Having arrived Lumut safely Owner and us had some errands to tend to in Kuala Lumpur so we got a car loaned and drove up there. Turned out my errand was not needed so I got a few days off and a visit to KL. Impressive city but impossible to find a taxi unless you were booking via a dedicated app, so we rather ate from eateries close by the airbnb than taking tax to some other venue. We actually found a very nice Mexican restaurant. After 3 nights we headed back to Lumut and left Owner to tend to his own business.
Leisure area of the AirBnB
Foodie road
KL skyline
KL traffic
Somebody's fond of Herbie
On our way back we chose the coastal road instead of the one leading beside Genting highlands via Ipoh. The road had a number of speedbumps but I reckon it was as fast as the other option. The only hitch was that when we're about to reach Lumut we were stopped at a police checkpoint and the policeman thought I was not fit to drive with my license but Enok was, I guess for some reason he thought it was not a valid document. Oh well, life goes on and Enok was driving.
Fanny in Lumut
Fanny in Lumut
Once back in Lumut I returned the car to my friend. In KL I had to repair the tyre as it had been punctured at some point. One morning it was flat so I had to put on the spare tyre and drive around until we came across a tyre shop.
At the 2nd hand dealers
Then it was onto pressing matters, I checked into the marina how the flag change process was going and was happy to receive the digital copy of the certificate of registry. Now I had more to get the insurance quote going. Then I had to source some canisters for spare extra fuel, the longest leg where it would be needed was Maldives to Djibouti.
At the 2nd hand dealers
At the 2nd hand dealers
At the 2nd hand dealers
At the 2nd hand dealers
My friend too me to a local junkyard selling all used things, there I found just what we needed. 20 pcs of 25ltr cans we could strap to the railing wires. Actually when filled they could fit 30ltr of diesel.
Extra fuel tanks on deck
One day my friend took me to see a local chaps fishfarm in the Lumut estuary "Pangkor Laut". It was very peaceful and he caught a fish and served it to us at the same time. Best lunch in a long time.
Visiting a local fishfarm
Visiting a local fishfarm
Visiting a local fishfarm
Visiting a local fishfarm
Local timber mill abandoned transport
Chinese breakfast
Then one morning as my friend was ferrying us around he picked up another chap who lived on a slow paced lumber yard. Around the yard was scattered old heavy work machinery and trucks. Some of them were the classic Mercedes Benz 911 trucks. The joke was that one could call the girlfriend and say that "I'll be picking you up in my 911".
Local timber mill abandoned transport
Chinese lunch
Chinese lunch
Our friends treated us almost on a daily basis to the local Chinese cuisine not to mention one factory owner making shock cords donated us a bunch of lengths that would come handy in securing e.g. jerry cans. Another one who owned the fish farm gave us discarded small pieces of nets he could not use that I then made into a vegetable hammock.
Orchids
Orchids
Chinese dinner
Chinese dinner
Chinese dinner, spirit house
At the wetmarket
Lumut estuary, one of the inland "fiords"
Last breakfast
Local catamaran in Lumut marina
The local business men in the area had gotten into building their own leisure cats equipped with gasoline outboards for propulsion. They were entirely made of plywood, glassfibre on the outside and epoxy painted inside. On deck there were small gensets to power entertainment systems and aircon. Nice platform to have fun on but I could see they were not strongly powered and as such would be having handling difficulties in adverse weather conditions with the considerable windage and very shallow draft.
Fishermen going out
Malaysian Navy
Merchant vessel
Sunset
Tanker
Then finally we thought we had everything we could possibly think of needing, our paperwork was done and then we were joined by Tim, our 4th crewmember for the trip. He came late one evening having flown in from Phuket and joined our farewell do for all local Lumutians that had helped us along. The next day was last minute shopping that I did not participate in and we got even more stuff to stow away. Then we did our out clearance and were cleared out of Malaysia. The evening was going to go easy as Owner elected to leave next morning, that was no problem as the port clearance was in force 48hrs (or perhaps 72?). Come evening our Chinese friends turned up again with gifts and then we put on the BBQ and had a nice time. Meanwhile I was tuning up our satcomms and managed by midnight to get test messages through. On the morning of 17th April we got up to a sunny and quiet morning. I got up and by 0812hrs we let go and were on our way towards Maldives. After communicating with the Agents there it seemed we could provision and bunker in Uligamu and would not need to trek down South to Male' for it, this would save us 2-3 days.
Indonesian fishermen
Indonesian fishermen
As we were puttering into the Malacca straits we could see from time to time huge merchant marine vessels and one morning when we were passing the Northern tip of Sumatra we were accosted by Indonesian fishermen, the came driving about in funny shaped boats asking for drinks. Our deckhand Tim then slowed down and threw them a couple of beers which was a big mistake, after half an hour we had like 5 boats hovering around us. It was a bit unsettling with them coming quite close but eventually they gave up and went away. The weather had still not favoured us with any wind so we were motoring.
Tanker
General cargo vessel
General cargo vessel
Rainfall
Sunset
Sunset
Sunset
Sunrise
Sunrise
Sunrise
Sunrise
As we puttered along and passed Sri Lanka we lost sight of most merchantmen because our route took us S towards Uligamu and the merchantmen headed for the high risk area towards Oman or the Gulf (or came from there). When passing Sri Lanka we saw the Island nation covered in towering cloud formations, the coast was still quite busy and again we encountered thirsty fishermen as the monsoon had not to our luck set in. As we passed Galle I could see on the radar quite a few ships anchored off the port.
Sunset
Sri Lankan fishermen
Sri Lankan fishermen, pulling net up
Sri Lankan coast, massive hotel structure, looked unfinished
Sri Lankan fishermen, catamaran type boat, remarkably fast on remarkably small outboard engine
Sunset
Sunset
We had some spectacular sunsets and sunrises, only a day in the middle we had a bit of wind, the sea developed a weird kind of chop that one would not expect in the open ocean, waves were more like on a lake. This made Fanny to hobby horse and roll from time to time but luckily the catamaran hulls right themselves pretty quick.
Sunset
Sunset
Sunrise
Sunrise
Sunset
Sunset
Enok and her catch
On the 27th morning the tank gauges were showing empty and we had to fill up from the spare fuel on deck, after this the gauges showed 3/4 full. The tanks were 500ltr each so in total 1000litres in the fuel tank. On deck we carried 20x25ltr so basically at least 500ltr but as they can take more I'm more inclined to think abt 600ltr, we also had a spare 40ltr barrel that we thought we might need.
Uligamu
Uligamu, arrival bureaucracy
Uligamu, Agent Asadhulla arranged food for dinner
Then a day or so before reaching Uligamu Enok caught a Mahi-mahi fish which we promptly BBQ'd for lunch and proclaimed her our fishing expert. Same evening our starboard engine overheated and so we switched it off and continued on one engine. We could only see that the plastic muffler where the cooling water is mixed with exhaust and then shot out had cracked and was leaking slightly. The wind was slightly on our side so we could use sails to some extent. On the morning of 30th of April we "limped" into the atoll of Uligamu, anchored off the inner reef and awaited the Maldivian immigration etc to come and clear us in. We had now logged 1716' and 315.5hrs with an average speed 5.4kts from Lumut.
Uligamu
As the Agents arrived they came with the health officer, immigration and some other chaps I don't know what their title was but eventually they got all the papers they needed. The Agent, Asadhulla of Seahawks, asked if we'd like some lobster as he had caught some, we all said yes. About an hour later a boat came and deposited on deck a couple of huge lobsters which we again promptly BBQ'd and ate.
Uligamu
The weather was looking to intensify from NW again so we were warned that our anchor position could be a bit risky so we decided to go outside the atoll and tie up to a mooring buoy on the Ocean side of the atoll. It was much calmer there but at times big rollers carried us up and down. At least we did not run the risk to drift onto the reef.
Uligamu, port
As we were still we offloaded the next day our extra fuel cans and started receiving them in dribs and drabs, first I filled the main tanks and then the jerry cans. In the end we were billed for 710litres which I found a bit over the top and contested it but eventually we reached common ground. I also sent provision lists to Assad asking this and the other of what we needed to continue to Djibouti. Tim started asking to see a Doctor as he had a spot roaming on his cornea and it was irritating him. Then we started troubleshooting the sb engine and found out it was not only the plastic waterlock that was the issue so then asked Agents if they had a technician available who could take a look at the engine. It turned out they had one available and he came onboard, after some time of tinkering he found out that the fresh waterpump had given up. The Owner was dismayed as he had had the engines fully overhauled in Thailand. Next days went finding spares for us and to find the fastest way of getting them here. We also sent the waterlock ashore to get it glassfibred watertight.
Uligamu, local school
At end of Ramadan muslims have a big party and we were invited to take part in the communal luncheon taking place at the local school, we all went and poor Enok had to eat with the women. There were tables laid out which then were laden with home made food, I assume one dish per household. We got a very big lunch indeed, including dessert. As we had eaten our fill the Agent walked us to the local provisioner, it turned out to be the supermarket of the island, a dark house with shelves and stuff on them. We picked a few more items and he promised to have them packed up and delivered onboard. After that we wanted to stretch our legs after many days onboard and managed to walk maybe half an hour when the Agent came by with a motorbike telling us to get us to the port as the weather was about to turn worse. We also saw some huge fruitbats flitting around the trees at various locations, in the village many trees or yards had been covered by nets I guess to ward off these bats. They made quite the noise when they were startled by passersby. I reckon it was a matter of him wanting us onboard so he could get his siesta, but nevermind, we complied and went down to the port. There some fishermen had caught some nice fish and we then bought the lot. Big red snapper and some smaller ones we cleaned up onboard and put into the freezer in wait to be eaten enroute as curry.
Uligamu
Uligamu
Uligamu
Uligamu, clinic
Tim's blob on his cornea would not go away and he kept asking to see a Doctor so Agent managed to get a time for him at the local clinic. As it was end of Ramadan it wasn't easy to get service although everyone was on the Island. As it happened the Doctor was Egyptian and he said he don't have the equipment to do the test Tim needed nor the medication to provide so he just got a lookover as I predicted. The other option would have been to try and fly to Male' or even Sri Lanka or rather home to his own country where his Doctor would have been able to give the care he needed. As it happened I had to sign Tim off as he noticed his hernia had re-ruptured so that was the end of his traveling with us, I did not want the responsibility of anyone's life that was not fully fit to sail. Although I'm no spring chicken myself and count myself lucky these days that I wake up every morning and have a healthy bowel motion I still don't have any fantasies of men over 50 being supermen and Tim was already over 60, better be safe, not sorry, and Tim agreed.
Uligamu fruit bat, photo courtesy of Enok
Uligamu, hermit crabs
Uligamu, ocean side
Uligamu
Then the day came when we got the waterpump back fixed. I don't know what they did as spares were several weeks lead time and they said that on the next atoll at the Yanmar service centre they could try "something", anyway the effort paid off, pump was installed and so was the waterlock. Engine trials came out perfect. Tim was offloaded and so we were on our way to Djibouti after receiving our port clearance at 1148hrs on 6th May. I had already sent my documents to the Agent there. Weather had not looked very good on departure and it appeared our sat gizmo could not receive anything else but text so I downloaded a 10 day forecast and asked a mate to send me some weather info.
Dolphins
Maldives
Uligamu
Next part of the journey: Maldives to Djibouti
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