Today is going to be a sweltering day here in Cape Town. The weatherman predicted at least 35 deg C. We are having a late summer as this is the temperature Cape Town usually experiences in February. This usually happens just before winter comes. Winter often arrives in Cape Town with gale force winds and heavy rains.
This is why Cape Town is not only known as the Cape of Good Hope http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_of_Good_Hope, but as the Cape of Storms as well. Bartholomew Diaz, the Portuguese seafarer, named this part of southern Africa, the Cape of Storms http://www.capetown.at/heritage/history/explorers_merchants.htm. The then Portuguese king wanted more traders to come to Africa and to go to India and therefor renamed the Cape of Storms to the Cape of Good Hope.
Have a look at this site giving you more information about shipwrecks around the Cape of Good Hope. http://www.capetown.travel/attractions/entry/cape_town_shipwrecks. Obviously there are many tales of heroism and the most famous being that of Wolraad Woltemade who risked his own life and that of his horse to save the lives of others http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolraad_Woltemade. Wagner's opera: "The Flying Dutchman" is such a folklore about a ship that went under around the Cape of Good Hope. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Dutchman
I have added a photo of a bronze plaque taken on top of Table Mountain indicating the layout of the Cape of Good Hope. The sea is stretching around the Table Mountain National Park on the right hand side of this plaque. On the left is land and built-up area http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Table_Mountain_National_Park
Well that is a lot of reading. Remember to visit my on-line store at http://www.bestforreading.com for a wide selection of books. I have updated my website with the latest books available. Have a look at this book which can be bought from http://www.bestforreading.com
Argo: How the CIA and Hollywood Pulled Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History [Paperback]
Book Description
The true account of a daring rescue that inspired the film ARGO, winner of the 2012 Academy Award for Best Picture
On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants stormed the American embassy in Tehran and captured dozens of American hostages, sparking a 444-day ordeal and a quake in global politics still reverberating today. But there is a little-known drama connected to the crisis: six Americans escaped. And a top-level CIA officer named Antonio Mendez devised an ingenious yet incredibly risky plan to rescue them before they were detected.
Disguising himself as a Hollywood producer, and supported by a cast of expert forgers, deep cover CIA operatives, foreign agents, and Hollywood special effects artists, Mendez traveled to Tehran under the guise of scouting locations for a fake science fiction film called Argo. While pretending to find the perfect film backdrops, Mendez and a colleague succeeded in contacting the escapees, and smuggling them out of Iran.
On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants stormed the American embassy in Tehran and captured dozens of American hostages, sparking a 444-day ordeal and a quake in global politics still reverberating today. But there is a little-known drama connected to the crisis: six Americans escaped. And a top-level CIA officer named Antonio Mendez devised an ingenious yet incredibly risky plan to rescue them before they were detected.
Disguising himself as a Hollywood producer, and supported by a cast of expert forgers, deep cover CIA operatives, foreign agents, and Hollywood special effects artists, Mendez traveled to Tehran under the guise of scouting locations for a fake science fiction film called Argo. While pretending to find the perfect film backdrops, Mendez and a colleague succeeded in contacting the escapees, and smuggling them out of Iran.
Antonio Mendez finally details the extraordinarily complex and dangerous
operation he led more than three decades ago. A riveting story of
secret identities and international intrigue, Argo is the gripping account of the history-making collusion between Hollywood and high-stakes espionage.
My recipe for this week is: Ginger Dumplings
Dough:
15 ml (1 desert spoon) butter
250 ml (1 cup) flour
5 ml ( 1 t spoon) Bicarbonate of Soda
125 ml (1/2 cup) cold water
30 ml (2 desert spoons) apricot jam
5 ml (1 t) ginger powder
Rub the butter into the flour. Mix the bicarbonate of soda with the water and add to apricot jam and ginger and then add to flour mixture.
Syrup
625 ml (21/2 cup ) boiled water
250 ml (1 cup) sugar)
15 ml (1 desert spoon butter)
Place all the ingredients in a pan and boil. Pout the syrup in a oven dish (with lid). Dish up spoons of dough in warm syrup and bake with lid on at 180 deg C until ginger dumplings are golden brown and the syrup milky. Have a look after 30 minutes. NOT EARLIER. The dumplings will not raise.
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