We've joined the 21st century!

We bought a cell phone, with a South Africa SIM card!

We owned a cell phone in North America. Kept it in the motorhome in case of emergency. Never used it. And of course it was "locked" to a Canadian network. I know, you can go through the process of unlocking them, but we just never figured it was worth the effort.

But both air time and the cell phone itself is cheap here. Plus, the cell phone is so cheap that it's unlocked to begin with. That means that we can take this cheap little phone to any country in the world and buy a local SIM card and use it there.

No ambition to own any kind of fancy phone, or internet connected kind of phone. Just want to be able to make the occasional phone call.

So, we were told that we could go to a "Pep" store and buy a cheap phone. So we did.

How cheap is "cheap"?

"Beam me up, Scotty!"

So, this little phone cost us R119 ($12.50), and we bought R27.9 ($2.93) worth of air time. I guess we'll see how long that lasts, but given that we don't plan on using the phone very often, it'll probably last a while! Oh, and those prices already include tax. There's a 14% value added tax on almost everything you buy here in South Africa, but it's included in the price you see and pay. Nothing added after the fact, just the way it should be.

Now, all I have to do is to remember to turn it on. 

It rained on and off all day yesterday. So while most of Canada and the U.S. are freezing, our temperatures have been a comfortable 24C (75F), although it's been cloudy and a bit wet. There have been breaks though.

Yesterday, we spent much of the day planning for our upcoming South Africa road trip. That included renting a car, and there are a LOT of options available here. We ended up with an older Ford Laser (similar to a Mazda 323). We'll tell you more about it, and the price we paid when we pick the car up on Thursday. We'll be keeping it for 53 days, so it was worth it to shop around and find a great price. 

What else. Oh, more couchsurfing hosts have come together for us. We're here with Mark until Friday, and then we're heading about 70 kms (43 miles) north up the coast where we're staying in a beach house type place for the weekend. Then on Monday we come back down to the south coast and start heading east along the coast. First stop in that direction will be a town called Hermanus.

If things clear up a bit tomorrow, we're hoping to do some more hiking. Kind of took a break the last day or so. Sure enjoying staying in one spot for a while!