Talaga

Today we begin the last of our paperwork shuffle here in Malaysia.
we will be checking out and off to new adventures in Thailand.


In this lifestyle we meet lots of new friends from many different countries. Sometimes we get to catch up with some old ones too. Langkawi offered that first with Phil whom we had known in the Marshall Islands but Christmas brought another surprise visitor. Jack Kimble and his partner Sandi arrived on a boat they were delivering from the Philippines to here in Malaysia. Jack and I went to Newport Harbor high school together and last saw each other in 1998 before Kathy and I started cruising. Jack and Sandi own a sister ship to ours and have been out enjoying this lifestyle since the mid 1970's. something we always look forward to in a new anchorage is making new and finding old friends.


As I said we will be off shortly, I'll try to continue posts via our onboard email but they will be without photos. Though the trip to Phuket, Thailand is only 120 miles there are lots of possible stops in between so it will take us several days. Once in Phuket we'll hopefully catch you up on photos.

Langkawi Adventures

Well to all you readers of my feebile attempts to organize this blog, bare with me as I continue to attempt new and easier ways to publish posts. I think that perhaps some hands on help would work wonders, are there any volunteers out there? Whatever I did this time was definitely less time consuming to get the photos loaded but you'll just have to put up with my various methods until I manage to figure things out.

As we sailed to the island of Langkawi from Penang we were busy checking out our cruising guides to find an anchorage. We knew that we would be spending several weeks in the area and did not just want to be anchored off the town of Kuah or spend our time in one of the various marinas. To us marinas mean boat projects along with an added expense. Our choice for arrival was an area refered to as the fijord for it's likeness to those in other areas of the world.

Lankawi consists of something in the number of 120 islands of various sizes and this fijord is actually a narrow passage between two of there. There were several others anchored in these protected waters. We spent our first several days here. Days were spent relaxing enjoying the chattering of the monkeys in the mornings and watching the sea eagles gliding the air waves and catching their dinner from the waters

The sceanery is spectacular. The water a warm 85', though not the type of clarity that you would want for snorkeling.

To soon it was time to move on to Kuah town to do the paperwork formalities, restock provisions and visit with an old friend whom we met in the Marshall Island and make Langkawi his home.

Wet Market Shopping

Here going shopping is a bit different than your basic trip to Vons or Costco. The "supermarkets" here in Langkawi more likely have mostly dry goods. Shelves are stocked with canned goods, paper products, some frozen things but very little in the way of fresh fruits, vegetables, fish or meat. For those sorts of things we go to the wet market. For the freshest selection it's best to plan your trip first thing in the morning. For us it's first a dinghy ride to shore then a taxi to the market place.

The front on the Langkawi market is devoted to fish, beef and poultry. The rear half fruits and veggies.


Each vendor has their own stall and different product. For the beef here you just tell him what you want and he will carve out your choice. We saw no grinders to make hamburger.


In this stall we purchased a half of a Wahoo, which the operator steaked out for us at a cost of 16 ringgets per kilo. That figures to about $2.50 a pound.

Here we see an example chickens, they normally include the feet along with some cuts of beef


We've finished our shopping and now are spending a bit of time in the "food court". Kathy has decided we should sample several of the different local delights, I couldn't tell you what any of these might be but she added another couple of things and the price was less than $2 US.

Through out the market place there are a goodly number of scavenger's and my guess would be this would be a most unsafe place for any mice or rats as we saw a minimum of 100 plus cats. they seemed quite happy and well fed.

For frozen meats: chicken, pork, beef or sausages, bacon we find these items in a freezer in the back of any number of Chinese duty free shops that have mostly liquor displayed but other goodies in the back.

Shopping here is definitely a different experience!

Merry Christmas

Here in Malaysia and being a bit ahead we are in the midst of Christmas day. We know many of you are experiencing a white or wet Christmas, here we have a lovely day with temps in the mid 80's and mostly sunny sky's. We have a port roast on the BBQ but we may be joining friends in a dinner ashore


We are not able to carry and store lots of holiday decorations but Kathy does her best with what little we do carry. Most years something is added from the country we're in. Fortunately she found the raindeer when we were in Penang as Christmas is almost non existent here in Langkawi. being mostly Muslim there is little evidence of Christmas.


So with Bing Crosby singing "White Christmas" in the background I give you a view of our bit of Christmas decor.


we wish you all a very MERRY CHRISTMAS.

George Town-Penang

We have left George Town, Penang behind and keeping with our goal made a one day passage to Langkawi. So now here are some photos of the sights of Penang. This bridge crosses from the mainland to Pulau Penang.


A view of the ferry landing area, marina in the background.


George Town is a busy city with lots of traffic, cars, buses and pedestrian.


The British colonial influence on the architecture.


No velvet pictures of Elvis but all kinds of other stuff

Amongst the colonial building are numerous temples- Chinese, Hindu and Buddhist.




No the monkey's are not quite in downtown but not far from it. This was a view as we were walking from the Thailand consulate to visit the botanical gardens.


The botanical gardens.



View from Penang Hill. The top at an elevation is 2700' above George Town. Access is via a railroad built by the Swiss in 1923, now being upgraded, a four wheel drive road or hiking trails.

Kathy busy shopping for the latest "Harry Potter" movie. Dvd's are sold for 5Rm or $1.75 US buy 5 and get one free. Yes the had "Harry" and in addition Kathy found lots more.


Transport via bicycle rickshaw is a great method of going in some of the crowed areas of George Town. here a driver takes a break.


These driver's will probably need breaks after pedaling us around. Cost 30Rm per hour.



As i said I the beginning we now ventured another 70 miles north to Langkawi. this will be our last rally stop and also where we will leave Malaysia after the first of the year for Thailand.
Stay tuned there is more coming from Langkawi.

A Midnight Awakening

I often mention about finding a secure and safe anchorage. Most of our cruising days and nights are spent at anchor. The boat is our house and we need a secure place to park it. For days and nights on end we leave our house attached to the bottom of the ocean by a hunk of metal and a length of chain. OK it's a high tech piece of metal designed to grab into whatever type of material the ocean floor consists of at that particular location but non the less it weighs just 66lbs. All of us yachties have what WE consider the best anchor. If you look around at cruising boats and ask, each individual will swear that his is the best. Truth be known they all work and also at one time or another they will all fail for some reason. Failure means that you and your house get to go for an unexpected ride. In an anchorage it could be you or perhaps another boat that drags. Some of the large local craft use only homemade anchors with little or no chain.


Last night, midnight to be exact we were awakened by our "anchor drag alarm" a feature built into our GPS. I got up to see what was happening. We had definitely moved, but had now settled in again. The tide had just changed and as the current also shifted we had gone from one direction of pull on the anchor to the opposite. In doing this the anchor normally rotates over and resets itself. In this instance we drug about 250 feet before it reset. We have one GPS that is always on and whenever at anchor has the drag alarm set. The photo is of the chart plotter screen showing our location for the past 3 days and then the little boat showing where we moved. While I sat and watched to confirm that we were stuck securely again one of the local boats drug to within several feet of the yacht anchored nearby before pulling up anchor and moving. After confirming we were secure once again it was back to bed.


Things like this don't happen often but if you spend as many nights on the hook as we do they will. You know what will happen if you play with fire! This morning all is well. One big reason for dragging is your anchor finding debris on the bottom, plastic bags, discarded fishing nets or other bits of trash. This is what is hanging from the recently pulled anchor of the local boat which was next to us.

Penang Rally Dinner

The days touring done it was time for eat, drink and be merry. The festivities were held on a tent covered lawn in front of a local college. Our first view was this lovely food covered table followed by one stacked with a cooler full of cold beer and a fruit punch. Also along the sides were BBQ,s with several different meats and a lamb roasting on a revolving spit.



Along with the dinner were awards for a photo contest sponsored by Lieca cameras for the rally participants. Yes, we had submitted some. The photos had been printed and displayed, we were pleased to see that several of ours were amoung them. Come awards we gathered in three. One of a Marshallese outrigger sailing canoe can be seen in the lower right background of the Lion dance picture.


After a great feed it was time for some "yachtie" boat racing. Each table was given a piece of foam, a small knife, some sticks and a piece of construction paper. We were asked to build a boat for the races. Several different types were built, from monohull to catamaran to outrigger.


The course was a water filled trough with 3 boats going off at a time. Propulsion was by captain and crew blowing into the vessels sails. After 3 heats and finals a winner was declared. We're still not sure if the winner's had the best design or were the best Blower's. No matter a fun time was had by all. That's our tables entry pictured, a non finalist.


All in all a very busy day.

Pulau Kukup

We departed Danga marina with the goal of no overnight passages as we made our way up the west coast of Malaysia through the Malacca straits. This area once known for it's piracy today is more renowned as perhaps the busiest shipping channel in the world. Imagine all ship traffic headed west from Japan, Korea, Taiwan and China goes through these waters as does all eastbound traffic from India and what has come thru the Suez and Red Sea from Europe. We were told 1000 ships a day and that does not include the local fishing traffic.

Our anchorage off the town of Kukup made for a short 25 mile day. Though as usual a short distance does not equate to time. As we left Danga we current against us and this continued as we rounded the southern point of the Malay peninsula. We averaged about 3.5 kts. motoring the entire way. We entered past the navigational marks through fairly shallow water, 13 feet, since Po'oino Roa draws 6' 8" that didn't leave much to spare. Once over the bar the depth increased to 70' of the town of Kukup.

Kukup's industry is fish farms. These appear to be floating docks supported with plastic drums. They have pens in which various types of fish are raised for market.

A shallow spot in which to anchor was found that would be protected from any adverse weather and we settled down to a sundowner cocktail and bbq dinner. the only downside was perhaps the fish smell.

The Present

Skipping forward to the present day 22 Nov.2010, now 10 years from the beginning. Perhaps at sometime I will figure out or get help in how to insert the old adventures as we made our way from North Carolina to here in Malaysia. For those of you who have just stumbled upon this site it has been a long and wonderful adventure so far, so stay tuned as we pick up from our arrival here in Malaysia.

We exited Indonesia and headed across the Singapore Straits on 14 Oct.2010. We felt as a slow moving pedestrian crossing a busy road as we watched for a break in the shipping traffic moving to and fro.