Photo,s not shown on Blog, see Photo gallery.

Tuesday 26th September 2006

We went to the beach at 9am, as a high holy man, was there to bless the yachts from the beach, after much charting, throwing water about, and at each one of us, and having rice placed on our forehead, we where assured of good sailing from now on. So there will be favourable winds, no accidental gibes, safe anchorages from now on!!!!
From there we took a taxi into Kutu with Been A Long, mailed the forms back to UK, for the pension, then spent a very nice rest of morning in th town.
Later went over to Sumar, picked up the Frocks for Lindy, did some shopping, then back to the boat.

Wednesday 27th September 2006

Took a taxi to Kuta at lunch time, spent a little time shopping in proper shops, Lindy brought some very nice white trousers, and I brought a pair of shorts in Quicksilver. From there we walked along Kuta Beach, lots of surfers and surf. Below is the memorial to the first Bali bombing, and the un-built site of the bombing.

We had a lovely meal, in a restaurant overlooking the beach, had a little walk, then we got a taxi back to Serangan Island.
In the evening, we went for final drink at the yacht club, then on to a little caf� for a meal, with Aquarius. Been along, and Gambori.

Thursday 28th September 2006 our wedding anniversary

Left anchorage at 0900 hours, for the first hour, we had the monsoonal currant against us, up to 5 knots, but then got in close to the land in shallow water, and got the tide, and had up to 3 knots with. Anchored at Amuk, which we thought would be rolly, and was for a while, but was calm over night.
The bay is very picturesque.celebrated our wedding anniversary on Mr Bean with A,B, and G.

Friday 29th September 2006

Left the anchorage at 0930 hours, bound for Ra-As Island, had lots of fish nets and traps to go around right up the east coast of Bali, we were hoping to be clear of Bali by sunset, but because of the adverse currant, we were still very much in sight of land. This meant we had to contend with the hundreds of un-lit fishing boats, luckily they do show up on radar, which helps.
Though we feel that as we are lit up, they will get out of our way, so far that has worked!
Lots of fishing boats on the beach, every beach was jammed packed with them.....Its now good bye to Bali, it will not be there tomorrow....


2000 hours, we are motoring, 6 knots of wind on the nose, and 1.5 knots of currant against, speed over the ground is only 3.2 knots, we may not get to Ra-As in day light, which means will would go straight by!
Watching the fishing boats on radar, which there was quite a few, they all saw us , and all kept there distance. it was a horrible sail through the night.
Just missed a unlit fish trap about 20 miles out from Bali, saw it in the moon light, and relayed it back to the other three boats in the pack.

Saturday 30th September 2006

We survived the night sail, we had a phone call from Daz at 0030hours, about them all coming out, and the cost involved, and we decided to have just Tara and the three boys, out from Boxing Day, till the 9th Jan, staying on the boat, then Daz, Em, with Issy and Mina out on the 10th Jan, we are so excited, it is so much nicer to spend the time on the boat in smaller groups .and hopefully Ben and Nicole may come out at Easter. Then we will try to get Dean family out at some point.
We will check into a marina for when Tara arrives, and if we think the boys can coup with the boat, we shall go sailing around to the west coast, and check out the resorts, and if that works, we will dio the same for Daz..
The wind backed at sun rise, and we sailed with a favourable current, the sea was still quite rough, so after a while, we turned on the motor, to give us more speed, and better stability, we arrived at Ra-as at 1500 hours, anchored in 22 metres of water. As we approached the island the tide was very low, there where hundreds of people on the exposed reef, I guess looking for crabs or the like.
Tomorrow we are off to Bawean Island, another night sail, distance 140 miles hope it is better than the last trip.

Sunday 1st October 2006

Left for Bawean Island at 0845 hours, we had 15 knots of wind on the beam, but by 1300 hours, it had dropped right down, and we had to put the engine on, and had to keep it on till about 0700 hours the next morning.
The night passage kept one on our toes, what with not being able to see the unlit fish traps..photo follows, the plan was ..if we hit one when motoring, just go into neutral, hopefully not getting snagged up. There was a lot of traffic, fishing boats, container ships, and the tugs, photo follows., Lindy had to take adversative action, when a container ship can too close, and made a turn shape to port, it can within 200 metres.
The guys behind saw it on radar, and the two images merged, and thought we had been hit, Lindy has now realized that radar can be used more than she did, and has leant how to track ships more affectively, and used the device to check a collision course.

Monday 2nd October 2006

Arrived at Bawean Island at 1300 hours, anchored in 8 metres, it's a very beautiful anchorage, quite windy when we arrived, but no fetch. I need to take the Genoa furling apart again, as it is still very stiff again.
We went over to Gambori at 1700 hours for a sundowner, with A, B, and to plan our trip to Kumai, as there are many options, another meeting is planned today

Tuesday 3rd October 2006

Took the Genoa furlex to bits yet again, de-greased with boiling water, then white sprite the grease that was left, machined the bolt now holding the reeling line in place, it was catching as it rotated, re-greased it, put it back together, it seems alright, we will see.
Went over to Been A Long for coffee at 1030 hours, with A and G, discussed trip to Kaumai, and after lots of discussion, and listening to the facts given on the net, although it does not sound right that we can do the 198 miles in 36 hours, yachts before have achieved this, it means keeping up an average of at least 5.5 knots of the whole journey. This can be achieved if we do not get any counter current, which we have had a lot of lately, and some good wind, if not we shall have to hove too, for the night in safe water, and approach land in the next day light. But the risk is whole while, it may save an extra night at sea.
Planning to leave at 0500 hours, when we reach Kumai, we are nearly at the equator, at 2 degrees south.

Wednesday 4th October 2006

Up at 0400 hours, had a cup of tea, got ready to go, went to weight the anchor at 0450 hours, and the windless would not work, had the option to find the fault or raise the anchor manually, opted to find the fault, so had to abort trip.
After 2.5 hours, had traced the fault and fixed it, it was the red isolation switch failure, so I by-passed it, and all worked again, will need to repair the switch later.
We left the anchorage at 0800 hours, three hours late, and with a sail plan to keep up 5.5 knots, now became 6 knots, but on calling the yachts that left on time on VHF, they said there was a 1 knot current with, so felt we could do it, and at 2100 hours we were averaging 6.53 knots, so all is looking good, and we can see the first of our pack 2 miles ahead. We have had winds around 20 knots the SE, and have had a brilliant sail so far, and hope to be Kumai, Borneo by tomorrow afternoon.
Below one of the colourful vessels seen on passage, the guys anchor in 65 metres of water in the day, then fish at night.
It is very difficult to judge what they are doing during the day, when you see the bow pointing at us, till one understands that they are at anchor.

Thursday 5th October 2006

Had caught up with Aquarius by 0200 hours, and Been A Long was only half a mile ahead, so we have done very well, and more to the point, we can make Kumai, today.
The wind went a little more easterly, so had to stop using the spinnaker pole, also the Genoa reefing system is still very stiff, will have to take the sail down in Kumai, and check the top bearing, if that does not work, will have to get the whole unit serviced in Singapore, guess it will have to be that the bearing have worn.
Got to the river month by noon, travelled up the river, with sometimes only 4 metres of water, and further up lots of nets spanning half the width of the river, we managed to see them and avoid them, but we heard some hit net!
Arrived that the anchorage 20 miles up river, lots of big boats here, god knows how they get up and down here, Kumai is a very large town.
We went ashore to the Kumai Yacht Club, a little shack run by Harry, the guy that is doing the Orangutan trip, had a great time, met some new faces.

Friday 6th October 2006

Went up the mast early morning up get the Genoa sail down, which we did, I noticed that that connecting bracket was causing friction on the foil, so think I have found the problem.
Once the sail was down, the system worked fine, confirming that the problem I saw up top was indeed the problem.
The wind got up a bit, so stopped work on the Genoa after re-greasing the top bearings .emptied 105 litres into the fuel tank, then went ashore to have the jerry cans re- filled at 5,500rp per litre that's 37p.
Rang Phuket Yacht marina, and booked 5 weeks there, starting on the 20th Dec, to cover Tara and Daz coming to visit us.
Went up the mast again in afternoon and managed to re-position the connecting bracket, put the genoa back up, furled it in, and it was very easy, job done, very pleased to have fixed it, it is very worrying especially at night when the wind gets up, and it will not furl.
Tomorrow we are going up river on a local boat, to see the Orangutans for three days and two nights.

Saturday 7th October

The boat picked us up at 0900 hours, we were with the Been A Longs, had a lovely trip up the Sekonyer River, got to Tanjung Putting National Park, the Orangutan training and feeding centre by 1400 hours. Seeing the Orangutan in their natural environment was just breath taking, photo's say it all,
Trevor , with his partner Joan, Trevor entertained us both evenings, with singing and his jokes, also all through out the day with his Jefro jokes, he can speak just like him.
We had a lovely day, we stayed at the park jetty, slept on deck under mosquito nets, I found it very comfortable, although Lindy found her mattress a little rocky.

Sunday 8th October 2006

After breakfast, and showers off the back of the boat, using buckets of river water, we headed back to see more Orangutans, in a different area, these were more wild and are further down the line of readapting to the wild.
I took a lot of movie film today, it really shows the Orangutans personality.

We went back to the boats , have lunch on the way, heading on to view some silver mines, photo below, the silver is in the sand, a very dark, they put the sand onto plastic sheets and wash the silver out leaving what they say is 98% silver, it's looked more like 2% silver and 98% sand. They get 50p per 100 kg bag, which seems very low.

From the mines, we start back towards Kumai, all the monkeys had come to the trees on the waters edge, getting ready for their nights sleep.

We arrived at our next venue, another feeding station for the Orangutan, moored the three boat long side the jetty, and had dinner on the jetty.