Aquaria - 10. Aqu Chapter 10

Once I had retrieved my airline ticket and checked in my two big suitcases, I headed upstairs to go through customs and quarantine, which I was pleased to see took very little time at all, so I was able to sit down and relax for a while before boarding the flight. Soon after sitting down, my phone indicated that I had a text message.

“Trent, where are you, I want to talk please, I am on the outskirts of Perth, just passing Mundaring, are you at the cottage?” I sighed once again, not wanting to deal with this right now, I just wanted to spend some time to myself, before I re-join the research sub, in about a week’s time. “Sorry, not possible at this time” I replied, “Of course it is possible, I have just driven 750 kilometres, just so I can talk with you” Mitchell replied.

“No, it is not possible, I have passed through customs at the international terminal already, and I am boarding a flight to South Africa in less than an hour” I responded. “Damn, you could have at least waited for me to return to Perth.

Fine, be that way, I thought we could talk and come up with a solution, but obviously you are not interested” Mitchell said in his text back to me. I decided that I didn’t want to argue about it anymore, so I shut off the phone, and placed it deep inside my backpack.

The trip to Johannesburg was long and tiring, and I arrived there at 4.30am local time, and it was close to 5.30 by the time I had collected my luggage and passed through customs, and it was after I had entered the terminal, that I remembered that I had not organise any accommodation,, so I sat on my luggage trolley, and retrieved my laptop, and began to search for accommodation.

I ended up booking a suite for one night, in the Hyatt Regency hotel, which was expensive, but very comfortable, which is what I wanted, and twenty minutes later the taxi pulled up outside the hotel. When I arrived at my suite, I was pleasantly surprised at how roomy the suite was.

Once the porter had left, I pulled out my laptop, and did a search for flights to Cape Town for tomorrow, and I booked a seat on the 9.25am flight, which takes just over two hours. Once that was completed, I had a shower and decided to have a rest, as I didn’t sleep very much on the flight over from Perth.

When I woke up from my sleep it was almost midday, so I changed into some fresh clothes, and headed downstairs, to get some lunch in the hotel restaurant. After I had made my lunch order, I glanced around the dining room, and stopped when I saw a man who looked familiar, seated on the other side of the restaurant, staring at me, and he smiled when he saw me looking his way.

I watched as the man spoke to the waiter, and indicated in my direction, before he stood up and began to walk my way, that is when I realised that it was my father that was approaching. “Hello son, this is a pleasant surprise to see you here” he said to me, and I stood up, “Hello Father, yes, I came in a week early, things didn’t work out very well for Christmas, so I flew out early, arriving this morning” I responded.

“I see, have you made any plans for the next few days yet?” my father asked me, “only that I am staying one night here, before flying to the Cape at 9.25 tomorrow morning” I said. “How about we change that, and you join me for a few days at Kruger National Park” my father suggested. “That sounds like it will be interesting, yes I accept the invitation thank you” I replied.

“Good, we will be staying at the Greenfire Lodge, I have a two-bedroom chalet already booked and paid for, so that is not a problem, and I was planning to stay for three days, before flying to Cape Town, where we will have three days before the Submarine arrives to restock, and take on the new crew members” my father said to me.

After an enjoyable meal, with some live music playing while we ate, I said goodnight to my father, agreeing to meet him for breakfast at 7am, before we set off north east, for our safari trip at Kruger National Park, which I was eagerly looking forward too.

The next three days were amazing, I saw just about all the big animals, from Giraffes, Rhinos, Hippos, Lions, Cheetahs, lots of monkeys and birds of all kinds, and even some Hyenas, which sound strange with their laugh.

The villa that we stayed in and the restaurant were amazing, and it was sad when we had to leave, to make our way back to Johannesburg, to catch our flight to Cape Town, leaving at 1.45 in the afternoon, and landing at 3.55pm.

Dad had booked us into the 5-star Westin Marriot hotel, with adjoining suites with connecting doors, and it has a separate lounge with a large work desk in it. As I was looking around, there was a knock on the connecting door, which I unlocked, and my father walked in, “I was hoping that we could spend some time talking business, as I have a few things I need to tell you” my father said as he sat down on the lounge.

“Yes, go on” I said as I too sat down, turning slightly to face him. “As you are now aware, you are a shareholder in the family company, which has a 74% share of ownership of the research submarine Aquaria, what you may not know is that you are the second highest shareholder after me, and as such I would like you to take on more of an active role within the company” my father announced.

“Ok, I guess I can do that, but what exactly do you want me to do?” I responded, “Well, I would like you to take charge of the Aquaria project, I told you that you have 26% shares in the company, which is equal to the amount of foreign investment companies having shares, what they don’t know is that I have a subsidiary company known as Blackthorn Investments, which has 5% shares in two of those companies that have shares in our company.

This means that you and I, have a clear majority of shares, even if one company tries to buy up most of the foreign ownership shares, which is limited under the rules that I have set, that any individual or company can own no more than 12% shares of the company, and if that individual or company breaches that rule, the two major shareholders, that is us, have the right to forcibly purchase the excess shares” my father said.

“That’s sneaky, but a good rule, so we don’t lose control of the company I guess” I responded, “yes that is correct, so what I want you to do is to take control of the project, in consultation with me. The captain has operational control of the vessel, but you have control of where the vessels goes and what research projects that the vessel gets involved with” my father said.

“Ok, I guess I can handle that” I replied, “that is good, now tomorrow, we will sit down and start working out a plan of where the Aquaria will be going, as I had mentioned to you the other day. With you occupying the starboard side executive suites on deck 6 permanently, we will have the second lounge room, leading off the library, made into an administration office for you to work from.

I will be staying onboard only while the Aquaria is in port here in Cape Town, then I will be flying to our head office in Douglas, on the Isle of Man, it is a beautiful Island, and a great place to live. I bought an old three level building a few years back, located at South Quay.

The building looks terrible on the outside, but inside, it has been totally restored, with polished wooden floors, and beautiful are open spaces, and I have turned the top floor into a large two-bedroom apartment” my father informed me.

We relaxed for the remainder of the day, and headed to the hotel restaurant for dinner, and afterwards, we went to the lounge to watch some live music for a while, before retiring for the night to our very luxurious suites, and I was able to get a very good night’s rest.

The next morning after breakfast, we returned to the suites, where my father pulled out a map tube from his luggage, and inside was some large laminated layout plans of the submarine, with 3 decks per sheet. “When the Aquaria does arrive here, it will be docking on the outer side of the Table Bay Harbour, because it is so large, it would be very difficult to manoeuvre it in the main harbour.

It is where all the bulk container ships usually berth, so the crew will have to be extra careful when leaving the sub to go on shore leave. I have already had discussions with the harbour master, and because we need to load up supplies, that is the only place that the sub can dock, and even then, there is only about fifteen metres of spare room.

The crew will have to rely on the official harbour transport to get them from where the sub will be docked to outside of the harbour region, which will be done by the seafarer’s mission. While the crew are having some shore leave, you and I will be having meetings with Captain Hunter and the senior officers, to brief them on where the Aquaria will be going.

What I told you the other day, about going to Trindade, St Helena and the Ascension Islands, then onto Bermuda, has not yet been passed onto the Captain, so we will do that when we sit down for our meeting with them” my father said to me.

“Where will we be going from there, and how long we will be staying at each location?” I asked, “Well the visit to Trindade will be for 3 to 5 weeks, and will be spent doing research in the area, and it will be a five-day journey to that remote island.

The Brazilian Navy has a permanent base there, and they are expecting your arrival. When you leave there, it will be a 3-day journey to the Ascension Islands, for a two-day R& R stop, and just one day journey to St Helena Island, for a one day stop before continuing, with almost 8 days to get to Bermuda, were you will be resupplying and giving the crew some shore leave.

Once that is done, I will be instructing the captain to set sail for the Isle of Man, which is the sub’s new home port. We will give the crew, some extended shore-leave once there, and we can discuss future trips once you have arrived” my father informed me.

After a little more discussion, we decided to go and do some sightseeing, including taking a cable car to the top of Table Mountain, looking around the city of Cape Town, checking out some of the local wineries, and a trip down to the Cape of Good Hope.

After 1 ½ days of being tourists around the region, we were in my suite, which over-looks the harbour, when Dad looked up from the notes and smiled. “She has arrived” Dad announced, and I looked out towards the harbour, to see the giant green/grey research submarine, being guided in by two harbour tugboats.

Grabbing our wallets and passports, we headed downstairs, and caught a taxi for the short trip to the Mission to Seafarers, where we would be getting a ride to where the research submarine is docking. When we finally arrived at the dock, the Aquaria was just finishing docking, and Customs & Quarantine officers, were waiting there to speak to the captain.

“Good afternoon Sirs, my name is Hamysh Lloyd, Managing Director of Lloyd Corporation, which owns the Aquaria Research Submarine, and this is Lt Commander Trenton Blackthorn, the Aquaria project director” Dad said as we handed over our passports. Trenton will be re-joining the vessel, but I will be flying out of South Africa in two days’ time” Dad added.

We were questioned about the purpose of the visit of the submarine to South Africa, and how long would the submarine be staying for, which Dad indicated for me to answer the questions, before asking about how many crews are onboard, and will anything be taken off the submarine, which I informed the officers of the crew numbers, and that only liquid and general waste for destruction to be off loaded and supplies to be loaded.