18th November - Danga Bay - Pelau Pisang - Molucca marina - Port Dickson marina

Monday 18^th November

So is this how you imagine the Molucca Strait to be??

No neither did we…

It was all very glam, modern, swish.  We had two nights along the way, with our lovely hitchhiker Cheryl on board.

Our first overnight stop was at Pilau Pisang.  It was a good anchorage in that we didn’t drift or rock around too alarmingly but it was VERY windy – maybe 40 knots, and the waves were consistently BIG.  It was still daylight when we got there so we checked the propellers.  Patrick, the Guru of Sailing in Malaysia, had told us at the briefing that our propellors would definitely be fouled.  And they were!  I volunteered to go into the khaki water to check and this is what I found:

Plastic crap with my G & T glass to give perspective

We felt very safe in our anchorage because we had some sort of coastguard or police boat hovering not far away, keeping a watch all night long… The Malaysian government is heartily sick of the pirates and they are being wiped out quick smart.

Is that how you imagined Molucca???

The second night we crept into the Molucca Marina at dusk.  Crept in cautiously because we had been told it isn’t safe.  And indeed it is abandoned and quietly rotting away although it was only built a few years ago.  We were safe enough, tied up to a brave little pontoon within the sea walls.

 And today we are in this very glam marina with a beautiful swimming pool and – gasp – marble washbasins in the bathroom, and  MORE THAN ONE shower!  Such luxury, after Danga Bay.  Many of our friends are here and…it is all GO!

This afternoon Pete worked on the boat… One of the starter motors has given up completely and the on our way here he had to climb down into the hold to dismantle the working one from one engine to attach it to the other so we could have both engines functioning.  McGyver strikes again!  Cheryl and I were very impressed and we did our best to keep him cooled down with cold drinks and a bit of a shower on deck.  But…we ran out of water.  Totally!  A minor disaster… We do have a spare 20 litre bottle so we didn’t die of thirst but it was all very awkward.  More water is coming, in big bottles, on Wednesday.  (Pete’s doing, while Cheryl and I were having FUN.)

Lego Taj Mahal...

So what did Cheryl and I do while Pete was toiling??  Well we went for a swim, had a cooling shower, and at 4.00 we joined in the Team Building Games… This was at a sort of Outward Bound course, behind the marina building, with ropes and games and stiff competition. Very much fun… Maybe next year I will join Katy and Mardi in their Commando Challenge after all!!  (I didn’t do as badly as I had feared…)