January 2010

2nd. January Bali Marina.Simon and I went off to do food shopping before he went to meet his girlfriend Ella from the airport; she flew from her home in New York.

We set off again as soon as Peter could check us out of Bali, to "do" some of the islands in an easterly direction.We got as far as Flores, stopping everyday for them to go snorkeling etc, they also stopped and had a night in a very expensive tent on the island of Moyo, Amanwana resort and nature reserve.A trip ashore to see the dragons on Komodo then Ella flew off from Flores back to New York and we picked up Simons niece and her boyfriend. Back to Komodo for them to see the dragons , this time though Peter and I also went ashore and had a look , very sloppy looking dragons if you ask me, all hanging around the restaurant, anyway it made a nice change for us to go for a walk in the hills.

The Islands that looked so bare and brown when we came through from Kupang now have had quite a lot of rain and look as though they are covered in green velvet. We stayed around the Komodo area for a couple of days and they did a lot of snorkeling.One afternoon when we were all on deck we noticed a disturbance in the water and soon realized that it was a manta ray, I grabbed my snorkel, fins and waterproof camera and jumped in after it (still fully dressed in shorts and T shirt) Simon did the same and grabbed the waterproof camera (well I suppose it is his). We swam with the ray for 10 mins or so and got a couple of quite good shots, unfortunately the water was full of small jelly fish and so I was quite keen to get out of the water by the time it cleared off and very glad I had kept my clothes on. The stings were like nettle stings, so very uncomfortable but only lasted for a couple of hours.

As far as I am concerned this was the highlight if the trip better than dragons any day.

Before Simon went back we told him that we were both exhausted and gave him notice that we would be leaving in March 2010, he seemed quite horrified but took it quite well, he may have been looking for a change anyway, and so we will have to start thinking of what to do next.

After dropping Simon and his guests at Flores airport we were left alone again to get Giriz back to Bali only now we were against wind and tide, the first couple of days we just hid behind the islands as the weather was very bad, wet and very windy we even lost the flag and the flag pole, didn't even see it go!! The green velvet now has waterfalls as well, quite spectacular.

After that we gradually made our way back, the weather improved and by the time we got back to Moyo we were able to anchor behind the island against a fantastic reef, we gave ourselves a quiet day there and went for a snorkel.

Very slow going but we finally got back to Bali on the 22nd January ready to start work again.

Second day back and Peter fixing the toilet in the crew quarters not a nice job, 1.5 days so lucky there is more than one on board. We are spending a lot of time trying to organize workers to do the work Simon would like done i.e. new galley floor and generator moved in the engine room, quite difficult to find someone that can communicate properly but we finally agreed to use an Australian chap. We took on 2 crew for a trial but they only lasted a week, no work ethic, back to us and the day workers.

We both had a very bad tummy upset (Bali belly) really not sure how we got it as we had not been eating out.We have decided to blame the fruit as we seem to get an upset tummy every time we eat it.

More good news though we are now going to have 3 new grandchildren this year!!!

February

Still in Bali Marina work now in progress on galley floor and in the engine room, also having trouble with the air con so having to source spares for that.

A lot of rain now so trying to do varnish work is a nightmare not sure I will be able to do what I would have liked to.

Well a strange month this is jobs in engine room and galley have gone completely t*** up, wood for galley floor never arrived so we still have a completely stripped out galley, the generator got moved but Peter had to do a lot of the work himself then the "engineers" were not keen on doing all the other work involved, seems they were not capable anyway, so Peter doing even more work down there, even having to source materials etc himself. On top of all this the Australian contractor that we were dealing withhas died (aged 45) so now wereally are in the poo.

I have managed to do some varnishing but not a scratch on what needs to be done.

Michelle and Michael almost bought a new boat, a bit of a project but after having a survey found even more wrong with it

(osmosis) and the owners would not come down to the surveyors recommended price so they lost it, they were very disappointed, but I think they would have had too much work and cost there what with the new baby on the way as well, hopefully they will find something else.
Simon has not yet come up with a new skipper despite the fact that we have now booked to fly to the U.K. on the 13th March, as that is when our visas run out.
We have made ourselves a small crate to send some of our stuff back to the U.K. in, this one had to be stronger as Peter wanted to send the few tools that he had on board and we had quite a few books so that has made it rather heavy. I have also stuffed as many of our clothes in there as I can in the hope that we will get the rest of them into our suitcases when we fly out. It will seem very strange leaving all this behind, the weather is going to be quite a shock as it has been very very hot and humid here, most uncomfortable and the u.k. and Europe will only just be thinking about spring so still quite cold and we will consider that uncomfortable too, no pleasing us!