March 12/13/14
We've been away from home, our puss-cats, Jane and our Singapore friends for more than 2 months and were very ready for the homeward bound leg. About 100 miles out of Port Blair, at 0930, Henry yelled out from the helm "We've got no steering"...... We had broken our main steering chain cable, with 300 miles to go to the Similans. Dreamcatcher immediately hove to and we got out the emergency steering tiller. It took about an hour to get it "right" and from then on we had to hand steer the boat using the big 4 x 2 wooden tiller from the lower aft deck. We radioed Rascal on our 12 noon sched, told her of our plight and she turned around from 25 miles in front and came back to escort us the remaining 300 miles into the Similans. We cannot begin to say how grateful we were for her actions, and how much we cherished her stern light during the two dark nights that followed. The first night we encountered one of the worst electrical storms any of the yachts had been through - a large horse-shoe shaped depression that closed in around us. Pelting rain and blinding lightning that made it difficult for us to keep our eye on Rascal as we wove around trying to find an exit from the storm. The tiller steering was hard on our arms and hands and impossible to keep a course : we tried using both hand bearing compasses and the hand-held GPS's to keep to the rhumb line to no avail: difficult to read and impossible at night. The only way we could keep any sort of course integrity was to follow another yacht. Rascal piloted us into the Similan Islands, exhausted, and we dropped the hook between two islands at 42 meters depth, the deepest we have ever anchored, but we simply couldn't go any further, we were exhausted. We had a beer, crashed out, and mid afternoon the Rascals and Smystery crews came over to sympathise, offer their heartfelt congratulations that we had made it, and helped to escort us to a safe mooring bouy. This was the first time in nearly 3 days that we were able to breathe easy and relax. We found that the continuous holding ice cold cans of beer helped the swelling in our hands to go down. We had a great final Andaman Adventurers dinner aboard Rascal, sans Rusalka who had needed to leave Port Blair a few days earlier and had escaped the Customs debacle. We loved the little we saw of the Similan Islands and are keen to go back.
Early the following morning we had Smystery as our escort, for the 60 miles emergency tiller steering into Kamala beach in Phuket. That's their home anchorage, and we knew Phuket would be a better resource center for the steering parts and fixing the problem, than Langkawi. We stayed aboard Dreamcatcher that night and took off on our own the following morning to Nai Harn bay in the south of Phuket, where Kevan & Sheila keep Rusalka. We anchored close by and Kevan came over to start what was a 2 day exhausting fix of Dreamcatcher's steering. We've been able to stay at their Phuket home for the past two nights - a welcome respite from the boat and a chance for the swelling in our hands to go down. We are very fortunate to have such good friends, and if Karma has anything to do with it, at some point we will be able to return the favours in some way.
During the two day fixing, we were able to pick up Rascal's new spinnaker from Rolly Tasker in Phuket and gave it (and the old torn one) a lift down to Langkawi. There was no wind enroute, and we wanted to ensure course integrity with the hundreds of fishing boats and trawlers that populate the stretch between Phuket and Langkawi; we were still a little spooked about the steering mechanism.
An early arrival next morning saw us into Telaga Harbour marina in Langkawi, once again next to our Singapore neighbours Olivia! We looked for the two little kitties we had encountered on our way up and they weren't to be found: we hope someone found them as appealing as we did, and they are enjoying a lovely home and a thoroughly spoilt lifestyle. We despatched our 18 kilos of dirty laundry to the washing lady, and had a relaxing first day. Drinks and dinner with the Rascals at their lovely home followed, and we are replete.
Mark & Julie arrived from Singapore a day later and we played with them for several days, visiting marinas, getting way-too-smashed on long island teas at their hotel, and generally had a fun time with them. The 24th March saw our departure from Langkawi, for the 450 mile south passage into Singapore. It was mostly uneventful, with the exception of two nights dodging fishing boats. The Malacca Straits passage requires 3 nights at sea (unless one does coastal day hopping which would make it a 6 day trip). On approaching Singapore, we encountered a pretty violent white squall that lasted nearly 2 hours and pulled out of the shipping lane to do figure-of-eights in the ship anchorage while waiting for the squall to pass and provide us with the visibility needed to negotiate the busiest port in the world. We were welcomed back into our original berth in our marina, and very happy to be home (without a repeat steering failure!). A couple of drinks, followed by a 12 hour sleep was the order of the evening. It is really nice to be back.
We will be writing a separate missive on the steering failure and the Malacca Straits fishing fleet specifically for sailors/cruisers.

Pic shows: Henry on the emergency tiller, steering Dreamcatcher: we took turns, hour about, for 3 days, across the Andaman Sea and from the Similans to Phuket