Monday, 20th October 2008

We arrived at Belitung at 4pm Bali time (3pm local time) and having motored for the previous 24 hrs the wind picked up and we had 20 odd knots in the last hour of getting there. Was certainly blowing in at the anchorage and we rocked and rolled until just after dark when it calmed down. Forgot to mention in the last update that we caught a small tuna on the way to Belitung - the first fish since leaving Darwin. Had dinner on board and then went ashore to participate in the locals festivities as they were celebrating the full moon. It was a great night with dancing, action songs etc. and they had all us yachties up dancing and teaching us the Indonesian way of dancing. Their dancing in Belitung is quite different to other parts of Indonesia and much more interesting. Some of the local ladies had Dave up dancing much more than he would have liked!! He even got paid 5000 rupiah for dancing from the Vice Regent's wife!! By the end of the evening we were worn out as well as wringing wet!

Next day was spent organizing our documents for customs clearance etc. in between getting ashore between the rain showers. The people in Belitung were really lovely people, so friendly and couldn't do enough for all us yachties. That night was the official farewell for the Sail Indonesia fleet and they put on a meal, plus dancing, music etc. and the USA members in the fleet did the farewell bit for us yachties, which consisted of some entertainment from members of the fleet and fireworks. All in all a lovely evening, finally arriving back at the boat at mid night.

The locals put on several free buses each day to go the 45 minute trip to the nearest city so we caught the 10am bus on Friday to stock up on fruit and vegetables at the market which was a huge one. There wasn't a lot to offer in the town but daresay like most of their towns you have to just shop around. The bus returned at 1pm so didn't have to hang around waiting for it to leave. Also picked up our customs clearance documents etc.

Friday night a group of us went ashore for dinner and they also had a presentation from the fleet for Raymond & Dewi who were the organizers of the rally. Went to a seafood restaurant and I ordered 1 crab with rice and vegetables and got 1kg of crab (4 in total) with a huge bowl of rice. Ended up taking a doggy bag back to the boat with the 2 uneaten crabs and most of the rice which I made into a rice salad.

We were up and started to get away at 7am on Saturday, along with Te Wai Pounamu, Purnama & Destiny 111 when we had a bit of a problem with the motor - no power so had to re anchor for Dave to have a look. However he got it sorted and we were away at 8.15am. The four of us, plus another 7 boats headed to Batu Gelasa, a 40 mile trip and we had a great sail and even had the spinnaker up for several hours arriving at our destination at 3pm. Most of us ended up having sundowners on the catamaran "This Way Up" and then we had Purnama and Destiny 111 on board for a barbecue dinner.

Yesterday and this morning we have been up with the larks, leaving just after 5am as we have had two 50 mile plus days but unfortunately both yesterday and today we have had to motor sail most of the way. We did catch a very small fish on Saturday, hardly enough for a meal but I made kokoda from it which we had for lunch yesterday. All 11 boats spent last night at Panjang Island and even though we had a thunder storm it was a good anchorage for the night. We are at present headed for an anchorage at the top of Bangka Island and may stay there two nights if it is a good anchorage. We currently have 9 miles to go to get there.

Catala opted to stay a day or two more in Belitung and then planned to sail directly to Sebana Cove. However, we decided that we wanted to do day hops as there are so many fishing boats, ships, fishing traps and large floating logs in this part of the ocean we preferred to day hop. Also when we were coming up from East Java there was a pirate warning out but fortunately we didn't have any trouble with nothing untoward happening around us. The last two days we have seen dozens of huge fishing platforms made from bamboo poles which the locals fish off and have little huts on them so we presume they also live on them from time to time. We saw people fishing off them but no boat tied to the platform so obviously have to get rides from fishing boats if they want to go back to land.

We are now into the monsoon season and most days there are thunderstorms, lightening and heavy rain but so far we have been quite lucky and have seen it go mostly around us. Dave has rigged up a lightening grounding device (LGD) so if we get hit by lightening it won't blow a hole in the boat today as we will need one from now on.

We are now only 100 miles from the equator. The next blog will probably be after we have gone across it.