The Year in Pictures

It’s been almost a year since the last post. A narrative on the happenings would be longer than War and Peace. So, to save you from boredom, we’ve decided to post a smattering of pictures of the year that was:

Île à Vache

When the aircraft was undergoing routine maintenance, we slipped out of Port-au-Prince to explore Île à Vache…

The Island of Cows, lies off Les Cayes, about 200 kilometers west of the capital Port-au-Prince and roughly halfway along the southern coast of the Tiburon peninsula. It is only ten kilometers off the coast, but a continent away from the hustle of Haiti. The island got its name during the seventeenth century when pirates used it as a provisioning stop.

 

Under the Tuscan Sun

In September 2017, we spent three weeks in Italy, where we travelled to Verona and Venice before touring Tuscany.

In Verona, we experienced Tosca in the two-thousand-year-old arena.

Venice was Venice, with tourist crowds that outnumbered the residents. But it wasn’t difficult to get away from the crowds, even near the Rialto Bridge, where a step to the left found us at All’Arco a small bar serving delicious cicchetti to a local crowd.

We attended the Regata Storico, the annual gondola race down the Grand Canal that has been a fixture since the thirteenth century.

 

We travelled to the islands of Murano and Burano, famous for its colourful houses.

From Venice, we travelled to Tuscany, where we based ourselves in the small town of Gambassi Terme. We could see the medieval towers of San Gimignano from our terrace.

On the way to the market in the nearby town of Certaldo, we stumbled across a medieval festival.

San Gimignano, with its iconic towers, was a short drive away.

Not far from San Gimignano we followed Francesco and his dogs Sally, Angie and Nuaoro through the undergrowth in search of truffles. Francesco’s biggest challenge was preventing the dogs from eating the truffles that they found.

In Florence, we stayed on the south bank of the Arno, away from the crowds. We visited the Uffizi Gallery and soaked up the standard Florence experience, but the highlights were watching the movie Dunkirk at the Odeon, discovering a wine bar around the corner from our apartment and experiencing lunch at Ristorante Alla Vecchia Bettola, where the locals eat.

We took the train back to Rome, where the journey had started. There we met up with family and friends. Nicky’s sister Susan joined us with Harley and Noa. We also met up with Giuditta, who introduced us to her uncle Giovanni – a devoted son of Rome.

One evening, we were all having sundowners outside the French Embassy. Giovanni explained to us that the embassy was housed in the Palazzo Farnese, a former home of Pope Paul III. He was telling us about the frescos and other works of art inside when the police began putting up barriers in front of the building. We learned that it was the one night of the year that the palace was open to the public and quickly joined the growing queue.

 

 

Antarctica

In December we sailed to Antarctica on board the sailing vessel Pelagic Australis. It was an unforgettable experience, but we took some photographs, just in case.

 

Jacmel Carnaval

On 1st January this year, we learned that the contract in Haiti had been cancelled by the UN with only a month’s notice. We returned to Haiti uncertain of the future, expecting to fly the aircraft back to South Africa via the Azores. But our employer signed a contract with a local airline, and our stay in Haiti was extended.

We had a few days off between contracts that coincided with the annual carnival in Jacmel.

Leaving Haiti

The new contract in Haiti didn’t give us any time to explore. So we cut our losses and said a sad goodbye to a country that we’d grown to love.