From Merrivale 16 March 1998

From Merrivale

16 March 1998

Dear Alan, Lorna & girls,

We have been here with Sheila now for 4 weeks % enjoying every moment, but all good things must come to an end so I think we will head for home next week via Hayes & sleep over there. We came through the Transkei on our way down & it poured with rain as far as Grahamstown & it was very misty & the roads full of pot holes, cattle, horses & black pigs. It took 12 ½ hours for the 1,050 kms. We had a royal welcome when we got here with all Ronald’s relatives & a lovely fish dinner of calamari & fish.  Do you remember Gerald Phillips, well he lives here & is a skipper on the chokka calamari boats & he came the other night & made us a lovely dinner of curried crab & calamari, calamari in butter, backed crabs & fried fish it was divine. He also gave me 5 kgs of hake he had caught.

The house we are living in Sheila is renting for R1, 300 a month fully furnished & it is 3 stories & has 5 bedrooms & a games room we could use as an extra bedroom. Sheila is going to have a full house over Easter. Taryn has a job with Merle, who is an estate agent & she has her own flat there, it’s very posh & we can see it from here as it is just across & stretch of grass from here. We are only 200 meters from the beach so I spend all the time on the beach, which is very flat & goes out for miles & the breakers not very big. We have also been fishing a few times, but have caught nothing & we are going now as soon as the washing is done as Ronald & Sheila have gone to PE for the day.

Cathy Lesley’s sister now lives in PE & came to see us on Saturday & very disgusted with the way Ronald & Lesley are behaving towards Sheila, just the same way they treated her, but she told me in secret that she has found her son & was in contact with him & his adopted family & they have exchanged photos & that he was going to come & see her , so she was very excited, Ronald & les are still not talking  to me, but Sherry phones all the time & says her mother has now  started to phone her , Sherry is keeping very well & baby due in early June.

Sheila has bought a house here a real bargain as a lot of the houses sell for +- R1 million rands & she got a 4 bedroomed fully house with a garage, one house behind the canals & one house away from the sea            for R185, 000 with fridge, stove, washing machine all the crockery, cutlery pots & pans     etc & all the curtains it is double story with a thatch roof. All the houses have to be painted white & have be thatched or black tiles.

We are going out to Jefferies Bay tonight for Jenna’s birthday dinner. I’ve just got back from the beach & I’m going to walk to the village to post this letter. One has to go to Humansdorp 20 kms away  for all our shopping & a bigger town than Howick, tons of love, Dad, Mum & family