Now we have internet-here come the posts
02 December 2014 | Telaga Marina, Langkawi
partly cloudy
Boy, I'm sure glad I made a salt water high pressure anchor chain washer system for Zephyr. The anchor and chain we brought up this morning was a mess. Thanks to the water pump, we short work of the mud in the chain links. The Jabsco pump claims to have 70psi. Don't know and don't really care as long as it does it's job and so far it's been great.
We both pulled up our anchor and were clearing the harbor about 1015, heading for our next planned anchorage at Pantai Jung Rhu. It was a short hop of just about 9 miles but we took our time and pulled in just after 1200. Now to look at the charts for the area, no boat in their right mind would come in here as where we are shows to be dry land. Instead, we are in about 12 feet of water. Even the depth markings on the charts as we entered the harbor say it's shallow and they were right. At one point we had "zero" under the keel but we switched out heading and found deeper water. Bill, on Solstice, followed behind with the two of us being in VHF radio contact the whole time as to depths. In the end, taking it slow was the name of the game and once in the harbor, we found 6 other boats had gotten here before us. No clue as to when, though we recognized the catamaran that left yesterdays anchorage yesterday.
This harbor must have a huge resort as there are boats zipping all over the place carrying lots of Muslim tourists out to see the sights. Steep vegetation covered cliffs are along the sides of the river that feeds into this harbor and the tourists are having a great time going up and down the river. We are planning on launching Puff(our dinghy) in a few minutes and taking a trip up the river too with Bill from Solstice coming along. There is no "free" internet here and I've pretty well shot what we had on our computer dongle so it may be a few days before you get to read this. One thing is for sure, when we head up river, we will be wearing swim suits as it seems to rain every afternoon here. Maybe not a lot but it can go on for several hours. With the temperature hovering in the high 80's every day, it's nice to just sit out on deck during the rain and let it cool you off.
As for Thanksgiving yesterday, Bill came over and we had quite the spread on the table. Two baked chickens, stuffing, mashed potatoes(with gravy), carrots, broccoli and cranberry orange relish. Add in a pecan pie and a deep dish apple pie and we had more food than we knew what to do with. Then of course we had the obligatory bottles of wine to wash it all down with and we had it great. We were smart enough to put up our tarp over the boat earlier in the day to keep the Sun off and it also kept the rain off later.
Once we got into the new anchorage and had a nice lunch, we launched Puff and with Bill(from Solstice)along we headed south along the river that feeds into the harbor. We were in search of "The Hole in the Wall". It's another anchorage that we planned on visiting tomorrow but this was a back way in. We will be taking Zephyr around the northeast side of the island and into this small harbor. Today, we went past mangrove trees full of monkeys and lots of Sea Eagles soaring in the sky about us and catching fish in the river around us. As expected, there were several tour boats zipping up and down the river so we had to watch out for them. Some even slowed a bit so they wouldn't swamp us with their wakes. We really had no clue as to which way to turn when we got to an intersection but we got lucky and either there was a tour boat there at the same time or we made a lucky guess. It took well over an hour to "Hole in the Wall" and once we got there we found numerous boats that appeared to be abandoned, all hooked to mooring balls all along the river. There were even some restaurants that cater to the tourists the tour boats bring in. They even had some fish farms set up along the rivers edge as an added attraction. It's one draw back it that all the restaurants were completely Muslim and no beer was sold or served!!!
Once we finished out short tour of the anchorage, we turned around and headed back up down, or maybe up the river towards out boats passing more tour boats heading in both directions. It took a good hour but we made it back just before our normal afternoon cloud burst. Todays waited till 1830 before it let loose. We'd gotten prepared for it by zipping on the side panels to the dodger so we could stay in the cockpit where it a good bit cooler than sitting downstairs with all the hatches and port lights closed to keep the rain out. The rain lasted a good two hours and slowly passed away in the night. But, have no fear, it will be back tomorrow.
We are slowly working our way around Langkawi with the only goal to be getting back to Telaga Marina by next Tuesday as that it when our reservation starts and when we hope an important box for home will arrive that full of boat parts for both of our boats. Lots of new electronics(AIS transponder and antenna splitter as well as a new depth sounder) plus some clothes for Tracy. It's very hard on clothes out here. The Sun can really shorten the life span of just about everything we wear. Heck, when we hand them outside to dry, we turn them inside out to try and keep the Sun from eating the thread and fading the material. It's amazing looking at some of my originally dark blue shorts only to see different colors. The outside all faded and the inside looking like new. The things we learn out here.
Still no internet so this post will be delayed for a while.