Tristan : Tristan gets bus for pensioners
Submitted by Tristan Times (Sarah Glass) 13.09.2007 (Article Archived on 27.09.2007)

The SA Agulhas arrived at 11:30 on the 12th September to beautiful weather, passengers were flown ashore by helicopter and the stevedores worked to get the four vehicles ashore, one being a secondhand bus for the island.

Photo (c) James Glass (Tristan Times)

Tristan gets bus for pensioners

Photo (c) James Glass - The new Bus for Pensioners 

The SA Agulhas arrived at 11:30 on the 12^th September to beautiful weather, passengers were flown ashore by helicopter and the stevedores worked to get the four vehicles ashore, one being a secondhand bus for the island.

This 24-seated, previously a school bus in Cape Town, South Africa, will be used mostly to take the pensioners three miles from the settlement to work at the patches.   Some might ask why do you need a bus when you only have approximately ten miles of surface road, but when you have pensioners who work well into their eighties growing the special Tristan potatoes and vegetables at the patches (and it's a 3-4 mile walk) a ride in the bus after a day of back breaking work, makes all the difference.   It will also be beneficial to those going a few miles to feed their animals in winter.

The fresh fruit and frozen was also landed, but there was not time to unload the other general cargo due to the late arrived of the vessel.   Today the 13^th September the weather has deteriorated and the sea conditions are not workable, so the Agulhas has departed for Gough Island, and to deploy weather buoys.   The remaining cargo will now only be unloaded in about three weeks time on her return to Cape Town via Tristan.

Sarah Glass