by Judy Handley | Nov 22, 2008 | Malaysia, Sailing Logs Year 4 |
Day 31, Year 4: Walking, Walking
Date: Saturday, November 22, 2008
Weather: Mostly Clear Day
Location: Kuah, Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia
In Indonesia “jalan, jalan” means “walking, walking” but here in Malaysia “jalan” means mad. But after Indonesia, anytime we do a town walk-about I always think “jalan, jalan” in my head. And today we certainly did a bit of walking. We left Windbird around 10 am and stopped by Blue Marlin to check in with Idunne and Rune. We saw Idunne in town our first day here, but we tried to visit yesterday and kept missing each other. Rune was home alone this morning, but we were really glad we connected.
He had a five-page document from another cruiser in the bay listing all of the businesses here, what they offer, with directions on how to the find the place. There was even a detailed map. We took Rune’s only copy since they were leaving today for Rebak Marina and we can return their copy tomorrow when we get to Rebak. This document saved our day. We had a huge list of things we needed to purchase and we had no idea where to find the things. With a little help from our friends, we located International anti-fouling paint in a store that sells marine charts. We went on to buy charts for Thailand, engine oil, transmission fluid, multi-grain and dark rye bread, Australian frozen meat, and on and on. The two things we didn’t get were fresh veggies and paint roller sleeves. We must have walked five miles to the veggie market only to find that it is open at 7 am and 4 pm daily but is not open in the middle of the day. We also did not find 7″ paint roller sleeves. So tomorrow morning before leaving for Rebak Marina, we will make one more trip into town to get these items.
It was after 5 pm when we returned to Windbird with a heavily laden dinghy. Soon after we got things packed away, Marianne and Kaye of Nabob popped in for a visit. They had arrived this morning after we left for town, but they had connected with Blue Marlin before she left and had been told to get a copy of the Kuah Town directory from us. We made a copy for them and made arrangements to go back in for dinner together. After a dinner not far from the dinghy landing, we walked around the corner to the Saturday night market. We immediately realized we had made a huge mistake eating dinner before coming to the night market. There was food of every type imaginable and lots of fresh fruit for sale. I loaded up on fruit and onions, but there were no other veggies. That must wait until tomorrow morning.
After a short shopping trip tomorrow morning, we will pull up anchor and head the twelve or so miles to Rebak Marina. As soon as we arrive, we will start the cleaning of the deck and topsides so that once Windbird is out of the water on Tuesday, we will be ready to assault the bottom. You never want to clean above the waterline just after painting the bottom due to the fear of destroying the bottom paint with harsh cleaners from above. So Sunday and Monday are clean, clean, clean, and then Tuesday she’s out of the water and the real fun begins.
by Judy Handley | Nov 21, 2008 | Malaysia, Sailing Logs Year 4 |
Day 30, Year 4: Day of Contemplation
Date: Friday, November 21, 2008
Weather: Overcast Day with Rain Early; Slight Clearing Late Afternoon
Location: Kuah, Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia
It was a day of contemplation. Early in the day, the canvas guy, Ben, came to the boat to look at our Doyle Stack Pack that covers our mainsail and to look at our cockpit enclosure. He can remake the stack pack for us with a few modifications to make it even nicer. But he can’t do this until February, so that piece of information made our final decision that we will be keeping Windbird here until this time next year. One decision made.
He then looked at our cockpit enclosure and his first comment was that whomever made it spared no expense. It was done right, but he pointed out the fact that we have a huge investment in stainless steel framing for the enclosure. If we build a hard dodger, all of that stainless has to be removed. So a hard dodger might not be our answer. We are still contemplating this one, but as of today we are leaning toward a new cockpit enclosure made just like the one we currently have. Oakum Bay in Marblehead,
Massachusetts made the current enclosure and we have been so thankful to them so many times for the great joy they did. Ben thinks he can the same job with a few improvements, so that is probably what we will end up doing.
The next stage of contemplation was about Christmas. We took our computers and went to the Royal Langkawi Yacht Club where we can be on the internet. It was a busy, busy place today as a major sailing race is coming in tomorrow. Actually, many of the boats are already here and today the place was abuzz with people. If there is enough wind, tomorrow’s leg of the race will take place here in the bay, but if there is no wind here, the race will take place outside the harbor. The bar and restaurant
were so busy today that they wouldn’t let us plug in our computers there, so we found a place on the second floor with a great view of the marina and bay and plopped ourselves down there for the entire afternoon. We contemplated the option of Christmas gifts for our kids, made some decisions, and got things ordered. We also made final orders of small boat items that we will have Kevin and Claire bring to us when they come in December. We still have a few loose ends, but we are much closer than
we were this time yesterday.
The thing we are still contemplating is whether or not to buy a new dinghy engine. We have our old Suzuki that just needs a little work on the carburetor, and we have the Tohatsu we bought from Freebird when they moved up to the 15-horse Yamaha. It looks worn, but it has been doing a great job for us. If we bought the new Yamaha, we would have to find a way to sell the two old ones and I’m just not sure that is going to happen here. So we’ll keep thinking on that one. It is just one of those
deals that is hard to pass on.
Tomorrow we will do more shopping in Kuah, top up on groceries, and get ready to move to Rebak Marina. It is on an offshore island, but they do provide a free ferry shuttle to the mainland a certain times during the week and then a van here to Kuah for shopping. There is no public transportation on the island, so you either use the free Rebak service or you rent a car or hire a taxi. We’ll start off with the essentials and see how it goes from there. Since we will scraping, sanding, and painting
the bottom next week, we aren’t going to want to stop to come in to Kuah to shop. Once the bottom is done, we can start exploring the island here. There is another major harbor with another marina complex, the tourist beach area, an aerial tram ride to the top of the highest mountains, waterfalls, and lots of other hidden gems to be discovered.
by Judy Handley | Nov 20, 2008 | Malaysia, Sailing Logs Year 4 |
Day 29, Year 4: Langkawi–What A Great Place
Date: Thursday, November 20, 2008
Weather: Overcast Day with Light Sprinkles All Day
Location: Kuah, Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia
We are liking Langkawi. We have had overcast weather with sprinkles, but the sprinkles are so light that you don’t need an umbrella. The harbor we are in could actually be in the Pacific Northwest if it were 30 degrees cooler. The surrounding mountains are green and lush and low clouds hang over the mountains. We are told that this weather will pass quickly and we will be back to sunshine, but actually it has been a nice break. Langkawi is duty free. We have been in lots of places that are
duty free, but none like this. The cost of liquor and beer here is unreal. In Singapore we would have paid about $40US for a case of beer. We just didn’t buy any. Here we bought ten cases of beer for a total of $100US. And you can buy most any kind of beer you want from Sapporo to Corona to Budweiser to any of the Southeast Asian beers. Unbelievable. You can buy any Corelle, Pyrex, or Luminarik ware in any of the duty free stores. I found a glass Luminarik container that I have been looking for the past five years. I think it cost $5US which was expensive, but I was glad to pay that after five years of searching out here and back in the US. You can buy a brand new 15-horse Yamaha dinghy motor for about $1350US. That’s way cheaper than in Panama and we thought Panama was cheap. We can have all of our canvas replaced for about $2200US. That’s expensive, but a lot cheaper than we could have this done back in New England. So the list goes on. We had lunch with a guy from the US named Ben and his Thai partner, Nim. Ben sailed here from Seattle and has been here about nine years now. He is the canvas guy in Langkawi and he is a wealth of information.
So in one day, we have way more information than we can digest. But it is Thursday, and Friday and Saturday are the weekend days in this very Muslim province. Tomorrow, Friday, everything will be closed, so that will give us a day to think. We will stay here on Saturday and then move the eleven miles to the Rebak Marina on Sunday or Monday where we will be hauled out next Tuesday. We are contemplating having either a new cockpit enclosure made or having a hard top built with canvas side curtains.
Windbird needs her first paint job but it looks like Phuket, Thailand is the best place to have that done. We’d love to have a new dinghy motor, but we have to figure out how to get rid of the two old ones we are currently carrying around. The list goes on and on and it is helping us make our decision about whether to head straight to the Med at the end of January or stay here for another year. I think the decision has almost been made that Windbird will be here for another year. Some of the
work we want done will happen before we head to the US in late February or March, and the remainder of the work will be done when we return in late fall.
So life is good here in Langkawi and tomorrow we will make some final decisions on our plans for the next year. Can’t think of a better place to have to sit and contemplate the future.
by Judy Handley | Nov 19, 2008 | Malaysia, Sailing Logs Year 4 |
Day 28, Year 4: Arrival in Langkawi
Date: Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Weather: Wind NNE 15-20; Rough Seas; Rain Early; Overcast Day
Latitude: 06 degrees 18.642 minutes N
Longitude: 099 degrees 50.904 minutes E
Location: Kuah, Pulau Langkawi, Malaysia
According to Malay folklore, Langkawi derived its name from the beautiful eagles that live here. Helang means big bird or eagle and kawi refers to the reddish-brown color. So basically Langkawi means “reddish-brown eagle.” When we sailed into the harbor here today, we were greeted by a huge eagle sculpture that looks over the harbor. It is mountainous, but the beautiful turquoise waters are not here in Kuah. They are on the northern side of the island. But still, it is a beautiful place and we are so glad we made the decision to come here directly. We had a little difficulty getting here, however. When I recorded the data in our log at midnight last night, the seas were silky and the winds were light. Thirty minutes later we were bashing into heavy seas with 15-20 knots of wind right on the nose. Windbird was hobby horsing through the waters and then the rains came. When I talked about the Northeast Monsoon in last night’s log, I guess I jostled some memory and made the winds come alive. But even with the adverse conditions, we still made it here by noon today. We spent part of the afternoon cleaning up a bit of seawater that came into our forward head through the hatch that was not dogged down tight. We then went over to see Eric and Robyn on Scorpido as they are leaving in the morning, and then went into town for dinner. We will have to fully explore Kuah, the main town here on Langkawi, in the daylight, but at least we found the people to be extremely friendly. We’ll stay in this location for another two or three days and then move to a small island to the west to Rebak Marina. Tomorrow we start the search for things on our “To Buy” list and for people to do the things on our “To Do” list we can’t do ourselves. So it is early to bed tonight as we have a big day ahead of us.
by Judy Handley | Nov 18, 2008 | Malaysia, Sailing Logs Year 4 |
Day 27, Year 4: Strike That, Move Forward
Date: Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Weather: Rain Early Morning; Mostly Overcast Day; No Wind
Latitude: 02 degrees 45.665 minutes N
Longitude: 101 degrees 21.500 minutes E
Location: Second Day of Passage, Port Dickson to Langkawi, Malaysia
Miles to Go: 109
You just can’t depend on some people to do what they say they are going to do. Yesterday we were headed to Penang, a city on the coast of Malaysia, but today we are headed to Langkawi, a group of islands offshore. I wrote to both of our children this morning and told them that we are as fickle as the wind at this time of the year in Southeast Asia. But actually, I think we have just mellowed into the cruising life where your plans change constantly depending on the weather, the wind, the currents,
and your frame of mind. We would like to see Penang, but once we got going, we decided that we just didn’t want to stop. I checked my bible, the Lonely Planet, and found that we can take a ferry from Langkawi to Penang for very little money and be there in less than two hours. So we changed our plans. We now have one more night in the Strait of Malacca with it’s myriad of fishing boats, tugs, tankers, floating debris, and rain storms, and then we will be in Langkawi where we can relax and get
ready for a week or two of boat maintenance. Langkawi is really a group of about 99 islands on the northern Malaysian border. Only one of the islands is of any size and it is the one referred to when people say they are going to Langkawi. We will arrive in the only town of any size on the island tomorrow mid-day, check-in, and try to meet up with Robyn and Eric on Scorpido before they leave for Thailand the following morning. We got an email from them today and Robyn explained that we will arrive
just in time for the Wednesday Night Market. Don’t know what that is, but we’ll check it out and probably see them there.
When we arrive in Langkawi, we will have moved from the Strait of Malacca to the Andaman Sea. We will have rain, but nothing like we have been experiencing. We are in the transition period between the Southwest and the Northeast Monsoons and the further north we go, the drier it will get. Because we are in that transition period we have been having very fickle winds. Sometime between now and the middle or end of January, the Northeast Monsoon should come into full play and that is when people
head across the Indian Ocean. We are looking forward to no more thunder and lightening shows, much less rain, and slightly cooler weather. It is amazing to me that we are leaving an area where the wet season is just beginning and almost overnight we will be in a new weather zone where the dry season is just beginning. But we will still have the 90 per cent humidity. You can’t have it all.
by Judy Handley | Nov 17, 2008 | Malaysia, Sailing Logs Year 4 |
Day 26, Year 4: First Day of Passage to Penang
Date: Monday, November 17, 2008
Weather: Rain Overnight and Early Morning; Totally Overcast Day
Latitude:02 degrees 45.665 minutes N
Longitude: 101 degrees 21.500 minutes E
Location: On Passage from Port Dickson to Penang, Malaysia
Miles to Go: 181
Sailing, well, actually, motoring in the Strait of Malacca is really no fun at all. It is truly a nerve-wracking experience. First of all, the water is an ugly greenish-brownish-yellowish color. It is rainy season, so it is either raining or overcast. But when the sun does shine, it is so hot you can hardly breathe. We mostly have wind against us, what little wind there is, and the currents are strong. Half of the time you have one to two knots against you and the other half of the time you
do enjoy the boost of a two-knot current. The coastline is low, no mountains, with lots of manufacturing plants. So suffice it to say, we will be glad when we reach the city of Penang and then have only a day sail to get us out to the island of Langkawi. It is a tourist destination and should have white sand beaches and turquoise water. Neighboring Thailand is in a totally different season. It is the dry season there, so I’m hoping that the weather in Langkawi in Malaysia will be much more like
Thailand. The real problem with the rain is that we have to shut the boat up tight to keep the water out, but that also makes it unbearably hot. Thailand should be a tad cooler and without the rain, we can at least have ventilation down below.
The other things that make sailing here no fun is the amount of “stuff” in the water. Today we have seen huge logs, five gallon buckets, tree limbs, plastic, Styrofoam, lots of huge ships, little fishing boats, you name it. It is in the water here. We are currently passing the entrance to Port Klang, the major big ship port in modern-day Malaysia. We are currently going through the big ship anchoring area for the port, and I am sincerely hoping that after we pass this area, the traffic and stuff
in the water will both reduce in numbers. Robyn and Eric on Scorpido crossed from Penang to Langkawi a few days ago and they were actually able to sail. We’ll just hope that the conditions are right for us as well. But until then, we will continue motor sailing north and hoping that it is our lucky day and that we will not have any collisions with logs. If we make it safely to Langkawi, I will be ready to give thanks on Thanksgiving Day next week. The land experiences this cruising year have
been wonderful, but the water travel has been challenging.
