We are currently 6ft up in the
air on a hardstand, in a boatyard on the historic island of Penang, West
Malaysia. We’ve been here almost 6 weeks now giving Pelangi a bit of face lift; adding some new stuff, upgrading
some old stuff and getting her ready for our 2014 sailing adventures. We bumped into some old friends of ours
last week, Sheila and Michael off SY Kantala, who wanted to know why we’d taken
them off our mailing list. I knew
I hadn’t written a blog entry for a while, but a whole year ago? When I checked, my last posting was 18th
December last year, and we’d just made a rather arduous sail against the wind to
make it to Puerto Galera, Northern
Philippines in time for Christmas.
So, for those of you who’ve been
waiting with baited breath a whole year, or just thought you’d fallen off our
mailing list here’s a brief history of 2013. Starting with Christmas in P.G.;
we shared the festive season with 2 other yachting couples – the fabulous Nat
and Ralph on Saltotu and Linda and Tony who were amazing hosts on Christmas Day
on their aptly named boat Amazing Grace.
They pulled off a full roast for the 6 of us and we had a great day drinking,
eating, and partying into Boxing Day!
We ended up spending over 2
months in P.G., most of the time with very windy/cloudy and rainy weather so we
all became locals of the nearby Rock N Roll Bar and P.G. Yacht Club! We did have some nice days though and managed a “girls day
out” shopping in the main township, snorkeling, motor cycling round the
picturesque bays and G managed to get in a few days diving. When we got our break in the weather, G
and I made a run for it and headed back South to our old (and favourite)
sailing ground of Bususanga. Lucky
we did, as on 6th March I got a dreaded phone call from Our Bev
telling me that Mum was dying. Mum
was 86 and had been ill for some time, so it wasn’t unexpected, but it doesn’t
make it any easier to accept when you’re so far away and all you want is to be
with your family and say one last good bye. We were able to leave Pelangi on a mooring buoy with friends
looking after her for the unknown amount of time we’d be away. We made the dash to Manila airport, but
were too late. Mum passed away
before I’d even managed to check in.
It was heartbreaking. I
arrived in the UK to the coldest spring on record and the highest the
temperature got to in the 6 weeks I was there was 8 degrees, even the dog
wouldn’t go out one day it was that cold!
We farewelled Mum with a small service that she would have liked; playing
her favourite songs and sharing memories with family and close friends.
We returned to Pelangi to thaw
out at the end of April and she willingly took us to El Nido, a gorgeous spot
North West of Palawan Island with lots of small islands to visit, fabulous coral
reef to snorkel, a beautiful lagoon and even a secret beach which you swam
though a cave opening to get to.
It was a wonderful trip and a fitting end to our time in the
Philippines. We needed to head
back into Malaysia before the winds changed or we would get stuck there and
after the typhoon that just went through we’re glad we did!
We crossed the Balabac Strait and
entered Malaysian waters on 23rd May and headed south down a now familiar route
of the east coast of Borneo then across to Tioman Island which we reached on 25th
June. We had plenty of dolphins to
keep us company almost every day and lots of bird life too on what was a very
nice passage.
It’s over 2 years since we were
last on Tioman and not much has changed; some of the old sailing fraternity was
back in the marina along with some new drinking partners (Tioman is a duty free
island after all!), most notably the ever-helpful and philosophical Larry and
his lovely partner Cordula. Larry
has recently found out that there’s no such thing as a cheap boat and a lot of
patience and a sense of humour goes a long way when each day of boat repair
presents a new challenge. We spent
3 months in total there doing some much needed and long-awaited maintenance of
our own and as the season transitioned we headed south around Singapore to
Johor Bahru, West Malaysia in the
company of 2 other yachts. This
trip is notorious for the amount of heavy traffic and VERY big container ships
that you get to tango with on your way through the shipping lanes so a daytime
passage is always recommended.
Trying to decipher what’s moving and what’s at anchor is the main game
you play for the 50 - odd mile journey, and you do get honked at rather loudly by
impatient tanker captains if you dare get in their way! There were a few incidents to make the
journey a memorable one, but eventually all 3 yachts were safely berthed in
Danga Bay marina on 10th October.
Compared to the idyllic Tioman
marina with its pretty setting, clear blue water, and nice beaches Danga Bay is
a dirty hole with filthy water and a depressing town center. The last straw was when a full sized,
tethered dead cow came floating by the outer docks one smoggy morning –
absolutely true! Time to go!! So
we slipped our lines sharpish and continued our journey north towards
Penang. It was a lovely 10 day
passage with dolphins playing round Pelangi on our first morning out of Danga
Bay. We enjoyed some nice evenings
anchored off small, uninhabited islands, spent a day in Port Dickson stocking
up on provisions and enjoyed 2 days on Pangkor Island with lots of sunshine and
beach walking. Pelangi’s haul out
had been pre arranged and at 2.00pm on 18th November the travel lift
gently plucked her out of the water and onto 5 hardstands. She’s getting very spoilt here with
bottom scraping and anti fouling, a new galley, a specially designed radar arch
with room for 4 solar panels, a spray hood/dodger so we can stay dry on wet
days, plus lots of TLC from me and G as we sand, scrape, glue and paint all
sorts of extra bits. She also has
a new bimini (sun shade) cover, new sail bag and even Dolly has got in on the
act with new chaps (covers). If we have any money left over after all this lot
we hope to cruise around the island of Langkawi 60 nautical miles away for
Christmas, then onto the islands off Thailand and around the Andaman sea. G’s mum Bev has decided to join us for
part of this trip. This will be
her 2nd time aboard Pangers so the 1st time can’t have
been that bad!
So there you have it, a mixed
year for us with new friendships founded, old ones re kindled, wonderful
sailing, heartbreak, some very precious time with my family in Devon, lots of
maintenance and long stopovers and much to look forward to. My log shows we sailed/motored over
2,110 nautical miles and visited/ anchored off 27 islands, so not bad mileage
for a slow sailing year! There’s
not enough brain cells left to count the number of beers, red wine, rum, vodka,
gin and whiskey drunk over the same period, but I do recall drinking a can of
coke one day!!
As for all those of you reading
this, we hope you’ve had a good year with travels, adventures and special times
of your own to look back on and new beginnings to look forward to.
I’d like to dedicate this posting
to the memory of my mum. Her and
dad brought me up to believe that I was as good as anyone else and could do and
be anything I wanted. I wouldn’t
be living the life I do without them, their love, support and that belief.
Christmas cheers then
Captns J and G XXX
