M/S Nautica left Bangkok at 5am and headed south into the Bay of Thailand bound for Singapore. It will take two days sailing to get there. We will follow the east coast of the Malay Peninsula to just north of the equator. Singapore lies just 85 miles from the dividing line between northern and southern hemispheres. The air and water temperature are now the same, about 86 degrees F. I just came into the cabin from our small deck where I could look out on a smooth sea on a clear, balmy night. The stars are visible but the heat and humidity create a bit of haze. I can see the lights of small fishing boats in the distance. They appear to use bright strobe lights to attract fish to the surface where they are caught ... read more

Friday, April 13. Nautica entered to mouth of the Mekong delta this morning at about 5am. On a prominent ridge facing the sea was a giant, white statue of Christ with arms extended. It is very similar to Christo Redemtor statue in Rio de Janiero that I saw last winter. Vietnam, though officially an atheist Communist country, it remains very Catholic. There are Catholic churches every where, some just down the street from Buddhist temples. The government here has obviously bowed to reality in many significant ways. Religion appears to be thriving and business, well that is something you have to be here to see for yourself. There are certainly a good many poor people here, but steaming up the Mekong toward Saigon, the mass of shipping, high rise construction, industrial areas all testify to a ... read more

Nautica arrived this morning at Chan May port outside Da Nang. The bay is surrounded by beautiful lush mountains. It is hard to imagine that 40 some years ago it was in the middle of a terrible war. We boarded our bus for the 1 ½ hour drive along Vietnam highway no. 1 to the old imperial capital of Hue. The highway runs parallel to the railway, both of which connect Ho Chi Minh City in the south to Hanoi in the north. Nothing connected these two cities back in the 60s and 70s except war and destruction. The highway is under constant construction and it is narrow. At one point the road snakes over a mountain pass and then descends into the flat plain on the other side. Driving here is not for the feint ... read more

Today we visited the Kok Tsiu Market on Fuk Tsum Street. This is not a place for the feint of heart, nor for vegetarian/vegan types. All manner of deceased animals were strung up in the stalls; chickens by their necks, pork roasts next to hog belly and various unappetizing entrails, fish of all kinds gutted and splayed or alive and floundering around in large tubs. We saw baskets of live frogs, glass containers of squiggly eel and other critters I couldn't identify. There were also vegetables of all kinds including giant carrots the size of baseball bats and beets as big as a football. I wonder if these things are grown too close to a nuclear power plant. But in spite of the blood and gore the market was spotlessly clean and folks were shopping for ... read more

I left Seattle on a partly sunny day, a rarity this spring. A surprise phone call from my co-workers at Benaroya was a particularly nice send-off. The flight to Vancouver was smooth and uneventful. The next leg will begin shortly. I'll report back in when I arrive in Hong Kong.... read more