This is the Arabian Sea with pirate attacks in January. We were supposed to find a safe route through all of this which we did by making a huge detour north but the attacks are now very close to our route down the Omani coast. Quest and the danish boat Ing were attacked by the pirate group in the centre of this photo.



An Omani fishing boat, not a pirate, but they came far too close for comfort for some of the yachts....... They were mostly just curious or busy hauling nets.






Natibou with blue sail and Jacabel, who were behind us in our group,getting just a litle too close to each other avoiding a harmless fishing boat. Things got a little tense on occasion!




And finally, me in my salwar khameez, traditional Indian dress, on Angel in Salalah. Sorry about the sideways aspect but it makes me look a lot taller and therefore slimmer!

In Oman

I don’t know where to start with this post and I suppose most followers of my writings will have read my last entry which I wrote while in a state of shock. Further frightening events happen daily as the pirate action escalates and we are told that no yacht is safe out there any more. The remaining Rally boats are all secure here at present in Salalah but we all know of several yachts still in transit to Oman and others who have taken the bold decision to carry on through the Gulf of Aden (GoA). The latest reports which we now know to be true are that a Danish yacht with a family on board is in pirate hands and heading for Somalia. There was a news blackout on this event and we naturally feared the worst. Another smaller rally of about ten boats with whom we had some radio contact a few days ago are in the Gulf of Aden and we just hope they are travelling safely
.
The long 1500 mile motorsail from Mumbai to Salalah, long because of our pirate avoiding detour, was free of actual pirate problems though some of the more panicky members of our group believed that any boat nearby might be a threat and we had some quite comical sudden course changes going on around us as curious Omani fishing boats came close by for a look with big smiles and lots of waving. We kept a good visual watch from the cockpit as normal and muttered a little about the dependency of some yachts on their radars and AIS systems…hopeless against small fast skiffs which the pirates use and useless being down below over the chart table, seeing nothing.

We stopped overnight at an island, Masirah, just off the Oman coast to refuel having received permission from the sheikh himself to do so. John from Spirit of Nina, who were already safely in Salalah, very kindly arranged it all for us. It was my first step ashore in the Middle East since 1976 and the Esso tankers….. All the women were covered top to toe in black as this island is very traditional but the sheikh’s daughter wore the most extraordinary black mask that looked like a bird’s skull. I wish I’d had the nerve to ask if I could take a photo. I wish too that we could have stayed a day or two longer but there was a pressing need to get to safety and Salalah.

As dusk fell the next night we were motorsailing as usual just off the coast when I spotted the dreaded lines of polystyrene floats which have plagued us ever since Indonesia. These floats which are lit only at one end are the visible part of huge drift nets which can be several miles long and hang just a few feet below the surface. If you can sail the boat in between two of these floats, you won’t get tangled up………We were in the middle of dozens of them horizon to horizon and they became almost impossible to see as night fell. We had successfully led our team of five boats in a line across several nets and were starting to relax a little when I spotted the next one about four feet away in the gathering gloom. OK for us but lethal for Hans on Natibou, the cat behind us. He got well and truly caught up so the rest of us crept out to safety and then wondered what to do. Hans was in favour of diving under the boat in the dark to cut the lines away but this is just too risky with nets and currents. So we decided to hang around as a group til morning when the task of freeing the boat would be easier. A very long night was in prospect. As luck would have it, the next, much faster rally group were just a few miles behind us and hearing of our plight, they insisted on coming across to help with their superhero team of cool divers, The Men in Black AKA the SBS. In a very short time, they had cut Hans free and so we were able to continue ……

This was a very arduous trip with little respite from trying to be in a constant state of alertness apart from sighting dolphins and two killer whales and being treated to an amazing light show each night as the water became alive with bioluminescence from our wash. I’m now just really relieved we’re here though.

Oman is very pleasant….a little dusty but not too hot if one stays out of the sun and not too expensive either. We found a huge hypermarket that sells everything we could wish for apart from alcohol and pork products. I got carried away in the date section and sampled quite a few before buying some which are the best I’ve ever tasted. The women mostly cover up completely in black with their headscarves encasing some huge lumps on the back of their heads. I think they look weird, like Darth Vader (they glide along the floor.) or vampires even. Strangely, the men seem to think they look mysterious and alluring. Surely this isn’t what they are supposed to think? The Arab men can look elegant in their floor length white, cream or grey shirts …I think they’re called dish tash or something like that….as long as they don’t have big protruding stomachs that is. I haven’t the nerve to take a photo yet though they are all very friendly and tolerant of our general state of Western undress.

So, here we sit while the big guns in the rally, of whom there are several, formulate a master plan to get us out of our predicament. We are not supposed to reveal our plans for some reason as of yet but I’m sure it’ll all become clear soon. In the meantime, I can sit here on the boat and try out my new dongle. Everyone who travels with a computer should have one of these though it took me many months to find out what they were and I am now so pleased to have one. Lets hope it allows me to upload a photo or two now. ..............

Phyllis

Phyllis was one of the four American hostages shot dead in the early hours of the 23rd February on board the pirated US yacht Quest that had been attacked by Somali pirates at dusk.on the 18th Feb in the middle of the Indian Ocean while sailing alone from Mumbai to Salalah, Oman. The other hostages were Bob, who had circumnavigated with Phyllis in their 36ft yacht on the previous Blue Water Rally, and the yacht’s owner/skipper and his wife, Scott and Jean. At the time the fatal shootings happened, Quest was surrounded by four US warships including a carrier and a battle cruiser and negotiations had been going on to free the four hostages for some days but in the end, a panic shooting between the pirates led to the warships closing in for action, panicking the pirates still further into shooting their captives. I can’t begin to imagine how awful those few days must have been.
I didn’t really know the owner and his wife as they had only joined the rally in Thailand at Christmas and we have been mostly at sea since then in different ports at different times. (The owner was a very determined character by all accounts and had decided to sail direct and alone from Mumbai to Salalah against all the advice). I knew Bob (who was very quiet) slightly better as he had been on various boats with the Rally fleet for some months and we met in Fiji. Phyllis however had been with the Rally since the beginning in Gibraltar, October 2009.
I first met her in Panama last year and she made quite an impression. She was very outgoing and chatty from the start with a strong American accent and a way of talking from the side of her mouth with her teeth clenched tight. She looked and sounded like one of those gutsy little female characters you see in old American movies who are propped up against the bar or looking after the menfolk on the ranch and always running the whole goddam show. She also reminded me a little of Liza Minnelli I think.
After circumnavigating with Bob in 2007-09, she wanted to do the whole thing again, this time sailing as crew on other yachts. She had sailed on several in the Rally for a few weeks or months before she joined Quest and I remember thinking that she and Bob would have felt very much at home with their own countrymen for the final legs of the trip across the Indian Ocean and up the Red Sea into the Med. We were always turning to her for her experiences from “the last time around”. She told me that the toughest part of the trip for her last time was the Pirate Alley aka the Gulf of Aden or GOA. Second time around, GOA had become less dangerous and Pirate Alley is now Pirate Pond aka the Indian Ocean. Unbelievable.
She was certainly a tough cookie. In October, she had hired a scooter in Kupang, Indonesia along with other crews and set off to explore the island. She came a cropper on the terrible roads and really scraped herself along one side when she hit the ground…..the scars were still very visible just a few weeks ago in Cochin which is when we last spoke. We hadn’t expected her to turn up in Cochin either as she had developed an extremely nasty corneal ulcer while in Sri Lanka which could have cost her an eye. The advice then had been for her to go back to the States immediately for proper treatment but she typically chose to grin and bear it and carry on with the Rally.
I think in a way that Phyllis belonged to the Rally and maybe embodied the spirit of the Rally too. She will be missed very much by everyone.
I just can’t believe that she’s gone.

Flotsam and Jetsam

The famous Taj Mahal Hotel, Mumbai. Moonshiner is about two hundred metres away.












In the famous Leopold's, Mumbai wearing garlandy thing and red spot...I was Hare Krishnaed, told I was being given good luck and then he asked for some money! Cheek!!










Val (Angel) and I went for a carriage ride around. Nice way to see the city and we were a bit of an attraction as I think they normally use these things for weddings.










This is Santa who worked very hard to pull us around. I love the ears. An Indian breed called kathiawari if I remember. Never thought I'd see one in the flesh!











And I just had to include Gandhi in his nappy...

Now for the other part that I wrote before......


I have never understood why some writers have to detail every single meal their characters eat unless the end result of all that food is something like terminal flatulence which might make the character behave out of character and is particularly relevant to the plot. I also don’t enjoy reading in a blog for example about every single course of a meal that someone has eaten. I’m talking Blue Water rally blogs here of which a number can be found on mailasail.com (click on “List all users” to find names if you’re ever so slightly curious….). Hmmm
So, having said all that, I am only going to write about food once although I have probably mentioned some of these things before…. We like meat and it can be very hard to find decent stuff. For some reason(!) most supermarkets in the second and third worlds only seem to supply strange chunks of unidentifiable flesh like chicken feet and backs and cow heels and pig tails. Yuk! I suppose all the best cuts go to the hotels and restaurants. We therefore try to stock up when we can. It’s quite difficult to buy meat in India as I expected. The only meat in the only supermarket in Cochin sold frozen things in poly bags called “veal bits” or “pork bits”, so we bought some! After pressure cooking, it was really quite nice. Enough said.
Other strange things I have eaten on the way round the world have been……

St Lucia….breadfruit….incredibly boring
Guyana…guinea pig…tastes a bit like chicken
Vanuatu….cassava/manioc…..looks feels and tastes like soft paraffin wax (don’t ask!)
Mackay, Oz….kangaroo…...looks and tastes like horse…better stewed than eaten as steaks!
Darwin, Oz……crocodile….tastes (you guessed) a bit like chicken
Singapore…..durian fruit…..tastes and smells like onion that has already been digested!! Don’t try it unless you’re barking mad!!!!
Indonesia……café luwak……the most expensive coffee in the world; tastes very nice and even smells like the civet that previously ate the coffee beans…..so there!

In Salalah, Oman, we may be subjected to eyeballs………….no thanks!

In the meantime, we are now happily and thankfully sitting peacefully at anchor in Mumbai. This is an unscheduled rally stop but one that has become slightly necessary for reasons I am not at liberty to divulge. Make what you will of all this!! We are slightly bemused by it all too.
The 650 mile slog here from Cochin with an overnight stop at Goa en route was not without incident…..surprise surprise! It went like this:-
I was just about asleep and going on watch in four hours when Dick woke me up to say we had a problem. The boat was filling up with water! No immediate panic but some concern to find where it was coming in before the level got too high and things started to get damaged. Just why do these things always happen in the dark with horrible lumpy seas to boot? I “womanned” the pump and managed to get the level down but was really hoping that I wouldn’t have to keep on all night. We called the nearby Rally boats to stand by just in case and started to look for the leak. It turned out to be just ever so slightly funny (if you can imagine being in the situation). An incontinence pad (!) which was used by the engineers in Thailand to mop up excess oil had been left under the engine where it couldn’t be seen and with just enough water in the bilges from seas over the bow, it had started to float, risen up and jammed the stern gland which in turn led to more than a trickle of water coming into the boat where it really shouldn’t have. A bit of skilful manoeuvring under the engine by Dick brought it under control within about an hour. Phew!!
So no more peaceful sleep for me after all that. It didn’t help that we were in the middle of hundreds of fishing boats at the time too meaning that we should have been keeping a permanent lookout.

First impressions of Mumbai? I spent a couple of hours ashore and it seems like an amazing place, bursting with colour, sound and life. It’s also pleasantly cool and February is the best month to visit so they say. Angel Val and David and I managed to find the famous “Leopold’s”, as described in the book Shantaram which you must read if you haven’t already. Not sure if I want to find the infamous Madame Zhou’s brothel though (as also mentioned in the book) but it must have been nearby…….
Tomorrow, we try to book a tour of the city as we have only a couple of days here and we must also visit the awfully posh Bombay Yacht Club before we leave. I shall try to get a couple of photos to go with this post but no promises… No idea at the moment if I can get online either but hoping.

After this, I have no idea when I shall next be online. Our arrival dates in Salalah are a bit vague for security reasons but it should be before the end of this month I hope. If not, you may hear about it on the news (only joking!). We have to take the threat seriously of course though there is very little risk to yachts apparently…we’re just not enough of a catch…..nice to discover how much you’re really worth!

We are trying to stay upbeat but some yacht crews are more nervous than others. We want to stay with the brave ones!

Watch this space…….

More photos first before the wordy bit....

This charming little place was in the ladies loo at the Customs building. It got worse!











A protest march going on in Cochin. Something to do with Anglo Indian rights which I'm sure they are perfectly entitled to. We just loved the colourful saris on display.

Val being dressed in the sari shop and looking very much like the Columbia Pictures lady I thought. David was in the background being "man in dress shop" but I couldn't possibly put the photo of him on this blog could I?

A few coracles twirled past the boat....... India is amazing!!

Having a go at stone polishing in Sri Lanka. Pity the poor person who buys my effort!

With Colin and sarah from Moonbeam on our "day out". Moonbeam have now decide to leave the Rally unfortunately as they had too many problems with the boat after the storm and wouldn't be able to catch up with the rest of us. A real shame for them and us too.

My pal "Monica"

Astride the lumbering beast!

And how to clamber around whilst aboard!

Just getting there!

We spent 6 days in Sri Lanka, two of them to recover from the long sail and to sort out one or two things with the boat and also to attend the all important (and top secret!) Rally briefing about the long trip from Cochin, India to Salalah, Oman where we have to stay away from the pirates…… Well, we are certainly going to stay a long way away, that’s for sure! The main problem for the boats is going to be fuel. The winds may be light for 1500 miles and so we may run out……… Hmm

We had to see something of Sri Lanka so we and Colin and Sarah from Moonbeam booked a day tour of the area with a driver for $20 each… a good price. Most of the other boats had already done an incredibly expensive and somewhat disappointing (lunch for example was a sandwich on the bus!) 5 day tour of the interior…tea plantation, elephant sanctuary etc but we were far too late arriving for that so a day would have to suffice.

It was a good day. We packed in visits to several places… you know the sort of thing…..a museum, an ayurvedic medicine place, a moonstone mine (I loved that!) etc. My favourite part though was the elephant ride and the pictures may accompany this piece if I can get a decent connection.

Sri Lanka was a nice place and I’m sorry we couldn’t stay longer. It was even quite cool at times in the early morning with a lowest temperature I saw of 24.5 C. I know: I’ve spent too long in the tropics quite obviously!

Most of the other boats had left a few days earlier for Cochin, a 400 mile, 3 day hop with the promise of exciting winds in the acceleration zone between Sri Lanka and India. The grib (weather) files were actually giving 25 knots which usually means up to 10 knots more. Our first day was pleasant enough as we cleared Sri Lanka but then we hit the acceleration zone and things livened up dramatically. A day later and I was saying it was the most uncomfortable 24 hours I had ever spent at sea! The winds were steady at 30 knots plus on the beam and we’ve seen much worse than that, but the sea was unbelievable. The waves were very steep, about 3 metres and relentless so that the boat constantly plunged in and the lee rail was permanently under as we heeled at over 30deg for a whole day. We were doing over 7 knots the whole time with both sails heavily reefed and the boat wasn’t exactly under control! Truly horrible, all the banging and crashing and difficulty getting around the boat or finding a corner to sleep in for an hour or so. The worst thing was the saloon table suddenly deciding to free itself after 30 years of staying put. It flew across the saloon and landed on me. I was in a state of shock for a while as I sat there pinned, wondering just what damage had been done to me. It was just bruises in the end but a few scary moments nevertheless.

The two other boats (Angel and Bali Blue) sailing with us had an equally uncomfortable time and reported big seas flooding compartments and things being washed off the deck. Angel lost two sails which were lashed down on deck. A very expensive day for them! The next day brought light winds and motorsailing with few problems until we blundered into a huge fleet of small Indian fishing boats, horizon to horizon. They have no correct lights and motor around haphazardly while we try to sail around them and not get tangled up in lines. All three boats spent the whole night on lookout….. very little sleep once more!

Still, we arrived here in Cochin, Kerala, India relatively intact and prepared ourselves for the checking in procedure. This was going to be a whole day experience…. We Brits certainly left the Indian people a great legacy. We ended up trudging backwards and forwards around the port area with bits of official paper, then, seemingly hours just sitting and waiting in various old colonial style buildings (in serious need of a paint job!) while the locals were somewhere else. These places were piled high floor to ceiling with dusty papers that will never be looked at again. Everywhere was showing signs of neglect and decay. It was like being in an old pre war hospital I should think. The whole process took about five hours and we missed lunch!!

Never mind…this was India and I was looking forward to experiencing some of it during our short stay here. Kerala is more affluent than the other states. They have tried, not totally successfully, to remove the beggars and to clean up a little I suppose. It is still quite incredible though to see huge piles of unmentionable, stinky stuff absolutely everywhere sitting smack bang next to stalls selling food with filthy skinny old men squatting amongst it all and brilliantly coloured women in gorgeous saris wafting by….. The constant noise too is amazing, tuk tuks (three wheeled cabs) everywhere, motorbikes and huge painted buses and each one constantly honking their horns. Crossing the road takes precision timing and an agile body! I couldn’t live here for a second but I’m glad I’ve seen it…and of course I had to buy a sari or two….. Angel Val and I spent a couple of hours totally immersed in a huge sari shop which must have had a million on display. Talk about spoilt for choice. One cost me just £2.50 and the other which is seriously luxurious just £12. I just need a little practice to perfect the tying technique now…….

The other side to us being in India now was to plan the Rally route through the N Indian ocean to the Gulf of Aden and on up the Red Sea which we must manage by March before the weather makes it impossible for yachts to navigate. There have been many obstacles. The NE monsoon should have arrived so that we could sail the long distance without fuel shortages except that it hasn’t yet so all boats have had to buy lots of extra diesel and we will need to stop further up the coast to buy more. No one wants to run out of fuel in the middle of the ocean where one would become a sitting duck for the Somali pirates. The pirates are everywhere now so they say and no route is totally safe. We take comfort from the fact that they are not usually interested in yachts…..yet.

The other problem that cropped up was the unrest in Egypt. We just hope that it has calmed down again by the time we get there in a couple of months. There has been an awful lot of discussion among the boats and many official meetings to try and formulate a plan. The mood is quite sombre. It is all top secret of course so I can’t say anything but watch this space for an update in a few weeks! We are currently hoping for an armed escort for part of the way. It’s all such a long way from the gentle life half way across the world in another ocean………………..