We headed back to Malaysia to avoid the charges associated with renewing our Thai visas. We pulled into Talaga where the process was easy and free, yeah Malaysia. After clearing in we headed around the corner to Rebak Marina to put Flour Girl on the dock so we could travel to Kuala Lumpur to start the process of getting new passports. We are out of pages and the US no longer adds pages to existing passports so new passports for us. On our way we passed friends on the boat Chantey. Will's son is on board for a couple of months so we decided to attack. I had a bad apple and so I gave it to Zack. We "loaded" the cannon and when we saw the whites of their eyes, I gave the command and Zack fired. A direct hit! Revenge may be ugly but we won't see them again for at least a week, so no worries. We put the boat on the dock the next morning and proceeded to wash everything we own. You cannot provide a cruiser with free water, things get ugly.

The next day we took the free ferry over to Langkawi and caught a taxi to the airport. Who knew it was so close? We were a bit early so Starbucks it is for a couple of hours. The flight took off fine and landed on schedule. It was a 2 hour bus ride to our hotel in downtown Kuala Lumpur. We stayed at the Geo which for the price was fabulous, but in reality it smelled like yesterdays curry and was pretty basic. We went out to find some dinner and the options in walking distance were not great. We ended up eating in a very crowded Indian restaurant. Not much for the vegetarians. Our waiter was really funny which made up for it although they did not serve beer and we were not allowed to go buy our own at the 7-eleven. Welcome back to Malaysia. It is an Islamic country and although everyone is as nice as can be you cannot drink alcohol in many of the restaurants, which is where you really want to drink a beer. We walked through China Town for a bit and I bought a really cool rickshaw with a man pulling it made out of bent wire from one of the many stalls.

We were up early the next morning and off to the US Embassy. I won't go into too much detail here but thankfully there was some bullet proof glass that prevented me from going to jail for murder. It was a nightmare. The waiting room was full and the one other white American who seemed to identify with us and desperately wanted to chat with us was absolutely nuts. He kept trying to drag us into conspiracy theory conversations. Did you know that the US government tried to move Hurricane Katrina away from Florida but it got out of control and because of the governments actions it strengthened into a super hurricane and that's why it was so catastrophic? Me either, but there was no place to hide, and on it went with one ridiculous story after the next. We got called to window 8 twice. Once they didn't recognize our postal code (VI) and the other to start the paperwork process. We had made online appointments. The online booking would only allow 2 appointments in one day, so Zack was the next day. Could we do it all in 1 day? NO! There are literally hundreds of people here like one more is going to tip the scales. We finally get to the last step of the process and we explain that Zack needs a passport as well as he has only one year left and it won't be enough to finish the trip. We don't have his birth certificate which we come to find out is the end all be all of proof that you have not trafficked the child. Or so I was told. It did seem at one point that she was going to help us. She had claimed to be the boss and it did seem a possibility. But, No, she decided to lecture me instead on the virtues of proper planning. It did not go so well. She just refused to see my point and like I said earlier that bullet proof glass has probably saved my ass from jail, because I was ready to choke her. Needless to say Zack is not getting a new passport in Kuala Lumpur. I did write a letter of complaint to the appropriate office explaining in much more detail than I have gone into here, and it was a waste of my time. I hate the government. Basically, I was told that the birth certificate would both prevent child trafficking and because the parents name does not appear in a minors passport we need to prove we are the parents. So, why not put the parents names and even their passport photos in a minor's passport? Our government is just ignorant. And on that note, please vote for Bernie Sanders.

We returned to Rebak Marina and I just need to tell one funny story. David went to check out and pay our bill. Zack and I went to say good bye to the crew of Allure who were hauled out doing a bottom job. David comes walking up with a grocery bag of Guiness beer. I asked why he bought that because I don't really care for Guiness. He didn't buy them, they were on the "Free Table." And yes, he truly believes that someone left beer on a free table. David offered some to Jason and even Jason did not want one for fear of the rightful owner showing up. David left 2 on his table any way. We returned to the boat and proceeded to tell our neighbors the story of the free beer. They were in stitches as they told the story of a woman a few days earlier who had inadvertently left her back pack on the free table for 3 minutes while she used the bathroom. She came out and someone had "stolen" her back pack and had rifled through it leaving several items on the table that they didn't want. The story got around and the back pack did get returned by a shame faced cruiser. David's beers quickly left the marina, so if someone is looking for them they are out of luck It may have been a funny story that night at happy hour but we will never know.

We checked out of Malaysia and started back into Thailand for one more month of cruising. On our way up we stopped at Koh Phaetra. It is a tiny little uninhabited island, actually more of a dramatic rock up cropping. It is 2 miles long and strikingly beautiful. The rock walls shoot into the sky and there are small caves everywhere. It is one of the places where locals collect swallow's nests for bird's nest soup. We anchored on the west side with great protection from any swell. The next morning we moved the boat around to the east side to have a look and a swim on the beach. We had the beach to ourselves and we were off to explore. There were some cool rock formations and Zack found some cool quartz deposits. He is into minerals and was chipping away at it with a small hammer. I was just looking around when I saw a really cool looking rock half buried in the sand. It was a light brownish with a cool pattern, about the size of a bowling ball and almost perfectly round. I thought Zack would be into it so I started digging it out. I was rocking it back and forth with my hands, trying to dislodge it from the sand when I noticed it wasn't round on the bottom and had some weird pieces sticking out. Zack came over to help and I made a joke that it looked like it had teeth on the other side. I kept at it and called to David to, jokingly, say I found some poor dead guy's skull. He laughed, but not for long. It was some poor dead guy's skull. David cleaned it out in the water and it seemed pretty old. Not sure what to do about it so we left it up past the high tide mark. Chantey showed up a while later and we showed it to them. We spent the rest of the afternoon playing on the beach and avoiding the dead guy.

The next morning we headed up to "Angry Monkey Bay" (not the real name) on the back side of Ko Phi Phi Don. It was late when we arrived so we throw down the hook and just stayed on board. David just happened to be looking at BBC online news, and saw a report that a 7.9 earthquake had just happened off the coast of Sumatra. There was a tsunami warning in effect. It was a lot smaller earthquake than the one that caused the 2004 tsunami that devastated Thailand, but better safe than sorry. We called Chantey with the news and we both decided to pull up anchor and head out to sea, about 10PM. As we were heading out the warning was canceled for Thailand. Excitement over for the night we returned to the bay and called it a night.

We headed to Au Chalong the next day to check in and do some provisioning. It was my birthday so we went out for dinner and drinks with the crew from Chantey. It was a mellow but fun evening. Zack made me a chocolate mud cake that was awesome! A good day for me.

From Au Chalong we decided to head for our favorite place in Thailand, for the third time, Khoa Lak. We have been here surfing ever since. Chantey spent a few days with us before they headed out to the Surin Islands. The waves are not as big nor as constant as the last time we were here, but we have been having a great time. Khoa Lak is such a mellow laid back place to hang out, and Memories Beach Bar has good food and cold beers. So what's not to love? We had bought a new surf board for me in Au Chalong about a month ago and I was really keen to give it a go. Unfortunately so was Zack. He got the first try and I have had to beg for turns ever since. It's a sweet little board and he is rocking it. He always lines up with the local guys and they are all super cool to him and give him tips and advice. David and I still hang with the tossers, but we are improving. The whole point of buying another surf board was so that David and I would no longer have to share and we could all surf together. I have been practicing on Zack's "Zebra" short board and I can now stand up and get rides on it. So I guess Zack has a new board and I have his old board. I'm glad I'm here and not in jail!