Maldives - A Divers Delight

Maldives

The Maldives is a tropical nation in the Indian Ocean composed of 26 ring-shaped atolls, which are made up of more than 1,000 coral islands. I'd been looking forward to visiting the Maldives for the longest time. Most popular for its beaches, blue lagoons and extensive reefs. I was excited to get to the Maldives but nervous about the passage at the same time.

We departed Phuket, Thailand on the 23rd March 2013. It took us 16 days to cross the Indian Ocean. My longest passage thus far. It was an eventful passage. Some memorable moments include catching a baby shark (which we carefully released), getting chased by Sri Lankan fishing boat "pirates" on 5 different occasions (about 380nm south of Sri Lanka), and jumping into the water to watch the dolphins swim with us (we did this of course when we were drifting at 1-2knots/hr). 

Chased by Sri Lankan fishing boats/pirates

16 days at sea did not go by as quickly as I had hoped but the sight of the dolphins really cheered me up and brought joy and excitement to everyone on board. Apart from the baby shark, we didn't have much luck with fishing. We can't help but wonder if the oceans are fished out. It might just be the reason why the fishing boats decided to "fish" us instead!

Reeling in the baby shark

Sharp teeth!

The pod of dolphins that swam with us for almost an hour

We had to motor on many occasions during this passage as we didn't have much luck with the wind either. No wind, but when it came, it was against us. 227nm east of Male, we had to motor all the way with 10-12 knots of wind on the nose. It was very unpleasant!

Male up ahead!

3 days later and with hardly any diesel left, we finally arrived and anchored in between Viligi Island and Male (N 04.10.142 E 073.29.697) on 8th April 2013. 

We waited for 2 days for our agent to get to us. Unlike other countries, it was compulsory to use an agent to check in. The visas for the four of us together with a one month cruising permit cost us $950 USD!

After clearing in, we moved to Hulumale island just 3 nautical miles away. Unfortunately, on our way there the alternator bushes shorted and all our instruments died. Our toilet flush pump decided to act up too! We spent a week working on repairs. 

Fortunately there is a ferry which runs from Hulumale to Male, the capital of Maldives everyday. We often caught the ferry to Male for provisioning.

Even though the visa and cruising permit was pretty pricey, we had the freedom to explore the many atolls and dive whenever we could not far from our very own floating "villa". 

Clear pristine waters

Here's our cruising log and some of our anchorage points:

16th April: Picked up a mooring in Coral Atoll (N 04.10.620 E 073.28.412)

19th April: Moved to South Male Atoll. Anchored at Velassaru (N 04.06.868 E 073.26.087)

21st April: Moved to Emboodhoofinolhu (N 04.05.700 E 073.31.216)

23rd April: Moving to South Ari Atoll, anchored at Dhigurah island (N 04.05.693 E 073.31.218)

Some islands are really tiny

24th April: Anchored closer to Dhangethi Thila dive site (N 03.34.957 E 072.56.70).

25th April: Moved to Long island. Anchored in 8.5m of water near Dhigurah Arches dive site (N 03.32.300 E 072.55.584).

28th April: Moved to southern tip of Ari to look for whale sharks (N 03.33.520 E 072.54.980). Didn't see any.

29th April: Anchored at Maavaruhuraa island (N 03.11.095 E 073.02.184). Eastern side of North Nilandhe Atoll FAAFU.

30th April: Heading south to Huvadhoo Gaaf Alif Atill.   


To be continued..

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Phuket, Thailand

On 11th March 2013, we picked up a mooring in Ao Chalong, Phuket. It was a 3 day sail from Port Dickson, covering 350 nautical miles. Unfortunately we had no wind and the sea was flat so we had to motor about a third of the way. 
 
We love Thailand. You can get almost anything here (much like Malaysia). Food is good and cheap. People are friendly. We spent almost 2 weeks here, repaired our dinghy and made a new cover for our sail drive at Cholomark which cost us $530 AUD. A little pricey but the workmanship was pretty good.

We finally departed Phuket for Maldives on 23rd March.

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Port Dickson, Malaysia

We departed Kuala Belait, Brunei on 18th February 2013 after servicing our engine and installing a new fibreglass leg for our sail drive. We had fabricated 2 new ones (a fibreglass and an aluminium) in Melbourne. 

Our 792 nautical mile passage from Brunei to Port Dickson was generally peaceful except for one rough night when we passed Singapore where we had winds gusting up to 28 kts. 

Singapore up ahead

My second home - Singapore!

We were happy that our new fibreglass leg held well.
  
We tied up at berth no. C31 (N 02.28.654 E 101.50.559) at Admiral Marina, Port Dickson on 25th February and left Raptor here with our crew for several days while we went back to Kuala Lumpur and Singapore to see our family & friends as well as to run some errands.  

My mum very kindly drove us back to Port Dickson from Kuala Lumpur. She also drove all of us (crew included) back and forth twice to the Immigration Office in order for us to clear out. Thanks Mum!

Full crew at P.D Immigration

We departed for Phuket, Thailand on 8th March.
 

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2nd Time in Kuala Belait, Brunei

5 days, 427 nautical miles with just the two of us onboard. By the time we arrived in Kuala Belait on 9th January 2013, I was an absolute zombie. 

My body was functioning but my mind was not. I was on autopilot mode. With a 2 hour on and 2 hour off shift, 24 hours for 5 days straight, it was really hard for either of us to get any proper rest. I don't know how the solo sailors do it but I definitely have a new found respect for them. 

I know you might be wondering why 2 hours per shift? Why didn't we make the shifts longer so that we could both have more time to rest? Well, 2 hours was just about as long as I could keep watch without dozing off or feeling seasick.

We didn't get much wind on this passage, so we had to motor most of the way. It was no fun breathing in gear box oil fumes the whole way.

Our initial heading was towards Miri, unfortunately our sail drive failed again. 

We anchored (N 04.34.540 E 114.11.784) in the Belait River just opposite the Kuala Belait Boat Club and subsequently moored Raptor right next to the jetty, opposite the playground where we left her for almost a month, to attend a friend's wedding in Melbourne, Australia.

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Palawan Island, Philippines

Puerto Princesa Bay

Departed Sandakan bound for Puerto Princesa, Palawan on 10th December 2012. The sail drive leg repair failed midway. Fortunately, it was not a long passage, only 291 nautical miles. We had to sail half way into 20-25kts of headwind. Arrived on 13th December, anchored in the Puerto Princesa bay (N 09.46.029 E 118.43.862).

There's a small yacht club called Abanico. The people there were friendly & helpful, food was good and laundry services were available. We spent a week working on the sail drive repairs (again!).

View of the bay from the Abanico Yacht Club

On Christmas day, we had a nice buffet lunch at the Abanico Yacht Club before setting off in the evening bound for El Nido. It was a tough night. We had 25-32kts of wind. A strap at the top of the storm jib tore and a wire for the leg support broke. 

My lunch did not sit well (even though it should've been digested by then) everything came out that night. Imagine me at the helm with a puke bucket in one hand, and holding on tightly onto the arm rest of the helms chair with the other, trying to keep calm and keep watch in terrible weather. It was a horrible sight, and an even worse feeling. But I had to suck it up and pull myself together because it was just Alex & I on this trip. That taught me to never have such a big meal before a passage ever again. 

The next day, we anchored between Verde Islands (N 10.05.488 E 119.13.499) and continued with repairs.

On the evening of 28th December, we headed for an anchorage in Dumaran. 46 nautical miles later, we anchored in Cynthia Bay (N 10.32.756 E 119.58.944), Dumaran in 6m of water. The charts were inaccurate plus it was a choppy anchorage.

Anchorage at Dumaran

Dumaran

Dumaran - Nice walk on the beach, lot of seashells and seaweed

We set off again for El Nido on 30th December. 86 nautical miles of very rough seas. 16-20kts of wind from the Northeast.  We anchored in Corong Corong (N 11.09.942 E 119.23.615) the next evening. It was too late for us to go ashore, so we spent New Year's onboard and set off some old flares as "fireworks". Happy New Year! Corong Corong was a nice anchorage, we managed to explore a little but there was no proper place for us to tie the dinghy securely.

Nice anchorage at Corong Corong

On 2nd January 2013, we departed Corong Corong for Puerta Princesa (on the West side) to clear out. 54 nautical miles later, we anchored in Sabang (Underground River),(N 10.12.147 E 118.53.768). We decided that I will stay on board while Alex goes ashore to clear us out.

What a terrible decision that was! As the day progressed, the weather turned. It started to pour, the wind was blowing hard and waves were building. Raptor was like a gorilla trying to break free from its chains! I was so worried that our anchor chain would break. It was rough. Trust me, because the steering wheel fell off!  

Bad weather

Day turned into night, Alex still had not returned. I had no way of contacting him. At this point, I was a nervous wreck. Thinking of all sorts of scenarios of what I should do, could do in case something else happens. If I could see myself in the mirror, I know I would've looked like I'd seen a ghost! But all I could do was curl up on the sofa, hope and pray that Alex would be back soon.. 

Around 8pm, just as I popped an anti seasick pill into my mouth, I saw some flashing lights!

"Alex! Is that you?", I yelled. 

-- Nothing. I could hardly see or hear anything in the dark with all the rain, wind and waves.

My heart started racing as I saw a shadow on the port side of the transom. I grabbed a torch to shine the light toward the transom and with a sigh of relief, it was Alex coming up from the water, onto the transom, all wet. He had swam over from the local fishing boat in which he had hitched a ride from. That very same boat then threw his backpack into our dinghy.

 "What happened?", I asked.

According to Alex, they had tried to drop him off, but the waves were too rough, he could see our rudders jumping in and out of the water! It was impossible to get close. In the midst of all the attempts, the bowsprit of the wooden fishing boat punctured our dinghy. And so, Alex decided the best way for him to get on was to swim and climb onboard. 

What a day! We weren't happy about what happened with our dinghy (one more repair on our never ending to do list), but I was glad Alex was back and we were both safe and sound. 

Map of Palawan

We departed Sabang for Malaysia the next day. 

   

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