Another beautiful morning

One of the things I like about this time of the year is the fact that we have so little wind.  Over the last few days we've had some stunning days with striking sunsets, but this morning I swung past the beach before work and got a slightly post sunrise photo.  The start of another tough day in the Bay.

Donation #68

Today's post is a public service announcement.  After putting it off for way too long, I finally had time to pop over to the SA National Blood Service HQ next to the Provincial Hospital to do my second donation for the year, bringing my total up to 68 donations.  It was wonderful to see the donation centre busy for a change and I hope it's a good sign for the future.  Blood is a scarce commodity and can't be manufactured so all blood and blood products used in hospitals has to come from actual donors.  Have you ever donated and if so, are you a regular donor?  If not, why not?    

My first photo on Port Elizabeth Daily Photo was...

While deciding what to post tonight I started wondering what the first picture was I posted on PE Daily Photo.  I went digging through the archives and arrived back at 15 March 2009 when I took over Port Elizabeth Daily Photo from Sue and Max Hoppe and posted my first photo on this blog.  It was one of a sunrise at Hobie Beach.  I think it was taken just after the start of Ironman that year but I could be wrong.  Never the less, it was the start of a journey which still continues today, closing in on 3000 posts done since that first one.  Good thing I checked so looking forward to celebrate in a couple of weeks time.

Cemetery fence at St Georges

The old Scottish Cemetery at St George's Park was established way back in 1854 on what was the western edge of town back then.  These days the western edge of town is all the way over at Baywest.

Friday cloud formation

I know I usually post a video from YouTube on Fridays, but today I want to post a picture I took on  y way back to PE from the Tsitsikamma.  Just outside Port Elizabeth I noticed a very interesting cloud formation and snapped a quick photo.  Not long after a friend posted a picture of the same clouds he took from the Donkin on Facebook.  One of the people who commented on it gave an explanation on what it was.  The clouds are Cirrus Clouds which is the most common form of high-level clouds. Typically found at heights greater than 6,000 meters, cirrus clouds are composed of ice crystals that originate from the freezing of super cooled water droplets.  The reason they were making these lines which made it look like the clouds were "leaking out" is wind sheer most likely caused by an approaching cold front pushing the air forward in front of it.  Interesting, isn't it?

A gargoyle and a knight at the Public Library

Have you ever noticed the knight above the old city emblem on the Public Library in the city centre?  Or the figure below?  Although probably a gargoyle but it does look like some mythical forest creature.  

Township take-aways

I was going through some older photos of mine and came across this one I took in New Brighton a while back.  This lady sells roosterkoek and vetkoek from a container near the Red Location Museum (which is currently still closed) and when I worked for Nelson Mandela Bay Tourism and got to go to the museum often I always stopped here from either.  About 5 years back she used to sell the roosterkoek for R1.50 plain and R1.80 buttered.  The mini verkoek was only 20c each and the local kids would come with R1 or R2 and walk away with a hand full.  Writing this my mouth is actually watering and I'm wondering if she's still there.

Red Hot Poker on the Wild Side

The Latin name for the Red Hot Poker is Kniphofia and its also sometimes known as a Torch lily or Poker plant.  According to Wikipedia, it is a genus of plants in the family Xanthorrhoeaceae, subfamily Asphodeloideae, that includes 70 or more species native to Africa.  This specific one I found close to Schoenies.

Explore PE on an Amazing Race

If you're a regular follower of PE Daily Photo you would know that my daughter Miggie was selected to the SA Indoor Cricket Girls Team that is going on an inland tour at the end of September.  Even though it's not an international trip it's still going to cost us a pretty penny sending her on the tour.  Money I honestly don't have.  Which means that we're going to have to do a bit of fund raising and the first project is organising an Amazing Race.  The Amazing Race takes place on 10 June and will take teams of four on a route through Port Elizabeth following clues and completing tasks.  The Amazing Race will be a fantastic way to explore PE a little more and the race will take teams to a number of places I bet they have never been or haven't been to in years.  The cost is only R300 per team which is less than it would cost four people to go ice skating, spend an hour at the trampoline park or even go and watch a 3D movie. The idea is to keep the first team busy for at least three hours with the stragglers coming in probably an hour or so later.  With nice prizes up for grabs to both teams and individuals and the opportunity to spend time having fun with friends it will really be worth entering a team.  

If you would like more information, enter a team or is willing to sponsor a prize, drop me a mail at fireflyafica(at)telkomsa(dot)net or jonkerfourie(at)gmail(dot)com and I will get in contact asap.  This is the end of my shameless self promotion.  Regular posts will resume tomorrow. LOL!

Sunrise over the Bay

I'm not an early morning person.  Too much of a night owl.  So one of the things I like about winter is the fact that the sun comes up later allowing me to get the occasional sunrise pic.  This is a recycled one but I'm hoping to get a few again soon. 

Experience South Africa in one minute

I spent the week in Durban at the annual Tourism Indaba hosted by South African Tourism and can't but help to feel very positive about the country's tourism industry.  To tell the truth, tourism is the industry that has the potential to create the most jobs in South Africa and can become one of the keys to cutting down on the country's unemployment rate.  But that isn't what this post is about.  As it is Video Friday, I am sharing the latest SA Tourism promotional video.  Experiencing SA in one minute.  

Flamingos at Swartkops

One of the things I really enjoy about driving past Swartkops to Uitenhage is seeing the flamingos in the estuary and salt pans. Usually I'm in a hurry to get to where I have to be and I really need to stop more often and take some more photos of them.

Towers and spires

The historic Public Library along with the even more historic St Mary's Anglican Cathedral in the city centre has a very nice collection of interesting spires and little towers.

Schoenies Forward Observation Post view

The view of the coastline from the World War II Forward Observation Post at Schoenmakerskop.  This historic building is now under threat due to a company wanting to mine the sand of the dune on which the FOP is located saying that it "isn't a natural dune".  What a load of hogwash!

Pincushions at Van Stadens

I haven't been to the Van Stadens Wildflower Reserve for a few months so I think it's time to swing by again to see what is in flower.  This is a picture from a little while ago with Pincushions in flower. 

The beacon at Cape Recife

The beacon out at Cape Recife is one of two beacons that were used for shipping purposes before the invention of modern navigation technology.  The second beacon is the lollipop beacon on Marine Drive where Admiralty Road and Marine Drive comes together.  Ships sailing along the coast from the west had to line up the two beacons before they could turn into Algoa Bay.  This ensured that they were well clear of Thunderbolt Reef at the point as well as the reefs inside the bay itself.

#ECMeetUp food

I attended the third Eastern Cape blogger meetup event at The Plantation this morning and there was food.  I mean it was great networking, meeting fellow bloggers, awesome talks and... food. Ok, so I'm not going to post about the event and all the great bloggers who attended, but I am going to show you the food The Plantation dished up for us.  The first thing you saw when you arrived was the pancake table.  Pancakes coming straight off the pan to be topped with all this. 

I decided to mosey over to the Mastertons Coffee table first for a cappuccino and only then back to the pancake table to join the line over there.  I wasn't the only one to have sweets for breakie.

The pancake aftermath.

If breakfast had starters then this was it...

... and this.

And finally breakfast.  If you are curious about what was going on at the event, who was there, what we did and more, then go and check out the #ECMeetUp hashtag on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

The Algoa Bay Hope Spot mini documentary

Algoa Bay is one of six marine Hope Spots proclaimed along the South African coastline.  Although the Algoa Bay Hope Spots covers the whole diverse marine ecology of the bay it focuses on the African Penguin.  The other South African Hope Spots are  False Bay, Cape Whale Coast, Knysna, Plettenberg Bay and the Aliwal Shoal.  Check out this awesome mini documentary on the Hope Spot and learn more about the penguins and other inhabitants of Algoa Bay.

Roosterkoek for lunch

I had to drive to East London yesterday (and missed yesterday's post so will slot one in a bit later today) and back today.  Along the way I stopped for a quick take away.  Want to venture a guess where I stopped?  I'll give you a hint.  In addition to roosterkoek they also sell the most delicious pies...

InniKloof cascades

One of the cascading waterfalls you can see at the end of the InniKloof Waterfall Hike near Hankey.  

Read more about our outing on the hike to the waterfall at InniKloof.

A mountain pool dip

A couple of weeks ago I got to finally go on the Waterfall Hike at InniKloof outside Hankey.  Something we've been wanting to do for quite a while now.  It was a day of beautiful views, huffing and puffing over a mountain, nearly loosing a child in the wilderness and finally taking a swim in a refreshing mountain pool under the waterfall in stunning surroundings.  You can read more about our adventure in the post Up(s) and down(s) and into the water at the InniKloof Waterfall hike on Firefly the Travel Guy.

Returning to high school rugby

I used enjoy watching DF Malherbe, my alma mater, play rugby and netball on a Saturday. A few years after school I actually helped to coach the u14 team for a year or two but as time went on I got to go less and less as life got more and more busy.  Now Chaos Boy is at DF but he doesn't play rugby so we probably only got to go once or twice last year.  This weekend was the first big home derby of the season against Volkskool from Graaff-Reinet and we went to hang out there a bit.  DF's first team pulled off a two point victory in a nail biting game.  I'm sure going to try to go and watch more often this year.

Cape Recife and Schoenmakerskop from the air

This week's Video Friday post is another one of Renaldo Gouws' drone aerial videos, this time of the striking coastline of the Wildside featuring Cape Recife and Schoenmakerskop.

Thankful for the rain

What an absolute pleasure the rain was today.  From the sound of it not much fell in the catchment areas which means we need a lot more but I'm sure at least the lawns around town sighed a sigh of relief.

Underneath the bridge

A couple of years ago I got to walk underneath the Van Stadens Bridge for the first time while following one of the trails in the Van Stadens Wildflower Reserve in search of a Geocache.  A couple of days ago I saw a friend post a similar picture and I decided to go and dig this photo out to post again.  Not the usual view of the bridge, is it?