Lingga and Benan
01 November 2015 | Indonesia
Kim
It was a 2 night passage from Belitung to Lingga, uneventful and no fish for the boys. Lingga is a very remote island group and is poor in comparison to Belitung. We pulled in early morning and anchored off the main village. It was a bit tricky with 3 knots of current blasting through the anchorage. The current going past the boat made it look as if the boat was moving, lots of fun getting into the dinghy. The regency put on a welcome celebration for us, which was simple, but nice. There was a short dance performance on the dock, a few speeches, and a tour of the village. Nothing overwhelming and only half day. Perfect.
It was Halloween so after the tour the kids all dressed up and went boat to boat trick or treating. Angie and I covered Zack in tattoos and he wore a mask that we had purchased in Vanuatu, I used some red frosting gel and made a scar across his chest. George was a ninja turtle, Luke was a mummy, Shayla was Bloody Mary, (I think) and Tayah was scary rag doll, again not so sure. Sometimes costumes can be tricky to make with limited boat supplies and not a lot of warning. Halloween is mostly an American thing. I had put out a call on the VHF radio to warn everyone in the morning. It was great, all of the other cruisers found some treats for the kids. One boat threw a raw egg and some tomatoes at the kids, so they got a trick as well. They had a great time and some boats got to clean out their stuff. Mike on Tashi Delik gave them half a chocolate cake, none of which made it back to our boat. Island Bound brought over 6 bags of candy and a bunch of cookies. They got way too much candy and they ate so much they all felt a bit ill. But a great time was had by all and so another great cruising memory.
The big highlight of Lingga was the World Cup Rugby finals. It was New Zealand vs. Australia. We missed the matches leading up to this but there was no way we could miss the finals. There are lots of Kiwis and Australians on the rally and it was all very exciting. There is a small warung (restaurant/bar) by the jetty and B.J. set it up for the cruisers. He brought in some beer, big because it can be difficult to get in Muslim areas. He set up a big screen with a projector so everyone could see. The game started at eleven p.m. The cruisers were there in force with flags waving. It started with the New Zealand team doing a haka (a traditional Mauri war chant) which was cool to watch. New Zealand is always the little brother to Australia and the pressure was on. We stayed for the first half. We heard lots of jibes on America. It seems rugby is a man's sport and American football is a sissy's sport played in full body armour. In rugby the only safety equipment you get is a mouth guard. There were some bloody guys on the field but they kept playing. One player was pulled from the game for a suspected spinal injury. It was rough to say the least. The Kiwis came on strong and at half time were ahead by a fair bit. So we went home. New Zealand did trump Australia and there were lots of sore heads the next day. The party seems to have gone on after the game.
I was glad we didn't stay because we moved out early the next morning for the top of the island, about a 20 mile motor, there is no wind here and we are burning lots of diesel. We are stopping at the top of the island for a crossing the equator party. We are back in the northern hemisphere! As we came up to the anchorage there were hundreds of little fishing huts on the water. They are wild looking with a tiny house, a big platform and a large net. We did not get out to see one but our friends on Dream Maker went out to see one and were invited to lunch. This life can be very random at times.
The party was a potluck and quite nice as pot lucks go. It was a pirate theme and some good costumes. George was a Somali Pirate, cute. At sunset Jason did a fireworks display and it was another great evening.
The next day it was up early and off to Benin, which will be our last rally stop in Indonesia. It is super hot here at the equator, just throwing that out there. We anchored and went in to check out the village. Benin seems a bit more prosperous than Lingga. Not sure why as we didn't see much going on. There were a couple of guest houses so maybe a bit of tourism. There is a lovely beach. We were given a few "local guides", children learning English. They were sweet enough but they may need a few more classes, or maybe they were just shy. I have done a lot of bread lessons along the way in the past 3 years and people have been asking, but it is just too hot. When we were at the Equator party someone mentioned that the boat Beach House would trade a bread lesson for a jet ski ride for Zack. He was all about it. It was about 10 in the morning and hotter than blazes but anything for my guy. I called to confirm and then put out a general call and we ended up with 4 cruisers. It's always a lot of fun once you get going and I made bread for us so win-win. Zack got his ride and he was stoked because he even got to drive the jet ski. He came back with the speed details and they got up to 80 kph. It was Lukes birthday on Benen and there was meant to be a party at 3 pm, so I baked a cake. There was supposed to be a welcome ceremony at 9am but when B.J. found out it was Luke's birthday he clandestinely ordered a cake for him. It could only be made for 3pm so he rescheduled the welcoming ceremony for 3 pm. Maybe a kid on Benan wants to listen to speeches for his birthday, but a cruiser kid not so much. Luke, to his credit, took it very well. We watched the dances and listened to the speeches. There was some local food. One thing was small dough balls filled with a sweet liquid and deep fried and rolled in sugar, Delicious! After the welcome ceremony we did some games on the beach. It went great. For all the games we had our kids pair with a local kid. The local kids in all of Indonesia are great, totally inclusive and willing to join in. We did wheel barrel races, three legged races, sack races, all lots of fun. Then there was egg roulette. It was sponsored by Evan, a single hand cruiser in the rally. I have never seen this before but it was a big hit. There were about 15 eggs in the middle, some cooked some raw. He spun around with a blindfold and picked a kid. The kid then had to pick an egg and smash it into his forehead. If you are lucky you get a hardboiled egg snack, if not you have a raw egg pouring down your face. It was lots of fun. Zack, George, Maria and a couple of the local kids got egg on the face. Evan took the last egg but had done a poor calculation and smashed a raw egg on his head. Serves him right because now Zack wants to play this game at every birthday. Maria had made a pinata and the kids all took turns. When it had been smashed and all the candy collected the local kids went around and made sure all the kids had gotten candy including ours, they were sharing with all, very sweet.
We all headed to B.J.'s restaurant to have dinner and eat cake. We also did a pass the parcel which is always fun. Mostly joke gifts and always a pair of Jason's underwear which he promptly confiscates. You gotta love that Kiwi humor. We had planned to do some fireworks for Luke's birthday but we had heard it was illegal to bring fireworks into Malaysia and that you could go to jail if caught. We decided to set off all the fireworks on the 3 kid boats. It was a huge show, close to the fireworks display on St. John for the 4th. We did not actually get all of them done and Zack had a few small ones left. No one asked about anything when we got to Malaysia and they don't come to the boat so we could have saved some but it was a great display and a great farewell to Indonesia. We are on our way to Malaysia tomorrow.