Day 50, Year 4: An Early Christmas Present for Mark
Date: Thursday, December 11, 2008
Weather: Another Beautiful, Hot, Sunny Day
Latitude: 16 degrees 18.632 minutes N
Longitude: 099 degrees 50.904 minutes E
Location: Kuah, Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia

We left Rebak Marina around 9 am and arrived back here in Kuah before noon. Our list of “to do’s” was long, and not everything got done, but we did manage to take our two old dinghy motors in to Nauti Bits to be sold on consignment and we bought a big, new, shiny Yamaha Enduro 15 hp engine for our dinghy. Mark has wanted this since Panama, so he is a happy cruiser this evening. On Christmas morning, I will decorate the motor with red ribbons as this is most definitely his one and only Christmas
present for this year and maybe next! So Merry Christmas to Mark. And we think we have to name this motor “Aunt Ethel.” My Aunt Ethel is in her nineties and going strong, and when we were on our way to shore today we saw a sailboat named “Aunt Ethel.” If our new dinghy motor has the stamina of my Aunt Ethel, we will be very happy. So “Aunt Ethel” she is.

After being out on Rebak island for more than two weeks, we are all of sudden back to “civilization.” The mosque blares prayers, the ferries come in and out, duty-free stores are everywhere, and tonight the shore is lit brightly with lights. But even with all that, it is very peaceful here. We will spend another day or two here and then head to Telaga Harbor to check out of the country. We’ll be back here in Langkawi in early February, so this will not be an emotional departure. There are still
so many things we want to see and do here, as well as many beautiful anchorages that we have not had a chance to visit. But we will be back to do these things later..

The really fantastic news of the day is that transmission does indeed appear to be working just fine. Another motor from here to Telaga on Saturday or Sunday should give us more confidence that all is well, but so far so good.