Midnight swimming in the Java Sea

As our anticipated anchorage was a no go due to the weather, we were again faced with sailing on through the night. No big deal, but beginning to get a bit tedious. We are cruising, not completing a record breaking global circumnavigation, however if you can't anchor, it is equally pointless just to float about for the 12 hours of darkness, so onwards, onwards.

A pair of spear f.a.d.s in daylight

As dusk had drawn in, we had noticed that as we were close into the coast at the time, a couple of  the large vertically deployed bamboo 'spear' contraptions, another type of  FAD , we had first encountered north of Penang in Malaysia, were in the vicinity. That being the case , best option was to go further out to sea and hope they were closer to the coast.

Single vertical bamboo poles, sometimes with a palm frond or piece of material at the top ate hard enough to spot in broad daylight, and no chance at night.

Yes dear reader, we found one! Or at least the pole part of one.
I suspect the bit we found- the bamboo pole , had actually been hit by a ship and  thus the pole was detached from “what lies beneath” and was free ranging around the ocean – well until we passed by.

Then it decided to hitch a ride with us.

I’m not sure what the skill base of a bamboo pole covered largely in barnacles really is, but to have managed to position itself as it did, fair and square across the starboard sail drive leg, without any means of manoeuvring itself, is quite a feat and obviously I need to give random poles more respect!

So mission impossible was to remove said bamboo pole from its current resting position. The pole I would estimate was about 10 -12m long and the circumference of the thickest end about 6-7”. it had neatly bent itself in two around the leading edge of the saildrive.

I’m sure I've mentioned it before but a saildrive leg looks just like an outboard motor leg, it is just permanently (she thinks hopefully) attached through the hull to the engine and at the lower end in the water under the hull is the propeller.

First things first. Get rid of the headway. That meant dropping the main and furling the jib.

Then drifting in a swell of about half a meter and a sea state on top of that of about 30cm , we attempted to lasso the out board end of the pole, some 5m away.
As the boat drifted in the swell, occasional the out board end of the pole would swing from aft of us, to abeam of us. The attempt to lasso the end proved fruitless. Meanwhile the end that was across the leg and now stretching towards the port hull as we lolled around ,was just short enough (about 4m of it, was between the hulls) to not quite manage to be destroying the anti foul or gelcoat on the port hull.

This fruitless attempt could have continued for some time but I wanted that thing gone before it could do further damage. The quickest way I could think of to do that was by getting in the water and manhandling it off the sail drive leg.

With no debate, as I knew Peter would disagree, I went and got ready, togs ,face mask and snorkel, knife and torch and slid into the water for a midnight dip in the Java Sea.

My first assessment was, that it didn’t look too bad, and the sail drive  didn't appear to have sustained damage.
I swam back towards the thin, out board end which was trailing at about 45 degrees astern, swam it forward to the saildrive  and started to physically push the damn thing so that it would all end up between the hulls and drift away.

That done, it was back under the water  for an inspection of the damage sustained. Clearly we had lost anti-foul off the rudder blade, where the inboard section had been rubbing and also the leading edge of the actual saildrive leg and the bit of the hull at the point where the leg appears through the hull. This was the very point where the rubber 'boot' which Steve had so painstakingly glued on back in Phuket when we were out of the water was.

He had done such an outstanding job that all was in tact.The rubber still stuck tight ,albeit now sans
anti-foul.

After the pole was gone, a quick dive seemed to indicate ,that no twine rope net,etc. was wrapped around any part of us it shouldn’t have been and  then we tested the propellers, so with me in the water still, and at a sensible distance from whirring turning things, but still close enough to see with the beam of the torch, Peter started the engine and engaged the propeller both ahead and astern. Everything looked ok to me visually. As i was there, we did the port one too, just in case.

Note to self; when engaging in midnight dips in less than calm conditions- remember to tie up ones board-shorts first, the elastic in the waist band could not deal with the surging water as I bobbed around!

Apologies once again at the total lack of foresight in filming the  event– I really should have taken go pro with me, along with torch and the knife!!!!

Once back on board a check of the starboard engine and the top (inboard) end of the saildrive appeared to indicate all was well.

Onwards, onwards, into the night!

Post the event, I did think about the number of sea snakes we had passed during the day. They scare me more than sharks up in this part of the world, mainly as we see them and apart from my baby black tip, sighted in Thailand I haven't seen a shark in 2 and half years up here.
Peter tells me not to worry, as its highly unlikely one would bite me- but highly unlikely isn’t good enough odds for me, especially as they rate amongst the most venomous snakes,  after all what where the odds that it was “likely” I would be taking a midnight in the Java Sea in the first place?

Unforgettable- for all the wrong reasons

What followed was the most forgettable part of the adventure so far.

Seven days and four unrelenting nights of bashing our way south against a north westerly running current and a SE'ly wind, then 5 days/nights making still slow progress east ,against a diminished wind and current.
.

The plan when leaving Bawah had been to use the SW'ly wind (still allegedly blowing in the northern hemisphere until October) to our advantage and arrive on the coast of West Kalimantan (Borneo),having sailed through the Tambelan Islands.

Well that plan lasted until about an hour and half after we departed.

Track from Anambas Islands . The wind precluded us from making the west coast of Kalimantan and pinned us to the coast of Sumatra  instead

Firstly the wind died then it backed to the SE along with some rain- oh well, boat can always do with a washdown! The wind then died again and a SW swell seemed to appear out of nowhere in particular, (well obviously it came from the SW, but why so suddenly?)

Motor/sailed for a few hours and then as the wind increased again from the SE we reefed the mainsail down to the second reef for the night , and ploughed on,slowly .

The 120nm overnight sail became a distant memory quite rapidly. Reduced to 3 kts (over the ground) against the dominating wind and current and being forced ever further in a SW direction, we realised by daybreak that the Tambelans were going to have to get by without us!

The twenty four hour distance was only 102nm or moving at 4.25kts.

From then on really it just continued to deteriorate.The sea state had become quite confused on top of the SW'ly swell. We had slammed a fair bit during the night and this pattern continued for the next few days.

Being pinned to the west side of the Java Sea , was the sailing plan that mother nature had decreed.

The most memorable event the next day, was that we crossed (thumped our way over) the Equator at 0932 (lmt), at longitude 105deg 10.777' E. We had managed a pathetic 97nm /4.04kts for the 24 hours.

During the night, thankfully in one of the periods of lighter conditions, we encountered our first and hopefully only, one of the infamous FAD that are used in SE Asia.

A FAD, is a fish aggregation device,or fish attracting device. They come in a variety of forms, and I will devote an entire photo post to them later.

For now all you need to know is they can quite largish structures , which float around the seas allowing fish to aggregate under and around them , thus making them easy fishing spots in deep water, but unlit hazards, especially when you are in a fibreglass 12.5m pod.

My total beam is 6.9m.

The FAD that we encountered – and apologies here, it never occurred to us to take a photo at the time, what with it being pitch dark and the unexpected contact occurring about 10pm when sailing along at 4 knots, was a bamboo structure in the shape of a St George cross.

A dozen or so 10-12m long bamboo poles (max circumference approx 6-8 inches) lashed together on the x axis and the same on the y axis. Strangely , although I was a sleep at the time, I heard it when it arrived.

Plumb between the hulls had gone the x axis, and athwartships, across the bows was the y axis. Could not have pinned it better if we tried.

So surprised were we, that it took a couple of seconds to figure out what had happened. A torch soon revealed what the issue was, and starting the engines , we went astern, and watched it drift clear, until it disappeared from the beam of the torch. An inspection by torch indicated some missing paint ,but apparently , thankfully nothing worse. Sometimes , moving slowly is beneficial!

Finally anchored off the NW corner of Pulau Bangka at 1300 on the third day after 72.75 hours of unrelenting bouncing around. Trying to keep your balance becomes very wearing in a swell that is a couple of meters in height ,combined with a sea state which is about 90 degrees opposed to the swell. Not to mention 72 hours of broken sleep patterns, as we kept watches.

I know K'Gari is a catamaran, but for the first time since I have had her, we have actually had to stow galley essentials like the coffee and the kettle , so that they were unable to escape their captive state and hurtle around free range!

The protection of Pulau Bangka afforded us two nights sleep

The next two days we progressed, still slowly, down Selat Bangka, (Bangka Strait) at least we were out of the 20 knot SEly winds and were really dealing more with the current! Joy of joys being inside an island in the relative protection and shallowness also meant that we could anchor at night and sleep a full nights sleep!

Clearing the Selat , we managed , as the crow flies 33nm in 5.5hrs as we tacked our way almost pointlessly, tryng to make headway.

Why you might ask were we not motoring? There comes a point where the sea conditions make use of the engine a complete waste of time, not to mention fuel and engine hours. Short sharp steep chop is one of those times , and as that was what we had , there was no point in bothering to try. It was far more comfortable to be tacking , doubling the distance travelled and making little actual headway.

The same can be said for the next few days. Once we cleared the protection of the Selat we made good speed and distance for the first six hours. Then it turned to custard again.

The next 96 hours we, spent beating our way south and east.

Arimbi Oilfield

Located north of Jakarta are oil fields. Having not planned to be anywhere near Java, I hadn't really studied their location. As it happens they were now between us and where we trying to get to.

The first one we passed through was the Arimbi Oilfield.
That took care of 12 hours of my life, but it was to get “better”. Further south and closer to the coast lies the Arjuna oil (and now gas) fields. This section was not so user friendly.

slow progress across the Arjuna Oilfield

Entry strictly verboten!

Not a problem to commercial shipping, but a definite blight to a yacht trying to go east in an ESE'ly wind.

Planning as were now were on a daily basis, looking for viable options, we had had as a last resort thought about Jakarta , but we didn't really want to go there, it just seemed that was where we headed under mother natures influence. The entire strategy now, was to get as 'quickly' as possible into the lee of the islands of the archipelago and hope that the wind would therefore be kinder . The oil fields , were just an added hiccup that we needed to deal with.

Another 24 hours of my life disappeared, beating our way east-ish, along the northern edge of the entry strictly prohibited , Arjuna field, the bonus being the weather actually started to ease!

Finally, just one more bit of the Arimbi oilfield loomed onto the chart and we beat our way past that, now with a vague plan to stop in a port called Semarang. However as the weather improved we decided against that and carried on.

The weather pattern had definitely changed. Instead of constant 15-20kts SE'ly winds, we could discern an actual pattern. From dawn to about 0800, the wind definitely had more of an east component in it , so this was the ideal time to be heading south towards the coast and using the east component to lift us. About 0800 the wind swung more to the south, so we would tack and make better use of that component.Then about 1100 it just disappear altogether , leaving us wallowing until we started to motor. Then in the afternoon it was back again from the south.....except the night we decided to stop and anchor in what appeared to be a spot which would be relatively protected from the south , only to find that the afternoon “breeze” was in fact onshore from the NE at about 20-25knots!

So once again we sailed on. 

Bangka to Surabaya track

Palau Bawah- beautiful

Leaving Palau Akar in no wind , we then started to see a front building to the west.Four hours later the sky was leaden tending to black and which arrived with 30 knots and lashing rain as we neared Palau Arabu, which we decided we would not bother stopping at due to the thoroughly inclement weather which was now upon us , as we would have been on a lee shore.

On to Bawah Island. Made good time with the front until it swung a little more on the nose and we ended up beating the last couple of miles to Bawah, which also meant a later than originally intended eta.

The entrance is impossible to spot, but with some GPS co-ordinates supplied by the Howarths, it was easy to nail.

Too late really in the afternoon to be making an approach acros a reef, we would never have attempted it without the co-ordinates.

Once inside the lagoon, it was beautiful- stunning in fact, just like the picture postcards.

The  lookout above the resort

Northern end of the island 

Couldn't resist

Bawah is now a privately resort, the island and lagoon being leased from the government. It is beautiful created and eco green sustainability was very much in mind whenit was built, over a five year period, apparently using no heavy machinary.

The catch is of course , and there always is a catch, you can no longer anchor in the lagoon, and mooring buoys are provided......at a price tag to rival 5 star hotels. However, the time of day being as it was, the fact that there was no where else to go, meant we stayed.

The resort was happy for us to go ashore and dine, ( very reasonably priced, equivalent to Australian prices and fantastic) .

Next day we went ashore again for breakfast, and then a walk to the northeren end of the island and then found our way to the view we were looking for. Stunning! I think I have used that before , but it was beautiful.

Just stunning 

Jetty by day

and by night

Google Bawha resort, if you are interested. I doubt you will find it listed on Agoda or last minute.com!

We left just after lunch and set sail into a promising breeze from the SW, just what the doctor ordered.....until it died!

The Cumi fishermen of Mandriau Bay

After Terempa and obtaining what I hope will turn out to be the correctly issued paperwork, as there does seem to be a certain amount of latitude in the interpretation of what exactly is required, and exactly how many precisely placed and countersigned stamps are needed, depending on perhaps the rise and fall of the temperature or the barometer or perhaps the disinclination to have ones not extremely busy day interrupted, we moved on to a beautifully quiet anchorage in a bay a little to the north of Terempa.

As this anchorage was actually located nearer to the airport ,we sailed through an internet signal zone, after we left the next morning. I think much to the surprise of the local fisherman we then floated about “in the zone” randomly it would appear, whilst “in the signal”, allowing for communication with the outside world and the payment of some bills via the wonder of internet banking, as apparently, life in the real world is continuing to grind away, needing the odd bit of attention to keep the wheels of commerce turning.

We eventually anchored again in a beautiful inlet at an island called Mandriau. In the bay as we arrived were 10-12 floating houses, or so it appeared. Upon closer inspection they were squid (cumi) fisherman.

There were signs of life on a couple of them and then about two hours before dusk, 3 small boats appeared with the fisherman, from where we are still not sure,as there were no nearby villages. They came by to check us out and then the boats did the rounds dropping fisherman off to the various squid boats.

As we watched, the “village” set off to sea for the nights fishing.

Out they go 

Each platform is towed out of the bay by a boat. The boat then returned and towed another and another until the bay was empty, save us and one squid boat.

Some of the squid boats had been rafted up together, and each one was towed separately.

The neighbourhood lights up

As it got darker ,astern of us, the sea was a blaze of lights.  They obviously have generators for the lights, but not for powering up an anchor winch. The anchors are retrieved manually, using a two poled vertical capstan arrangement.

Some of them as they passed us, appeared to have a pole running forward and aft down each side with nets attached. Perhaps here they catch

the squid in nets rather than the jigger system we have seen else where.

The next morning they returned , an exact reversal of procedure. Watching them raft 6 up together was fascinating. Seamlessly dropping one alongside the last, using only a longish tow line behind a single boat, passing so close to the '”raft “ that lines are just passed across, and q.e.d. the task is completed, once an anchor is dropped , from what had been the towing line. In no time the bay was basically deserted again of fisherman, as they returned from whence they came.

Before they left with their nights catch , we went over to buy some squid. $3 procured us a bag full, which provided at least three meals worth. We stopped them from giving us more, as they just looked as though they were going to fill the bag we had given them. Three double handfuls were more than enough for us!

After that whilst the washing dried, we ventured ashore to give the drone a bit of a test flight. Drone had a near death experience back at Ayam anchorage, when taking off from the fore deck.

I have flown it very few times and until now always with vision , provided via mobile phone app. No signal means no app , so flying it is only by visually watching the drone.

During take off, I was a tad hesitant and didn’t get the altitude high enough as quickly as I should. I’m not sure if there was a slight updraught through the trampoline , or if we swung slightly on the anchor , or if I was just too slow, or a combination of all or some of the above but I realised (in slow motion really) that it was not going to clear the safety wires. Indeed as I lunged towards it to grab it from underneath the blade did just tip the upper wire,resulting in a tiny nick in a set of blades.

Mandriau Bay .The  cumi fisherman  have returned for the day

My flight control ineptitude almost resulted in the early demise into a watery grave of drone. Since then , I had been waiting for an opportunity for a test flight on Terra Firma The beach at the head of the bay presented such an opportunity.

Result , yes all ok, drone flies fine. The footage seems a little jerky but that will be nothing to do with the near death experience , that is just trying to preset the aperture and light settings prior to take off, as I have no way of seeing what is being recorded without the app. Sort of like flying on IFR, I guess! 

We moved on to Akar Island , yet another beautiful anchorage in a bay. Talk about seclusion, apart from the squid fisherman in Mandriau, every anchorage has been ours alone.

Lost my little spoon spinner on the way- something must have hit and run.we didn't notice as a the time we were having a great sail in about 15 knots of wind. I think that takes the lost lure total to two now.

We started to clean the squid,but decided to do the lot and freeze them down in meal size portions.

We dined on cumi, marinated for a short time in a little oil, soy ,ginger and sweet chili and a little squeeze of juice our ever depleting lime stock, then flash fried on the bbq- tender and yummy!

Akar Island- wonder if we will find an anchorage amongst the crowd?

Terempa

The capital.

We did the rounds of Harbour Master ,Customs and Quarantine. Very confusing!

When we had checked in to Indonesia at Nongsa Point I had been asked what my next port was?

Mistake number , Ive lost count, in this learning experience of cruising.

What I should have said ,was the most distant port in Indonesia that I could possibly have thought of.

I however ,had said the Anambas, which was literally my next port. So I had been issued with a port clearance to the Anambas. Now I had to convince them in the Anambas that looking at my papers and them saying “no need”, when I asked for a stamp and clearance, was possibly not going to cut the mustard in 1600miles when I tried to check out of Indonesia.

Proof of having been there?? Hope so
I'm even dressed in my 'officialdom'  visiting gear.

Round one went to the Harbour Masters office, who was adamant that I needed nothing. So to prove we had been there in lieu of an official stamp, a photo outside the office. 

Next it was off to customs, who photocopied the papers I proffered and assured me that I had no need to see Customs again until my last port in Indonesia when I check out.

A Customs officer then wandered with us down the street to Quarantine , who also seemed puzzled by my quest for a stamp, or anything to officially prove I had been to visit them in the Anambas.

After our departure from Malaysia, I was feeling a tad uncomfortable with the non application of any official stamp to any of my paperwork.

Although we had obtained sim cards in Nongsa, it appeared that email technology etc was still yet to arrive in the Anambas via Telkomsel.

I had engaged an agent to provide me with both the sponsor letter to enable the issue of the original visa and in case we needed any “local” assistance for the duration.

Via texts we commuiated and I expressed my concern at the lack of interest by officialdom. I was advised to return in the morning to the Harbour Master and insist on a port clearance being issued.

This I did, and having asked for it, it was eventually provided, just as soon as the “officer in charge of issuing such things” was summoned. He arrived eventually and then from there, with a completed set of papers, as luckily Im getting a bit more savvy about these things, and I had photograped, using the marvels of technology and mobile phones ,all 6 pages which I had handed over, and was able to show them the missing page which had not returned to me,and which was eventually located on the desk he had been typing at. Then clutching a new clearance to the farthest port I could name in Eastern Indonesia, it was back to Quarantine, who obligingly now issued me with a new Quarantine clearance.

 K'Gari anchored 40m off the wall

Terempa itself, the town of , was a busy port. We anchored in the SE corner of the bay about 40 m off the wall that turned out to be a thoroughfare, full of motorbikes and mini trucks, not much bigger than golf buggies, in about 12m on a sandy bottom.

The shipping was small coastal stuff and fishing boats, but it was fairly constant and fun to watch the manouvres, no tugs and manual anchor recovering!

The town

The main wharves

Just so we know we are!

The people were so friendly, a young woman on a motor scooter , stopped as we wandered down the main street and asked if we would like to come to her house and have a meal. A chap on a bicycle stopped to say hello, shake hands and welcome us to his home town. The kids were great- they can all say hello- as its exactly that in Indonesian apparently, then they just started laughing and giggling to themselves and following us. Two separate young lads on bicycles stopped to ask where we from and practise their English. The people could not have been more friendly or welcoming.

https://youtu.be/_DcWgteOURE

The morning that I was to spend pursuing officialdom for a clearance, we were about to set off , when we decided to stay onboard as there was an obvious front moving towards us. As it hit, we started the engines to ensure that we didn't drag the anchor as we only had 40 meters between us and the wall at the end of the harbour. We stayed put!
 Then it was back ashore via the somewhat dodgy wooden ladder which came down from the breakwater onto the floating pontoon we were tying the dinghy up to. We did notice that literally overnight, where the ladder was leaning on the concrete wall. the side bar of the ladder had worn away by at least half its width. The rungs of the ladder appeared to be made from boards from an old orange box and not entirely afixed to the side arms in a couple of places.

With years of training of assessing dodgy ladders, we decided it would suffice, just- especially as there was no alternative!

Banks were available and small shops selling hardware, small groceries, a bakery, a couple of places to eat , a coffee shop, the mosque seemed to make up the main street. The fish market was located neaer to the wharves and we did wander past a laundry. No apparently obvious larger stores.

Terempa Harbour

A tiny Indonesian town , 150 miles east off the main coast of the the Malaysian Peninsula, and 150miles NE of Batam which is the first part of Indonesia opposite Singapore, and a delightful place to visit.

Anambas Islands

Our  track around the Anambas 

We checked into Indonesia, totally trouble free, and done incredibly efficiently by the staff at Nongsa Point Marina. Interestingly here the government apparently want photos of my engines. These were duly taken, by one of the marina employees and I assume sent to somewhere, other than 'trade an engine'.

Take an old sheet and some blue packaging tape

and a stapler and a bit of twine

My 'handcrafted' international code flag N (required to be flown in conjunction with Q ) until Quarantine clearance has been granted into Indonesia, cut the mustard.Happily it wasn't closely inspected, or some minor defects may have been apparent, but flying above Q from the shrouds it looked the part.

and look what you can make!

Almost looks like the real thing.

Set off to in a taxi to find the nearest ATM machine and also to search vainly for tonic water. Eventually with a 15 minute detour to a much larger shopping precinct than the original destination we found some local tonic- interesting taste and definitely will not be putting Schweppes out of business soon, but needs must when desperate!
Fixed up the phones with Indonesian SIM cards ,another mystery to occupy my time working out how to load them up, which will be made that little bit harder by having nothing in English. Both Malaysia and Thailand gave you the opportunity to switch to English, but cant figure Telkomcel out yet. Raided three ATM's in succession and left as instant millionaires having extracted 3.5 million – so should at least be able to but an ice cream somewhere!

The next day we left heading for the Anambas Islands 140nm away to the NE. located in the South China Sea and lying more off Malaysian territory than Indonesian, it is actually called the Regency of Anambas and Natuna.

These are islands which by reputation yachties have left alone. Piracy (petty theft rather than the kidnapping variety,as far as yachts have been concerned,and even then tug and tows and small tankers are much more lucrative).However over the last 3 years, a rally which sails from Malaysia to Borneo has stopped in at the islands and there has been no trouble and perhaps even an awakening that being nice to yachties is preferable to scaring them off.

Out into the Singapore Straits for I guess the last time,we made our way NE , this time actually with the traffic instead of contra flow. A couple of hours into it ,we were overtaken by a storm , which produced torrential rain for a couple of hours.

yep its wet

Chart on the left , radar picture on the right . Red is heavy rain ,yellow is what we were in and see the view above and below -not much without the radar.

and quite dark for 2pm!

Horsburgh Light Its there, both of them coming through the gloom

For anyone who has been through the Straits we passed just on half a mile to the west of Horsburgh Light and could just make it out as the rain started to ease.

Not too much traffic as we clear the Straits for the last time

Following the rain a great breeze for sailing arrived and stayed for the night, so we actually made good distance through the night once out of the grasp of the currents in the Strait.







Twenty four hours later and the first of the islands was within sight. The wind died and we ended up motor sailing past Pulau Djemadja to our first anchorage in the Anambas, Ayam Island.

Pulau Ayam anchorage

Beautiful and deserted until the following morning when a local chap and his family returned to their residence,set back from the foreshore, under some trees. He came to visit with his small son, in their canoe and appeared to be after a face-mask ,if we had one to spare. With no English from him, and no Indonesian from us, that is what we think he was asking for. Not having one to spare , he left. This was my first chance to check out under the boat since leaving the Tiomans back in June.
All appeared fine, very little growth- the mussels in Senibong hadn’t taken hold and the anti foul still doing its job in fine style.

Shifted over to Pulau Telega North , great sail en route.

on the way to Pulau Telega N

Drift snorkelled over the reef astern of the boat at the anchorage. Not ,any small fish but a few definitely plate size contenders. Good coral and good diversity, plates, staghorns,bombies, quite a bit like home.

Next day we shifted the 4 hours across to the main city of the Anambas Regency – Terempa.

Back on board , preparing to depart for Indonesia

August 10th

Back on board again, after a couple of weeks back at home.
Flew into Singapore, arriving in the evening and stayed two nights in town. I really like Singapore , the more I visit. This time I finally managed to get in the visit to the Changi POW museum.

Decided that as there was luggage to be  dragged about , that the easiest way of getting back into Malaysia was via a taxi, across the causeway,instead of public transport. The public transport is great , but has no facility for people with luggage. So for $50 Sgd , it was seamless transit into Johor Bahru. In fact, so seamless that we got dropped off at the Indonesian Consulate, (with all our baggage) and applied for our Indonesian visas. It being a Thursday afternoon , and Friday and Saturday being “the weekend” here, this was the better option, otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to apply until Sunday.

Two hours later, paperwork submitted, visas paid for and with advice to return on Sunday, all we had to do was find a cab back into the city of JB. Eventually managed to get one after going back into the consulate and they called one for us. Took the taxi into the city – a distance of about 3km and cost of 11RM. Reloaded  credit on my sim and Peter obtained his. Then as luck would have it had time for a ice blend coffee at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, before jumping an Uber back to the Marina. As a cost comparison, a new, air-conditioned Uber  vehicle, travelling 20km and complete with random commentary, was 14RM compared to the short taxi ride.
I had previously found this to be the case ,when travelling the distance to the nearest shopping mall from the marina. Taxi flat 10RM , Uber 4-5RM for same trip. Uber clean and guaranteed air-con, taxi not so!

Having left Singapore at 1300, we were back on board at 1700.

Back on board. Sembawang dockyard in the background.

The next couple of days were spent getting ready to leave. The final top up of fuel tanks, which I hadn't wanted to by myself. I preferred to wait to put the top up final 25lts in each tank for when there were two of us .One  person to fill, the other to watch the tanks filling from down below!
Tried to replace the compass light on the port compass which died as we left Phuket. Obtained two spares in Oz, from two different suppliers. Both claimed to be the correct light for my compass, and indeed both the same package etc . However failed totally to get it to work. When in doubt, Skype someone who knows- Peter my friendly electrician back in Brisbane. No go, even with distant help. Annoyingly we will be (night) compass less on the port side. Naturally this is the side all the other navigation gear is located!

Also discovered that the HF radio which was working fine, when I went home, seems to have died. Having no clue about how to fix it- other than checking all the connections were good, it appears we will be HF'less as well. Annoying to say the least, as I had finally managed to master the pactor radio, side of things when we were at the Tioman Islands  , and had been  able to receive and send emails over the HF radio, and more importantly obtain the weather, when out of mobile phone range. Now for some reason HF is kaput!

Picked up the visas on Sunday, all ready to go.
Went through the checkout of Malaysia routine, which folks, went about as smoothly as when we arrived n Johor Bahru!

Off to Jabatan Laut, located 'conveniently' on the opposite side of town to Kastams and Imigresen..
Part one went well. So then it was off to Kastams. The first line of defence there, directed us to the passenger boarding area for the fast ferries. Being familiar with the office , I backtracked and again explained I needed to “go into the office, not trying to board a ferry.” Once in the office , it unfortunately became clear that Norman who had dealt with the check in, was not at work today. In fact not many in the office at all. Initially only one woman in civies. After about 10mins a uniformed officer turned up, then another. Eventually after several phone calls to Norman , and about 20 more minutes, I had the vital Port Clearance in my hot little hand. I asked for copies of all the other sheaf of papers I had handed over, but was told “no need”. Hmmm, each office does things differently!
Then we were kindly escorted by a 4 stripe Kastams officer , who did apologise for the delay in processing the Port Clearance “ not my usual job”, through a labyrinth, almost empty of functioning  shops, of a two story facility which eventually led to Imigresen.
Our escort departed and then Imigresen asked for one of the papers that Kastams had decided they needed to keep. Quick 10minute saunter back to Kastams- again devoid of uniformed staff- wait until Mr 4 stripes turned up, more phone calls to Norman , and back to Imigresen with a set of photocopied papers.
Imigresen took the papers, didn’t actually read them, our passports were stamped, with exit stamps. Something I immediately checked, was that we had actually been checked out of the country and not into ,a fate which had befallen a fellow marina occupant, and we returned to the marina.

Later that evening, when compiling the paperwork for Indonesia, it became clear that we would not in fact be leaving “on the tide”in the morning , as we required a copy of the crew list , stamped by Imigresen from the last port of departure prior to Indonesia. I had the crew list , just not a stamped (or chopped,as they prefer up here) one.

Last view of Malaysia receding as we head to Batam

One of the marina staff was recruited the next day  to return to town to obtain same, but by the time it was completed  another  day and a half had passed , as he didn't quite make it in time that afternoon. Then  there was no point in going so we stayed one more night and left the marina at 0830 the next morning for the 25nm run down to the 'border”

Thankfully all my other check in, check outs from Malaysia had all gone without a hitch, over the last two years. Had my experiences at Johor Bahru been my first taste of “how it all happens” , I think I  could be forgiven for assuming that each subsequent experience would degenerate into bouts  of confusion and erroneous information.

So good bye Malaysia , Hello Indonesia.

From Seninbong Marina to Nongsa Point Marina and on to the Anambas Islands