DoraMac

DoraMac's new website

2008-09-02T23:30:00.001+08:00

DoraMac has a new website!
www.mydoramac.com

You will find Ruth's blog along with photo albums, a little history, the route they are taking and some information about the boat.

This will be the last posting on this blog. Hope you enjoy the new site!

Tana Toraja

2008-08-29T13:24:00.005+08:00

August 29 around early afternoon

Skulls, bones, house roofs shaped to look like ancient boats, livestock markets where wizened men with skinny legs covered by colorful sarong skirts and younger men in jeans bargained for dozens and dozens of pampered water buffalo and even more dozens of fat, squealing, sad, soon to be slaughtered pigs. Colors, noises, calls to prayer from the many mosques, scenery, food; your senses are overwhelmed taking it all in. And each has its own Indonesian, Makassan, Buginese or Tarajan word to describe it. Learn one phrase and forget one phrase...that's how it went. But it was all very "biak!" which means good in at least one of those places.

It is 350 kilometers or about 210 miles from Makassar by the sea to Tana Toraja in the high mountains. The drive takes 8 hours but there are many stops along the way to see bamboo processing, a simple native home, local snack stops, to try sticky rice candy and not purchase dried fish preserved with formaline; lunch stops and scenic mountain view stops. All along the way, our extremely knowledgeable, warm, interested guide Rusli Amin taught us about the 3 distinct cultures of the area; Makassar, Parepare and Tana Toraja. I wish I could explain all that Rusli told us, but alas, it is a jumble in my head and will stay that way until I sort it out at a later date. But now I will be able to see what I read and that makes all the difference.

I took about 400 photos! I could have taken more and it would be an artist's dream to have time for painting. But with just a day to go, one to stay, and one back we had to pick and choose. Randal and I are already daydreaming a month here during our next circumnavigation. It is a tourist destination but it hasn't been Disneyfied yet. The people allow you to browse the small shops and bargain for that special one thing you just have to have. But no pressure, no begging. We stayed in a "resort hotel" with a 2 star room, a 4 star setting and depending on the meal, 2 to 5 star food! Combine all of that with cool, great sleeping weather and it is the perfect place to explore and just stay a while. I must admit I was starting to look for totem poles; you'll see why. Randal and I give it 2 thumbs up!

The photos I am sending now are ones Randal took. He focused on the highlights of the area. I'll start with those.

We were lucky enough to be in Rantepao for Pasa Bolu; market day. Each week men walk miles to town with their water buffalo. Pigs are trucked in too. Tana Toraja culture is based on the importance of the funeral ritual. Families save for years to buy water buffalo and pigs to slaughter for the funeral celebration. The more buffalo and pigs, the more honor to the dead person and his/her family. Until they die, water buffalo are treated as sacred animals and are pampered, fed, bathed. They are killed in the quickest and least painful way. Pigs are not so lucky and watching them caught, bound, tied to a carrier and hauled out for a funeral celebration, I found it disturbing and sad. I know now where the phrases squealing like a stuck pig comes from. It is not my culture and I am not a vegetarian; but I felt sad watching the treatment of the pigs. If a water buffalo price is not met or one negotiated, the animal is led home for more pampering until the next market day.

This little piggy went to market and it was not a pretty sight to see. Notice the blue plaid cloth wrapped around the man on the left and the purple/brown plaid on the right. Also the man with the gold cloth hanging from his shoulder. These are sarongs that are almost the size of twin bed sheets. Men wear them for warmth over their shorts. Rusli said the sarong indicates the man has not yet had time to bathe for the day. After someone buys a pig it is caught and bound onto a bamboo holder.

Families save for years to be able to have a huge feast for their honored family member. This may take place a year after the death. But bodies are mummified and preserved until they are taken to the caves for burial.

This family was hosting a funeral. July and August are the traditional funeral holding months. No rice harvesting I think so there is time. These women are drumming the news that people are welcomed to the funeral celebration to be held in the next day or so when the family has all arrived. The home is draped with the red bunting. It was the most amazing drumming sound, hollow and rhythmic. Wooden carved boat like structure is used to carry the body to the cave. The roof of houses and rice barns are also constructed with this boat shape. The mountains were once part of an ocean and the ancestors had taken their boats from the water and used them to build homes thousands of years ago.

This is the home of the dead person's family. Many buffalo horns indicate great wealth. The family could afford to buy and slaughter them for the funeral feast. Other families would donate buffalo or pig to the feast but then they must be paid back when there was a death in the donor's family. Pig jaws were along one home at another site we visited. Family honor is completely tied to these funeral ceremonies and generations save and contribute. The really elaborate funeral celebrations are mostly for people who have lived into their 70s. They may have saved their money but also educated their children who could then earn more money to help provide a bigger funeral. It is the main celebration of family existence.

A cave burial site. The people of Tana Toraja or Tarajaland are Christian, maybe from the Dutch colonizers. But they still follow the old burial traditions. The open umbrella shade those carrying the body also shades the body. It is assumed, I think, that the dead person is with them in spirit. Carvers come to the stone and carve caves ordered by a family. Apparently anyone can use stone anywhere, one doesn't have to own the property. Lots of things are abundant like these stone places, bamboo, bananas, and other fruits so anyone may take for free. One might ask the land owner, but permission is almost always granted. Rusli says here a man gets bamboo for free while in Makassar each man must buy his bamboo where it is not abundant.

We visited a small village famous for its unique native architecture and for the burial caves and hanging graves sites. This structure is a pig shape. It holds the bones and skulls of women.

This one is for men and is shaped like a water buffalo.

These are tau tau, images of the dead who are placed in the cave. The wealthier you are the larger tau tau you have. This one family of the woman in purple were in one large cave behind a metal fence.

Caskets placed in caves. Our guide Rusli, sounds like Bruce Lee.

Another burial site. Each square is a carved burial cave.
The wooden structure in the lower right carried the bodies to the cave.

Tau Tau representing those buried in the caves.

Tau Tau carver. He learned from his father. Families pass the skill to the next generation. He wants his son to get a good education so he can get a better job. The small carvings were amazing. He has been carving them for 20 years. That's me in the photo. I am wearing a shirt bought in K K that has sleeves. I did see many European women tourists sleeveless and no one was pointing or making a big deal. I guess because this area is Christian and not Muslim. Our guide Rusli couldn't eat with us at the recommended local "tourist" restaurant because they included pork in their cooking. Rusli is Muslim. We had some great discussions about the world and its issues.

This is just a tiny tiny bit of what we saw. The mountain and rice field scenery was beautiful. The stilt homes totally unique. I will try to do another email before we leave here. It is 1 am Saturday, August 30. Our wifi is far too slow with many disconnections so that odd hours work better. I will try to send this now.

Makassar, Indonesia

2008-08-26T06:17:00.002+08:00

August 26 6:17 am

Hi Everyone,

Our coodinates are 05 08 228 S 119 23 912 E. Maybe you'll see us. Off into the "supposed to be very scenic" mountains to Tana Toraja in about an hour. Homes there are built in the shape of boats or buffalo horns. Also famous for their elaborate funeral rites. Supposed to be a "must see" according to our Rough Guide. We have a driver/guide to take us there. Be gone 2 nights and back by Thursday evening. Not sure of the wifi situation. Hope we don't get altitude sickness after being at sea level for so long!

Makassar very interesting. Foreign and familiar at the same time since in many ways it reminds me of China. More when I can send an email from my computer.

Ru

Indonesia - Arrived!

2008-08-23T07:30:00.002+08:00

August 23 7:30 am is when I am writing this.
Hi Guys,

Randal wrote .....

Arrived safely at anchor 6:45 AM in Makassar at 05'08.228S 119'23.912E. Yesterday was terrible and the price for the boat got down to make an offer. We had heavy winds and waves just about all day. When we made our turn toward Makkassar we had in excess of 20 knots winds on the nose and building waves. It was 9:00 PM last night and it took us nearly 10 hours to work our way through the reefs and a million fishing boats.

I think both Ruth and I are wired and tired. Too wired to try to sleep but too tired not to want to. From the water front this place really looks interesting. Lots of bars and restaurants along the beach and just north of our anchorage is the ship terminal. We look forward to exploring.

Ruth wrote.......

Randal did a great job never complaining a bit when I woke him up during all but one of my watches so he had to be up part of mine as well as all of his. Last night coming here was beyond me except for about 2 and a half hours. Randal did all the rest. I was just too pooped and too scared of all the fishing boats surrounding us. Luckily I had driven more of the daytime. Now we are beyond tired and are just waiting for customs to notice us. If not, eventually we'll go find them. A boat taxi led us to an anchor spot. We thought he was customs. He saw us as customers. It does look like an interesting spot.

This passage was a lot like doing Outward Bound. I didn't love it and it was almost too hard and at one point I did say I couldn't do something. But in the end I was really proud that I had done it. Same with this passage. Now I know we can do it and know how to do it better.

Randal is looking through the binoculars at the people eating in the Dunkin Donuts! A big water taxi just went by and everyone is looking at us.

"This is what cruising is all about, I reckon." Randal, after hearing what I had added.

The end!

Crossing the Equator

2008-08-21T12:00:00.001+08:00

Hi Everyone,
Randal sends out a noon report to our friend Nick Spence in Subic. Nick takes the readings and translates them into a projected weather report for us. We get sailmail weather, but Nick's is better. I am having Red Sox withdrawal pains not being able to follow the game or read every news bit about them. But I did help them along last night in my own way. Randal wrote this report of us "crossing the line," as crossing the Equator is called.

From Randal

8/21/08
12:00 Noon
01'01.39S 118'52.94E
SOG 6.0 Knots
COG 191 (COG is "course over ground" showing the line in back of you up to you and projecting where you will go. Heading is where the boat is pointing but maybe because of the wind and current pushing you around, not where you actually were or are going to go. Clear?)
Wind W at 3 knots
Seas Flat
Skies Partly cloudy
Temp 84F
Conditions Calm

At sunrise this morning we had 12 to 15 knot winds on our port beam with building seas. But by 0800 the wind had died to zero and within thirty minutes the waves disappeared as well. Now there is just a little side to side movement of the boat, the paravanes are hardly having to work at all.

Last night at 01:37 we crossed the Equator. I had asked Ruth to prepare (a ceremony) while we were still in KK. It happened ("the crossing") on my watch and I awakened Ruth 10 minutes early as per her instructions. She fetched a package she had prepared for the donation to King Neptune. The package included a piece of left over fruit cake Ruth had made from a mix* but Ruth never follows recipes and when it went in I saw the tide drop 3", a can of turkey Spam, some coins, a Dora Mac business card, a big sea shell from Clarendon Island, a piece of sea glass, Ruth's broken lucky Red Sox ring**, all wrapped up in an American flag bandana. I hope he is appeased.

Ruth also painted a commemorative document, worthy of framing, with all the necessary information and a drawing of Dora Mac. We have to fill it out yet though. I'm sure you'll see a picture of it on our web site when we reach wifi land again.
Just before the chart plotter read 00'00.000, I asked Ruth to take a picture of it. She tried several times but couldn't get the focus right. I got my camera but I couldn't get a good photo either. I stepped outside the door because I was feeling queasy looking at the camera I guess. When I came back in Ruth was still fidgeting with her camera not realizing the plotter now showed 00'00.135S.
I just took a shower after three days and it is beyond comprehension how much it has raised my spirits. I can tell when my spirits get low because I start fantasizing about someone offering me a large amount of money for the boat and me selling it. The large amount is directly proportionable to my low spirits, the lower the spirits the lower the offer. But now I'm clean and the offer is one million.

* This is not the Official Roanoke County Public Library Fruitcake. This mix bought in K K came with no fruit included though the picture on the box showed fruit included and it called itself Fruit Cake. Who would have guessed. The direction on the back show you adding a bag of fruit into the mix at step 3. Hope Neptune likes it better than Randal did. I added my own fruit and nuts.

** I bought a "Lucky Red Sox" red bangle and red ring in Subic Bay just before we left. The ring broke, bad luck, toss in ocean!

Ruth

Malaysia to Indonesia

2008-08-19T12:23:00.001+08:00

August 19 12:23 pm

Just crossed from 4' to 3' 59" It was kind of exciting. 360 degrees around us is the Celebes Sea, sun, fluffy white clouds, some wind and some waves.

We're going 6.1 knots and the sea is more than a thousand feet deep. Pretty amazing. Will be in Makassa in about 4.5 days.

Love,
Ru

Malaysia to Indonesia

2008-08-15T15:44:00.004+08:00

Hi everyone,
We are anchored off a lovely island just now and it's my favorite part of cruising. Just quiet and pretty and no noise and no karaoke. Of course, no wifi and no Sox scores! Last time they did well when I was unable to follow them on a daily basis. Hope that works again.

From Randal...
"Anchored last night in Kudat. Now have arrived just north of an island by the name of Palau Jambongan. Location is 06'45.404N and 117'24.368E. Real nice cruise today, never out of site of land. Tomorrow will be our first overnight passage with just Ruth and me aboard. It is 135 NM. We will leave tomorrow morning about 10:00 AM and at 6 knots should arrive at our next anchorage, Dog Nose, at 8:30 Sunday morning. This is a 22.5 hour passage. We have to leave late because if we leave early we will arrive before dawn and we want to arrive during daylight.
If you look at our schedule you'll see our next passage after that is 346.1 NM but we are thinking of running all the way to Makassa which is 677 NM and 113 hours, four days plus 17 hours. This is a little hard to plan because we're not sure of the boat speed. According to climate charts we will be facing a headwind but a one knot current going with us. We could plan on arriving at 12:00 noon but that would mean leaving our anchorage at 7:00 PM, well after dark.
There are a number of things we could do. I have anchorages laid out all along the west coast of Saluwesi we could duck into as we neared Makassa to hold up."

Me again
At some point very soon we will cross the Equator. Tonight we are 6.45 degrees north of the Equator. Each degree is 60 miles so we still have a way to go. It was my task to find out how cruisers celebrate the event called "crossing the line." We will take photos and make a big deal and I will tell you later.

Friday, August 15 3:44pm

Romblon continued

2008-08-11T18:00:00.003+08:00

August 11 6 pm Monday Kota Kinabalu

Back again to Romblon........
After we left Tony's house Avon drove us further along the coast. During our lunch stop, I went snorkeling though the warning to watch out for the jelly fish, "but they won't bother you," made it a tad bit unenjoyable so I got out sooner rather than later. We had a nice lunch and it was there that we met Toffy Padua. He had kayaked over from his home. Toffy and Avon were long-time friends from their school days in Manila. Toffy invited us to his family's compound to see his environmentally friendly sustainable tree home.

We drove and he kayaked and we all got there at about the same time.

First the outside. Toffy's dad has his own house. Toffy's sister has her own house. Toffy has his own house. We didn't see his dad's but we did see both his and his sister's.

See my pictures of Toffy's environmentally friendly/sustainable tree house with sleeping loft.

I loved Toffy's treehouse and his sister's Zen like home. Both Toffy and Avon would like to see Romblon develop in an environmentally friendly way.

http://touristsinmymind.blogspot.com/ is Toffy's web site. He seems a real creative guy. He was a wonderful host who was willing to take his time to share ideas with us.

After the visit with Toffy we went back to Romblon Town and Avon drove us around to find cases of Gatorade and then dropped us off at our dinghy. We had taken much more of his time than we had contracted for, but he also enjoyed visiting friends. With all of the visiting we didn't make it to the local fort up behind the town. Next time. Romblon is a place we hope to revisit.

I also want to share the photos of our visit to the marble works. But that will have to wait for another email.

K K with Valerie

2008-08-11T11:05:00.003+08:00

August 11 11:05 am Kota Kinabalu

Hi Everyone,

Just a quick bunch of photos from my "luck and chance tours" with Valerie. You'll see why as I tell our story.

Here are Stephen and Valerie. We had just been to the State Mosque and were walking past these group of homes built over a canal. They were quite poor but picturesque. Not the best photo of Stephen and Valerie, but at least it is from the front.

Stephen and Valerie were going to the Mosque and invited me along. Randal was doing boat things. Unfortunately no photos were allowed inside. Both Valerie and I had on our mid-shin pants and wraps. Hers was a lovely, wispy peach color and mine was my huge tie-dye green cotton sarong. Stephen wore shorts and just offered to wait outside while Valerie and I went in to explore. We left our shoes and walked on the cool tiled floor through the building.

We wandered around outside and inside and felt as if we weren't getting much from our experience. We found a small room with women praying wrapped head to toe in shawls and robes. We didn't want to interrupt and it was warm in that room wrapped in my green tie-dye. But we also didn't want to just leave. So when the men started leaving their huge air-conditioned prayer hall, we asked if we could go peek inside. We were answered with smiles and passed along until the exact right man told us that he was in charge of tourists and he would take us into the huge prayer room and explain about the prayers and mosque. But first we had to put on tourist robes so that everyone would know we were tourists. Valerie guessed the robes were there so tourists would be adequately covered. I think she is right. So I put on a huge robe that looks like a choir robe and then my huge green tie-die shawl over my head. Rats, no photos since I'm sure that I looked a sight. Valerie looked just fine in her wispy peach scarf tied perfectly over her head. My bouncy hair wasn't helping any, either. But vanity aside, we walked back to the big prayer room, robes dragging behind, and our guide showed us how Muslim prayer was performed and told us the 8 principals of the prayer. He told us how men stand shoulder to shoulder and how they must not move around and disrupt their concentration. If they must move it is 2 small steps and then pause and 2 more if needed until they are where they need to be. He showed us how they place their hands and feet and head when they pray. He told us about the decorations in the hall and how many tons the giant chandelier weighed and why tourists aren't allowed to stand under it, just in case. Most interesting to me was the hexagonal beehive symbols all around the wall. Inside the hive, tilted a bit was a 6 pointed star which to me is a "Jewish star." Valerie asked him about the hexagonal design and he mentioned the beehive symbolism. But he also mentioned the Star of David saying that the Jewish religion, like all religions had symbols and good points and should be respected. I don't know how we all thought before 9/11, but since then I wonder if we respect the Muslim religion as much as they seem to respect our religions and us as people. I hope that Muslim women from Malaysia who wear head coverings are treated as well as I am here not wearing a head covering. My Sox hat doesn't count.

Another day Valerie and I went to the State Library Reference Library

http://www.ssl.sabah.gov.my/ is the web address. I had already been to the State Library lending library which I guess now is the City Library..... But since this was the newer library, opened in 2004 I wanted to see it. It isn't on any of the maps so with just the street address we took a taxi and hoped for the best. The helpful security guard and desk staff at the marina had told the taxi driver where it was and with only one small mistake we got there. Luckily I had seen a picture on the web site. I had been looking for the information about the library in town that I had visited and found this site and was really unsure what library was what since the sign outside the city library said State Library as did the map. Old sign, old map... But I recognized the pink building and in we went. Needs have obviously expanded since 2004 because the library is building up to add more space.

Saturday and Sunday the library hours are 9 am until 2 pm. But there is just a small staff and the front information desk isn't staffed.

Guards took my backpack so I am not sure who uses the blue lockers on the left side of the photo. But they are a good idea so you don't have to worry about leaving your stuff unattended. None of the signs offered any English translations. But they do use Dewey Decimal System as our library at home, so I could find the art books. And most of the books were written in English!

Lots of computer access but most students were using the paper materials available. I recognized many titles that we have in our library and many paper sources like Facts On File that we no longer update in paper format and neither do they.

Where there is a library, there will be a library display!

They had an up-to-date, varied, and interesting magazine collection. Some written in English and some not.
From their version of Glamour Magazine

Because it was Sunday, most staff were not there. But I found that none who were there wanted to chat about libraries. In China, in the Public Library and High School library, the librarians were very interested in exchanging ideas and answering my questions. The library staff in the very small Olongapo library also responded when I said that I worked in a library in the U. S. But in neither of the libraries here have any staff shown any interest discussing libraries with me. So I can't tell you any more than you see in the photos or the web site. Sorry. I will do another email about my trip to the City/State Library.

After the library Valerie and I walked back to the museum complex that we had visited previously. The art gallery was having a water color exhibit. It didn't look so far away on the map so we walked. We left the library and walked to the main road and took a left. Should have taken a right. We asked a man having his car repaired for help. He offered to drive us and we both had no doubts that it was quite safe to agree. So in about 10 minutes we were off to the Art Gallery. We had to buy entry tickets to the museum, unfortunately. There were about 30 paintings and I enjoyed seeing them. They were all better than I could do, at least most of them. But nothing made me go wow. Too bad. http://www.sabah.gov.my/artgallery/ is an interesting sight about current art in Malaysia

Since it was cheaper to get a taxi from the hospital down the small driveway from the museums, we walked there and saved 5 or so ringgits. It would have cost more to have a taxi sent to the museums to get us as we found our last visit. Though it was less than $3 US we still felt like a cheaper taxi down the drive made more sense. We walked, got the taxi and returned to the marina. Valerie came to Doramac for a cool drink and one last chat. She and Stephen would be off to Sandakan for 3 days to visit Agnes Keith's home, see the wildlife and other sights and wouldn't be back till we had left. Or we thought we would have left. Now our lost package coming from Australia seems to be in West Malaysia. If we can wait an extra day for it, we may so I'll be able to hear all about their trip.

Getting ready to go

2008-08-11T07:28:00.003+08:00

August 11 7:28 am Monday Kota Kinabalu

Hi Everyone,

It never fails. I get itchy to leave, then get to know the place better, make friends, and then, just at that point, it's time to go. In this case, because we have signed up for Sail Indonesia we have no choice. Actually we should have left a week ago, but computer issues that are partly resolved, got in the way. We think we will leave tomorrow. I am sending an excel file of our stops, but we may change that as we go. We have several overnight passages which eliminates the need to negotiate shallow anchorages and lets us cover more ocean more quickly.
Our sailmail may or may not work. Our cell phone will stop working when we leave Malaysian waters and cell towers. So for the 2 or 3 weeks we are traveling you probably won't hear from us. Don't worry. I will joke and say our EPERB will save us if the boat sinks or in a dire emergency I guess we could stick it in water and the coast guard would come. But that would have to be a terrible emergency and that won't happen. We can also speak with passing ships on our vhf. Actually, our sailmail had stopped working between the Philippines and K K and we had no problem. We anticipate no problems this time. We have fuel, lots of fruit and veggies, fresh and canned, and our chart plotter and autopilot to help. We'll be fine.

Our British friends Valerie and Stephen are off to Sandakan and won't be back until we have left so we said our good-byes Saturday. Valerie, always up for an adventure, had gone with me to the other State Library and then to the Sabah Art Gallery in the museum complex where there was a small water color exhibit. I'll write about these adventures, but just now I'll say that Valerie is a kindred spirit and between the 2 of us we made the only possible wrong turn walking to the gallery from the library so were driven there by a kind Chinese man. We had stopped to ask directions from a man having his car fixed at an engine repair shop. He was kind, told us we had gone left when we had needed to go right. He said his car would be done in 10 minutes and he would drive us. His car was done in 10 minutes! and he drove us to the gallery! It was nice having someone to explore with. Sort of like when Sallie came to visit in China. It's touring by luck and chance. When we go with Carol there is planning and organization and we see way more than we would have. If we're lucky and get to Thailand when Carol can join us, we'll get some great touring there too! While we still have phone connection I will text Carol and she will email Harriet and Harriet can email all of you. Great system in a pinch.

Last time I lost contact with the Red Sox they jumped in the standings. Hopefully that will happen again.

When you look at the excel file, there is no place called Dog Nose. It is just shaped like a dog's nose below his ear. The ear is near Teluk Sumangat and the nose is near Tangung Sugut. Teluk Balesang is our first location in Indonesia.

All of this is on paper and in the chart plotter, but we might make changes on the way.

So I'll send this now. I will try to send some email with photos of here before I leave.

Ru

KK to Labuan Bajo - Upload a Document to Scribd

Romblon 3

2008-08-07T16:30:00.003+08:00

August 7 4:30 pm Kota Kinabalu

Where we still are waiting for a second package. The first one came with a part for Randal's seatek computer but it didn't fix the problem. This afternoon a boat neighbor Terry on Valhalla came to try to fix our AIS boat identification system. It wouldn't fix. We may never leave K K! Luckily the Sox won! You all won't believe this, but I would have preferred the computer work and the Sox lose. See what winning 2 Series does to you. Me anyway. Actually, we really are discouraged by the computer issues. Not sure what plan C is or when we will leave to get to Indonesia by the first week in September. This is also typical boating life.

We are rejoining our friends in Romblon for this post.

Tony Parkinson

Our second full day on Romblon was a tour of the marble works, stops at various resorts, the local cathedral, and visits to the homes of both Tony Parkinson and Toffy Romero. We had a very full day indeed! I'll write about all of our friends first and then do an email about the marble works and one about Romblon in general.

When we left the marble works and began our tour of Romblon Island, Avon asked if we wanted to see Tony Parkinson's home with its wonderful view. We said sure. Here is a quick intro to Tony.. "David Anthony “Tony” Parkinson, an Englishman, lived 28 years in Kenya. He came to the Philippines when the Calait Animal Reserve in Palawan was created in 1977. (The Safari Park in Illultuk Bay where we spent Typhoon Frank.) If you ask him, he will surely tell you stories about the translocation of eight species of big Kenyan mammals to a Philippine Island." Tony is a "retired" animal conservationist. In his working life he tried to place animals in settings where they would thrive, where they would be protected, and where more people around the world could come to see and appreciate them. He has worked with many of the world's major zoos. He is acquainted with many well known animal conservationists. Ultimately, knowledgeable people would be the animal's best protection.

See pictures from Tony's house.

We both found Tony fascinating and very cordial considering we sort of invaded his "view." We actually hadn't expected meet him, just see the view. We were lucky to catch him at home.

One of Randal's favorite books is West With the Night by Beryl Markham. She spent her growing up years in Kenya. Randal told Tony Beryl Markham stories and Tony told us Tony stories. Randal made a gift of his copy of the book to Tony and received a wonderful emailed thanks.

And we still had more adventures to go after we left Tony!

Romblon 2

2008-08-03T18:43:00.003+08:00

August 3 6:43 pm Kota Kinabalu

Here we are back in Romblon again. Our first full morning in Romblon was with the visiting kids. But we had made a plan to meet Chris and Myline for lunch. We then spent most of the afternoon with them.

Myline and Chris during lunch at the Romblon Deli! Our table is marble. Food was quite good. Chris spent many years as a commercial fisherman in Australia. Myline is Filipino. She is also an accomplished sailor.

Their home is up a mountain with lots of lovely jungle all around. Randal and I had the fun of sitting in the back of the truck during our drive through town and up the mountain.

The view from the kitchen sink window. Who would mind doing dishes here! Much of the land seen from the window is theirs.

They had 2 very large rooms that were light and airy and cool.

Chris has bought this house for Myline.
A marble table on the front porch. A great place to swing away on the hammock.

The road past their home.

While we were having lunch at the Romblon Deli, Chris called a friend, Avon Romero, who does local tours and sells real estate and is into lots of things and knows about everyone it seemed. Avon introduced us to both Tony Parkinson and Toffy Romero. The people we met on Romblon were the best part of Romblon.

Next post, Tony Parkinson

Visitors!

2008-08-03T07:25:00.000+08:00

August 3 7:25 am Kota Kinabalu (I will continue with the Romblon story later, but need to tell you about our new KK friends.)

Hi Everyone,

Yesterday Randal and I had lunch at the Restoran Mars. Having eaten there several times before, (it's Randal's favorite) I knew the "restroom" had a picture of a man outside the door. One day I had gone looking for a door with a picture of a woman and was told, "only one toilet and everyone uses it." No problem. It was the familiar Chinese squat toilet with a bucket of water and pail to flush and wash down the whole area. So yesterday when I saw some women looking around, I told them that everyone used the "men's room." The women had spoken to each other in sign language but I didn't assume they were both deaf. I did assume they were not particularly westernized since they were dressed in a more traditional Muslim style. One of the women turned to me and in perfect English said, "Oh unisex." I did a total re-evaluation just from hearing that one modern slang term and I know I looked startled. I know because Emilda told me later that evening when she and her team of architects came to visit us on Doramac. They were in Kota Kinabalu at the request of the KK government to evaluate the accessibility of the waterfront area for disabled citizens, pregnant women, women with baby carriages, the elderly, foreign tourists, or anyone not able to negotiate all of the everyday architectural obstacles. We got further acquainted as Emilda seemed to keep working her way to the end of the "restroom" line. While waiting, she decided to take a chance and ask if we would answer some survey questions. We said yes we would, so she sat down and we talked long enough for her to be left behind by her undergraduate assistants, Ph.D advisor and several volunteers with different disabilities who were exploring the accessibility of the waterfront. When she left us we invited her to come visit us on the boat. Happily she took us up on the offer.

Emilda is a lecturer and Ph.D candidate at the International Islamic University of Malaysia. Dr. Fadzidah Abdullah is her advisor. They and Che Rahim and Ahmat Zairh undergraduates in architecture and Emilda's great friend Sibyl who lives in K K and teaches high school English all came to visit us last night. We had a wonderful evening and made more wonderful friends.

Emilda with her arm around Sibyl. They have been friends since childhood. Though both had on the same blouse, Emilda is Muslim and Sibyl, Catholic explaining the difference in their dress. Standing behind Sibyl is Fadzidah. Fadzidah earned her undergraduate degree in Lubbock, Texas and her Ph.D in the UK. She is Emilda's Ph.D advisor. Ahmat is standing and Che sitting. They are both undergraduates who hope to go on to do graduate work.

Emilda worked as hard as she could to teach me how to play CONGKAK. www.wikihow.com/Play-Congkak will do a much better job than I telling the rules. Emilda was amazingly patient. She explained and demonstrated; demonstrated and explained and finally, maybe I sort of kinda understand. When I read the rules on wikihow this morning, they did make sense so I must have learned something from Emilda's patient efforts. I vow to learn to play. The white are small shells that are used as playing pieces. It was a great gift! When Emilda handed it to me wrapped up, she said, if we already had one she would take it back. She was of course joking knowing no way would we already have one. I could tell from the shape of it we didn't already have one. Now we do and it will be a wonderful reminder of a wonderful evening. "Congkak is a game suitable for 2 players using a board which has several houses and 2 storehouses. The object of the game is to gather as many congkak seeds into your storehouse. It is a game played during one's free time and is normally played by women, especially liked by youths. The game, related to mancala, is commonly played in Indonesia, Borneo, Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines." I do remember seeing the boards in the Philippines. I was intrigued by it and asked a street vendor who had one what it was, but only know understand his answer! Emilda brought one with shells rather than seeds because of our connection to the ocean. The shells feel so nice in your hand. Emilda loves to play and plays alone of with her daughter. Both Fadzidah and Sibyl had some knowledge of the game. The young men had no clue. But they both knew how to use the timer on their cameras.

Randal led the boat tours.

We took lots of photos. This was not only a research/ paid government project but also a chance for two friends to spend time together.

Fadzidah was quite an adventurer herself and had traveled in pursuit of her studies. She had to learn to understand Texas English and then British English. I know I had problems just learning to understand Tallahassee English when I went to Florida State for my MLS.

Randal and I took turns posing in group and individual photos. But you know what we look like. And in those someone was always left out because I don't yet know how to do the timer on my camera.

They were great sports about the bandannas. Fadzidah and Che wore them in the traditional Malay style.

They were such an interested and interesting group. I would like to sit down and have hours to "interview" them individually. And fun too! I had made some brownies and Randal and I had loaded up on ice cream grocery shopping after lunch, so we had snacks after the tour. Always snacks!

Sibyl and Emilda had gone out on the bow to do "Titanic" poses. Emilda especially was hoping "Captain Jack" Depp would show up rather than Leonardo DiCaprio.

When we said good night, I felt as if we had all known each other for much longer than one short visit. They wanted to know us and we wanted to know them. Hopefully our paths will cross again.

Hopefully I haven't made too many errors in telling this story. If I had, I do hope someone sends me corrections!

K K with Valerie

2008-07-31T17:30:00.006+08:00

July 31, 2008
5:30 pm

Hi Everyone,

About 5 boats down from us is a sail boat. Brits, Stephen and Valerie are the owners. I don't know the boat's name or their last name. But I like Stephen and Valerie very much and their boat is quite nice too. They lived 5 years in Hong Kong, some of it in Sai Kung and they kept a boat in Hebe Haven where we stayed. Stephen is retired. Valerie works in an elementary school with children aged 7 to 11. When teachers need help or will be away from the classroom Valerie takes over. She works part time and loves it; especially teaching art and physical education. Valerie doesn't love cruising so much so Stephen recruits crew and goes off and Valerie joins him during summer and other school vacations.

Valerie and I went off one afternoon to the wet market and the next morning to the different local museums.

Valerie in the white hat buying a pineapple. Just after this photo we each went our separate ways and then spent most of the time trying to find each other again. We each tried staying put and then decided the other was doing the same thing. Her comment that the vendors were probably as anxious for us to find each other as we were to find each other was quite funny. I guess it was pretty obvious that the two of us were looking for each other.

Local fashion statements.

Islam is the state religion though other than the clothing women wear, and the price of beer and wine, you don't really feel its influence as a tourist especially here at the marina/ hotel complex where most of the guests are Asian.

I bought mangoes and lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber , avocado and cilantro.

The next morning Valerie and I went off to the local museums. They had exhibits, but no tours or explanatory literature, so it was too hard to take much in. The part we liked the most was the Sabah Museum Heritage Village which has replicas of traditional homes of different indigenous groups around Sabah. Again, there was little literature and no one there to tell you anything, so not so educational. http://www.mzm.sabah.gov.my/intro.htm is the website for the museum complex.

One day I'll have a photo of Valerie from the front. She was in pink and white and the lady in the distance was in pink and white and the water lilies were pink and white.

This "ethnic village" looks much like some of the villages that we saw cruising the islands in the Philippines and the small islands in Malaysia.

Inside one hut. I kept waiting to fall through the floor.

The big sign says no smoking. The small one in small print says, remove your shoes. I had spent so much time looking for a "do not enter" sign that I missed the one that said it was ok if you took off your shoes. But I only went into one and no one saw me but Valerie and she was quite diplomatic about it. I told her about going into a hut and she said she hadn't wanted to remove her shoes. I said, "huh?" It needed to be in big letters like the No Smoking sign you can't miss. I guess matches are far worse than shoes with grass huts.

While we were there they were filming some costumed dancers. We could have waited and taken photos with them, but it was too hot and we had more museum to see.

It was lovely and fluid. Music was provided by a cd and boombox.

We also went to The Sabah Islamic Civilization Museum since all of the museums are together. Again too much stuff and no overall explanation or introduction. But now I know the difference between Muslims who follow Islam and Hindus who don't. I guess if I had really thought about it, but since I hadn't, Valerie explained that to me. Helps to go around with an elementary school teacher. Helps to have a public library which there isn't. I would imagine as we travel around Malaysia and Indonesia I'll learn more about Muslims and the Islamic religion. It will be interesting. Valerie has been to Indonesia and found it hard to watch women appear to have much less freedom than men. We'll see come September when we start to tour Indonesia.

Got back to the boat about 2:30 and made myself a mango/avocado/strawberry yogurt shake. Tasted healthy and not bad, but the yogurt made it too tart and the mango wasn't quite ripe. But it was ok.

Kota Kinabalu

2008-07-28T19:00:00.004+08:00

July 28: 7pm

Sutera Harbor Marina, Kota Kinabalu

Hi Everyone,

I seem to be confusing everyone with my "catch up emails" from our passage and anchorages from Puerto Galera, to Kota Kinabalu so I will introduce everything by where we are when I am typing. I still want to show some photos of Romblon Island and the marble works there and also our stops at Coron. Our Subic Bay friend Audrey is building a web page for us and I might just wait and put them in a photo section that you can just browse. The web page won't be ready for a bit, but when it is I will let you know. There will be maps too so it will be easier for you to follow us. Audrey and Bob do this for work along with lots of other things. They are giving us a very "kind" contract made time while they were here figuring out what we would like. I can't wait to see it. Darlene at the Roanoke County Public Library has done a heroic job of posting my journal and photos. But Randal and I want a permanent site that will always be ours. And one day Darlene might just run away to the South Seas herself so we think owning our own site might be best for us. And with so much going on at the Roanoke County Public Library, she and Marino the computer guy just have way too much to do as it is. I'll keep you posted. In the meantime http://www.doramac.blogspot.com/ looks great.

This photo is the small swimming beach created by the Magellan Sutera Hotel in the complex with the marina. Looks lovely doesn't it.

However, the reality are the slippery rocks, jelly fish, sharp coral and long spined sea urchins. I look like I'm holding on to the Caution C. They didn't mention the fairly large waves too. No one was in the water here or at the Pacific Sutera hotel beach either. There are lots of huge beautiful swimming pools and I might just have to see if I can swim the length of the Olympic pool they have here.

Randal's favorite restaurant. It is on a corner just across the road from the wet market. For 9 ringgits Randal and I can each order 2 items plus a ton of rice, and a drink; that's $3. And not only is the food cheap, it's good too and the staff helpful and courteous. They bring us extra small bowls of soup and different condiments to try. My favorite is the chicken noodle soup. Randal gets the fried chicken you can see piled in front. It is an Indian restaurant; not sure if it is Muslim or Hindu, though I don't think there are any pork dishes. None of the menu is written in anything I recognize.

Randal walking down the street towards the Indonesian Consulate where we went to pick up our passports and papers for the Indonesia Rally. Notice his long pants. Shorts aren't allowed in the Indonesia consulate though he did wear them the first day we went. He had his pants in his backpack; but the gate guard let it slide for that one time. We are much more comfortable in shorts especially in the heat and haven't worn long anything for years. (Except when I was home in the winter.)

We actually just went through the gate and into a long waiting area with some service windows. We never actually went into the building. The lady at the service window was really friendly and helpful, smiling and just being nice. People around the world we have met seem to have positive reactions to our being Americans. And most of the time we respect their customs and feelings ( Randal did wear pants the second visit.)

We will join the Indonesia Rally the first week in September. Between then and now we need to finish boat work and get ourselves 1000+ miles. We may do several overnight passages to save time and because some places don't have great anchorages so it's actually easier to just go all night with not much to run into in the middle of the ocean. We came the 4 days from Hong Kong to Subic without stopping. There were 5 of us on the boat, so more to do watch. Randal and I will have to do it alone but that's ok.

Go Sox!!! Good baseball day.

Women in saris

2008-07-25T17:13:00.003+08:00

July 25th Friday: 5:13 pm

I went out for a walk this afternoon. I seem to have a case of the blahs and am just tired. "Could be the heat, or maybe it's fleas!" as the song in West Side Story sang. Well I don't have fleas, but I'm finding the heat very heavy especially after our island cruising where, on some mornings, I wore my long-sleeve Red Sox shirt. And life in a big city is "big." I will try to get to the museums and mosque and those things should be interesting. People are certainly very friendly here and quite energetic, more like China than Olongapo. Funny, that I'm always ready to leave somewhere, and then miss it. Hmmm

Anyway, I just walked around the hotels here in the Sutera Harbor complex; but I took my camera. I was really glad I did so I could capture this group of young women. I don't know why I didn't talk with them more; I felt like I was interrupting and they seemed hesitant in English. Now I wish I had found out more about them. Maybe I will see them again.

See Women in Saris pictures

Puerto Galera adventure last morning

2008-07-24T01:13:00.002+08:00

Carol didn't stay on DoraMac with us, too rolling for her since we were anchored out. All of those bancas going by made lots of waves. She stayed at the hotel just up the hill from the PG Yacht Club. The Moorings was developing more facilities that would include space for conferences and more upscale demand. Carol had asked if they would provide a tour and brunch for us Monday morning before she would leave. They had agreed. So after an early morning swim off the back of DoraMac, we all took the service boat back to The Moorings.

See the pictures of our last morning with Carol.

As you can tell all of our adventures with Carol have been wonderful. Saying good-bye was very hard..........But someday..........

So ends our Puerto Galera adventure with Carol Carino.

Puerto Galera continued; White Beach

2008-07-23T15:10:00.001+08:00

July 23, 2008 3:10 pm Wednesday

Randal and I had been to White Beach but Carol hadn't so off we went after our visit to Ponderosa. Plus we'd had a tip that the best Halo Halos were to be had at White Beach and where to find them. That alone would have been enough for Carol and me. And I have lots of photos of Carol eating her halo halo and there are lots of me eating mine. None of them were the least bit flattering since one had to really open wide to get that stuff in. So no photos of us chowing down the halo halo. But, unfortunately I didn't take many other photos.

See the pictures here.

Puerto Galera adventure/ Ponderosa Golf Club

2008-07-23T15:00:00.003+08:00

July 23 3 pm Wednesday

Randal is off giving a boat tour to some New Zealanders so I get the computer for a bit! So to continue with the Puerto Galera adventure.....

After Tamaraw Falls, we went on to Ponderosa Golf Club with a stop first to pick up our new dinghy anchor. Randal had supplied the materials for the shop to use and they made a wonderful little anchor. The labor cost $8. ... See our pictures here.

Our next stop, and last of day 2 was White Beach.

Kota Kinabalu

2008-07-21T12:44:00.002+08:00

July 21 12:44pm
Hi Everyone,
"I loved the diversity of the city and the huge wet market." That's how our friend Jamie Fritsch described the center of Kota Kinabalu. It's true. You feel like you are in China and India at the same time. The women in their saris are just so colorful. I'll try to get some photos of them. But here are just a few photos to get you oriented to Kota Kinabalu. We have lots of boat work to do and the best "natural attractions" are inland, so I think we might miss them. The mall has Starbucks and Body Shop but the upscale shops of Hong Kong or Makati. Our friends Bob and Audrey, from Subic Bay, are here for a too short long weekend. They went off with Randal to do boat stuff today. I just don't feel great enough. So I'm having a quiet day catching up on some email and watching the Sox lose their 3rd game to LA.

We will probably be here for another 2 weeks. Of course that's what we said about Subic. But we have to be done to make it to Indonesia to meet the Indonesia Rally in the beginning of September. Randal and Bob were looking at possible routes this morning. Bob and Audrey have their own growing business in Subic so just hanging out here is a relaxing vacation for them.

http://www.sabahtourism.com/en/home/ is a site for Sabah which is the specific area of East Malaysia where we are now. Malaysia is two islands in the South China Sea. East Malaysia is on the north tip of Borneo.

See my pictures

Just checking in

2008-07-20T19:30:00.000+08:00

July 20, 7:30 am
Hi Everyone,
Just a quick check-in. Our friends from Subic Bay, Bob and Audrey are here this weekend. Since we haven't had tome to explore yet, not sure what we will do. I have my "once a year" cold and don't feel like doing much at all. We'll see. I will try to catch up on my picture emails when I feel a bit better next week.
Thanks for the emails I am getting from you. It's great to catch up with folks at home.
Time for breakfast.
Ru

Google Earth

2008-07-17T20:42:00.002+08:00

For those who follow us on Google Earth

From Randal:

Check out our nice marina. Kota Kinabalu has all the makings of a very nice city. 5'57'59.88N and 116'03'23.76E. Replace that first ' with a degree symbol.

My laptop failed and yesterday I followed a lead to a computer service store. The technician looked at it and said we only work on Acer but let me see what it's doing. He turned it on and spent 30 minutes checking it out before making a call to a friend and sending me to him with cell number, name and address written down. There was a customer there that overheard our conversation and told me to wait a few minutes and he would give me a ride. He took me directly to the location, parked his vehicle, and led me to the shop on the third floor.

That technician started working on the computer right away and spent the next two hours testing the hard drive and other components before telling me the cable between the hard drive and motherboard had failed and since it was a custom computer, would be very difficult to replace. At the end, even after all his work, he didn't want to take any money. After I told him that I insisted on paying, he made a bill for 10 ringits. I gave him 50 or about $16.57 USD.

I like it here but we have to be in Indonesia soon and will have to leave as soon as all the repairs and maintenance are done.

Randal

Tamaraw Falls Puerto Galera Adventure Continued

2008-07-16T15:00:00.005+08:00

July 16th Wednesday, 3 pm

Hi Everyone,

I hope to email this some time today or tomorrow morning. Just depends when it actually gets finished. Randal's computer is still out of commission so we share, 75/25 because he does lots of boat work on the computer. He is off doing boat chores at a super marine hardware store. We have a very thorough boat cleaner here so I am supposedly supervising. We chat, I type, we have a cold drink and chat, I email some more and check on the All-Star game, Go J.D. Drew!! Sox, keep it up!

I'm back tracking to our Puerto Galera adventure with Carol.

Tamaraw Falls (Tam' a raw the raw at the end rhymes with cow)

The very first page of our Philippine Rough Guide is the title page. The backside of that page is a full page photo of Tamaraw Falls. “The mother of all cascades here is the mighty Tamara Falls, 30 minutes by jeepney outside Puerto Galera and not far off the road to Calapan. Here cool mountain water plummets over a precipice and into a natural pool and a man made swimming pool.”

See Carol's pictures

My 3 favorite things about Tamaraw Falls:

1. Watching Carol climb everywhere all over the falls to take photos of Randal and me.

2. Tamaraw Falls is named for the small, native and endangered water buffalo.

3. I finally had my photo taken on a water buffalo!

I never said they were real! It was a lovely spot. If we hadn't had other fun things planned we would have gotten into the water ourselves. There is a natural pool and a man made pool. But after several photos we climbed back up to the road, got back into the car and continued onto our journey. We had 2 more stops: Ponderosa Golf Resort and White Beach!

Tara Island

2008-07-14T19:30:00.000+08:00

July 14th: 7:30pm Kota Kinabalu

Hi Everyone,

We stopped at Tara Island shortly after we had left Romblon. It was one of my favorites. It inspired me to paint! I hav to admit that most of our stops are running together in my mind. they were all pretty similar to me so I am sure they are impossible for you to distinguish. But the images are pretty so I am sending some photos. I am sending the emails I can do quickly. the remainder of the Puerto Galera Adventure, romblon, Illultuk Bay: Safari Park, Coron Town and Puerto Princessa were multi-day stops so it will take me longer to write about them. In the meantime, more island photos.

In the meantime, more island photos.

Island Cruising

2008-07-14T11:00:00.001+08:00

July 14th 11 am

Hi Everyone,

I might have fixed my Outlook, so this is from me. It will take a bit to catch up and finish our Puerto Galera adventures with Carol. But here are a few photos of our stops along the way between Illultuk Bay where we waited out Typhoon Frank and Kota Kinabalu. I still want to send photos of Romblon and Puerto Princessa because we spent longer than an evening in both places and liked both. I will also do a separate post about Illultuk Bay and all of its stories. If you want to know what the area around the Sutera Marina, Golf and Country Club looks like, picture West Palm Beach. That's what Carol suggested from the photos of the marina she saw on the web. Much different from the small islands with just fishing huts. But I really enjoyed our time at those beautiful spots; so cool, quiet and remote. http://www.suteraharbourclub.com/ is the marina's web site.

So here are some random photos of our island anchorages.

Hello from Kota Kinabalu

2008-07-13T14:17:00.002+08:00

Hi Everyone,

July 13, Sunday 2:17 pm

Randal and I arrived in KK yesterday afternoon about 3:30pm. Our last 4 or 5 days of cruising have been pretty rolling and our speed averaged maybe 5.2 knots. 55 mile days took almost 10 hours! Even though you mostly sit, it's tiring especially when we are underway just past 6 am each day to get to our anchorages in enough light to see if there are any reefs we need to avoid. Some anchorages were nearly as rolling as the trip itself and some were perfect, with no one there but us. Randal could shower on the swim platform and not embarrass himself or anyone else. That was Teluk Lung where we put the dingy down and explored and snorkeled and had a wonderful dinner of salmon patties and fried potatoes!

Now we are Kota Kinabalu where you can't hang your laundry out to dry on the boat and there are pages of rules about everything. It is lovely and means to stay that way, hence the rules. Everyone is friendly and helpful. A kind Irishman named Brian led Randal and me to the free shuttle bus and then showed us the local mall. We were there yesterday to get money and today after we made the required visit to immigration. Immigration was very helpful and informal.

Now back at the boat, Randal's computer seems to have crashed and the main saloon AC won't work. Our other electronics, bow thruster, anchor light and flood lights seem to be on the fritz. Just part of cruising apparently.

The wifi here is free but seems slow at times. I will try to do photos when I can. Who could believe I would miss the Subic Bay wifi??!!!

Today we took a taxi from the yacht club to Immigration. Our driver going out was an elderly Chinese man. Our driver coming back was an elderly Muslim man. That apparently is KK. And both drove on the left side of the street with the steering wheel on the right side of the car.

So we have gone from anchorages where we were the only noise and light for miles to being in an upscale, modern, city.

Oh, and thank goodness the Sox are doing well. Last I knew they were 4 games out! Go Sox!!

Anchored at Sir James Brooke's Pt.

2008-07-08T15:25:00.002+08:00

3:25 pm Tuesday July 8th

I forgot to attach all of your names so only sent yesterday's email to myself! Now we are anchored off Usula and if it would just quit rolling from side to side on the boat, it would be a real treat. We have had side rolling for several days now and all through last night's anchorage. It took us forever to get here averaging about 4.9 knots because of wind and waves hitting us on the port bow and prot beam. We were just too worn down to get out the dinghy down for a beach trip. It's pretty here, but not irresistible. I might try to capture the water's colors with paint. Picture fake Kodak color and that's what it's really like here. And you can see 40 feet down into the water. We saw some fish swim by and a Philippine eagle fly up to its tree rest on the island. It is a very round little island covered with trees and a beach running around its perimeter. You could probably walk around it in an afternoon. Another trip. Anyway, the deep water is darker blue then aqua then green. It actually just depends on how the sun hits it what you see and how far into it you see. Last night the bottom was mud rather than coral. The sky was overcast. It was about 3:30pm and I couldn't see many links of the anchor chain.

We did have to work our way through two squalls during the day. You can see them coming from a great distance. I now know what Robin Reed the weather forecaster for WDBJ 7 meant when he mentioned the leading edge of a storm. They have edges and sides and you can see where they start and end.

There are several bancas here. Guess they are out fishing.

Time for me to send these 2 emails and then check on the Red Sox. Our friend Carol texts me the scores every day. She is a Yankee fan coming from NYC. But she feels bad for me when the Sox lose. Which they have been doing. Scarier than the side waves we have been getting! Go Sox!

Hard to believe that our new computer cell phone works here but it does!

Puerto Princessa

2008-07-04T19:00:00.000+08:00

Hi Everyone,

Happy July 4th!

7pm Puerto Princessa

At the Abinaco Yacht Club here in Puerto Princessa we have met some very interesting and helpful people. Cissy and John who run the yacht club are very helpful, practical, and charming. John can speak on any topic and in several languages. Cissy can accomplish anything you might need. The club is bamboo and cloth shades and rope and boat artifacts and looks exactly as it should. Very Masterpiece Theater set in the tropics pre WW2. Of course the tv has CNN which generated a Brit complaining that it wasn't BBC. But mostly it looks like old world with the charm of far away. Puerto Princessa itself is another story with its cell phone shops, large supermarket, and roads filled with cars. It is larger than Subic Bay, but more Olongapo than Manila.

Thanks to Toni and Darren, a New Zealand cruising couple, we now have a cell phone that connects to the computer for internet. They told us where to get them and helped install the software needed to configure the computer. It would have taken us longer than the "forever" it took them to install it. Someone had helped them a bit previously. So far it can't seem to do photos so those will have to wait for Kota Kinabalu several days away. But I can seem to catch up a bit reading email and checking on the Sox. We will have to change some of the configurations when we get to Malaysia and need new sim cards for the new phone. It plugs into the USB port and costs 10 pes0 for 30 minutes. Pretty cheap.

We will probably be here one more day (weather is forcing us.) The names and coordinates of our anchorages are on the chart plotter and not in front of me so I will have to send that next email.

I will also see if mornings are better for email. If so maybe just one photo of our lovely anchorages whose names are all running together in my head.

Hello from Puerto Princessa

2008-07-04T07:15:00.002+08:00

Hi Everyone,

Happy 4th of July. 7:15 am

We are anchored at Puerto Princessa midway down the east side of Palawan Island. We have officially checked out of the Philippines and will be on our way to Kota Kinabalu in Malayasia. It will take several cruising days and anchorages. We have learned much about anchorages and anchoring and pearl farming! We had to zig zag our way through hundreds and hundreds of rows of pearl farms on our way through the Dumaran Strait. Long story that will be easier to understand when I can ever send photos.

The Yacht Club here is very small and very friendly. Met two other cruising couples who have just come from Indonesia where we are heading. They gave us helpful information.

Today we will finish gathering supplies and are hoping to purchase cell phones that will allow us to use them with our computers to have wifi in Malaysia and Indonesia. That would be great. Apparently loading the program onto the computer is a nightmare. We'll see.

We stopped at several anchorages on our way to PP; places that no one goes other then the yachtie we just met. Just us, a few fishermen in bancas, some small huts on shore and all the stars in the universe. Except for Orion's Belt that can't be seen in this latitude. At least I can't find it. It would be over our house in Roanoke some point every night.

Puerto Princessa has about 120,000 people! There are coffee shops, book stores, a large supermarket with no recognizable cookies. Very big, but our trike driver takes us where we need to go. Very helpful too.

Actually my only concern is for my Red Sox. Carol keeps me posted daily and perhaps getting Sox scores from a New Yorker is not so good. But no gloating from her; the Yanks are doing worse. One day she followed the Sox and the Rays for me so I would really know what was happening. Not sure what we will do without our daily text chats! We will have phones again; new sim cards in Malayasia will mean a new phone number. Technology is great!

So that's it. Hope I can send this if I am still connected.

From Puerto Princessa

Ruth Johnson on DoraMac

Coron

2008-06-27T17:49:00.000+08:00

Hi Everyone,

5:49 pm Thursday June 27

We were safe and snug in Illultuk Bay, Calauit Island Busuanga. Only problem was that we ran out of fruit and veggies but had plenty of everything else. I made bread and brownies! Our last two nights we had dinner with Carol and Brian who are cruisers from New Zealand. They had fruit and veggies so we contributed the meat and wine and brownies. They came Monday and we all toured the Safari Park together. It was great company and we had fed some animals. When we get to somewhere that has wifi and we have lots of time, maybe I can send some photos finally.

We will spend tomorrow in Coron.11' 59" 751 N 120' 11" 899 E are the coordinates.

For everyone who worried, sorry! Our friend Carol who lives in Manila had us covered!

Typhoon

2008-06-23T20:39:00.001+08:00

Hi Everyone,

You all have had way more news about the typhoon than we did. Our info just shows wind and waves for our location and in the area we will travel when the seas again are calm and we leave here. We are in Busuanga Province / Calauit Island / Illultuk town. We are in a very protected cove and there are enough friendly banca folks going by that if we really needed contact with people they would try to help. As it is, we have plenty of food, water, electricity and enough old Red Sox DVD's from the "04" and "07" playoffs and world series to last 'til October! I do miss being able to check on them. Carol was texting me scores and Harriet now keeps me posted. Our friend Carol is keeping a close eye on us. Randal and I have no doubt she would rescue us in a New York minute if we needed it.

As it is, we are having a lovely time. I am painting and reading; baking bread, doing laundry and cleaning and enjoying the quiet away from karaoke and the PG banca ferry traffic. If we just had some fresh fruit and veggies I'd be happy as a clam. Because of the wind generated from typhoon weather we have a nice breeze and are comfortably cool for the first time in almost two years! I had on a long sleeved shirt yesterday. We probably have another 3 or 4 days as the seas calm. That will give us time to see the Safari Park game reserve here and explore the bay and check out the entrance reef too. It is why we came after all.

Sorry if we made you all worry. There is no cell phone tower and no WIFI. This very slow radio wave email with no web surfing possible may be more typical than my being able to be online on a regular basis. Just go by the old adage, "no news is good news." I do have lots of photos and stories to share and am exploring with our friend Audrey to set up a real web page. So that's it. We really are in a lovely protected spot.

Safe and Sound

2008-06-23T20:35:00.001+08:00

Hi Everyone,

Randal and I are safe, dry, and waiting out the bad weather in Illutuk Bay, Calauit Island, Busuanga. This is a very protected cove and one of the best typhoon anchorages in the Philippines. We are not in the direct path of the typhoon but are getting strong winds and rain. The seas outside the bay have to calm before we will leave so we may be here another week. There is not a cell phone tower with SMART, (our phone service) so we can just communicate with a very slow email which is transmitted through Brunei. Email goes through our single sideband radio which bounces off the atmosphere. Sun spots can block it and radio traffic can make it very slow. We are about 500 ft from shore where there are some small native homes. There are other similar homes dotted around the bay as well so we aren't marooned out here alone. Small bancas go by and we wave and they wave. There is a wildlife preserve here and as soon as the weather is good enough we will go for a tour. While on Romblon Island we met a Brit, Tony Parkinson who helped establish the preserve when Marcos was president of the Philippines. It was originally a way to save threatened species. Tony is a very interesting man who can tell you about David Attenborough, Joy Adamson, Diane Fossey because he knew them. While on Romblon our guide took us to meet Tony and see the spectacular view from his home.

Our new, huge, wonderful anchor is doing a super job and we are making a giant doodle on the chart plotter as it captures the boat's swings around on it. If I ever get to have wifi again, I'll try to send a photo.

We are surrounded by the preserve lands and small mountains (blocking the wind) and, other than the wind, it is very quite. Randal and I have watched the last game of the 04 and 07 World Series that I have on DVD. We run the genset to generate power but use it sparingly though I have done laundry and will bake bread this morning. If we just had some fresh fruit and veggies it would be just grand!

This is definitely a lesson in weather. You do what it says! The sun is coming out!!!

Ru

Paradise Islands

2008-06-19T18:31:00.002+08:00

From Randal:

We had an uneventful passage today of 46 NM that took eight hours and thirty minutes. Some of that time was searching for the perfect anchorage at our destination. We chose a place in 55' of water between a peaceful little fishing village and an island that protects us from any ocean swells. The village has about 12 huts, some with the roofs coming apart. I can only assume the habitants died or moved and now their home is in shambles. These huts are framed up with bamboo. The floor is several feet off the ground and they all have grass roofs. There are chickens and children running around in equal number. The chickens crow and the children laugh and play.

Earlier I saw about six older children walking up the beach in defiance of their surrounding just like teenagers anywhere around the world. There was a dog carrying something in it's mouth but I could not tell what it was. There are young women washing clothes in buckets and at least one man boarded his banca and rowed out to the island to hunt for something on the beach at low tide. I saw him when he went back ashore and if he was carrying anything it could be concealed in his hands.

After anchoring Ruth went for a swim behind the boat and said she could see the bottom even though we are in 55'. Didn't take her long to get her fill and she came back aboard, showered, and warmed us some veggie soup. We hadn't had much for lunch and now that the passage was over, were both hungry.

If I didn't mention it, this is paradise. The temperature outside the boat seems cool compared to the temperature inside the boat. The engine room, which is centrally located under the pilothouse, gets to 120 degrees F during a passage and keeps the boat very warm all night. Of course in the early morning it starts to become comfortable but then we start the engine and do it all over again. That is why staying for several days in one location is so attractive. The second night and there after is very pleasant.

We had to force ourselves to leave Romblon.

From Ru:

We did go from Romblon to Looc Bay on Tablas, to Ilin Island and now we are here on Tara Island, population very tiny and remote. But NO KARAOKE!!!! We will be at the Safari Park tomorrow. Not sure when we will have wifi again. For Thursday evening (Philippines time), we've anchored somewhere off Tara Island, somewhere about 4 miles from these coordinates 12 15.193' N, 120 26.450' E. Google Earth doesn't seem to mark where Tara Island is. At 7PM, we're ready to sleep, it is real dark and quiet. In the past, sometimes where we have docked, there's lots of noise from Karaoke singing. So, quiet is good.

Hello from Romblon

2008-06-15T07:50:00.001+08:00

We are on Romblon Island and in Romblon town. Romblon is known for its marble and we will go on a tour this morning to see some of the quarry/factories. Romblon hasn't become a tourist destination yet and it's very nice and the biggest place we have been since Subic. Weather has been lovely. We were invaded by young children Sunday morning just as we were in China. They stayed for cookies, Mountain Dew and to get flag bandanas. Sweet cute polite kids. In the afternoon boat friends Chris and Mylin drove us up to their lovely mountain home overlooking the bay and their sailboat. On our first day out from Puerto Galera we saw wonderful magical dolphins, me for the first time.
Got to go. Not sure when I can email again.
Ru

Coco Beach Island Resort

2008-06-12T20:05:00.003+08:00

June 10, 2008

We left Sabang and took the one road that really leads anywhere; the ridge road back to Puerto Galera from Sabang. Many people take bancas to get between places along the coast and “driving” to Coco Beach we found out why. We turned off the ridge into the woods onto a bumpy dirt road. We stopped at a sign nailed onto a palm tree indicating Coco Beach was down a dirt path into the woods. Dante parked our red minitruck and we all got out. With Dante as our leader we started down the path into the woods towards Coco Beach.

See my pictures;

Leaving Puerto Galera

2008-06-11T21:28:00.000+08:00

Hi Everyone,

Looks like we will be leaving Puerto Galera early tomorrow morning and heading to Marinduque , Romblon, Santa Fe, Mangarin Bay and onwards. Not sure when I will email again. I will text our friend Carol and ask her to email my sister Harriet who can let you know we are moving along. We will also try out our sailmail if we can’t find any wifi and we really need to email. I am way behind on writing up our Puerto Galera adventure and hope to do some today.

I will send out an email when we can receive email again. We will check one more time this evening, but after that it might be a bit.

Randal checked the weather and it predicts calm seas with tiny waves for the area we will cruise. Last November when we were here with Nick and Zaida we had bumpy seas back and forth from Marinduque to Puerto Galera so had to layover in Marinduque and skip our trip to Romblon. There were little stingy things in the water in Marinduque so we couldn’t even swim. Now with our new wetsuits, that won’t be a problem though I think we won’t have time in Marinduque since it is just an overnight anchorage between here and Romblon for us. Romblon is known for its marble work so that should be interesting.

SCUBA on our own

2008-06-11T20:52:00.003+08:00

Hi All,

Our equipment test went fine. We did a different kind of dive today, no tests, just float along with the underwater current. The tricky part was to follow our leader Jamie and not bang into any of the coral formations. But Jamie was a good leader and I trusted him. He had a job watching both Randal and me since we are still learning to stay at a specific level. Everyone is supposed to just follow the leader but he kept having to come back to get Randal or me to make sure where we were. I hadn't cleaned my mask's original film off well enough so my visibility wasn't as good as it could have been. The current was moving us fast enough that you couldn't really look long enough at anything so that was a bit disappointing. But all the gear worked well. After that we had to pack up all of the gear and get it back to DoraMac. Randal hired a small banca. There are no roads through Sabang so no way, by vehicle, to get the gear back to the one road out of town. The banca man, not much bigger than I am, carried most of the stuff onto the boat. Then he carried Randal piggyback onto the boat so Randal wouldn't have to walk through the water in his socks and sandals. There was a ladder from the boat into the shallow water and he carried Randal to the point where he could step onto the ladder without walking through the water. It almost worked and looked very funny.

We started off back to DoraMac. Our first stop was at Coco Beach Resort to donate some of our "already read" books. We had met a very interesting Dutch man who has helped develop the resort's coconut product line so that local families can earn a living making and packaging the products. I'll write more about him when I continue the story of our adventures with Carol. Then we continued to DoraMac with one short stop for fuel to put into the banca's small engine. When we got to DoraMac I was even more impressed with our banca driver who perfectly maneuvered his banca to the foot of our swim platform. He again carried most of the gear off his banca onto our boat. Randal paid him 300 pesos, 50 more than the 250 we had agreed on. It was totally worth it. (About $7.00)

As soon as we had gotten some of the gear settled, Randal put his back on and went under DoraMac to clean the prop. It took about 20 minutes since most of the gunk had been scrapped off in Subic. It was a bit disconcerting to have Randal down under the boat alone but I could see his bubble floating up to the surface. We had tied a line under the boat near the prop so he could pull himself to the surface if need be. But we had learned the basics and he was fine. And even though we had never learned to dive under objects which does take more training, the boat is not a large area, so okay.

Hanging to dry behind the cockpit.

Two tanks to use and 2 for spares

Now we just have to find someplace to store it all. That might be harder than the underwater mask removal!

hello

2008-06-10T17:09:00.000+08:00

Hi Everyone,

I am sending this myself from the Rock nRoll Cafe. Tomorrow Randal and I go on a real dive and we'll use our own equipment to test it out. No tasks to practice, just follow the dive leader and look at fish.

Today was frst day of school here. It was so cute. Kids looked so full of promise. Sad since there is not so much opportunity. They had uniforms and funky backpacks. The big ones held the hand of the little ones and everyone looked happy! It was the end of the school day; so maybe that was why all the smiles.

Will work on sending more photos of our adventures with Carol.

Go Sox! Go Celtics!

Puerto Galera Tour

2008-06-09T21:17:00.000+08:00

Puerto Galera with Carol # 1

Randal is in the galley making us our first pineapple shake. I just tried it and you can almost imagine rum in it: it tastes just like one of those wonderful bar drinks with the little umbrella and cherries hanging from it. Yum! One day I’ll be brave enough to make us avocado shakes.

We just had the best weekend visit with our friend Carol Carino. She came to visit and she took us on a tour of Puerto Galera! We visited Escarceo Point Lighthouse, Coco Beach Resort, Tamaraw Falls, Calapan, Ponderosa Golf Course, White Beach and had a special breakfast and tour of The Moorings, a hotel and resort just up the hill from the Puerto Galera Yacht Club. Carol had stayed with us in Subic Bay when we were tied to the pier, but was afraid that the boat motion here would make her seasick. So she stayed at The Moorings and asked them to provide her with a car and driver. The “car” was a converted mini pickup truck with two benches set up in back. It was bright red inside and out, cute and actually quite comfortable. And we covered some really bumpy, hilly terrain. Between us, Carol and I took hundreds of photos. My favorite is the one where I made friends with a water buffalo! Carol took lots of photos of that and some video too. The pictures from the top of the old Escarceo Point Lighthouse are neat too. And then there are the ones from the VM restaurant in White Beach where Carol and I had really great Halo Halos. We saw beautiful scenery, ate too much food, and had an altogether wonderful time that was way too short.

Carol came Saturday late morning. Her driver, Michael, took her from Makati to Batangas where she caught a morning banca ferry to Puerto Galera.

After she checked into The Moorings and got settled she had her driver take her to Muelle Pier. Earlier in the morning Randal had gone to Sabang to pay for our Scuba outfits and was on the pier in the Rock N’Roll Café at the computer. He stayed there, but Carol took the service boat to DoraMac to bring us some vitamins. She had been kind enough to bring us a gift of Caltrate for me and Cardio vitamins for both of us. Carol wants us to stay healthy! About 11 she and I took the service boat back to the pier and we made our plan for the day. In trying to plan for Carol’s visit I had read about the Escarceo Lighthouse just outside of Sabang. Amazingly in our prior trips I hadn’t walked there. It is slightly uphill and about a mile out of Sabang the opposite direction from Puerto Galera. Carol’s driver Dante knew the area and took us there on our way to lunch in Sabang. The landscape and 360 view was lovely.

See my pictures;

Then it was back to Sabang and lunch at Portofino.

After lunch we went off on another adventure, to Coco Beach Island Resort. Coco Beach is between Sabang and Puerto Galera so was on our way home. It was supposed to be a nice place to swim so we thought we would check it out for another day. It was much more interesting than a simple resort. More like a socially responsible resort that was trying to maintain the environment and offering good work to local families. I’ll tell you about it next email.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

hello

2008-06-07T20:38:00.002+08:00

Hi everyone,

I'm using the rock n roll bar computer. Letters are worn from some of the keys so ignore spellng. I can stll receve emal normally at my regular address. I have asked my sister to forward the group emails because of an a problem with part of my email from Outlook Express, not web Yahoo. Complcated to explain. Bottom lne is I can receve emal. (I key doesn't work well.)

Our friend Carol Carino is here vsiting and we are doing site seeing for a few days so I wll have some interesting stuff to share next week when I have tme. Also, we bought the whole scuba outfit!

Tme to go!

SCUBA

2008-06-05T08:00:00.005+08:00

SCUBA

As of about 2 pm this afternoon, Randal and I are certified Open Water divers. I would like to have opened with something more profound about the beauty of undersea exploration. But the truth is most of the course was a profound struggle for me. The actual swimming around underwater looking at neat stuff was fine. It was everything else that was really hard for me. Hard enough that at one point Simon was making me tell him why I was doing the course, for me or for Randal. Simon was our instructor and the question was asked because I was stumped at a very important part of the training. If I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t go on to complete the course. No way around it.

The course to become an Open Water diver is the first level of Scuba diving. You only are advised to go down to the depth of 60 feet. If you only go down that far, you don’t run into the issues that deeper dives can have, like decompression sickness. You also aren’t trained for high altitude dives or really cold water diving. We are certified as beginner divers who can do recreational dives to see fish, coral reefs, and what is hanging onto our propeller or anchor. Those were our goals. Simple. Reaching them, not so simple.

Of the two of us, I’m the one who really likes being in the water. If there is a chance to swim, I’ll go in. I grew up by the ocean. Randal grew up in the mountains and can swim, but it isn’t just great fun for him. But, of the two of us, he had the easier time learning the basics of SCUBA. The tanks, regulators (breathing apparatus,) underwater compass all made sense to him almost instantly. I still need to be told lots of the steps to hook up the equipment and take it apart. By the 4^th day I was better than the first, but not competent, not yet. I even managed to put my leg through the arm of the wet suit preparing for dive 3. And our 4^th day, I put the suit on backwards, at least as far as I could before Randal pointed out what I had done. That wasn’t so bad to undo. But getting my leg out of the sleeve was a real task. These suits fit snug as it is, so the sleeve was way tighter than the leg. I can laugh now. Then I was hot and stuck! Simon was kind enough to say he had seen it all before. He also said some folks had quit the course when asked for whom they were doing it. Simon looks like a British version of Matt Lauer of the Today Show.

Over the 4 day course we had to learn emergency procedures. How to drop off your weight belt with one hand; how to take off and put on your BCD vest underwater (vest that holds the tank and every other piece of equipment and helps you go up, down, or float around.) We had to learn to switch from our main regulator to an alternate regulator, our own and our diving buddy’s. We had to simulate being out of air and take our buddy’s alternate regulator. To teach us what it would feel like to be out of air, Simon turned off our air supply from the tank to the regulator. Randal went first. He did fine. I didn’t even let Simon get half way with turning it off before I made the out of air motion and grabbed for Randal’s alternate air supply. I felt like I was out of air. None of the tasks that got between me and my supply of air were easy for me. And it is air, not oxygen in those tanks. Filled they weigh 20 lbs though felt like 200 to me wearing it and my 12lb weight belt out of the water back to the dive shop.

We did class work, beach work, and a dive each of the first two days. Each dive itself was about 45 minutes. Randal and I got to Action Divers at 9 am in the morning. The first day we ate lunch about 2:30pm. The second day it was 4 o’clock before we ate lunch! Full days. I was totally exhausted at the end of day 2. We also then had to walk the mile from the shop to catch a jeepney from Sabang back to PG. Very tired. Our 3^rd and 4^th dives were several days later. Randal had developed an ear infection. No diving with ear infections. He put in ear drops and took amoxicillin and we were able to resume diving 6 days later. I honestly felt as if the reprieve were over. Our 3rd dive was the watershed for me. It was do the emergency tasks that scared me, or quit. There was no way around it To pass the course you have to be able to deal with water filling your face mask or even losing your face mask. You can’t just pop up to the surface, fix it all and go back down. And you can’t hold your breath while you replace your mask. That actually would make it easier so you don’t accidently breathe in through your nose. You have to keep breathing through your regulator and not breathe in through your nose at the same time. You can NEVER HOLD YOUR BREATH WHILE SCUBA DIVING. The air in your lungs compresses as you go down. It expands as you go up. If you hold your breath and go up, your lungs over expand and cause significant problems. Plus, it might take a bit of time for you or your dive buddy to find your mask. And, you may be down too far to just shoot up, while exhaling, without hurting your ears or causing other problems. EXHALING IS NOT HOLDING YOUR BREATH. And besides all of the safety issues, you don’t want to waste the time or air. Your dive buddy has to stay with you so would have to go up too. Lots of reasons why you have to deal with the mask skill. I struggled and struggled. When our friend Audrey took us for a scuba lesson in Subic, she tried to teach me to clear my mask. It is very helpful for snorkeling too. I couldn’t do it. Even though Audrey is a professional dive instructor, she didn’t push it; we were just there for an introduction to diving, not a real course. With Simon we had to try it during dive day 2, but only to begin to try. I actually didn’t understand how it worked so was doing it wrong. Simon showed me and Randal practiced with me on our boat. I even practiced with my snorkel, putting my face in the water with no mask and breathing through my mouth (snorkel) and not also up my nose. I got one tiny, very tiny bit better. Yesterday, dive day 3, it all came to a head. I couldn’t fill my mask and clear it. Each time I would try I’d get water up my nose or down my throat. I would shoot to the surface and yank off my mask. Simon would have to come up. Randal too. Randal to check on me. Simon to make me go down and try it again. Simon actually let me get away with only half filling my mask. But then we had to take the mask completely off and replace it. At that point my nose and throat still burned and I just wanted to cry. I wanted Simon to say, I could skip it, but I would have to learn on my own. Simon couldn’t do that. He is a professional dive instructor and we were doing this for certification. Randal was able to do it. He tried to help me. Simon told me I could do it. Any time I questioned equipment or anything, Simon said it was just because I was nervous and if I would just relax and do it, it would be fine. (I do think the regulator mouth piece was too big, but I obviously could use it.) Simon bases much of his teaching on the belief that people take the course because they want to dive and will do what it takes to learn, conquer any fear and learn any skill. If one can’t learn a skill, they just don’t want to enough. There is much truth in that. The confrontation came after I had taken off my mask, replaced it, cleared it and then shot to the surface and whipped off my mask. Simon was really frustrated that I could do it, but not stop panicking anyway. “Why are you doing this course? In your heart do you want to dive? Do you want to explore the ocean bottom and see fish and things? Or are you just doing it for Randal?” “If in your heart you want to dive, you’ll conquer your fears.” Simon asked me these questions to make me decide what I wanted to do, keep going, do the skill, and dive? Or did I want to quit? I certainly wanted to quit trying to learn that mask skill. But I knew I wanted to keep going, not just for Randal. But I couldn’t promise Simon that I could take off and replace my mask. I could hardly breathe at that point. I just wanted to cry. That had happened at Outward Bound one time when I was faced with a physical challenge that scared me. I stopped to cry for a bit, got it out of my system, started to breathe normally again and went on. I did the same thing, cried a bit. Put my mask back on, went down and found a way I could do it. It involved holding my nose part of the time. But I got my mask off, back on and cleared and stayed at the bottom. I felt like a kid who had cried about getting a shot and then it really didn’t hurt. I felt both successful and foolish that it had taken me so long with such a struggle. Simon dealt with it. He told me that people have stopped the course at the point when he asks them that question. I really do want to dive to clean our boat bottom, free snagged anchors and even see some neat fish and things. Not just for Randal. We did a dive and practiced other skills like going to the surface when almost out of air so just exhaling and not inhaling at all. That dive was 45 minutes also and then we had to walk forever back to the dive shop through the low tide. I thought my knees would buckle from the weight. When my friend Martha and I walked the Coastal Path in Wales we carried at least twenty pounds, all day for 3 days up and down hills and that didn’t seem so heavy. This partly empty tank weighed a ton. While we were taking apart the equipment and rinsing it in fresh water, Simon told us our 4^th dive would be from a boat and we would learn new skills and do the mask removal again. I wasted time worrying about it all night and all the next morning until I actually did it during the dive and it was fine!

Yesterday was our 4^th and final dive. It was the day I made sure I didn’t put my leg in the sleeve; instead I put the suit on backwards and had to change it around. It is like pulling on a very thick, wet, too small bathing suit that covers you whole body. Trying to pull it up over my hips and butt was a real challenge. We got our tanks ready and I remembered half of the steps, put on our booties and weight belts and, since it was a boat dive, climbed up the ladder into the banca that would take us about 10 minutes out to a cove for our dive. My friend Shelly Shuster said she fell off the ladder getting onto the boat for her 4^th dive. I could see how it happened and almost did the same thing but for the boat person hanging onto me for dear life. You walk up a steep narrow ladder while wearing your weight belt. When we got to our dive spot, we anchored and put on our BCD and mask. Sticking our tank and butts over the side, one at a time we fell a few feet backwards down into the water. Doable, though I think I forgot to pump up my BCD as full as I should have. You keep one hand on your mask and regulator so they stay put and one hand behind your head in case you bang into something. I don’t remember having my hand behind my head, but I know I had my hand on my mask and regulator because they stayed put. Our next task was to learn to use our underwater compass. Randal got an A+, I got a D+ but I have an idea how to do better. Then we did an emergency ascent with Randal breathing from my alternate regulator. That was fine. Then we had to do the mask task. I did it first try with my convoluted nose holding method. I kept my eyes open so I could see what I was doing and that works better for me. You can’t see clearly of course, but well enough to make it less scary. Then we went for a dive to practice buoyancy. You use your inflatable/deflatable vest, weights, and your breath to keep yourself in place and not float away or float to the bottom or surface. Your weights are fixed but you can use your vest or breath. If you start to sink you inhale deeply and inflate your lungs. If you rise too high you exhale a lot more than you breathe in. It does work, though takes lots of practice. We practiced for about 30 minutes of that and then it was time to get back into the boat. I was actually sorry the dive ended, amazing since I had been dreading it earlier in the day.

Back at the dive shop I stayed in my wetsuit so Randal could take a photo. I have kind of a dazed expression and you can see the impression of the mask on my face. There was just too much activity with another boat of divers coming back for me to take a photo totally suited up. We changed and finished our final log entry. Simon filled out our temporary certification and we were done! Certified. Even me! Thanks Simon.

See my pictures here

quick hello

2008-06-04T20:07:00.000+08:00

Hi Everyone,
Just a quick check in. Randal and I have been busy with our SCUBA course and amazingly enough, we finished today. I say amazing because I didn't think I could take off and replace my mask underwater. I did!
I'll write it all up and send a few photos soon.
Still in Puerto Galera PG.
Ru

(**&%*$&%$#^%@$^blog problems!!!!

2008-06-01T17:24:00.002+08:00

Hi Everyone,

Saturday, May 31, 2008

I am sitting in the Rock N’ Roll Bar fighting with my email, my new blog, and following the Red Sox. I could tell you that my lucky red Red Sox ring broke and that’s why they aren’t doing so well lately. But it broke after they started losing. And I did lose my Red Sox hat in 2007 in Sai Kung the day before we left to come to the Philippines; Sox won the Series in ‘07’ so it’s not the fault of the ring.

I am realizing just how spoiled I got when we were attached to the docks at Hebe Haven and even more in Subic. In lots of ways it was just like living at home without TV. And even then we could get one channel with Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives and the Gilmore Girls till it ended. We had AC and unlimited water. You stepped off the boat onto the dock and could be on your way. Very different when you cruise. You have to provide everything for yourself.
We have to make our own power, water, and transport ourselves from boat to shore. There really isn’t enough power to run the AC, so we don’t. I don’t mind, but Randal suffers from the night heat. You have to think before you use anything that drains a lot of power, even our electric kettle. We can make enough water fairly easily so that’s good.

Because it is the “slow season” here the service boat has limited hours. Sunday through Friday it runs from 8am to 9am and then from noon to 9pm at night. If you miss it, you swim back to the boat. Remember when Randal missed the last boat back at Christmas time? Only the goodness of a few hearts got him back to our boat that night. Friday it runs from 8 am to 10 pm and Saturday from 8 am till 9 pm. Randal is also dinghy captain and he doesn’t want to mess with it, so we aren’t. We really haven’t needed it yet; our schedule matches the service boats. We have to be in Sabang for our SCUBA class by 9 am so have to catch the early service boat anyway. Scuba class lasts from 9 until late afternoon. Other days it’s nice to have the quiet morning on the boat to read, paint or even swim around the boat area. Randal works on boat things and I do laundry if the genset is running to charge the battery bank.

Sunday, June 1, 2008

After my internet session and after the 10th inning of the Sox Orioles game, Randal came back from getting a shave. It was his turn with the computer so I went off to the town center. It is just about a half mile walk along the main road that curves and goes down the hill to the row of shops and activity. I stopped in one of the little office/school supply shops for a notebook. I have decided to go back to keeping a paper journal; power and wifi being iffy. Just a pen and sunlight are needed for that and no power crashes can lose everything you just struggled to write. There is just something more fun about pen and paper anyway. I ended up buying 3 smallish notebooks for a total of 67 pesos. The last time we checked in Sabang it was about 43.20 peso to the dollar. It has gone up a tad. Not much money to us, but I thought that it would be a luxury to some school kids here to have more than one. Not that most of the kids look “poor.” They all seem energetic and happy and just the right size. Filipino women are my height or shorter than I am. None of them seems to weigh even 100 lbs. I stopped to try on a top the other day and it needed about another half yard of material to fit me. First the adorable “small” Muslim woman said it fit because it was “an extra large.” Then she told me leaving half of my top half uncovered was the style. Not my style…. I was trying it on over a tank top so maybe that was the problem. Maybe I’ll get one for when we are making a passage and there will be no one to see anyway.
At the small supermarket I bought some more amoxicillin, no prescription needed. Randal is taking it for his ear infection. One does tend to self medicate when cruising. Especially on a long 5 to 15 day passage, there is no other choice. He is improving and the swelling on the side of his face is going down. But still no diving today either. I bought some Ritz like crackers and some other cracker that resembles a saltine and some brown bread. It was bread delivery day so it was available. Since it is the off season, bread and yogurt don’t disappear in 20 minutes from being shelved. And the market isles were not jammed packed. Last December, between the heat and the crowds it was quite awful to shop. And truly hard to find bread. I headed back to the pier stopping to find where the post office was located. It was closed with no hours posted. I’ll have to check during the week. As I was walking, I spotted the most pathetic dog. Its hips were rubbed raw and it was very thin. I thought, no pretty scenery or inexpensive trinkets or moorings can make up for how sadly the dogs and cats are treated. They aren’t mistreated, but totally neglected if they are strays. There is no neutering so lots of unwanted pets. Not that there are roving packs of animals. I am afraid to think why that might be. But just too many mangy skinny looking dogs and cats. It puts me off. I couldn’t think of how to rescue the poor dog; we can’t possibly take an animal. So I walked back to the pier and found Randal still on the computer. I left him there, stopped at Brettos for yogurt and caught the service boat back to DoraMac. I finished my painting and wrote in my new journal. When Randal returned it was time for mango shakes. I also started cooking vegetable soup, the best way I know to use vegetables before they can go bad. I even threw in a half cup of rice that cooked as the soup simmered. Pretty good stuff, and healthy!

Jan from south of Copenhagen stopped to visit about sunset. Randal met Jan at the Classic Club Thursday. Jan is an experience diver so after a tour of DoraMac, we talked diving for a bit. Then Jan was off to his boat and Randal and I tested the veggie soup. By 8:30 Randal was off to sleep and I read for a bit more. By 9pm I was ready to call it a day too.

See my pictures.

Ru

Mango Shakes

2008-05-31T04:52:00.003+08:00

Even when we lived in Roanoke, our dinners were often haphazard. I don’t love cooking. I really don’t love cooking if the end result doesn’t involve lots of vegetables and few starches. Randal likes starches, meat and not so many vegetables. His mom, who lived to be 96 and was a great cook, added a stick of butter just to start things off. My mom cooked Pritikin. Back in Roanoke it was tricky to make meals we both liked. And when I cooked, I found I ate too much. It seemed a waste to cook a little of something. So luckily, neither one of us is a fussy eater. Now, lots of nights I ask Randal which can he wants; chili, ravioli, beans? I do cook beans and boiled potatoes. Randal says I don’t cook the potatoes long enough. Randal says there is no such thing as overcooking potatoes. Hmm. So, though our breakfast and lunch are pretty normal, dinners are truly haphazard. We have also picked up the habit of eating a bigger lunch than we did back home. It is better that way, and since we were often out and about, just worked out that way too. Randal’s favorite meal at the Scuba Shack in Subic Bay was babyback ribs, beans, potato salad and San Mig Light. Big lunch! Of course, we walked almost 2 miles to get there and often stopped to do chores on the way back adding miles. So, as much as we ate, we seemed to break even; no calories gained, no calories lost.

How does all of this relate to mango shakes? We all got hooked on mango shakes back in China. I ordered one at dinner one night, passed it around for the entire contingent of Diesel Duck owners to try and still had lots left. After that, it was the drink of choice with dinner followed by a San Mig light. I actually was the only one who never ordered another mango shake, at least not with a meal. The mango shake craze followed us to Subic where they were available most of the year. (In China there was a mango season and a no mango season.) Still it wasn’t my thing. I ate lots of mangoes, just didn’t drink them in shakes. I mostly like to chew my calories.

Our last trip to Manila, when we visited Carol and went to Lake Taal, we shopped while in Makati. Randal wanted a blender to make shakes. He had spent several years during our biking hay day drinking protein shakes. Even in Roanoke it took a few tries to find a blender that wasn’t destroyed when it tried to crush ice. So we knew it wouldn’t be easy. Subic Bay had no ice crushing blenders. Carol sent us to Anson’s Department Store in Makati and Randal found an Osterizer. We had asked a store clerk to show us the blenders that would crush ice. He took us to the most expensive one, the only one that would crush ice. 2600 pesos and worth every peso when we are drinking mango shakes! Actually that only translates to $62 and worth every penny since it does crush ice. Or rather it has since we bought it in April.

So the point of this story is that almost every evening we have a mango or mango/banana shake for dinner. Sometimes we eat something light later, but sometimes not. We have the shakes any time between 4:30 pm and 6. Randal adds milk and sweetened condensed milk, vanilla sometimes and even peanut butter sometimes. All of the results are wonderful. Since we often start our day at 5 am, we are ready for dinner and sleep earlier than members of the working world. Being closer to the equator we have almost 12 hours of light and 12 of dark. It gets light by 6am and starts to get dark by 6 pm. For us, dark often means time to go to bed. Light certainly means it’s time to get up.

We have a system for our mango shakes that shares the work. I buy the mangoes and bananas and peel the mangoes when it’s time for shakes. Randal takes the peeled mangoes and does the rest. He even refills the ice tray (or no shake the next day). We keep glasses in the little freezer just for the shakes. Afterwards, I clean up.

The other evening Nancy and Geoff Cannell came to visit us and Randal made mango/banana shakes. Geoff added some rum to his. He said that it was good, but I haven’t tried one that way yet so I don’t know. Sounds good. We have some old, cheap banana rum that literally none of the other Diesel Duck folks wanted. I thought it might be interesting in banana bread. Anyway, maybe I’ll try that one time. It tasted good in Crystal Light!

See the photos.

Ruth Johnson
DoraMac

Quick Update

2008-05-30T19:30:00.005+08:00

Randal has an ear infection and his left ear is swollen shut! We have antibiotics and ear drops and hopefully they will cure him quickly. No SCUBA until his ears are clear. We have had 2 days of classes and short dives in about 15 and 20 feet of water. The emergency skills are difficult for me, but the dives are so interesting that it makes me want to continue.

Randal went to the Classic Club yesterday and I stayed on the boat and read and painted and we both had a wonderful day. Today we stayed on the boat, too. Jane who is with Tony on a catamaran moored near us, came by for a girl visit. Tony went on to town and Jane stayed to chat with me. Women chat is definitely something I miss. Randal worked on our battery issue and I read and painted and, about 2:30 took the service boat to town. Some of our prepaid wifi cards weren’t working right so I needed to check on them. I also had to walk to the wet market for fruit and vegetables. On the way back I stopped in a small shop run by a lovely Muslim woman and her mother. Both were wrapped in yard of cloth from head to toe. Their faces were not covered. I was looking at the simple, skinny tie tops; it is very hot here. But the tops were made for women the size of the shop owner and just not big enough.
Randal and I had planned to go to the Friday Yacht Club barbecue but Randal really wasn’t up to it.

Tomorrow we will rest some more and hopefully early next week we can resume our SCUBA classes. We have to make 2 more dives for certification; in open water off of a boat into deeper water. I am looking forward to that, but am scared about the deeper water too.

If I ever get outlook working I will send photos, until then it’s the 1,000 words.

Ruth Johnson
DoraMac

Passage to Puerto Galera written by Randal

2008-05-30T10:06:00.000+08:00

We left Subic Bay Friday, May 23, and arrived in Puerto Galera Saturday afternoon.

Hamilo Cove at sunset

Randal's story of our voyage (my comments are in parentheses.)...

"Two day passage from heaven. The first day was very smooth and we arrived in Himilo Cove at 3:15 PM after shoving off the Subic Bay dock at 7:00 AM. We left Himilo at 7:00 Saturday morning and arrived here in Puerto Galera at 3:30 in the afternoon. The water was so smooth at times you could hardly tell you were on a boat."

We rigged up a sun shade and had dolphins swim with us.

Going up to the flybridge for the day is like packing for the beach; food, drinks, hats, books, but also life vests.
This line of bancas were following a course that would cross our bow. They needed to change course or I needed to change course. We had the right of way and were bigger so they changed course and passed behind us rather than cross our bow.

Randal continues…

”Sunday I found the dive shack I had been in contact with and signed up for our diving certification class. I brought home one manual for each of us and a DVD to watch. Our three or four day class starts tomorrow. We have to watch the DVD, read the (240 page) book and take an exam, then it’s into the water for personal instruction from a Brit named Simon who I met yesterday too. http://www.actiondivers.com/ is their web address.

We found a wifi source that reached the boat but we had to go into town and find the shop and pay them for passwords to use it. It was expensive, 50 P $1.17) per hour. You get a little piece of paper with the user key and password. Each piece allows one hour of usage or 125 MB which ever comes first. It also expires two days after you sign in. Sounds like a westerner set it up rather than a Filipino. We tried it yesterday and it does work. They told us it works 24/7 but it is not available this morning and I have a feeling it works their business hours which are 7:00 AM to 10:00 PM. (Correct.)

Today is a study day, we have to read the 240 page book, take the quizzes at the end of each chapter, and be prepared to take the exam when we arrive at the dive shop Tuesday. I have a feeling the DVD is a repeat of the book. Ruth has contacted a lady friend she made when we were here during Christmas and has made an appointment to go see her. Nancy paints and her and Ruth hit it off right away. She and her husband have a house and a boat here and Ruth is going to see her house for the first time. There is a picture of her and her husband in Ruth's email from Christmas. Her husband was wearing a kilt.

There is a big difference from what we are now doing to what we were doing (in Hong Kong and Subic Bay.) Before we were in a safe marina with sea walls protecting you from the waves of the bay which were naturally protected from the waves of the ocean. We were attached to a dock and we could walk right off the boat and be on land. We were attached to shore electricity so no worries about usage; we ran the A/C all the time. We had a water hose on the dock so no need to worry about water usage either. Our main concern was getting the boat ready for cruising. Now our day is much different. We are very careful of the electricity and water we use, no waste. We can have no A/C unless we are running the gen-set. (So very little A/C.) We are anchored out in the cove and have to hail the service boat on the VHF radio to come pick us up to go to shore and bring us back again. If there was no service boat, and it is rare there is one, we would have to launch the dinghy and go where we wanted to go. (We aren’t sure about leaving the dinghy at the pier while we go off, so we aren’t using it to get to town.) We watch the battery monitor and when it is down to about 60% we will have to start the gen-set to charge the batteries, heat water and make water with the watermaker. This will be the time for doing any cooking in the microwave and washing clothes as well. We can make water, wash clothes, and use the microwave off the inverter with current supplied by the batteries but they deplete them so fast that it’s better to do it while the genny is running as it supplies an excess of electricity than what the battery charger can use. We can also do all these things while underway (cruising) since I installed that big 140 amp alternator on the main engine. While underway the engine heats the water in the water heater by circulating engine coolant through it. Our plan is to run the gen-set every other day for about two hours. I think
this will do the trick but we will have to experiment to see. The watermaker makes 25 gallons per hour so that means we will be producing an average of 25 gallons per day and I'm sure we use more than that. Since we can make water while underway, if we enter an anchorage with nearly full tanks we should be okay if we don't stay too long. The water tanks hold 250 gallons.

One of the things I did during our first visit to PG was join the Classic Club. The CC meets every Thursday for drinks and lunch and the bill is split. No women allowed. New members and returning members are introduced and there is a lot made over the fact that this is the 695th continuous meeting, da da da. There are no visitors because when you attend the first time you are a member. There are no dues, no bylaws, none of most things associated with clubs and organization. The guy who owns the dive shop where we will get our certification heads the thing up and arranges the place where we will have the lunches. I told him yesterday that I would surely be there this Thursday. Ruth reminded me just now that Thursday is our anniversary. Oh well, I'll have to propose a toast to her for letting me come.”

Randal

So Randal is off to CC. I am going to spend the afternoon painting and worrying about the Red Sox! I am more worried about them than about having to take off my face mask underwater during our next SCUBA class. You must take off and replace your mask, breathe through the regulator with your mouth and not breathe in through your nose. So far, not breathing through my nose is not a task I have mastered when we are learning to empty our masks of water. I practiced a bit this morning, but I still can’t do it well. In her book, The House of the Spirits, in the chapter “At Home With the Spirits,” Isabel Allende talks about travel memories. “the person doesn’t bring back the month; the person brings back the big strokes, the brilliant colors, the intense experiences, and in a week you have forgotten how uncomfortable you were and the mosquitoes. You only remember those things that eventually you write about.”

Here is a photo of Tuesday evening.

Ruth Johnson
DoraMac

Scuba and visit to Nancy

2008-05-27T19:12:00.000+08:00

Hi Everyone,
Survived the first SCUBA class. The actual time we spent swimming underwater looking at the reef and tiny rainbow colored fish and purple coral and neon blue starfish was great. The time yanking on a cumbersome wetsuit, getting on the vest and tanks and booties while slowly overheating….not so fun. Then my regulator wouldn’t stay in my mouth where it belonged and I almost truly gave up on the whole thing. Really. But then we had an exercise where we switched from our main regulator, (mouth piece through which you get air) to our alternate regulator. My alternate worked better for me and things improved greatly. I stopped panicking and started breathing and began to remember the fun I’d had in Subic with Audrey during our first SCUBA outing.
We swam around for about 30 minutes in water that was about 15 ft deep. Though we are in the tropics, I did need the wet suit in the water or I would have gotten cold. Hard to believe since I had grown up with New England Atlantic Ocean water. If I weren’t too lazy I could get out my SCUBA text and tell you how many degrees of change there is as you dive…but I am SCUBA texted out for the time being. Actually we are supposed to be reading Chapters 4 and 5 right now. But I spent most of Sunday night and Monday afternoon and evening learning SCUBA stuff and I need a break. I did go visit my great pal Nancy Cannell and her husband Geoff at their beautiful home on top of a mountain overlooking the sea. It is just a 10 minute drive from town and up a scary mountain road, but it is the perfect home. Comfortable, light, light, light!!! and lovely and inviting and informally formal and just perfect. They love living on their boat here in PG, but I might have to be dragged away from that house if I had the choice. Lots of big spaces, lots of small cozy spaces and all open to the light. And of course there is a pool, small garden area with a pool and fountain and a rooftop set with chairs, tables and a 360 degree view. Did I take thousands of photos? I had my camera and intended to. But Nancy and I had such a great time just seeing the house and talking and talking and talking, that the photos just weren’t that important. We didn’t even mess around with art! That’s how fun it was to just be together and talk.
It is 6:48 pm and feels like midnight. We were up at 5 am, out at 8 am and in SCUBA class from 9 am till almost 2 pm. Then we walked across the beaches to catch the jeepney from Sabang back to PG. Then we walked through PG back to the pier to catch the service boat back to DoraMac. Now I have to go read chapter 4! So goodnight. And GO SOX!!!!
Ru

cruising life

2008-05-26T07:44:00.002+08:00

Hi Everyone,
We bought some Internet Time cards from KrisNee Cafe. We can use the time on the boat between 7am and 10pm (their definition of 24 hour service.) It does let me send from Outlook, but only to individuals.
Randal signed us up for the SCUBA course and that will be all day for 3 or 4 days. The "learn on your own" text book has 250 pages and it took me a while to get through the first 50 and take the little quizzes. And I already knew lots of the info because our friend Audrey had loaned us her dive instruction videos and had taught us lots of the basic stuff. So for the next few days I won't be traipsing around town anyway so not much to email about. It will keep my mind off the fact that the Sox can't seem to win a game outside of Fenway Park.
This morning I am going to visit my PG friends Nancy and Geoff Cannell. I'll take the service boat to the pier and Geoff will come get me and drive me to their home. It is just a 10 minute drive, but I'm not so sure where it is up one of the small mountains behind town. Nancy and I will spend the morning talking about art and local PG gossip.
I think Randal and I haven't quite made it to "cruisers" yet. We still miss the "sometimes" instant 24 hour wifi. We miss the luxury of being plugged into the marina power and water. No AC here on the mooring and we have to be a little careful with water though Randal says the water maker will work fine. I take a wait and see attitude. We could get water from shore in giant plastic water holders. And I am sure we will one day. We just are more used to the cushy cruising life. Jane and Tony came aboard Saturday and eyed our washer/dryer and roominess. They have a catamaran sailboat with no washing machine and definitely no trash compactor. Jane washes daily by hand. But they are as happy as we are to be learning to be cruisers. It is definitely a transition. In Hamilo Cove it was quiet and cool. Here in PG it is less cool because we have our bow cover on and starting about 5 am bancas go by in and out of town. We fall asleep to the kareoke bar in town...water carries the sound. But early in the morning, we can hear the birds sing and the rooster crow.
I'm off to get ready for my visit to Nancy.
Ru

cruising to Puerto Galera

2008-05-25T01:17:00.001+08:00

Hi Everyone,
Again, just a quick note. My Outlook Email send feature won’t work in Puerto Galera. Jane, who we met yesterday, says her Outlook won’t send either. We can both receive, but not send. My web Yahoo won’t do photos. Hard to believe that I miss the Subic Bay wifi!

As I said yesterday, our trip down was very pleasant and calm seas. We anchored in Himilo Cove Friday night and our new anchor caught and held perfectly. However, when we went to bring it up, its swivel had it turned wrong way around so Randal had to mess with the boat hook and while he was doing that we almost backed into shallow water. A learning experience. Other than that, totally smooth cruising. We did have to change course one time for a huge ferry coming towards us. Size takes right of way. While I was driving a line of three bancas (all smaller than doraMac) was aiming to cross our bow, I kept my course and they had to change and pass in back of us. Luckily they changed course soon enough so I didn’t have to get Randal to leave his fishing gear and come back to the flybridge to give me advice. If I had been unsure, I just would have changed my course and been done with it. We caught no fish anyway. And now that we have our Paravane fish that work, we will hopefully never need them.

Ru

here in PG

2008-05-24T19:15:00.000+08:00

Randal and I arrived at PG about 3:30 pm this afternoon. Seas were smooth and we averaged better than 6 knots and only used 25.7 gallons of fuel to go over 100 miles.
Old friends Chris and Mylene stopped by on their way from shore to their sailboat. New friends Tony and Jane stopped by on their way from shore to their catamaran. We are going to have dinner with Jane and Tony in a bit. We'll have to eat fast; the service boat ends at 9 pm
Randal and I are sharing my computer right now. We are plugged in at the Rock N' Roll Bar.
So that's it.
Ru

Bottom Cleaning

2008-05-22T22:19:00.002+08:00

Things that had to get done before we could leave.......

Getting the Bottom Cleaned!

One of the reasons Randal and I want to learn to SCUBA Dive is to clean the bottom of the boat, the propeller, and the bow thrusters. If they get clogged with crustaceans and other living things, it either slows us way down and uses more fuel, or it clogs the bow thrusters so they might not work. During our last two trips to Silanguin we could tell the prop was dirty by how slow the boat would go at 1500 rpms. Tuesday morning, one of the local fellows, Glenn, a friend of Jordan’s our current boat helper, came at 9 am so we could go off to cleaner water and he could clean the boat bottom. It was overcast with some rain. But when you are working under water, rain isn’t a problem. Wind and waves would have been the problem, but it was fairly calm. We actually motored over a bit and anchored off shore of Vasco’s Restaurant.

Jordan came too. His job was to be ready to jump into the water to get Glen out if we had to move the boat for any emergency reason. You can’t start the propeller while someone is cleaning it, and to move the boat and control drift or direction, you need to have the boat moving and the propeller running. We had no emergencies and all went smoothly. Jordan went into the water to help clean the sides of the boat. That was good. Unfortunately he had borrowed Randal’s face mask and somehow managed to drop it to the bottom. We’re not sure why, but Glenn decided that the mask was irretrievable because of the current and murk. Oh well, things happen.

After our SCUBA lesson with Audrey I really think I could do the boat bottom cleaning. It isn’t easy scraping all of the barnacles and stuff off, but Randal and I would divide the work and take our time. If we did it on a regular basis, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. And cleaner water might not generate so much clinging stuff. Oceanography, zoology, geography, cartography…all of the ographies I wish I had studied, then I wouldn’t have to call it “clinging stuff.”

Randal and Glenn in the engine room where Randal is showing Glenn the sea chest. The sea chest takes in all of the water used to cool the engine exhaust, and for the air conditioning and geneset. Creatures, similar to our under the sink creatures, crawl up into it and it gets clogged. Randal was pointing out to Glenn that the opening under the boat needed to be cleaned too, so where about it would be located.

Get Ready ……..
Get Set………
Go!
Going down………………………….

The scuba vest is inflated so you float on the water. You deflate the vest, and that, plus the weights you wear let you stay under the water and not float up to the surface. The trick is to use enough weights and inflate the vest just right so you don’t sink or float back to the surface. Neutrally buoyant is the correct term, I think.

Jordan cleaning the boat sides.
This little creature, scraped from the bottom of the boat looked like an oyster. My foot with my rope necklace now an ankle thing and my Red Sox rubber bracelet that is way too big for my wrist. Yup, I really do wear that stuff during the season. Worked last year! I bought a real chain for my Red Sox hat charm; the rope one sometimes untied itself.

To tell if your anchor is dragging you pick 2 points in the distance and watch if their relationship changes. (The tree and the notch in the mountain to its left.) If it does change, your anchor might be dragging. You have to do this because there are no lines painted on the ocean to tell you if you are in your space. You can use a radar ring on your electronic chart when you are anchored in a cove; it will beep if you move out of that ring. We did that in Hamilo Cove when we traveled to Puerto Galera and anchored over night. But we were too close to shore to make a ring that would work. So we just had to watch. I don’t really understand spatial relationships and need to work on seeing what I am supposed to see.
Job done!

Friday morning departure

2008-05-22T13:22:00.000+08:00

Okay, so if all goes as planned and the weather cooperates we will leave very early tomorrow morning. We will arrive in Puerto Galera Saturday evening, not Sunday as I emailed earlier. It is 2 days of cruising, Friday and Saturday. I won't email till Sunday at the earliest.

Jordan is filling our water tanks and Randal is off for one last trip to town. I stocked up on bread and wine and cookies this morning. We are having the pizza party tonight. Pizza leftovers tomorrow as we cruise.

Luckily we have done this trip twice before so are pretty comfortable with it.

So that's it.

Count Down to Departure

2008-05-21T12:21:00.002+08:00

Racing around madly so we can be off on Friday! Tomorrow evening we're throwing a farewell pizza party for the folks on the dock to say thanks for their help and friendliness while we were here. In the past few days we have stocked up on food, water, beer, and Gatorade and lots of canned stuff and peanut butter. I biked to the Public Market this morning for some fresh veggies. If we leave Friday as we plan, we will be in Puerto Galera on Saturday evening so we don't need lots of fresh stuff. We will be in PG for at least a week, I am guessing since 3 days we'll be taking classes to get our SCUBA certification. There is wifi at the PG yacht club so I should be able to email some. Not sure what emails I send between PG and KK (Kota Kinabalu) but I will post when I can. I'm still not sure how I will handle not being able to follow the Red Sox every minute.
So for now, back to my chores getting the boat packed up and ready.

Ruth Johnson
DoraMac

Subic Bay to Kota Kinabalu

2008-05-17T10:36:00.005+08:00

Our proposed route. It shows the order of our ports, the nautical miles between ports, estimated cruising time, and the latitude and longitude of the destination port. I had sent it out with an earlier posting, but the excel file wouldn't work. Since we are getting ready to actually leave Subic Bay, I took a photo of the excel sheet that my sister recreated and here it is; such as it is. It doesn't indicate the amount of time in each port, we can't know that yet. It will depend on the weather and how much fun we are having at any given port. We hope to get our Scuba certification in PG and I would like to see the marble workings at Romblon. The spelling is a bit off on the list (our fault, not my sister's.) It is Romblon and Coron. We will be keeping track of our mileage and time so I will send out a totally corrected chart after the fact.

Ruth Johnson
DoraMac

Short Timers and a Fish Tale

2008-05-17T09:13:00.012+08:00

Well, it looks like we might actually be about to move along; maybe even this coming week if the weather cooperates and we have everything we need done. Our biggest project was getting the paravane fish redone and as of Thursday, they are hanging on the rail, ready to go when we are. Today or Monday at the latest, our new anchor will come back from Manila where it was being galvanized. Yesterday morning we spent almost 2 hours at Royal Supermarket buying a second load of provisions. It took me almost as long to figure out where to store them! Since we are new to this and not sure what we will find along the way we bought the real essentials like lots of peanut butter, sweetened condensed milk for Randal's super smoothies and 3 packs of dental floss. We also bought lots of "heavy stuff" like laundry detergent and dish detergent because it is easier to get things to the boat here. We took our latest boat person, Jordan and we filled 4 carts full. We took a taxi back to the SBYC and with a 2 wheeled cart got them form the taxi to the boat. Out cruising we might have to do all this with a tricycle taxi and our dinghy. It's certainly possible, but easier here. We will have lots of Gatorade and water and beer.

Randal and I could live on peanut butter and some kind of liquid if we had to. We tend to eat local a lot and that means eating what is available rather than stocking up on things to avoid eating local. We can do that at this point because we won't have long passages between ports. We do have lots of canned tuna and salmon and canned chili and " Vienna Sausage and Spam" Yuck. I would truly have to be desperate for the Spam and Sausage. Hopefully I won't have to eat those words or the Spam or Sausage either.

Once we start cruising the emails may become rather infrequent, short and text only. It just depends on the wifi we can find. Our first real stop will be back in PG so I should be able to email from there as we have in the past. While we are there, Randal and I are hoping to get our scuba certification and some equipment. It takes 3 days, which seems awfully quick to me. We need to be able to clean the bottom of the boat and free our anchor should it ever need it. As for recreational scuba diving, that might come later when we hit really clear, irresistible water with lots to see. You do go out for a dive during your certification. After our quick lesson with Audrey, I feel like I at least have a clue what is involved. Hopefully I'll love it. I know I'll be able to do the boat maintenance stuff.

So here is the tale of our paravne fish.....
Paravane Fish Tale

What are paravane fish? They are metal pieces shaped like birds or fish that hang into the water from paravane arms and keep the boat from rolling side to side in the waves and swells.

http://www.tc.gc.ca/MarineSafety/bulletins/2000/15-eng.htm

This illustration comes from a Canadian Marine Safety Bulletin and the rigging is a bit different from ours. But you can see the arms and the fish hanging into the water dragging along side. Ours had been problematic from the get go. Instead of acting like fish, they were more like dolphin, jumping out of the water and diving back in. Not what you want to happen. When they come out of the water, you can’t be sure where they will dive back in; and 50+ pound pieces of metal flying along both sides of the boat NOT GOOD!!

We went through 4 or 5 or 5,000 modifications and the accompanying sea trials out in the harbor before we solved the riddle. The thing of it was; everyone saw what needed to be done, but not all at the same time. And it was the kind of thing, that until you really believed what was the problem, no one could convince you. But finally Captain Randal took the matter into his own hands and made the final modification and voila! The fish stopped flying and swam smoothly in the water along side of the boat. As in the illustration. The whole point is that when the boat leans side, the fish on the opposite side want to stay in the water so keep the boat from rolling so much. Makes for a smoother ride.

Fish that wouldn’t stay in the water

Fish that would stay in the water. Cutting out that notch made all the difference, though we all came to that realization at different times.

Then came the finishing touches, painting and redoing the nest for the fish to ride in when not in use.

Painting the fish with epoxy primer so the paint will stick. That is Jordan helping Randal.

Testing the “nest” on the rail wherelive. There is a hoisting system because you can’t just pull them up with their rope.

A metal piece will go around the torpedo part on the bottom of the fish. You can see our dinghy and solar panel on the left side of the photo. We have new tan sunbrella dinghy side covers.

Fish in the nest. I guess I should have been calling them birds so the image would fit together better.

So this whole paravane arm swings down and the fish hang into the water from the top of the arm where the red is touching. First you lower the arm, and then throw the fish into the water. To retrieve it you pull up the arm until you can reach the fish’s line and then retrieve it on a pulley. Then you finish pulling up the arm. During this time you are in the middle of the ocean so no one is needed to drive the boat. It takes one person to put out the fish, but 2 people to retrieve the fish so they don’t crash into the boat.

This is as true a fish tale as I can write, not being an expert on paravane fish.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Tagaytay Highlands

2008-05-09T17:39:00.017+08:00

During all of our previous trips to Manila we have stayed mostly in Intramuros, Bonando, and along Roxas Blvd. It was a mix of Manila life with its wealth and poverty, its history and Mall of Asia. This trip we saw how the other half lives, as well as some of the beautiful Philippine countryside. We spent most of our time in Makati and its upscale shopping areas, malls, and gated living areas. No beggars, no people living on the streets. Looked like upscale Roanoke, New York, Boston…. We also visited the mega-upscale Tagaytay Highlands. http://www.tagaytayhighlands.com/ after our trip to Lake Taal.

From their web site which is loaded with lots of photos and info. It overlooks Lake Taal.

We had planned to go to one of the many restaurants on the grounds, but our timing was a bit off. We arrived a little before 5, hungry, of course. The restaurants didn’t open until 6. We decided to have a snack to hold us, but they filled us up! What a surprise?

Halo Halo washed down with a Frozen Margarita

Banana Shake washed down with a glass of Sangria.

I washed my Halo Halo down with decaf. Randal is taking a sample while I take this photo.

These tiny birds were as bold as could be.

The very last drop; don't think I left them much.

It had been a long day, so after our ice cream treats we went back to the car and began the journey home. First we took some shots of the lovely sunset.

Half way home we stopped ….Mr. Moo’s Fresh Milk Kesong Puti

Carol bought some carabao cheese (carabao are water buffalo) which I brought back to Subic and devoured in no time. It tastes like a combination of ricotta and mozzarella, sweet and salty all at one time. And it really is made from the milk of water buffalo.

Spread on toast for breakfast.

Last stop of the trip.

We truly had eaten dessert first at the Highlands, but a late light dinner back in Makati

was the finishing touch to a great day.

One last photo from the day at the volcano.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Taal Adventure # 3

2008-05-07T06:59:00.018+08:00

Taal Lake # 3

So we took the banca ride across Lake Taal, the mini-horses to the top of the volcano, and then walked along the ridge of the volcano. It was then time to mount up and ride back. Oddly, no one really wanted to ride back. Randal had hated the ride up with his guide squished onto the saddle with him; plus his guide had cantered along causing Randal to fear an immediate crash. I feared my mini-guide would race us down hill and the mini-horse would stumble onto its head. Carol worried about me. She suggested that we walk down and I was tempted. But we had more adventures planned and I thought walking would take too long. So we all mounted up, this time my guide on back with me, but I held the rein too.

Randal was up ahead of me. Then both Randal and the guide were off the pony. The guide looked to be fixing the saddle, or so I thought. The next thing I knew, Randal was walking down the mountain. Randal had given the guide this choice, “either you walk or I walk.” The guide told Randal to walk, so walk Randal did! No tip for that guide! C.C.

Here we are. Me, Gabi the horse, and my sidekick, Junior. C.C.

We slowed down so Carol could pass us and take a photo of me from the front. The man in the maroon shirt is Michael who drives for Carol. To Michael’s right you can see Randal walking along. I can’t even remember if I asked him why he was walking. Though I might have asked if he wanted us to walk too?

If you are wondering how Carol took this photo while riding along in front of us…

I love it! If you can’t see it, she is holding her camera up over her head and aiming it back at me.

Back at the ranch. My “guide” said his name was Junior and he was 14 years old. C.C.

What a cutie! C.C.

While I was trying to make friends with this cutie, my phone rang and I received a text message…….

I lost you, walk to the boats. Sender: Randal 26 April 2008 15:44:59

We are here! Sender: Me 26 April 2008 15:45:25

Oh Sender: Randal 26 April 2008 15:50:55

I thought he was kidding, but then I got a little worried! Randal had lost sight of us so had followed a different group of riders down the mountain ending up further along the lake shore than we were. No problem, we just all got into our banca and went to pick him up.

Faster, Faster! Somehow this turned into a friendly race and we wanted to win. So much for worrying about slow and cautious C.C.

I’m still learning to use paint. Within the red dots is a white dot. It is a water drop. As we were racing along, water was coming over the side of the banca. Randal kept getting it in the face and Carol was determined to capture the little water drop hanging from his ear. I was sitting in back of Randal with Carol. Every time we would hit a wave, water would come over the side and I felt like the guy on

“Laugh-In” who was always having water thrown at him. Laughing while water is thrown in your face is not wise, but impossible to stop.

Our next adventure was a trip to the Tagaytay Highlands.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Rowing a boat across the South China Sea!

2008-05-06T09:40:00.001+08:00

Subic to Hebe Haven by Rowboat!

It's 3:17 a m here and I couldn't sleep. So I'm following the Red Sox game and decided it would be a good time to work on email. I still have to finish writing about our trip to Lake Taal and the Tagaytay Highlands. But I thought some of you might want to follow the adventures of a small 2 person row boat crossing the South China Sea from Subic Bay to Hebe Haven, Hong Kong. http://www.subic2hebechallenge.com/ is the official web site. It is kind of crazy, but so are the two airline pilots who are having this adventure. Randal remembers seeing their boat in Hebe Haven while we were there. The guys were very friendly and stopped to chat even as they were racing to get themselves ready to start off about 2 pm Saturday afternoon. We came from Hebe Haven to Subic in about 4 days averaging about 6 knots. It will take these guys 3 weeks to get back there. They said they would average about 4 knots, I think.

They can both row, but will take turns resting in their little sleeping compartment.

John Graham, a 747/400 Captain, and Stu Pryke, an Airbus Captain.

The green boat with the tan tarp covering its bow is DoraMac. Next to us on the yellow/green boat are Cath and Rob and Dave and Dorothy next to them in the blue boat.

Very lightweight oars. They told me that sometimes they sculled and sometimes they rowed. I think I understand.

Rob and Cath singing a farewell song they had written.

Almost ready to go.

Rowing away.

Proceeds from the "Asia Miles Subic 2 Hebe Challenge" are proudly forwarded to "The Sunnyside Club" and "Children's Cardiac Care" Hong Kong.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Fw: Taal Volcano # 2

2008-05-03T15:27:00.002+08:00

We arrived safe, sound, and only slightly damp from our banca trip to find a rather dusty, makeshift, but bustling little ranch with lots of mini-horses and some adorable small foals. The man in charge pointed at me and then at a mini-horse and said get on. The mounting block was made of empty talapia fish food pellet bags filled with sand. I got on "Gabi" the mini-horse and put my feet in the stirrups. My knees made a 90 degree angle, which if you ride, you know is not good. Stirrup way too short. But since the stirrups consisted of two small metal stirrups tide on either end of a rope, there was no way to adjust them. No helmet, no reins, awful stirrups and guides ready to run: I had my doubts. I don't know boats, but I do know riding. In my younger days I would have loved this all, but now I believe it's possible to break parts of yourself falling from even a mini-horse.

Sad but true, this is how I started my trek up to the volcano being led by a barefoot kid while I rode a tiny horse. The saddle had pretend stirrups that made me ride with my knees bent way too much for good balance. The saddle horn was way too tiny to use for balance. I had no reins and the makeshift halter was held by this kid who just wanted to GO! My poor young guide had actually gotten onto another pony and was set to speed off leading me after him. I yelled, WALK! So he did; he got off and walked which I hadn’t meant at all. Actually it really wasn’t such a bad walk, but I did keep asking if he wanted to ride on back since his and my weight were less than lots of other pairs. But he refused. (On the way down he did ride with me!)

Since I felt a little too unbalanced to risk unearthing my camera from by backpack while riding, this is the best photo to show our route from the boat to the volcano. We came from the shore and followed the path in the center of the photo. A small observation tower is off to Carol's left.

This is the center lake with the volcano around it and Lake Taal in the background. I am wearing my Red Sox B hat. C.C.

You could see steam coming up from the volcano.

Some views from the top. It was quite lovely; not so easy to capture without a wide angle lens.

Walking along the ridge of the center volcano. C.C.

Rain shower off in the distance.

Convenient CR (comfort room.) Cost 20 pesos. Usually it’s 1 pesos.

Next email, the trip down.

Ruth Johnson Doramac

Lake Taal: Part 1

2008-05-01T08:53:00.013+08:00

You can see the rim of the original vocano with the lake inside and the volcano within the lake, with a lake inside! Like a Matruska doll.

The green line is our banca ride across the lake and the red line is the pony trek to the volcano. These photos are from Wikipedia.

This was a fun trip on the spur of the moment; little advance planning, just all adventure to see what we could see. Carol, her driver Michael, Randal and I left Makati about 9 am and drove the 50 or so miles to Talisay, a small resort town that offers access across Lake Taal to the inner volcano. It took almost 3 hours in the Sturday traffic, winding mountain roads, and a slight goose chase to find the best (reliable, banca won't sink and we all drown in the lake) resort to find lunch and hire our banca. When you get to the main lake road in Talisay, you are met by bunches of men waving signs hawking their boat services. We finally settled on these guys and followed them wherever the led us; at times back and forth and back and forth along the main road till we said, "Stop, we'll eat at the first place."

Our "guides"

I can't really tell you much about our resort. Its name started with K and there is a large wooden fish over the entrance.

Carol and Randal look at the lunch menu.
We shared barbecued pork and rice for 5, though the 4 of us managed to eat it all. Pretty good too.

The resort had a fish cage where they raised talapia. You can see across Lake Taal to the inner volcano area. The large mound on the left is an extinct volcano. It looks a long way across, but it only took about 15 minutes to get there. It felt quite safe; the lake was quite calm.

A typical banca. It held the 4 of us and 3 banca boat men. (They're small.)

Randal and Carol.
Michael and I are in front.

View from the banca. C. C.

Not so pretty. This was the little ranch area where we got our ponies for the ride to the volcano. We took a few photos at the end of the ride when we had more time. I'll show you later. The ride was an experience, right up there with my pony ride in China when Sallie rode the "zebra."

Next stop the top!

Ruth Johnson
DoraMac
#end

Manila Day 1, Mostly

2008-04-29T13:28:00.001+08:00

Monday April 28th.

Last Thursday morning we took the "express "bus from Olongapo to Manila. The bus stopped 22 times along the way; Randal counted. Two official stops and 20 unofficial stops to let folks on and off along the way.

We had the front row seat. The man standing in front near the window was the ticket taker.

You can see why it takes 4 hours to get to Manila. Lots of traffic out of Olongapo and then insane traffic in Manila. They showed a movie, Deja Vu with Denziel Washington. Totally implausible plot, but it was quite entertaining and made the time pass quickly.

At some of the stops men came on board selling snacks.

These are pork rinds. Randal actually bought some once. They come with a dipping sauce.

When we arrived in Manila we were met by Michael who drives for Carol. You met Carol during our Samat adventure. It was wonderful to have Michael drive us since he knows Manila and Makati and we don't. Our first stop was to the HSBC Bank. HSBC stands for Hong Kong Shanghai Bank Corporation. When we opened our account in Hong Kong, I asked if our money was insured. The answer was no, but since they were one of the biggest banks in the whole world, we need not worry. Well I can think of other words HSBC stands for, but nothing I can write here. Randal's ATM card was wearing out and he had applied for a new card. Because he didn't include his middle name, the Hong Kong Bank wouldn't send the card. The HSBC Philippine banks say they can't help because we opened our account in Hong Kong. So?! HSBC is HSBC, NO? And his worn out card wouldn't work at this ATM. Not a good start for our trip.

Anyway, after that failure we moved on to our next stop, Santis. The chef at Aresi in Subic had sent us there to buy a blender that would chop ice. Michael drove us to Santis. Lots of wonderful foods and spices and wine and everything you might want if your goal was not to buy a blender. But it was a blender we wanted and blenders was what Santis didn't have. We give up for now.

Next stop was Carol's place to dump our stuff. Luckily on our way there we noticed an HSBC branch at the Power Plant Mall. Power Plant Mall is walkable from Carol's place. Luckily the ATM card worked with no problem.

Cash in hand we strolled through the Mall looking for shoes for Randal. That was one of the "must buys" on our list. His old shoes were falling apart.

We opted not to try this and went off to Power Books to browse. We bought a Lonely Planet travel guide to Southeast Asia since it included lots of our future stops.

Later on that evening a view of the Pasig River that is the northern border of Makati.

Makati is part of greater Manila. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasig_River Pretty interesting article about the river which divides Manila in half.

Morning view.

A small, local ferry runs back and forth across the river. Carol said at one point the river was clogged with water plants but it has been cleaned out. A larger fast speed ferry goes along the river's length. I just read that it costs about 45 pesos and is air conditioned and has a bar. It saves travelers from taking a combination of buses and jeepneys to get to their destinations.

Friday night we went to Fort Bonifacio for dinner. You saw the photo of Clawdaddy and the Patriots and Red Sox banners. But you didn't see who we met while strolling along the shopping area after dinner.

Elvis may have left the building, but he is presently standing here in Fort Bonifacio, Makati.

Randal is wearing his Mt. Samat hat and the shirt he had made in Olongapo. One of his favorite shirts had been used as a pattern.

ps I sent this as an email post and the photos didn't show up so now I am re-editing it. It is hard to get just right. I truly may have to read the directions. Till then, the layout might be odd, but the photos should be labeled correctly.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

A few photos from Manila

2008-04-28T17:00:00.005+08:00

Just a few random photos from our trip to Manila until I sort through the hundreds I took.

Clawdaddy Restaurant

Fort Bonifacio is a great little shopping and restaurant area in Makati. The owner of Clawdaddy was a fan of Boston sports teams, at least the Sox and Patriots. Patriots banner, Red Sox banner and photos of Ted Williams!! I felt completely at home.

Our waiter took this photo.

Yup, got on a pony again! Thought I would never get on again

after my crazy ride in China. My sidekick is riding on back.

This was part of our trip to the Taal Volcano. C.C.

Sunset up in the Tagaytay Highlands. C.C.

Lots of stories and loads more photos. This will have to do till I get it all done.

If you search for Lake Taal Volcano in the Philippines you can read about it, quite interesting.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Off to Manila

2008-04-23T12:52:00.001+08:00

Hi Everyone,

Unless plans change, Randal and I are off to Manila tomorrow to visit our friend Carol and to do a last round of chores that can only be done in Manila; like buying Randal shoes that actually fit and a blender that really chops ice and doesn't destroy itself in the process. Thanks to the Chef/Owner of Aresi Cafe we have the name of a restaurant supply store in Makati so there is hope. I am looking for a slow cooker, though they are available here too, so that's less important. But I do need new bike pedals; mine are beyond repair.

We will go Thursday and plan to return Sunday. That will give us time to do chores Thursday and Friday and go seeing sites with Carol on Saturday. We would like to stay and visit with Carol longer, but too many boat chores.

If you haven't yet noticed, it is baseball season. I have been refraining from posting daily Red Sox scores on my email. I figure, if you care, you already know, if you don't care, you don't want to know, and if you are a Yankee fan, you hate knowing. So unless there is a really huge reason to write about the Sox, I'll just keep it to myself. I'll just say that my new little red (Red Sox) ring and red bangle seem to be bringing them luck. That and digging up Big Papi's shirt from under the new Yankee Stadium.

Ruth Johnson

Doramac

Aerial View Subic Bay Yacht Club

2008-04-23T09:45:00.000+08:00

We are actually next to the slip with the plus. I walked down the dock and counted spaces today. DoraMac must be out on a trip to Silanguin since our space is empty.

You can see the swimming pool at the club and I have actually been using it lately. Catherine and Rob Coulson, who are in the next slip on Bob-the-Boat, are swimmers. I have been going with Catherine late in the afternoon. Next to Cat and Rob are Dave and Dorothy on DavidEllis. Across from B-T-B. are Nick and Zaida. On the other side of the + are JR and Heidi. I have mentioned all of these folks and now you know where they live. Dave and Jamie Fritsch were on the other side of Dave and Dorothy, but Dave Fritsch is on his way to Hawaii and Jamie is in Connecticut waiting to rejoin Dave there.

This was my first attempt to use paint and add text and lines. It was a battle to get the photo the correct size and the text and line done. Time to read the help section on paint and then practice. Wish I could take a class in Paint at the Roanoke County Public Library! I'm sure one of my former co-workers could teach me in way less time than it will take me to teach myself. I am doing battle with blogspot just now too. This is my fifth or so attempt to post this.

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Drain Gunk

2008-04-22T06:02:00.000+08:00

Sent: Monday, April 21, 2008 6:38 PM
Subject: Gunk

Gunk is how I labeled the photos I took, so I guess it's as good a name for this email. The sink in our rear head was draining slowly so I decided to clean it out. The same things that are living under the boat seem to make their way up pipes too. Yuck. Before I had thought about a photo, I had scraped the thing clean and trashed the trash. But then I decided to clean the trap under the sink too. Same gunk. Yuck. I did take a photo of that. You might not want to read this email if you are eating. And my sister says this is way too much information!!

Looks like a creature from a really bad horror movie

This is the drain trap.....supposedly to keep yuck from going down the drain. Seems to me it is keeping gunk from coming up the drain.

Ruth Johnson

Doramac

Cruising Plans

2008-04-19T15:23:00.001+08:00

This is an email Randal wrote to Ken, his brother-in-law and my friend! Not sure if the Excel sheet will work. If not I wil try to see what I can do about posting our route.

Saturday, April 19, 2008

See Excel Attachment

We have two electronic chart programs. The Raymarine chart plotters, one in the pilothouse helm, an E-120, and an E-80 up on the flybridge, both equipped with Navionics electronic charts. These are an integral part of the boat and are hardwired to the radar, GPS receiver, GPS compass, primary and secondary autopilots, depth sounder, and necessary alarms. We also have a large laptop with C-Map charts. I used the laptop software to plan our trip leaving Subic Bay yesterday and then manually input the information into an Excel file so I could include the information important to me, like departure times each day to be able to reach the next anchorage by 4:00 PM.

This will give us an overview of our trip and how long it will take. Each days trip will have to be manually input into the boats chart plotter where it can be refined and checked once more to make sure I'm not taking the boat over a small island. In the Excel file the "Day" column represents travel days not consecutive days. We intend to lay over in Puerto Galera long enough to get our scuba diving certification for example. We don't know what calendar days these will be so I have left the tide column blank until I find out.

I made nearly this whole plan not knowing if most of the anchorages are suitable or not. We have been to Hamilo Cove, Puerto Galera, and Marinduque, but the rest were just based on what the chart looks like. Before this is locked in concrete I will consult with fellow cruisers, my cruising books for the Philippines, and see if I can figure out how to use Google Earth to look at the harbors.

Then there is the weather. Direction of the prevailing wind/waves has a strong presence in passage planning. The veterans do it instinctively because here at least the prevailing wind comes from mostly two directions, the NE monsoon and the SW monsoon. The NE monsoon comes during the Northern Hemisphere's winter and the SW monsoon comes during the summer. The SW winds bring rain almost everyday and the NW winds bring drought. In trip planning you want the wind behind you are at least on your rear quarter if possible, certainly not on your bow where waves will build and gives you a hobby horse ride which is only fun for a short time. Of course if you're going from point A to point B and the wind is going from point B to point A then there is little choice, unless you can wait, like we are going to do to cross the Indian Ocean.

Of course just because you're in the middle of the NE monsoon does not necessarily mean the wind will be coming from that direction on the day your boat is where it is. Fronts still move through and land masses which we try to avoid with the boat are disturbing the wind as well, speeding it up, slowing it down, and changing it's direction. All of this is much more important to sail boats than to power boats. While sail boats get their horsepower from the wind, we diesel crankers are only concerned with comfortability and safety.

I'm going to play with Google Earth for awhile now and might even print the anchorage pictures and put them on my plan clipboard. Some of those aerial pictures show the channel and the shallows better than the charts do.

Footnote: Ruth asked me to send this to her as well to see if it is worthy of posting on her blog.

Footnote 2: Passage planning is very much like planning life's journey. The best laid plans can be set adrift in the event of a typhoon; but only if you don't plan for a typhoon, which I

have.

Randal

Ruth Johnson

DoraMac

Day trip to Silanguin

2008-04-19T15:09:00.000+08:00

Tomorrow, Sunday, April 20th, we are making probably our last day trip to Silanguin Bay. We want to try out the re-done, and re-done yet again paravane fish and also hopefully clean some of the crustaceans off the propeller.

I have set up the process to email directly to our new blog www.doramac.blogspot.com and want to see if it works. Hopefully it will.

Ruth Johnson

Doramac

# end

DoraMac's first blog by Ruth

2008-04-01T06:35:00.000+08:00

Of course I haven't read the directions, but here goes anyway. The Roanoke County Public Library http://www.yourlibrary.us/ is still recreating my journal with a link from its web page. In the meantime I am going to try my hand at blogging. We'll see how it goes.

Ruth

DoraMac in Silanguin Cove

DoraMac

DoraMac's new website

Tana Toraja

Makassar, Indonesia

Indonesia - Arrived!

Crossing the Equator

Malaysia to Indonesia

Malaysia to Indonesia

Romblon continued

K K with Valerie

Getting ready to go

Romblon 3

more K K stories

Romblon 2

Visitors!

K K with Valerie

Kota Kinabalu

Women in saris

Puerto Galera adventure last morning

Puerto Galera continued; White Beach

Puerto Galera adventure/ Ponderosa Golf Club

Kota Kinabalu

Just checking in

Google Earth

Tamaraw Falls Puerto Galera Adventure Continued

Tara Island

Island Cruising

Hello from Kota Kinabalu

Anchored at Sir James Brooke's Pt.

Puerto Princessa

Hello from Puerto Princessa

Coron

Typhoon

Safe and Sound

Paradise Islands

Hello from Romblon

Coco Beach Island Resort

Leaving Puerto Galera

SCUBA on our own

hello

Puerto Galera Tour

hello

SCUBA

quick hello

(**&%*$&%$#^%@$^blog problems!!!!

Mango Shakes

Quick Update

Passage to Puerto Galera written by Randal

Scuba and visit to Nancy

cruising life

cruising to Puerto Galera

here in PG

Bottom Cleaning

Friday morning departure

Count Down to Departure

Subic Bay to Kota Kinabalu

Short Timers and a Fish Tale

Tagaytay Highlands

Taal Adventure # 3

Rowing a boat across the South China Sea!

Fw: Taal Volcano # 2

Lake Taal: Part 1

Manila Day 1, Mostly

A few photos from Manila

Off to Manila

Aerial View Subic Bay Yacht Club

Drain Gunk

Cruising Plans

Day trip to Silanguin

DoraMac's first blog by Ruth