Wild seas

Isn't the ocean just a marvellous thing? Ever changing, in shape and tides and colours, sometimes smooth as glass and mostly heaving like a billowing sheet in a gale, as today.

My view through The Gap provides amazing opportunities to see craft of all shapes and sizes ploughing through the swells, although I daresay none but the behemoths of the seas left the sheltering harbours today. The swell is 22 foot at present, producing breakers that keep us rushing outside to exclaim at - it seems we never get tired of that - but some years ago a weather buoy measured a swell off Slangkop of 17 metres! This was accompanied by one of our classic hurricane style storms that smashes windows on the Atlantic seaboard and throws concrete benches into trees, but this cold front has brought icy Antarctic air rather than destruction.
Temperatures will, they say, remain below 15 degrees for a week at least, which is heavy going for Capetonians who thrive on long sunny summers and generally mild and short winters. Somehow this winter has seemed darker and colder than usual and it will be a relief when the evenings start later. I mean, who wants to be tucked up in bed with hot chocolate and an electric blanket and find out that it's only 6.45?
That is ridiculous! But cosy...