A few photos that got lost in the previous post!

I would say that this is the "Royal Crescent" of Phuket Town though slightly more colourful and busy, less greenery and look at all those electric cables. They hang down near to the ground in some places.

Almost every family gets around by scooter which cost very little (no tax apparently) We saw them for sale, brand new, for around £600. I was lucky to capture this fairly typical family of 5 on board, stopped at the traffic lights, as they usually rush around like maniacs. Some carry their pet birds around too in cages.

The group photo with "the View" taken on Boxing Day as we did a tour of the south of the Island. Crews of Spirit of Nina (Gillian and John) and BionicII, (Jaime, Carmen and their daughter Nyree..not too sure of the spelling here)

And finally, the Christmas tree and the palm side by side in a corner of the Royal Phuket marina where Moonshiner is currently berthed and just visible between the two.

Happy New Year!

I don't think I shall be too sorry to leave Thailand next week! We shall have been here three weeks by then and will have seen a fair part of the island of Phuket at the height of the holiday season. Maybe a visit outside the busy season would show a better side of the place, but then the weather is supposed to be rather more unbearable.....there are already far too many particularly vicious mozzies around for me. I am beginning to wonder if they love the taste of MSG which is in most of the food and can be bought in huge sacks like sugar or rice...I nearly bought some by accident. That wouldn't have gone down well over the Weetabix!
Most of the Thai people are very friendly and polite except when in supermarkets where manners completely disappear. We found a place to buy some provisions yesterday which was the largest and most untidy, sprawling, dirty jumble of anything and everything under the sun that I have ever seen. It was choc a bloc with locals buying sacks full of (dead) chickens and (live) fish together with massive lumps of goo in varying shades of brown which was piled high in bowls on the filthy counters. Thousands of polythene bags containing "something edible?" were stacked everywhere and had swollen almost to bursting in the heat. We didn't buy! All we really wanted was milk and kitchen roll but couldn't find either...we were eventually told after walking up and down miles of aisles selling anything from polystyrene takeawayboxes to sacks of cement, that they had sold out of milk. We found a butcher's section in the middle of the chaos whose counters were piled high with bits of what I concluded might be pork as there was a baby pig's head in the middle of it all. No sale there either..... We found a few items and managed to get to the checkout, paid and left only to be stopped and have all the shopping gone through, pulled out of the bags and ticked off on the receipt. I was extremely hot and bothered by now and not in a mood to wait patiently but we're told not to get cross with the locals as they take it very badly. Grrrrrr!!
One good thing about Thailand is the ability to buy prescription only drugs over the counter at very good prices. I needed Piriton or something similar to help ease the itching from mozzie bites and was able to buy as many as I liked from a chemist. In Guernsey last year, they got very shirty with me when I said that wanted 6 months supply in one go....
It's New Year's Eve today and it looks as though it may rain for most of the day. If so, the firework display may be a bit of a damp squib. We are hoping to get to see the infamous "Ladyboys" who put on an extravaganza called the Simon Show. I saw a few of them yesterday in Phuket Town, buying material. They were outrageous!

A Buddhist temple somewhere outside Phuket Town. The gold paint looked very fresh and we found some pieces of gold leaf floating around. Their temples are much more cared for here than in Bali, Indonesia. I suppose there is more money available?

The view that everyone who gets away from Patong Beach must come to see, somewhere up in the hills in the south of the island. I have to say that it does look very nice from up there but the beaches are all actually full to bursting with oily people when you get just a little closer....

OK, I admit, I'm just not in the holiday spirit at the moment.... Hoping Sri Lanka is less noisy and crowded and cheaper too. More from some way across the Indian ocean in a couple of weeks then........

A Slightly more Colourful Batch of Photos from Thailand

A hornbill seen at Pangkor Island, Malaysia. I wish I could have heard the noise they make. It's supposed to be earthshattering.







These strange looking bamboo poles are apparently meant to lure little fish which turn lure bigger fish to prey on them which then lure the fishermen to catch them all. I have no idea how effective they are but the sea around these parts is choc a bloc with fishing boats trying to catch anything and everything that swims I think. Most fish traps are unlit making them really hazardous at night (Advice is "just don't do it!). The fishing boats can be very brightly lit, at least the ones which catch squid etc but they don't carry normal navigation lights and dash around in all directions meaning that us poor yachties don't get to doze at all on our night watches. Roll on the Indian Ocean!!

I can't help taking pictures of cats...I've got hundreds! This one looked just like a mini "Min" (my cat in Guernsey whom I miss very much) so I thought I'd publish it. Well, why not? Most of the cats in Thailand look very well fed and happy which makes a change from other places that aren't cat friendly.

We had an organised Rally party at the Phuket Yacht Haven and the Thai tourist board very kindly put on a show with their dancers and musicians. They were very good but not quite as amazing as the Balinese dancers. Sorry Thailand!

And this one I took last night in Patong which is where it all goes on..... One night was enough! The "Ladyboys" were out in force and if I'd coughed up 100Baht, I'd have had a proper photo, a full frontal no doubt but I wasn't willing to pay anything so settled for a sneaky rear view. I have to say, they are mostly incredibly ugly from the front anyhow!!

Just a few odd weather photos (I've been having a sort out of my files)

Not really weather, this one though there was ceratinly some around! A large barge being towed backwards into the Lombok Strait and also on fire, hence the smoke! Odd. I think it may have been rubbish that was alight and there was a man up in the bow observing it. No real
danger then but a bit of a shipping hazard I think!


This is just sunrise at Rok Nok, Thailand. it's quite hard to get a sunrise, not because I am always asleep of course. It's just usually too hazy to see.





This is the scene just before a squall hits, providing the weather is coming your way. The sea is an amzing misty emerald green and the sky is pewter. Not captured very well here unfortunately. Thia squall brought 40 knot gusts and rather a lot of rain for half an hour or so.




I was lucky to capture this one, a waterspout in the Java Sea behind a rather nasty squall. This one passed behind us fortunately but we certainly got wet with other squalls passing overhead.





This is an earlier photo of the strait between Flores and Rinca, Indonesia. Interesting in the sense that it is very much like the Alderney Race with up to 9 knots which we are well used to of course but some of the other Rally boats were a little apprehensive. Speeds for all of us were well into double figures for a while!

News from just a little further North

I started this blog just over two years ago before I left Guernsey and I was beginning to feel that I had very little more to write……..I’ve seen an awful lot of sea and many, many thousands of islands across three oceans. OK, I know I have also been ashore a few times but I could be just any old tourist when on dry land. These “tourists” are absolutely everywhere too, let me tell you! Oh, except Blanquilla of course but that was thirteen months ago and half a world away…………

The sea is always interesting to look at because of its ever changing colours and wave forms etc but extremely difficult to describe in words and I have yet to take a decent photo of one of its more beautiful states. Even mirror calm water is constantly on the move. I sometimes think it would be easier to paint.
I still maintain my view that one island is very much like another in the sense that they are mostly just greenish lumps emerging in the distance from the water and also impossible to photograph well unless one comes across the perfect one palm tree desert island (I did once, in the San Blas Islands but it was about 50 yards from the next island which rather spoilt it a little). They are usually better once you get ashore of course but most we have had to pass by out of necessity (speed is of the essence in this Rally). We would still be in the Grenadines if we wanted to set foot in each place I reckon.
So, I was thinking what I might write about in this posting as we left Langkawi, Malaysia which was a jolly nice place I should add. Set among a picturesque group of islands which were naturally impossible to photograph and duty free ashore to boot! But, we had to leave as time was running out to reach Phuket for our next Blue Water gathering and Moonshiner was booked into a marina there for an engine overhaul…..rather important this, to ensure that we can get through the Red Sea area safely next March.

We were about an hour’s motoring NW out of the Langkawi Archipelago and I was keeping a close watch on the numerous fishing boats and their pots which were all around us, as has been the case since we entered the Java Sea over two months ago, when I spotted a large black fin about 100 yards ahead….. “How nice” I thought, a whale. Let’s hope I get a good close up view of it this time so that I might possibly identify it positively for once. They have a habit of diving and disappearing before the boat gets remotely close. This one didn’t. Then another smaller fin appeared and disappeared. Odd. Then I saw a large black hole which I thought may be a blow hole? The boat was getting much closer and the object of my attention wasn’t going anywhere. I started to feel a little nervous. This was big!
I shouted to Dick who was down below that we had a whale very close to us. Then the boat was going right over it…..No time to move out of the way for either of us. We must surely hit each other. My voice rose an octave I’m sorry to say. I anticipated what was about to go on between us and watched over the side with horrible fascination….. A few seconds passed. Then, just beneath where I was sitting in the cockpit, I saw an unforgettable sight. About 10 feet below me, an enormous whale shark was slowly swimming at right angles underneath the boat. I had a grandstand view and I didn’t even get my feet wet! Of course I didn’t get a photograph though I could have done if I’d had my wits about me as I had enough time but the image of this once in a lifetime encounter is ingrained in my memory and I just hope that you’re all incredibly jealous!!!

So this encounter has become the subject of this posting. As I said earlier, being at sea for long periods is never boring and, just sometimes, one gets to see something really, really special. What next I wonder?

And now we are in the Royal Phuket Marina, Thailand where we shall spend Christmas. We are due to leave when the work on the engine is done, hopefully before New Year’s Eve when absolutely everyone absolutely has to be at Patong for the festivities. OK! My first impressions of Thailand weren’t great. It’s full of people who are not Thai! Well I suppose it is Christmas and they are all on holiday which I don’t begrudge them at all but they must be horrified by the prices here. The book information (out of date now!!) said 86 Baht to the pound. The reality is currently 47, nearly half the value. I now want to go back to Malaysia which is cheap, cheap, cheap, but I’m going to keep quiet about it I think!
Photos next time when the internet link is better.....Just boring ones of the sea!!

Malaysia, cheap, cheap, cheap!

How does one leave somewhere dramatically? By storming off or flouncing out or exploding I suppose. If so, then we have certainly not left anywhere in such a manner, thank goodness?! Our attempted departure from Klang last week was quite the opposite in fact. The engine refused to start at all so we couldn’t go anywhere! Angel who were leaving at the same time as us, to make the overnight passage to Pangkor, were extremely kind and agreed to delay their departure to wait for Moonshiner to be fixed. This eventually took three days and a very dedicated Malaysian engineer/mechanic (I don’t even know his name) who eventually worked until 1am in the horrid conditions down in the engine well to get the thing sorted out. It was the exhaust gasket on the manifold this time but I think this has been a problem building for some time. See? I am learning a fair bit about diesel engines

At least virtually everything is cheap in Malaysia so being stuck for a few extra days wasn’t expensive (eating out every meal is as cheap as buying and cooking the stuff….hoorah!) but the river Klang is just so dirty and smelly, we were very relieved to leave in the end.
The overnighter to Pangkor was punctuated as usual by umpteen small fishing boats and nets and a short lived but nasty squall accompanied by torrential rain and lightning, so we arrived fairly refreshed into this very new (for this, read unfinished) marina complex at Pangkor. And it has turned out to be an as yet undiscovered gem for yachts and yachties. The man “in charge” is a charming Chinese Christian Malaysian called James Khoo who has helped us enormously with all our needs varying from taxi driving to hauling Angel out of the water for minor repairs to supplying rat poison. (There is a bit of a rodent problem in Malaysia!)
The whole area is being built on reclaimed land and will eventually contain hotels, accommodation blocks, shopping malls, conference centre etc. You know the sort of thing. The marina part of it is of minor consequence and will merely provide an interesting view for the residents and visitors…...but we don’t mind this at all. We (I) really like it here! I bought a hat (Katharine’s wedding!), shoes, a dress, a large bag, 2 teeshirts, 2 tops and a purse for under £22. Unbeatable!

Angel is currently out of the water for her minor repairs which will I’m sure be very competently done and we have been staying on with her for a few extra days to enjoy the facilities a little longer.
The plan is to leave tomorrow morning (Saturday I think….time doesn’t matter out here at the moment) and head northish for Langkawi where one can buy duty free drink (fairly necessary with Christmas coming) and clear the boat out through customs etc so that we can carry on up the coast to Thailand from where the next post will probably be sent. We will be accompanied, along with Angel by a very nice Dutch built boat, Jaden now owned by an Aussie, Ian and his wife, Jam (Thai, no idea how you spell it!). The more eyes we have out there in the dark to spot the dreaded fishing nets etc, the better!

More photos from the East.

Me in a bellydancing costume shop in Kuala Lumpur. I was drawn to all the gorgeous colours...just like Trinidad's carnival shops. These photos are courtesy of Val and David on "Angel" to whom we swept all the rubbish that had accumulated around Moonshiner's hull here in Klang the other day, the photos of which I posted a couple of days ago. I'm surprised they are still speaking to us! Mind you, most of the rubbish returned upriver with the tide later on that day and an awful lot of it is still bobbing up and down around the marina.

Val took a much better photo of the Petronas towers than I did. This is the image that you see everywhere and shows how they really look.

We four had a meal in Kuala Lumpur in a reggae bar. Pictures of Bob Marley all over the place and run by a Ghanian (How do you spell that?). Anyway it was a nice honest sort of a meal and this picture makes me look less chunky than most!! Thanks again Val. I was rather underdressed. The women are mostly Muslim and wear headscarves and sleeves. I bought some traditional (very cheap...£3.00) headgear in the end but I haven't worn it yet. It may come in handy for keeping out the draughts on night watches..... Makes me look just a tad pious!

This is an earlier photo of a group of Blue water people at a Chinese restaurant in Singapore with our delightful hostesses Eunice and Guan. Angels Val and David are standing behind and seated next to me respectively.

And finally, the first Singapore sling at Raffles Long Bar. Tradition is to leave all those nutshells all over the place. They get stuck in your shoes. Ouch!

In Malaysia, Port Klang about 20 miles from Kuala Lumpur.

This "amazing" picture was taken looking up because we couldn't get one looking down not having pre purchased tickets. All I can say about the Petronas Towers is that they are very well looked after ( very shiny) ...and guarded!!



This is an old picture of me taken in June I think of me sewing in the rain. My hair was recently cut and I had real curls! It was hidden in my camera and I only just found it. You might as well see it here as anywhere.





Angel, a 42' Halberg Rassy with whom we have been sailing in company since Australia more or less. We found all this debris around Moonshiner's hull in Port Klang, Malaysia in the morning after a terrific rainstorm with high winds which broke a barrier upriver and released all this rubbish downstream which accumulated around us. We just swept it on downstream towards Angel! Goodness only knows where it is now......... The river flows fast, but then it also turns and flows back up so the debris may yet return to us....

The same overnight storm actually broke the wire between the pontoons on which we were moored and we discovered that Moonshiner was the only thing holding the pontoons together. We decided not to leave there and then because about five other boats would have found themselves somewhat adrift!

It's nice here though!! Great beer!!!

We hope to leave soon to make it further up the Malaysian Coast towards Thailand but the boat is currently undergoing yet another small engine repair so we wait........ More later.

Singapore, a delightful, clean and safe city.

This is the backdrop to the marina at Keppel Bay where the rally boats are currently berthed. The buildings really are leaning in and the architect is the same one who designed the one in NY to replace the twin towers. They are currently 40 storeys high and going on up.







A model of the marina. Our pontoons are so new that they aren't on this model but are just about in the middle of the photo. The electricity meters on the pontoons were at zero. Real virgin berths!!





Sorry about the blurring. This was just about 6 yards across the equator. An important moment to record I feel. I also have one of the Dateline crossing. Oh dear! This should have been in the last set of photos but it got missed.





I had to include this. We had a meal at one of the malls nearby. This was my duck with chicken broth looking just as it did in the illustration and costing just £2.40. Tasted good too. Food is mostly incredibly cheap here though not at Raffles of course where a gin sling cost £12.50 and a curry £75. I had the drink but not the curry! Photos of that evening in the next post I hope.

And last but not least, this was my one indulgence at the Night safari zoo (open from 7.30pm til midnight every day) and where you travel around a circuit in trams to see many creatures of the night that are mostly sleeping during the day. A very good evening all round culminating in this...me putting my feet into the water and having them nibbled by hundreds of tiny fish. It feels exactly as you would imagine and they really do "clean" up your feet a treat. Should be on the NHS!

Singapore is a lovely city...this from a cityphobe. It's very clean, safe and cheap. Public transport is available everywhere at all times, buses taxis and underground and great prices. If it wasn't so flaming hot and humid most of the time, I could live here.... Might have to learn Cantonese though. I can't understand some of the "Engrish" at all!

We're leaving for Malaysia on Saturday along with a few other boats and we're looking forward to some pleasant daysails with overnight anchoring. Night sails aren't recommended anyway as the coast is overwhelmed with fishing boats. Too many yachts have tangled with fishing nets already and we've had some near misses too... We certainly don't want to add that to our list of mishaps! Next post from Malaysia then...........

Nice photos first. Reading comes later.

It is almost impossible not to get a cute photo of an orangutan baby!

Our guide and driver on the speedboat up the river in Kalimantan. Nice local people.

They also had this gibbon at the feeding centre deep in the jungle of Borneo. I thought they were bad tempered but maybe this one had learnt that if he bit, he wouldn't get any more bananas! There were peccaries running around below eating the discarded banana skins.Life is tough at the bottom!

A fairly typical Indonesian fishing boat. We saw hundreds of them lit up like Chrismas trees at night.

Errrrr...this is a picture of the river which we sped up (?) in Borneo ( Kalimantan). Trees fall into the river daily making progress ever so slightly hazardous!

Anexciting time all round....

Maybe I shouldn’t have written anything about dramatic entrances? Maybe I was tempting fate? Where and with what weather conditions might it be a very bad time for the engine to start to fail? I can tell you… In the middle of the second busiest shipping lane in the world and in the midst of a sudden torrential thunderstorm passing directly overhead with 35 knot gusts laying the boat right over and a waterspout about a quarter of a mile away. That’s where!

The story goes like this……. Singapore is just 20 miles away to the NW from Nongsa Point across the incredibly busy Singapore Strait which the yachts are advised to cross at the narrowest part 12 miles to the west of Nongsa. Several of us left as early as possible that morning to make sure we would arrive in Singapore in good time. The engine started perfectly and we were doing well for the first few miles but then it started to sound as though it was getting short of something…fuel or air maybe, so we managed to flag down another rally yacht, Fai Tira and asked them to stay close by just in case….. This they were happy to do (many thanks John and Pete!) in spite of having their own engine troubles….transmission I believe. The VHF radio was very difficult to use at the time as the airways were full of ships talking to each other while trying to stay away from one another.

We ploughed on with the yankee set to give us more speed as the sky darkened dramatically. The storm broke with almost horizontal rain bringing visibility down to less than a quarter of a mile. All the time, the engine was sounding more and more unhappy and we were only just making about two knots as we crossed the shipping lanes…one or two ships passing just a little too close for comfort….then the engine died completely, we could only just make way under sail and Fai Tira had to do a mercy dash around a small freighter to take our towline, which was all ready to go of course. We still had a few hundred yards of shipping to negotiate. It was close!!

Fai Tira towed us through choppy shallow waters until their engine started to protest and another Rally boat nearby, Laroobaa, took over as far as the marina breakwater. Many thanks to Guy and Simone! A few beers are now owed! After this, the delightfully helpful marina people were there to take us safely into the berth. A few minutes later, a mechanic from a local gin palace was on board and the problem quickly diagnosed and solved. (The gasket on the lift pump.) I know very little about these things except that it could have happened to anyone but that it so often seems to be Moonshiner! We were beginning to believe that this might really be the end of the Rally for Moonshiner as we didn’t know what the problem was at the time. The upshot of it all is that she is booked in for a major engine overhaul in Phuket, Thailand next month. We have just 600 miles and a month to get there so should be able to daysail gently up the coast……. I’ll let you know.

In the meantime, we are enjoying the luxuries of this very new marina at Keppel Bay. They are taking publicity shots for the marina at some point so we may appear on their website in due course. What I’ve seen of Singapore so far looks quite inviting too. I seriously intend to get to Raffles Hotel for a Singapore Sling. I feel I’ve earned one!

Last post Indonesia!

The Bluewater Rally in their wisdom had declared that the rally boats must be at “Nongsa Point” a couple of days earlier than we had all expected and planned for…..something to do with it taking a long time to deal with so many boats all at once. Nongsa Point I should say is the last stop in Indonesia where we would expect to “clear out” of the country before hopping across the Strait of Singapore to…….Singapore (!) which is all of 15 miles away.
Indonesian customs and immigration rules are strict and having tangled with them in Kupang, over a 1000 miles away to the east, we were all keen to do the correct thing, pay our dues and not upset anybody but, hey, Indonesia is absolutely huge and full of the most amazing and unique things…….I’m talking about orangutans here of course. Would you come all this way and just sail past? I think not!! And so, of course did most of the other Rally boats. As I write this part, anarchy rules and some of us are sitting at anchor in the midst of the most incredible thunderstorm awaiting a short trip up the river tomorrow morning to Kumai and thence a daytrip by boat forty miles upriver to commune with our hairy orange cousins. My only orange experience up ‘til now has been a daytrip to Jersey Zoo with Richard, then aged 7 in about 1994, when one of the Big Daddies swung across in the branches over our heads leaving in his wake the most overpowering stench of BO. I’m hoping to get a little closer to a couple of relatively fragrant babies this time!!!

The trip here to Kumai, Kalimantan (used to be Borneo) from Bali has been quite entertaining .The sail northwestwards into the Java Sea meant negotiating the Lombok Strait (again…we did it on the way to Bali from GiliAir) but in the opposite direction. I only just learnt recently that this narrow channel is the main one where water streams through to the Indian Ocean from the Pacific. Wow!! That’s a lot of liquid coming through. No wonder we saw whirlpools and reached 11 knots…in the right direction luckily. Be ignorant of your tide times at your peril. A significant number of yachts went aground en route to or from Benoa, Bali. Moonshiner was not one of them!!

We were in company for the 5 day trip to Kumai with Canadian “Angel”…..she’s a 42’ Halberg Rassy, lovely expensive Scandinavian boats but heavy and therefore slower than most of the racy new designs and the bigger boats or catamarans…….. OK, slower than nearly everybody else except Moonshiner and even we can beat her under sail, apart from the fact that we had to motor practically the whole way from Bali to Kumai. Refueling was therefore first on the agenda before any thought of going upriver into the jungle.

Tomorrow duly arrived after a very peaceful night, storms having abated, with us three boats resting at anchor in the river mouth. Around 6.30am after hauling up the “pick” (navy speak for anchor), we motored in a little convoy up to the strange little town of Kumai, a very busy port full of local and foreign trading vessels of all shapes and sizes. I quickly learned that this was a town with no beer! A lovely local man “Harry” arrived alongside and told me that the local governor got so fed up with all the drunkenness and killings that he banned alcohol in the town. Indonesia is not like other places.

Angel Val very quickly organized a daytrip for she and me via speedboat about thirty miles into the deepest Borneo rainforest while her husband David and Dick sorted out the refueling for both boats. We had the most wonderful time and the photos hopefully show a little of the experience. The orangutans, of which we saw around fifteen individuals, were absolutely delightful and it was such a privilege to be able to see them at such close quarters behaving quite normally around us. There were several other varieties of animal/bird/insect to spot too. We saw macaque monkeys, a gibbon, peccaries, a hornbill and other exotic birds as well as hundreds of spectacular butterflies. A very special day.

After getting back to the boats we were treated to the most incredible lightning display I have ever seen, several massive forks at one time striking the ground repeatedly in virtually the same spot and accompanied by such hard rain that it took your breath away. Nothing in Indonesia is ordinary it seems. I wish we could spend more time here……

And so the next day dawns with Angel and Moonshiner setting off again southwards downriver and then northwest for about 600 miles towards Nongsa Point with perhaps an overnight stop or two en route…………

Three days into this leg and we have had to motor the whole way so far. Not very good for the fuel consumption and there is some concern that we may run out before we get to Nongsa Point! Hmm. This part of the coast of Kalimantan is a haven for fishing boats and for the first two nights at sea we had to negotiate hundreds of them. I think they might be after squid as they fish at night with dozens of brilliant lights around the deck. This makes them easy to see at least. One boat though also had a long line trailing from the stern which Angel just managed to miss by sailing over and then tell us about before we hit it, so we turned away from it and tried to go around it. It turned out to be over three miles long, just little white floats every twenty feet or so and the odd flag on a stick every mile, no lights at all. Could have been a disaster!

There is almost constant lightning somewhere nearby at night and yesterday morning, we were given a spectacular close up of a rather black thunderstorm which passed by with a waterspout in its wake. Not something to get too close to but I hope the photos turn out well.

Another day and about 120 miles closer to our destination. Still lightning around but a long way off over land somewhere to the north. We are very close to the equator now. It’ll be strange to be back in the northern hemisphere after about 8 months and over 11000 miles south of the equator. We are away from the shipping lanes and fishing fleets now which makes being on watch a little less arduous. As I write, it’s 3.15am and the only light visible is Angel, about 2 miles ahead. Last night, I wouldn’t have been able to find time to use the computer as there were constant lights all around. Earlier on this afternoon we saw some dwarf spinner dolphins. This is a fairly newly discovered species according to the book. Interesting! The sea was also absolutely teeming with jellyfish, millions of them. Nice!

And so another day or two has passed….losing track of time. It’s quite normal when you spend long periods at sea because days blend into one another when watches start at 1am and never seem to end. Actually, we are now safely tucked into a snug berth at Nongsa Point marina which on first inspection is quite wonderful. Even civilized. We made yet another dramatic entrance however. This would be our fifth such except that this time, there was absolutely nothing wrong with the boat! Shall I remind you of previous arrivals? Why not?!!

No 1…. Being towed into Chaguaramas, Trinidad October last year by Pete on Troutbridge…high pressure fuel pump.
No 2…..Being towed into Puerto Ayora, Galapagos by Aqualuna, March this year after 5days of trying to make it back to the Galapagos. HP pump and generator failure.
No 3…..Charging almost uncontrollably into Papeete, Tahiti in May when the gearing went meaning the boat could only go full ahead or full astern or sit in neutral. No one waiting for us on the dock knew this. Had they known, they would not have been standing there!!
No 4….. Being towed for the last 500yards into Neiafu, Tonga by dinghy in June. Reason? Good old HP pump again….fixed once and for all by ace one legged engineer, Tevita in Tonga who fitted the replacement. No trouble since!
And No 5……Arriving here at Nongsa Point, Indonesia in the middle of a terrific thunderstorm with 35 knot gusts, overhead lightning and horizontal rain. As I said, dramatic, but at least the boat was running perfectly with just the slightest chance of running out of fuel within the next few minutes!

So we are here in this very pleasant marina for another day before the dash across the Singapore Strait to..............Singapore! Photos next I hope.

Bali away from the marina is absolutely lovely!

Val from Angel and I went to Ubud for a couple of days to see the real Bali and obviously had to see the traditional dancing with the "barong" (tiger) and the amazing fingers and eye expressions.





We stayed in a wonderful hotel built on the slopes of a lush green valley with two swimming pools and spas, temples etc. I didn't want to leave. This picture shows our room with balcony on left of centre.




There are millions and millions of scooters everywhere. They charge along the roads in all directions. Many people carry huge loads on them. This one was just so funny. I saw families of four all balancing on just one scooter.





A sacred place near Ubud, "The Elephant Cave" which is centuries old and encompasses Buddhism, Hinduism and who knows what else. I had to wash my hands here and say a little "prayer".





Val and I went to another dance (about witches and evil spirits) at a lovely temple here. This is the obligatory picture of course!
Bali really is amazing and I would highly recommend a visit. It's just so colourful and cheap.Every square inch is decorated it seems and I bought a lovely dress for just £4.00. My best bargain so far! I love the language. A dentist is a "doctor gigi". I shall be sorry to leave which we are due to do tomorrow morning but I am looking forward to seeing the orang utans in the wild. Next posting probably from Singapore in a couple of weeks.

Typical Indonesian boat in Gili Air island, Indonesia. They have smaller ones too that have lateen sails. Very colourful.






And here is one of these boats being built! I asked permission to photograph of course as you never know how they might react. My Indonesian is extremely limited but I always learn how to say sorry, excuse me and thankyou very much as that seems to get me out of trouble!


My first sight of a typical Indonesian house as seen in Gili Air.

A Timor pony on Gili Air, used for taking tourists around the island. Most of them looked quite well fed and happy too.

Another Timor pony on Gili Air...well I like horses don't I? How about the dung hamper?

Photos now.

A baby crocodile at the farm in Darwin where we saw hundreds of them all sizes. This one was about a year old and unfortunately destined for meat and handbags! I didn't tell him that though. They feel really cold to the touch by the way.







This is Val from Canada and yacht Angel. Photo taken from the 31st floor of the tallest building in Darwin where we assembled for cocktails. I do like the high life!






This is Sangiang Island on the way from Rinca to Bali, just the most perfect volcano I have seen as yet...possibly due to blow its top sometime soon but not today?






The booby spent most of the day and night with us. Ithink it was just tired and a bit hungry but it wouldn't eat the tinned calamari I offered it. I thought it was quite a nice photo anyway!