Cape Town's winter has begun.

Storm clouds over Table Mountain



We've had drought conditions here in Cape Town since last winter when we did not get our normal quota of winter rain.

To save water restrictions have been placed on us and gardens have suffered terribly because of the restrictions.

Because of the drought a brand new industry has sprung up in Cape Town.

Every houseowner has decided to put down a wellpoint to keep his garden alive.

Fortunately I got in early and had my wellpoint done a year or two ago which allowed me to water quite freely while others were restricted.

Unfortunately as the drought got worse so the underwater supplies also got scarcer, so much so that where I could water for an hour before the pump started sucking air it did that after about five minutes in the last week or two.

To make matters worse the levels of the dams deteriorated as well and were down to about 27% at the beginning of this last weekend.

Cape Town was desperate for water and one could feel the mood of the people as rain clouds gathered over Cape Town only to be blown away again without a drop of rain falling.

This weekend a south east gale came up, normally this is a summer wind and does not bring rain.

With this wind the thunder clouds started to gather and on Sunday afternoon we had a short sharp shower of rain which came in from the east and not from the north as it normally does.

Shortly afterwards the clouds once again blew away and we thought that the rain had gone again.

An hour or two later the clouds started to build up again and as it got dark Cape Town experienced the most wonderful thunder storm.

Cape Town seldom experiences thunder so you will find most Capetonians and their dogs hiding under their beds as the thunder and lightning crashes overhead.

At times the whole of the sky was alight and here and there fork lightning stabbed groundwards as the storm raged.

With the storm came the rain.

Lovely hard rain that teemed down and lashed the parched earth.

Gutters were soon full and streets became rivers as stormwater drains took strain from the downpour.

The good news is that the storm raged for hours and that this morning (Monday 11th April 2005) it is still raining.

Maybe we are going to have a good winter this year and get our full quota of rain.

The best of all is the feeling one gets when you step outside after the rain has stopped.

The parched earth looks green instead of brown and everything just comes alive when it gets a bit of water.

After such a long and hard summer I am sure Capetonians are all rejoicing this morning, even if it took them hours longer than normal to get to work because of some of the flooded roads.

On behalf of Cape Town I say thank you to God for the rain.

He knows exactly when to bless his people.


Geoff Fairman
Visit the turtlesa website for more photos
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Ps These storms were very severe and brought about large scale flooding in the Bredasdorp Cape Agulhas area.

Did you know that in South Africa ?

1.You can be fined a R150.00 for letting an animal stray onto a public road.
2.You can be fined a R100.00 if you are the driver or a passenger on a motor cycle for not wearing the chin strap of your crash helmet.
3. You can be fined a R100.00 for not giving way to an emergency vehicle using its siren.

Above are some of the petty fines that you can bring upon yourself.

Of course there are the more serious ones such as failing to exhibit your car licence which you have already purchased but have forgotten to stick onto your windscreen.

The fine for this serious offence is in excess of R500.00.

Of course the authorities use underhanded methods to catch the unwary.

I'll just list a few for you.

Speed in South Africa causes many road deaths especially on our national roads yet the traffic officials set up their speed cameras on downhills into country towns to catch those people who have failed to slow down to 60 kilometres per hour within a hundred metres of passing the road sign.

The speed limit before the advent of the sign being a 120 kilometres per hour.

On the N1 highway out of Cape Town the authorities have set up a speed camera in an 80 kilometre per hour area where the camera is hidden behind a road sign.

Unless you know of the camera you will ride over the trip wires before you see it.

Over the Easter weekend the traffic officials parked their white panel van on the left hand side of the road just below the crest of the hill facing oncoming traffic so that it looked as if the vehicle had a problem.

When you got closer there was a camera hidden next to the vehicle photographing oncoming cars doing in excess of the speed limit.

You might ask “ What am I going on about”.

Let me tell you!

In South Africa its all about making money.

Road Safety although blasted over the radio and TV is not the main issue.

Municipalities and traffic authorities are out to make budget and the easy way to do it is to target soft targets.

Hidden cameras capture thousands of speeding cars each month in areas where a couple of kilometres above the speed limit will do no harm.

It's also very easy on the traffic officials as there is no confrontation.

Many of the cameras being used on our roads do not belong to the traffic departments because the duty of regulating speed on our roads has been outsourced to private companies.

They bring in far more revenue than the traffic officials ever would even after having to pay a commission to the outsourced company for capturing the speeding motorists on film.

Motorists are being targeted and the real criminals “ murderers, rapists etc are getting away scot free.

A report in a local newspaper listed a number of alarming facts in one of their latest issues.

Below is one of them:

The South Africa Law Commission advises that only 6% of all violent crimes reported and investigated by the SAPS result in a conviction.

Of those reported 75% do not make it to court and of the balance approximately 50% of offenders are actually convicted.

These statistics make really terrible reading.

If we were to compare the violent crime conviction rates to those of traffic offenders I am sure that 95% of the traffic offenders caught on camera end up paying their fines.

It is easy to regulate soft targets and honest people.

What conclusion does all of the above lead me to.

If private traffic officials can achieve about a 95% conviction rate for traffic offences why not employ private investigators to investigate serious crime and pay them when they get convictions.

With a bit of luck the real criminals of our country will get their just desserts.

If this were to happen and be succesful the country would save millions in security costs as the public would not have to turn their homes into prisons to keep themselves safe.

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Read about S A Prisons in the latest Turtle Essays Ezine
Here is the link:
S A Prisons


See you all soon

Geoff Fairman