting the adaptor, trying it out, and coming back to return it as it wasn’t the right one, he ran smack into the long bowsprit of a big boat next to Constance and gashed his head open. Thankfully Jean-Alaine on Armelle T is a physician and he came to take a look. The gash is on his scalp and is about an inch-long but it is not deep and Jean-Alaine said he didn’t need stitches. It gash bled profusely and then Mark rinsed his hair and we put Tridine (like Betadine) on it and kept blotting it with gauze pads. Mark is fine but his hair is going to look a little wild for a week or so since he won’t be able to shampoo it for a while. We’ll just have to find him a new hat that covers the whole mess!

We were actually on Constance when Mark got the call to come get the adaptor. I was delivering a belated birthday present to Ed and Lynne. I have been going through the Lonely Planet for South Africa and writing up a ‘short’ guide to the places we want to visit. They don’t have a Lonely Planet, so now they have a shortened version and we can start making decisions on where we want to visit. If we want to go to the same places we can rent a car jointly and save a lot of money. Car rentals with unlimited mileage and full insurance coverage look like they are going to cost about $90 a day for a rental of four days or more. If we can share that cost it will be much more affordable.

But for now we are settling in for the weekend. Mark is starting upload photos to the website. I have hundreds of folders for him so he will be busy for a couple of days. But so far he is finding uploading to go incredibly fast. A lot of things here are much more third world than we expected, but not the internet access. It is 3G and FAST.