Day 41, Year 5: Checking Out of Malaysia
Date: Sunday, December 6, 2009
Weather: Change in the Weather; Overcast and Humid
Location: Kuah, Langkawi, Malaysia
We have finally checked out of Malaysia and will be leaving in the morning for Thailand. Shirena left this morning and we hope to catch up with them at Ko Taratao by tomorrow evening.
This was a day to get all of the last things we had on our MUST DO list done. Mark changed the engine oil, I worked all day finishing one last Christmas present for a grandchild so I can get the package in the mail before we leave in the morning, and Mark made one last trip to town to buy a few provisions that used up all of our Malaysian money except what we will need to send the package tomorrow morning. I am currently canning spaghetti sauce and we have downloaded the last of websites we want to read about going around South Africa. So we are feeling pretty good about being ready to go. We talked to Justin, Jo, and Ziggy earlier today which was their Saturday night, and we have just finished talking with Heather, Jed, Sam, and Jonah on their Sunday morning. Ziggy was the squealer as always, but it was time for bed and he was tired, so we got only a limited number of squeals and smiles before he was done with looking at the computer screen. When we talked to Heather, Jed, Sam, and Jonah it was their morning and it was time for Jonah’s nap. So, after a few delightful smiles at the camera, we mostly saw him sleeping. But Sam, on the other hand, was non-stop entertainment. He is old enough to know who we are so he kicked into high gear. He sang for us, played the violin, and took me sailing on his little wooden sailboat. Unfortunately Mark didn’t get to go along. It was just Sam the elephant and Oma the reindeer on Windbird. We just love to see the grandbabies doing whatever they are doing.
This morning, Jean Pierre of Safina came over and spent a good deal of time with us discussing our AGM battery purchase in Singapore this time last year. He needs new batteries and thought the price he was given here was out of the ballpark, but actually it is almost the same as we paid in Singapore. In fact, there is only one distributor for Trojan AGM’s in this part of the world and that distributor is in Singapore. He was ready to turn around and sail south to get a better price, but I think we convinced him that he will not do better than the price quoted here. After he left, we had a flurry of visitors. The first was a group young sailors on small club racing boats. They were being given instructions right next to Windbird and then off they went. Next, Darrell and Loretta of CanKata came over to get a copy of The King and I video from us. And then a couple who had emailed our website last year as they were preparing to set sail from Australia dropped by. Peter and Dell of Pacific Express had read all of our Indonesian logs and just wanted to thank us for the information.
So now we will head north and enjoy a few days of island hopping before checking into Thailand. We hope to have time to read more about the passage to South Africa as we travel. We have made the decision to go that way, but we certainly need to spend a great deal of time sorting through the details of where we should be when in terms of the weather.
