1 January 2016 Ko Hong, Phuket
It’s not surprising, but after last night’s surfeit of wine, we both felt very “dull” this morning, so we had a quiet rest day, reading and playing musical instruments.
The weather was lovely with blue skies, but in the afternoon, we had gusts of wind over 25 knots, shrieking around Ko Hong. I was sitting in the cockpit reading and noticed that we seemed to be in a slightly different position. After a few minutes observation, I confirmed that we were slowly dragging backwards in the strong gusts.
We pulled up the anchor, which came up clean with no debris, and re-anchored in 7 metres of water. Our Rocna anchor dug in well, so I have no idea why we were dragging, unless the anchor had tripped itself. We’ve been doing pirouettes over the past couple of days as the tide changed, so maybe the anchor chain had caught up in the anchor - very strange.
2 January 2016 Ko Hong to Ko Yang, Phuket
After a leisurely breakfast, we motored 3 miles to Ko Yang and anchored in 4 metres of water at 08°15.87N 098°29.26E. This is a stunning anchorage next to a small island with a very extraordinary pinnacle of rock - a tad phallic, but very photogenic. We pottered about for the morning, waiting for high tide in the afternoon, so that we could visit the nearby island of Koh Ping Kan.
At 15:30, together with “Spruce”, we dinghied one mile up-wind to Koh Ping Kan, which is famous for being the remote island headquarters of the villain in “The Man with the Golden Gun” and is consequently known as James Bond Island. It’s one of the major tourist attractions in Phuket and we’ve heard that there’s a fee of 500 Baht (£10) per person to land there.
Being late in the afternoon, it was relatively quiet, but there were still a dozen boats milling about, picking up and dropping off tourists. It’s very shallow water around the island, but by arriving at high tide, we were able to take our dinghy into the lagoon and right up to the iconic pinnacle. There were hundreds of people on the small beach and we could see a score of permanent stalls selling souvenirs - we didn’t bother landing.
It’s all very disappointing, the island is small and the pinnacle is only a quarter the height of the impressive pinnacle back where we anchored the boat. We didn’t stay long.
“Laragh” arrived in the late afternoon, so we went over and had a few beers with them.
3 January 2016 Ko Yang to Ko Yao Yai, Phuket
We’re booked into Ao Po marina tomorrow, so we decided to head south and get a bit closer to the marina. I did my usual inspection of the engine and found that the engine bilge was full of bright green water. The coolant leak is getting much worse… It’s obviously not the radiator cap because my sample bottle had hardly any water in it.
I spent 30 minutes poking about the engine. I can see a drip dropping from the oil filter, but cannot see where it’s coming from. I now suspect that a seal has gone in the fresh water pump and the water is running down behind the timing belt cover. This is a complicated job because it involves removing the timing belt and I don’t have the gear to do that, so I’ll get it fixed by a mechanic when we get back from Myanmar. At least it seem s to persistent now, giving me a much better chance of finding and fixing the leak.
We’ve had loads of wind for the last five days and today when we want to sail there’s bugger all. It was only 12 miles to the next anchorage, so I topped up the coolant in the engine and we motored south for a couple of hours. When we reached the 20 metre deep channel to the west of Ko Yao Yai, we hove-to and drifted about for 1½ hours while we ran the water maker to top up our tanks. Then we motored over to the north-west end of Ko Yao Yai and anchored at 08°06.60N 098°31.75E in 4 metres of water. It’s quite a nice anchorage and, for a change, there’s no-one around.
After lunch, I reluctantly dragged out my snorkelling gear and had a go at cleaning the hull in the very murky water. The underside of the transom had a three inch wide, one inch thick band of goose-neck barnacles - it’s only 23 days since I last cleaned the hull. This is a bad place for marine growth, but at least the anti-fouling on most of the hull is still holding up. The bottom of the keel has been nicely scraped free of barnacles (and anti-fouling) when we hit the sand bar a few days ago.
4 January 2016 Ko Yao Yai to Ao Po Marina, Phuket
After an early breakfast and refilling the engine with coolant, we motored across to Ao Po Marina. The plan is to get quotes to replace the teak deck from three suppliers, but on the way, I received an email telling me that Precision Shipwrights couldn’t make our appointment today. I sent off a flaming email and within fifteen minutes, I had a response - the owner is coming out to see us later in the morning. It’s great having 3G internet access.
We pulled into Ao Po Marina, which is a nice modern marina with a lovely looking swimming pool, restaurant and a gym. The showers and toilets are very luxurious. However, it’s not very convenient for cruisers because the marina is in the middle of nowhere, 10 miles from Phuket town, so without a car, it’s challenging.
Scott from Precision Shipwrights arrived at eleven o'clock and we spent an hour discussing the teak deck and the blue stripe on our topsides. Scott is Australian, very professional and has expanded his company so that he runs a full service operation with wood working, painting, rigging and fabrication. Scott is very knowledgeable about teak and the techniques for laying decks.
I spent the rest of the day planning. I've got a long list of jobs to do and have started a project plan. Two of the suppliers are based at Boat Lagoon and would want us to be hauled out, whereas the other supplier is based up at Yacht Haven and would want us to leave the boat in the water.
Leaving the boat in the water is marginally cheaper because there are no haul out charges, but Yacht Haven is miles away from anywhere and we would have to hire a car. We can rent a small apartment in Boat Lagoon, but they don’t have one available in Yacht Haven. I’ve got some jobs that need us to be hauled out, but I could wait until later in the year to do that. However, if we left the boat in the water in a marina for three months, how thick would the barnacles be? Decisions, decisions.
After much deliberating, depending on the quotes, we’ve 80% decided to go into Boat Lagoon. It’s a more expensive option, but it’s very convenient with many marine suppliers based there and it’s only a short motorbike ride into town. I’ve started to think that if we could haul out this week, then the workmen could begin ripping up the old teak deck while we’re away and we might get the job finished a couple of weeks earlier. I emailed Boat Lagoon to see if we can haul out on Friday 8th.
The quote came in from Precision Shipwrights at £13,300 for the deck and £1,840 for the painting. It’s a big headline figure, but still only 30-50% of the cost of doing the job in Europe.
5 January 2016 Ao Po Marina, Phuket
I was up early doing more planning and worrying. Nai & Toe from Phuket Inter Woodwork arrived at eleven o’clock and we went through the various jobs. They are a family run, Thai company - Nai is the Project Manager and she speaks good English, while Toe (her husband) is the woodworker, but speaks little English. They were very knowledgeable and I had the impression that they wouldn’t try to over-charge me for any extras. We got along famously.
After lunch, Glenys and I chatted through the options. Boat Lagoon has replied that they can haul us out on Friday. So, depending on the quotes, we could go with either Precision or Nai & Toe - both can move quickly to start work next week.
We decided to go for it and haul out on Friday 8th at Boat Lagoon. I confirmed the haul out with Boat Lagoon and we booked an apartment for two months starting when we get back from Myanmar.
It’s going to be a frenzy. We get hauled in three days’ time; we need to get the mast lifted out over the weekend; and I need to remove all the deck fittings and sort the boat out before we fly to Myanmar on Monday morning. To make matters worse, we still haven’t decided on who will do the work. I spent the afternoon mildly panicking and planning.
Marly from Yachts Repair Company came and measured up. He’s an enthusiastic guy, but I suspect that he runs a very small operation and doesn’t have the resources of the other two, so I’ve knocked him off the list. He’s going to get me a quote in a couple of days, which will be an interesting comparison - although we’ll probably be on the hard before he gets it to us...
Nai and Toes quote came in at £8,700 for the deck and £1,200 for the painting - 50 % cheaper than Precision. Nai says that she will be able to lift the mast out on Saturday. They look like the best bet, but we’ll sleep on it and make a decision tomorrow morning.
6 January 2016 Ao Po Marina, Phuket
It’s a no-brainer - I told Nai that we’d go with her and she’s going to arrange for our mast to be lifted on Saturday morning. With only five working days until we fly to Myanmar, I’m definitely panicking now.
Nai doesn’t have a professional rigger, but assures me that if I can get the rig ready to lift out, she has people who know what they’re doing. She’s only going to charge me for the crane hire - her people’s time is no charge. This is good because it’s much cheaper, but very worrying because I don’t know how good they will be.
I spent an hour or so writing a checklist of steps to remove the mast and looked back at photographs of when the mast was lifted in the USA to see how and where they attached the crane to the mast. I feel better prepared and will be keeping an eye on what they do - the last thing that I want is the mast or any of the rigging to be damaged.
I then spent several hours taking photographs of the teak planks on the deck to ensure that Nai’s team lay the new planks in the same way. They’ve assured me that the width of the planks will be 35mm with two 2mm rebates at each side of the plank to give a 4mm caulking groove. I want the new deck to look the same as the original and I even want the Hallberg Rassy logo at the bow.
As well as taking photographs of the teak detail, I took pictures of all of the deck fittings and measured their positions. When the new deck is put in place, all of the screw holes for the fittings will be covered up by teak. For most of the fittings, I’ll be able to find the old holes in the fibreglass deck and can drill up though the teak. However, some of the fittings will be in tight corners with no room to drill up from under the deck, so I’ll need to find the positions by measurement.
I spent the rest of the afternoon, pottering about doing a few jobs in the blistering heat, mostly getting ready to haul the boat on the 8th. Glenys did lots of laundry, while we have access to copious amounts of fresh water in the marina. There’s no launderette here, so unfortunately, she’s had to do it all in a bucket by hand.
In the evening, we treated ourselves to dinner in the restaurant, which was very nice and not too expensive. I had soft shell crabs, which I haven’t seen since the Chesapeake in the USA. Apparently, there are hundreds of crab farms in southern Thailand that specialise in soft-shell crabs. In the USA we had them pan-fried, but here they were stir-fried and very good - I’ll be keeping an eye out for them from now on.
7 January 2016 Ao Po Marina, Phuket
With the haul-out scheduled for tomorrow, we spent the day preparing the boat. I checked all of the sea cocks to see if any need changing - they all look okay. I changed the oil in the engine and the generator. The boat is going to be on the hard for almost three months and it’s best to remove the old oil which is corrosive.
I pickled the water maker, so that the osmotic membranes won’t get fungal growth while it’s not being used. I went up the mast and removed the delicate wind instruments and also put some tape on the mast at the point where the USA rigger had placed the crane strop when we last had the mast lifted.
We lifted the 15hp outboard on deck and I started the small 2.5hp outboard, which started after only ten or so pulls - amazing because it hadn’t been used for eight months. Finally, I inspected the bearings on the rudder. There’s signs of slight leaking past the lip seals, but I think that it’s okay - I’ll remove the quadrant when we’ve been lifted out and make sure that there isn’t any play in the bearings and that the rudder moves freely.
Glenys spent most of the day washing and cleaning. One of the biggest problems in the tropics is mildew, which soon takes hold, especially when the boat is locked up and there’s no air flowing through the cabins. She wiped down all the surfaces in both of our heads with a bleach solution.
We had a quiet night in eating a curry while watching a movie.
8 January 2016 Ao Po Marina to Boat Lagoon Marina, Phuket
The alarm went off at six o’clock and we were clear of the marina half an hour later. It was only six miles to the entrance to the dredged channel into Boat Lagoon and high tide was at 09:00, but I wanted to make sure that we didn’t miss the tide.
We motored inside of the two small islands of Ko Nakha Yai and Ko Nakha Noi, where the charts show quite a few rocks and shallows, so I was a bit nervous because I don’t trust the charts. However, there were no dramas and we arrived a mile off the entrance to the channel just before eight o’clock and then hove-to for half an hour.
The entrance into Boat Lagoon is notoriously shallow. It’s supposed to be dredged, but I don’t think that a dredger has been down it for years. The high tide height was 2.6 metres today, so I was hoping to have no problems.
We started our approach at 08:30 and followed the line of black poles, keeping them to port. The cruising guide says that it’s best to stay 10-15 metres from the poles, so I kept about 10 metres, so I could turn to starboard if I encountered shallow water - there’s nothing worse than the water getting shallow and not knowing which way to turn. I suspect that I was too close to the poles because the depth dropped to 2.2 metres at one point.
Half way along the 2½ mile channel, we were met by a couple of marina staff in a RIB, one of who jumped aboard. After giving me instructions for a couple of minutes, he asked if he could steer - sure why not? He was very competent, obviously knew the channel very well and how to handle a yacht. Near to the marina, we saw depths of 2.4m in the middle of the channel.
We were hauled out very quickly, pressure washed and moved to our stand by 10:30. There must have been a dozen blokes milling about in controlled chaos as they lowered our boat onto its cradle and set the stands.
I went to see Nai to let her know that we had arrived and she said that a crane would be here at 08:00 tomorrow. We spent the rest of the day getting the mast ready to be lifted out - we removed the sails and bagged them; removed the boom and lowered it to the ground; and then tidied up the various ropes connected to the mast.
By evening, we were all ready.
9 January 2016 Boat Lagoon Marina, Phuket
Nai’s team and the crane arrived at ten minutes to eight. It was a total frenzy with six guys on deck knocking out cotter pins and unscrewing bottle screws. The guy in charge didn’t like where I had told him to sling the crane and put it a few feet higher up to that it was just under the intermediate shrouds. I guess that it was better there because there was no chance that the sling could slip higher up the mast - the rigger in the USA had used a rope from the sling to the foot of the mast to hold the sling in position.
By nine o’clock, the mast was safely on the ground and suspended on trestles. I must admit that they were very fast and professional. They took the utmost care to make sure that none of the rigging was scratched or damaged - a very good service for free.
As soon as the crane was out of the way, the gang started to erect scaffolding around the boat installing a tent to keep the boat in shade while the teak deck is replaced. Again, it didn’t take long and, by lunchtime, we had a very nice canopy shading the deck.
I spent the afternoon starting to remove the deck fittings. The first job was the windlass, which took an hour. I then slowly worked my way aft, removing dorade vents, u-bolts, windlass switches, etc.
Later, I tackled the starboard side genoa track which has 36 bolts through the deck. Most of these could be accessed fairly easily by removing a couple of head-linings in the saloon. However three of the little tinkers were hidden away inside a cupboard in the galley.
Getting at the nuts involved unscrewing and removing the shelves in the cupboard, which took half an hour and much head-scratching. I managed to get it off before sunset.
Glenys wandered off to the nearby supermarket and bought a six pack of cold beer – now that we’re on the hard, we’ve had to switch off our fridges because they are water-cooled. When she arrived back, all work stopped and we downed a couple of cold ones, sitting on the bare teak deck enjoying the cooling evening breeze.
10 January 2016 Boat Lagoon Marina, Phuket
We’re off to Myanmar tomorrow, so there was no rest for the wicked. I carried on removing the remaining fittings, including the port genoa track, which was much easier than the starboard side. Glenys did more tidying up, cleaning out the fridges and getting ready to leave the boat for three weeks.
It all went very well and by four o’clock, we we’d checked into the Boat Lagoon hotel and we were luxuriating in a very nice room with air conditioning. The room that we've been given is a long way from the main hotel building and the swimming pool, which is a bit of a disappointment, but the room is very similar to the one that we will be renting for two months and will be a pleasant change, especially because the shower is very good.
11-30 January 2016 Myanmar
We had a fabulous trip to Myanmar. It’s very unusual for us to be on an organised holiday, but Glenys arranged a custom tour package through a local company called Santa Maria Tours. The cost was reasonable at $1,450 US per person including all transport, guides and hotels for 20 days.
We started in Mandalay, where we saw local craftsmen and countless Buddhist Stupas & Monasteries. After three days’ sightseeing, we drove to Hsipaw in the Northern Shan territory where we had a two day trek, staying in a Mountain Villager's House. A rickety train took us back to Mandalay, where we stayed overnight and then took a slow boat down the Irrawaddy River to Bagan.
Bagan has thousands of Stupas and Temples that date from the 14th century and the whole area is intriguing. We splashed out on an expensive, but fun hot air Balloon Ride over the temples at dawn - it was stunning. After three nights exploring Bagan, we drove to Kalaw in the Southern Shan region and then hiked for three days to Lake Inle staying in a local village and then a Monastery.
Lake Inle was fascinating. The locals live in stilt houses over the freshwater lake and their main occupations are fishing and farming. The fishing is done in low canoes made from teak and the fishermen have developed a unique technique of rowing using their legs, which allows them to see over the extensive reed beds and also frees up one hand to handle nets. The farming is done on floating gardens consisting of 2 metre thick reed beds.
After three nights at Lake Inle, we took a domestic flight to Yangon, which is a very large noisy city. Unfortunately, Glenys picked up a nasty virus, which confined her to the hotel room for two days and too soon we were flying back to Phuket via Bangkok.
It’s hard to summarise Myanmar. The Buddhist way of life is all pervading - Bhuddist Monks and Nuns are everywhere and it’s difficult to be somewhere were you cannot see the golden spire of a Stupa. There are a dozen ethnic groups consisting of 130 tribes, each with their own language, customs and Way of Dressing. The cities have a reasonably modern infrastructure and everyone seems to have mobile phones, but the villages still rely on ox & cart for transport with Water Buffalo to plough the rice fields.
We loved the country. If you want to know more, I've produced a separate article, cunningly called Trip to Myanmar.
31 January 2016 Boat Lagoon, Phuket
We arrived back at Boat Lagoon, Phuket in the early hours. We’ve rented a small hotel room for the next two months. It has a big double bed, a kitchenette and a bathroom. It’s not very big, but should be adequate for the next two months and it has air conditioning, which will be a blessing.
I woke up at seven o’clock, sneaked out of the room and walked to the boat -being a Sunday, it was very quiet. I was pleased to see that our contractor has painted the blue stripes on our topsides, which looks okay, but there are many dust spots and some orange peel effect in the surface.
The teak deck has been removed and the glass-fibre deck seems to be in good condition. Previously, there was an area of the deck that was creaking when I walked on it and I thought that maybe the teak deck had separated from the glass-fibre deck. However, the creak is still there in the glass-fibre deck, so I need to investigate a little further.
The inside of the boat is okay. A little dust has come through the head-linings, but mostly the interior looks fine - no mould or rats that I could see.
I packed up some items for breakfast and lugged them back to the apartment, which is a quarter of a mile walk. After breakfast, Glenys said that she felt fine, so we walked back to the boat and loaded bags with all our clothes, kitchen items, food, musical instruments, etc. We bought some provisions from the supermarket, which is expensive, but very convenient, then called a courtesy bus from the hotel to carry it all back to our apartment.
It’s very hot and humid at the moment, so Glenys really suffered and had a relapse. After lunch, we chilled out in the air conditioning - Glenys had a recuperative rest while I did some planning for all the jobs to do on the boat