Advertisement
Published: November 4th 2009
Edit Blog Post
The last week has seen us sailing from Malaysia to Thailand. We actually crossed the Thai border on the first day of sailing and spent the rest of the time travelling to Ao Chalong, where the boat is now anchored.
On-board, we rely a lot on solar-panels and a wind-generator for power and, given the blazing sun and frequently high winds, this works very well. Navigation-wise, we have a GPS and a back-up GPS so we no longer have to pore over unwieldy charts and plot points manually.
Our first stop was Tarutao, an island which, due to its remote location, was historically used to house political prisoners. These prisons later become anarchic and British troops were brought in to restore order (“I say, these fellows are kicking up a bit of a stink, what?”) Legends of penal colonies and ruthless pirates abound although, nowadays, the island is used (more sedately) as a National Park. We anchored close to the lighthouse and our night’s stop passed without incident (and no sighting of Johnny Depp).
Most of our passages en-route to Ao Chalong were spent dotting through a maze of lobster pots and mooring buoys. A lot of these
are very poorly marked but can signal huge nets floating just under the water - disastrous if caught in an engine. Unfortunately, on our 2nd day’s voyage from Tarutao to Koh Mook we managed to sail over a flag-marked net and it got caught in the port-side engine. It would be churlish of me to say under whose watch this happened - suffice it to say that, of our 2-strong crew, it wasn’t mine.
Although I mention we were only a 2-strong crew, we did have a number of stow-aways. I spotted one - a little gecko - on the first night when a little hand (or was it a foot?) cheekily popped down onto the saloon window before he thought better of it and scuttled away. Dad mentioned that he had spotted the unauthorised passenger back in the Marina when he was sleeping in the anchor hold (the gecko not Dad) but hadn’t thought to remove him as they are very useful at keeping away mosquitoes and flies. Personally, I would prefer to use some anti-insect spray and a mosquito net in my cabin rather than share my pillow with a miniature reptile, but I see the point
in principle. As I don’t think that geckos can either swim or fly, I am afraid the poor thing is stuck with us for a while.
Our next visitors were a horde (if that is the correct term) of tiny little birds who looked to seek refuge on the boat in Koh Lanta. They flew around us in their hundreds before attempting to settle under the dinghy at the back of the boat or under the canoe at the front of the boat. However, whilst our gecko friend was deemed to be an asset these were definitely considered to be a liability in terms of their likelihood of using our boat as a public convenience and Dad set off with an energy that would have been more appropriate had we been invaded by a swarm of flesh-eating bats. He explained that last year a flock (I think that is a better term) of similar birds had invaded the boat and feathered corpses had later been found in the cabins and in the sails after the poor birds had died from the lowered temperatures. In which case, perhaps our winged visitors were just coming to pay their respects to their departed feathered folk...
Although we were mostly at sea over the week, we did venture ashore once or twice. The first time at Koh Lanta Old Town where we moored the dinghy at a jetty absolutely laden with scuttling crabs which set my delicate nerves on edge (they looked like they had sharp pincers, those crabs). The second was at Koh Lanta resort where the route to the beach was via the “Snake Jetty”. This was not actually as ominous as it sounds: the jetty wasn’t ridden with snakes; if that had been the case wild horses would have had to stamp them to pieces before dragging me onshore. Rather the jetty was unsecured by posts and so the movement when it rode over a breaker was similar to that of a snake. This, understandably, made it confusing to traversing later in the evening - it was hard to tell whether it was the waves or the last G&T that was producing the unsteady motion.
Monday 2 November was the Thai water festival which takes place annually at the full moon. We were at Phi Phil Island and they really went to town for the occasion with the obligatory effervescent and effeminate male compere (think of a Thai Dale Winton) hosting an evening of Beauty Pageants (no, I didn’t participate), dancing and song. The evening ended with everyone sending out to sea a beautiful arrangement of flowers, which is meant to represent your worries. If they float away from you this is good, as your worries are leaving you. If they come back to you, I can only assume this is bad although the Thai’s do not dwell on this, being an optimistic kind of people.
Phi Phil is a very bustling “party” resort which was rebuilt after the Tsunamai. Most of the bars along the beachfront have live music or entertainers (fire jugglers, dancers, etc) but are, for the most part, virtually empty as, although this is the start of the High Season, the number of visitors to the area is down. One of the most annoying aspects of Phi Phi is the number of speed-boats that whizz in and out of the busy bay dotting needlessly close to the moored yachts - it’s like the nautical version of boy racers revving their engines and doing unnecessary turns at speed. The only difference being that at least when you encounter a boy racer your toothbrush isn’t in danger of ending up on the floor.
The next stop after Phi Phi was Ao Chalong where we have been catching up with some old friends. But more of that later.....
Advertisement
Tot: 0.057s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 10; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0335s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb