We just got an email from the embassy that our new super passports have arrived! Just in time so we can get out of here on Saturday. With Friday being a national holiday--Chinese New Years, we will be heading into the embassy tomorrow afternoon as pickup times are between 1400 and 1600. We got our passports with extra pages already installed so it won't matter how many countries we visit. We were down to our last three pages in our old passports and many of the countries out here love to take up a whole page with their stamps and visas. Indonesia is particularly bad and we expect to be back there again in a while.

We'll head into town(Maura) and check at the Ferry Terminal to make sure we can get through Customs, Immigration and of course the Jabatan Laut-or Harbor Master's office on Saturday. One of all of the offices might be closed but we doubt it as the ferries would still be running, holiday or not. The Harbor Master might be closed so we will be checking it out. I just hope we don't run into the same problem we had back on New Years Eve when the bus driver dropped us off at the terminal the check into Brunei and promised to come back in an hour to get us and never showed. We're on a much better level with him now as I bought him a pair of sun glasses I brought from the US. He didn't have any and it can get quite bright here. He broke his last pair. So, we figure he can drop us off at the Ferry Terminal, we can go in and ask the questions we have and then if it's still going to be a while before he comes back, we know the way back to the bus terminal at Maura.

We'll hop on the bus to Bandar Seri Begwan and have one last lunch at McDonalds and try and find some hoses we need and then take off for the embassy. BSB is set up in shopping sections. Each shopping center or area has it's own draw. There is one set up for electronics and appliances. Another for car, truck and general maintenance parts. Clothes in another. If you know what you want, it makes shopping easier as you only have a couple of places to stop to get what you want, plus there is competition between stores to have the lowest price when there are so many stores in one area.

Once we have our passports, we will stay here for the Chinese New Years(not that we will do anything) and then check out of the country on Saturday(if possible) and head out for the South China Sea and the island of Tioman. It's about 800 miles(6 to 7 day trip) west south west of here and the winds and waves look to be perfect for the trip. We may even put out the spinnaker if the winds let us. Winds are due to be about 10-15 knots from the north to northeast and swells are set for less than 5 feet again from the north or northeast. I may have to close the gate valve I installed in the exhaust line to make sure no water comes in but that why I installed it.

So Saturday looks at this time to be our get out of Brunei day. It's been a while since we did a crossing of more than a couple of days so it's going to be nice to see the open ocean again.