Category: that’s a bit mad

Ice Road news

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Great news for anyone wanting to travel between the Estonian islands of Hiiumaa and Saaremaa, but who hasn’t been able to get a ferry because of all the sea ice in the… er… sea.

The authorities have opened a 17km ice road between the islands – specifically between Tärkma on Hiiumaa and Triigi on Saaremaa – over the frozen sea.

This is pretty cool (no pun intended), as it’s an official ice road, sanctioned by the government and maintained by a private contractor. You can even check on the current status of the ice road on this website.

The really good news about this official ice road is that it’s safe, simply because it’s sanctioned and maintained. But Estonians are a wild bunch, and so authorities have had to warn against individuals using several unofficial ice roads (no sanction, no maintenance; no Pirlo, no party).
That does come with some risks:

“The concern is really about this uncontrolled situation. The risk is high. Right now, one might think the danger is not great since the weather is so cold. Because right now the road is unclear and not everyone knows exactly where to go. You definitely have to monitor the road. There is just one spot where there’s a crack with water, but otherwise it’s totally passable.”

Oh, just the one spot where the freezing, dark, salty water of doom is creeping through?
That’s perfectly ok then.

The list of rules for the official ice road is long, involving weight limits, visibility constraints, distance between vehicles and banning overtaking. Also:

Seat belts must be unfastened, and vehicle doors should remain easily openable.

But why? Oh, wait.

Oh.

Right.

But it’s not like they haven’t thought this stuff through. How about this for a directive:

The recommended speed is up to 25 km/h or between 40–70 km/h (speeds between 25–40 km/h may generate a resonance wave that could damage the ice).

I wonder how they found that out?

I think that it’s unlikely that ice roads will ever be a thing here in SA. Mainly because of the weather, but then where would we go to anyway? Robben Island? That’s really about it for local offshore land around here. But it’s probably just as well, given our dodgy driving reputation.

Honestly though, this Estonian version sounds like something that you should experience at least once in your life. Or just do an unofficial one and make it the last thing you do in your life.

I could live here

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It’s Denmark, which is the most boring of the Scandinavian countries I have been to (n=3), but still – look at this:

This bar will give you a free beer between 12 and 1pm.

There’s no catch, no obligation to buy another beer or any food or any other product. You just turn up and ask for your free beer, please. And then you can leave, although I’d advise you to drink the thing once you’ve ordered it, obviously.

The only T&C here is that you are only allowed one per customer per day, and that seems a bit tight perfectly reasonable.

As a loss leader for the bar, one presumes that it must work, otherwise they wouldn’t be running it. And – according to the guy who shared this – it’s not a limited promotion either. This has been going on since New Year already, and shows no sign of stopping.

I’ve seen beer offers before, but they’ve always come with the inevitable hidden catch. There isn’t one here. And for reference, a bar-bought 500ml Tuborg costs about 60DKK in Denmark, which is a terrifying R127, so this is a pretty sweet deal.

Sadly, the price of flights alone make this one a bit of a non-starter for us here in Cape Town, but if any of the local pubs are reading this and thinking that something along these lines might be worth a bit of a trial run… well… let me know and I’ll see you at noon tomorrow.

Upload

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Great news: TLC have decided to upload the new series of Mock The Week onto YouTube.

You can find it here.

Not so great news: You need to be in the UK to watch it.

Of course, there are many ways of being in the UK when you’re not actually in the UK, and so that’s not too much of a problem.

And I’ll also be using some of those techniques to enjoy the Winter Olympics over the next couple of weeks, given that our national broadcaster can’t afford it and the local Sports TV service has decided not to buy any rights either.

But that’s reasonable, because it’s only the cold places and the big countries that pay for that sort of thing, right?
Well, if I lived in Curacao or Afghanistan, I could watch.
Micronesia, Ghana and Guinea-Bissau are all broadcasting them, as are Yemen and South Sudan.

Cold. Big. Nope.

In fact, it seems like SA is just about the only place on the planet that is not showing any Olympics.

And so local residents will have to rely on the Olympics YouTube channel (not great) or digitally fly to some other place (like Yemen) to watch.

Which is absolutely ridiculous in 2026.

Why don’t the City do more?

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People are always whining about the various levels of Government in this country. Actually, in any country. No-one is happy. We’ve said this on here before.

But alleged mis-management and poor prioritising aside, this City could do more if it didn’t have to stop occasionally to address shit like this:

Seriaas?

Yes… er… “Seriaas”:

City authorities are warning the public about spreading fake news regarding 500 green anacondas actively living and breeding in Zeekoevlei Nature Reserve after a news alert claimed its existence.

The news alert, which was shared widely on social media, made claims that more than 500 green anacondas were actively living and breeding in Zeekoevlei Nature Reserve. It further stated that the City of Cape Town had declared a state of emergency around the vlei and that access to the reserve was restricted.

A vlei is a lake, for my foreign readers. And a Zeekoe is a hippo. So “Zeekoevlei” means “Hippo Lake”. Of course, there are no hippos in Zeekoevlei, though. No, they live right next door in Rondevlei (“Round Lake”) and they occasionally wander into the suburbs.

What there also aren’t any of in Zeekoevlei (or Rondevlei) is Green Anacondas.

There aren’t even any Green Anacondas in South Africa.
There certainly aren’t 500 in a lake in the middle of the Cape Flats.

But as we’ve seen in other cases, people share first and (probably then don’t even) think later. Here, the consequences are less serious. No-one’s child is going to die of measles (or get eaten by a Green Anaconda, because there aren’t any of them). But the message remains the same. Because despite the authorities having to debunk what is – even to the untrained eye – complete bullshit, there will be people who believed it, and there will be people who will still believe it.

Meanwhile, Eddie Andrews, the City’s Deputy Mayco Mayoral Committee Member for Spatial Planning and Environment, a man who probably spends a good deal of his day just saying his job title, now has to waste even more precious and valuable time writing statements like the one on the link above, meaning less time for Spatial Planning and Environment duties. Statements which most people shouldn’t have to read, but which many people will not read – or will completely ignore – anyway.

There are no Green Anacondas in Zeekoevlei.

No-one should have to be telling you this.