Sunday 16 August 2015

Love it when a plan comes together. Wind was very helpful with poled out genny and reefed main for getting us to Tomia 2 1/2 hours before high tide. Came in early through the very narrow channel with depths no less than 3 meters.

Was subsequently pummeled by costs out the wazoo. 500,000 rupiah for the port captain to start and he took our departure paper from Debut without giving us one to next. Then went to dive resort for drinks and dinner and to check on a dive next day. $220 US per person. After administration of smelling salts discovered that included the whole day with 3 dives and food. Although not entirely convinced you can't take it with you decided to have a bit less to carry and signed up. Sometimes you just don't mind if result is good and this was. Great day of diving and being treated like the cream de la cream of cruiser trash. Counting drinks, a dinner, a lunch and donation of $25 per person that's requested for reef maintenance we'll be down the better part of a boat unit.

Monday

Ouch! Well, it was fun, but now heading toward less dear accommodations at the next island north then, maybe, to the "Welcome Ceremony and Gala Dinner" at Wanci (Pulau Wangi Wangi - just love saying it).

The common boat here is a high prowed, low freeboard longboat with inboard, unmuffled, one-banger engine. They're loud and you can almost count the revolutions. Figure underway they must go a meter or so per pop. Nobody's going to sneak up on you in one of these. Even the larger cargo vessels have an extreme, swooping shear that has the midship gunwale just above water. Apparently they don't normally sink so must work for them.

Better wind and more comfortable temperatures than anticipated. Expect both of these will evolve as we head north into Borneo (now Kalimantan), Sumatra and toward Singapore. So far almost no motoring which is good although diesel is cheap because it must be schlepped in jerry cans from fuel stations.

Jack