Back in Langkawi

Back in Langkawi again after sailing some 400 miles to Phuket, Thailand and back. That may not seem like a great, and it isn't, but lets see you move 17 tons - 400 miles for free! Well mostly for free. We motored a little some days to get into the lee of islands and drop the anchor. We sailed 5 days each way, stopping a a different Island each night. Some days the sailing was exhilarating with winds of 20 knots we really tripped along at 9-10 knots, other times with the wind dropping we coasted along. Early in the trip our port starting battery packed up, so Marvin had to climb down the hatch into the engine compartment and turn on the emergency switch. This switch allows power from the house batteries to be used to start the engine. After starting the switch is then turned off to prevent the bad battery from draining all the house batteries. We have 8 very large house batteries all wired together as a happy family. Bought a new starting battery in Phuket.

We flew the smaller symmetrical spinnaker a couple of days in light winds and tried the big spinnaker one day, but found it huge, an I do mean huge. It will scare you just taking it out of the bag! We hoisted it, but then us 3 ladies (Ruth Shiela and I) looked at it, chickened out and put it back in the bag. Maybe later with a crew. In our defense, the spinnaker is 8 years old and looks absolutely new.

Sheila and Ruth went to boarding school in Scotland a few years ago, well many, many, years ago when they were young. Ruth just had her big 6 -ooh birthday and now the poor soul has lived with me almost 1/2 of her life! In the last few years, Ruth and Sheila have come back into contact and Shiela was brave enough to join us for some sailing. She was a delight to have along and did more than her share of rope handling and chores. I am now back to having to dry the dishes each evening. It was nice sitting back while the two ladies did all the galley chores, while talking constantly, while I took it easy.

In Thailand the ladies went on a tour and rode elephants and water buffaloes. Ruth even had an elephant massage. She actually volunteered for this! Meanwhile I was having my own thrills. I took a motorbike taxi from Phuket to Boat Lagoon Marina, about 15 miles. You jump on the back of a 125 cc motorcycle, grab the seat handles and hang on! The Thai driver doesn't speak any english and drives like he was late for dinner. We even carried a 60 lb. battery. Not something you want do to every day.

Living on the boat we are very green and leave a small footprint. When the sun is shining our 8 large solar plates produce enough energy to make drinking water from the seawater, and to run the entire boat including freezer, fridge, communications, lights and even clothes washing machine. but we do have to hang the clothes out to dry. Our reverse osmosis watermaker can make as much as 380 gallons/day, but that is only if the sun shines brightly for 24 hours continuously. On this particular trip we only used the watermaker a few minutes to give it some exercise, and we still returned with tanks 1/2 full. We collected about 40 gallons of rainwater one evening using our bimini collection system. This consists of two hoses attached to the low points of the bimini. When it rains hard, we let it wash off for awhile, then start collecting pure rainwater. Beats buying water! With plenty of sun we can even use sun energy to make ice for our gin and tonics. Now if we could only catch some fish! Far too many fishing boats all over the Andaman Sea. We spend a good part of each day dodging them. Some are dragging long nets, some are hauling crab pots. others have fishing lines out and some fish only at night with lots of bright lights shining down into the water. Every once in a while we come upon a small fishing boat drifting, only to find 2 or 3 fishermen asleep under a tarp. The local folks are quite comfortable with the warm sea. If it gets rough, they haul their boats up on the beach and find a place to nap. In the larger caves you may find 2 or 3 families of sea gypsies living there temporarily.

Back in Langkawi Royal Yacht Club - Changed the oil in both engines including all filters. Sounds easy? First you climb down thru the aft hatch into the hot engine room. The oil needs to be hot in order to manually suck it out up thru the dipstick opening with a small 1/4" tubing. Really!! With a small hand pump. Then there are 10 filters that need to be changed (2 diesel fuel filters/engine, 2 oil filters/engine and two water filters). It works fine if you do it exactly right, if not you end up cleaning up several liters of spilled diesel running down both elbows because you did not close the fuel valve tight enough. Then took the 78# stainless anchor to a machine shop and had the shaft straightened with a large press. You don't want me to even get started on the trouble with the oil leak - a bad casting of the original part, and businesses in the USA that don't ship overseas. Try staying up late at night, for several nights, and cheerfully saying good morning to folks that ask where is Malaysia and we don't ship there, because the address doesn't fit in our computer format.

We had some fun too - rented a car and toured the Island of Langkawi. Had a great lunch at the Mediterranean style bistro (Tapaz) at the upscale Marina Talaga. Then rode the cable car to the top of the mountain and went shopping in the handicraft center, all followed by a seafood dinner at Wonderland, and a stroll thru the local bazaar, night market.

We have now hung out here in the Royal Langkawi Yacht Club for 6 months during the hot wet season. It is still hot, but the N/E monsoon winds are filling in, so it is time to say goodbye to Langkawi and move on. We have enjoyed our time here and will miss Langkawi and the nice people here. Bob and Judy will arrive from Australia Dec. 24 and we will soon thereafter be off to Cochin, India where Ruth will meet her sister for a 3 week land tour. Then we will be off again to the Red Sea and Europe.