Andaman Islands

We left Mike and Harriet in Thailand. They had a nightmare of bureaucracy in
leaving the country as immigration wouldn't let them leave Phuket and sent
them back to where we had cleared into Thailand, even though the immigration
officials there had told us very clearly that, with a copy of our entry
document, they would be able to leave. Ridiculous and without any logic at
all. So we are sorry Mike and Harriet had all that hassle as we had had a
lovely time with them; the further north away from the spoilt areas south of
and in Phuket you go, the clearer the waters, the more it feels like
Thailand must have been in the past. I am afraid it is all rather messed up
now, and we won't be hurrying back to Thailand or Malaysia, unless it is to
Amanpuri where we had dinner. It is the original Aman hotel and as gorgeous
as the other two we have stayed in - Bali and Morocco.

So we stopped at Kho Surin for the night on the way over to the Andamans, a
good snorkel in clear waters the following day, and two days over to Port
Blair in the Andamans. We have been joined by Kurt, a 30 year old Aussie
crew, who is quite new to sailing but has built solar plants and gas plants

Cellular Jail

and is very practical and easy going - just what you need on a boat.

Port Blair is next to Corbyn's Cove. We didn't see Foot beach or Brown river. The Andamans are "strategic" to the Indians which means it is full
of bureaucracy and restrictions. It takes 2 days to clear in and nearly 2 days to clear out, because of the love of sequential paper: Port Authority,
Customs, Immigration in that order both times, each one requiring ship's docs, crew list, list of goods on board and some want it again on the way out, plus report your position twice daily, provide a declaration where you
have been, a photo of your track etc. "WHY do you need this?" is not a

Beach 7

question they ask. Maybe the British taught them. Our colonial history here
is not great featuring the cellular jail which housed 763 individual cells
for prisoners including many political prisoners at the time of "The Indian
Mutiny/First War of Independence".

How the economy works is not so clear. 500,000 tourists come a year, almost
all Indian, relatively low-end. Diving used to be world class, but a
combination of 2004 Tsunami and 2010 bleaching due to warm water means you

Splendid trees

only find good coral and fabulous marine life (amongst the best we have

Instructions for a beach

seen) if you dive between 20 and 30m depth. That would be fine except the
local dive companies who used to use game fishing boats are no longer
allowed to do so because that comes under Agriculture/Fishery and they won't
allow diving from fishing boats.
We did manage to do some good diving from
the back of Calliope by taking the dive guide who discovered all the sites
with us. He was thrilled as he isn't allowed to go to the places he
discovered. And it's not clear game fishing is allowed any more though it goes on. So the diving is try-it-out/PADI OW for the Indian tourists who pay half what is charged elsewhere, and the high end diver doesn't come. Our
agent worked out that one international gamefishing person is the economic
equivalent of 375 local tourists.

But some good news; logging has been severely curtailed due to a Supreme Court order of 2002, which also banned the use of the Trunk Road through the tribal areas (not implemented). Indian Premiers keep announcing plans like 1m tourists p/a, and a nuclear power plant, but they don't happen. Little commercial fishing, so not sure what makes it all tick if it isn't government, military, some marine services and the tourism. It has
definitely been worth the visit but give me Indonesia and its smiley people

Ross Island - British Empire until 1943

any day. However, we much enjoyed having William and Miranda to stay and visit Cellular Jail and Ross Island together.

Buying fish off the locals - better return than buying lures

The Andamans are beautiful but it's very frustrating not being able to go
ashore on many islands. Understandably we were warned off North Sentinel
where a foolish American missionary was killed by a poisoned arrow a month
or so ago, but all we wanted was to wander along a beach, well away from
tribal lands. I missed the interaction with locals, whether through eye
clinics or school visits - even the children we encountered seemed wary of us. However the samosa-seller at Radhanagar Beach was delighted to see us as each time we passed we bought a bag full of delicious snacks.
We are now on our way to Galle in Sri Lanka which will take 5 or 6 days: so far great sailing conditions and we are making 8 knots with our asymmetric sail up and about 20 dolphins playing in our bow wave. It doesn't get much
better than this!

Malaysia and Thailand

When we set off from a place, we record it in our beautiful logbook and
write "towards" the next destination, acknowledging that although you may be
intending to go there, things do not always go to plan. We seem to have had
a few changes (by no means necessarily bad) in our sailing adventures in
Malaysia and Thailand. It felt wonderful to get back 'home' on board
Calliope after our fantastic time back in the UK for Pippa and William's
wedding and our holiday/honeymoon with them and Alex and Michael in South
Africa. The Malaysian coast, though, was less tempting than we'd hoped, with
dirty water and numerous fish farms, so we pressed on past Penang to
Langkawi.

Langkawi

At the Royal Langkawi Yacht Club Marina, we partly dealt with
those machines that had been working perfectly when we left the boat but now
were not working well - freezer, fridge, watermaker and started to provision
for the weeks ahead. Langkawi is an odd place - a duty free zone, it

Hole in the wall

attracts thousands of visitors a day through its busy ferry terminal; they
then embark on a theme park-like experience of zip wires, boat trips, animal
petting zoos ... all very organised and passive. We wanted to visit the
Lake of the Pregnant Maiden but by 9am the hordes of guide-led tourists
dissuaded us and we sailed away with Mike and Harriet Bane on board to an
idyllic spot called Hole in the Wall: a narrow inlet to the Kilim River
where sea eagles swooped and skinny monkeys scampered along the rocky shore.
We enjoyed a lovely goose-winged sail to Tarutao, a national park where we
watched the red sun set at the same time as a reddish moon rose (it was even
redder and fuller the next day (22nd January) and much-photographed!)

Sea Urchins

Although the water was blissfully warm and a very pretty greeny-blue, up
till this point it had been opaque - we think it was so shallow that sand
was constantly stirred up. However in Ko Tanga we found some fun
snorkelling in clear water around huge boulders. That afternoon we dropped
anchor off Ko Lipe (Ko means island) and enjoyed the slightly hippy vibe -
lots of tie-dyed clothes, beach bars and little boutiques. We had a massage
on the beach and supper ashore, then suffered until the early hours as the
partygoers' loud music and Chinese New Year celebrations carried far too
clearly across the bay. The following day we part-cleared in to Thailand
and very nearly lost our passports in the process - they got bundled up with
those of a tour group heading back to Langkawi. Now THAT would have made us
change our plans!

Near Ko Phi Phi

There are some extraordinary rock formations in Thailand and one lunch stop
we swam below towering Ko Rok Nok, a group of pinnacles which looked like a
film set, emerging from nowhere in the middle of the sea. Next stop was Ko
Phi Phi (pronounced pipi), a gorgeous setting which has been spoiled by the
sheer numbers of tourists. The anchorage was one of our bumpiest ever,
mostly due to nonstop comings and goings of boats. Definitely not
recommended.

24th January, Charles's birthday and sadly no wind at all. We motored to Ao
(means bay) Chalong on the south coast of Phuket island and successfully
cleared in completely to Thailand, visiting immigration, the harbourmaster,
customs and quarantine (thankfully all located in the same building) and
presenting passports and photocopies thereof, ship's papers, crew lists
(ditto photocopies) to each of them. What do they DO with all the paper?!
Here's another example of plans changing. We motored towards Yacht Haven
Marina in the NE of Phuket Island. Triple chocolate cupcakes were eaten,
candles blown out and happy birthday sung. Night fell and we came within
sight (sort of) of the marina. Suddenly, very gently, we stopped - we had
run aground on a sandbank. The tide was rising, so we dropped anchor and
waited. At that moment, the heavens opened and we were deluged with warm
rain. We opened the Dom Perignon 2009 the Banes had brought with them and
instead of the slap-up meal ashore we'd been hoping for, enjoyed corned beef
hash with our Champagne. A feast! The following morning we attempted to
enter the marina but ran aground again, so managed to negotiate a berth in a
deeper part where we were able to complete repairs to the freezer and
watermaker and take on 1100 litres of diesel. Thanks to a hire car, we
could get to supermarkets (Tesco and Makro) and Mike and Harriet managed an
evening in Old Phuket Town. Charles and Nicky saw rather a lot of the main
road and ugly modern development along it - and became familiar with the mad
driving practices of the locals: U turns on dual carriageways are a
speciality!

It was time to head north, but sadly the strait to the north of Phuket has a
low bridge we couldn't fit under, so we had to sail all the way round the
south of the island, passing US Warship 2, an aircraft carrier bristling
with planes and helicopters - quite threatening when seen from up close.
The west coast of Phuket is the most developed and we sailed past Karon,
Kata and Patong beaches with their hotels, parasols and jet skis, to anchor
below Amanpuri, the original Aman hotel - we are such fans, having stayed in
Amandari in Bali and Amanjena in Marrakech. Fabulous cocktails and dinner
ashore set us up for the next day, where we had to go back (by taxi) to Ao
Chalong and clear out of Thailand, presenting the very same papers and
photocopies to precisely the same officials... Our crew list now includes
Kurt Benson from Australia, who will be a big help on some of the longer
passages ahead.

Two more days followed with the Banes. Fishing, to Mike's chagrin, was
dismal - the lines were bitten through by huge fish ("the ones which got
away") or possibly cut by floating debris, of which, sadly, there was still
far too much. But some squid and cuttlefish were purchased from a passing
fishing boat, and what a lot of those there are - a veritable Armada sets
off from shore each evening and the horizon is bright with their extended
dazzling 'arms'! We found a picture-perfect deserted anchorage near Yipun
Island, though the snorkelling was poor, the water greenish with suspended
nutrients for all those super-strong fish. Much fun was had puzzling over
cryptic crosswords, with success except when it came to the Listener which
we were unable even to start to solve. Mike and Harriet left us at the
Golden Buddha Resort, where we enjoyed a fine farewell lunch before sailing
west to Ko Surin. Another plan had to be revised; unable to get our anchor
to hold, we had to give up on the anchorage on the east side of the island
and motor round to the west. We were ravenous by the time we anchored after
9pm. It was all worth it to wake up and snorkel, drifting with the current
in crystal clear water, trailing the dinghy behind us, above busy coral
heads - lots of little Nemo clown fish, parrot fish and puffers.

So that's it for Thailand. I'm disappointed not to have met more locals and
seen more inland, but glad to have passed through. We are now on course for
Port Blair in the Andaman Islands, which are Indian and where we anticipate
much bureaucracry to go with the hassle we had getting our visas back in
December. Winds are light but with our huge asymmetric sail up, we are
making good progress and hope to arrive in two days' time. Flying fish
scatter in our path - otherwise there's nothing to see but the sea. Lots to
read and Charles and Kurt have done a heroic amount of stainless steel
polishing today!