More Updates On AMARA

All,

We've just had a great team effort battling a monster Yellowfin tuna for the last 2 hours and had him up to the side of the boat several times where we were attempting to gaff him.  Unfortunately the line touched the edge of the exhaust pipe and broke.  

All good on Amara,

Martin

AMARA Update!

I got a great email from Martin today that I thought I would share with you all to give you an update on Amara and their current position.  Looks like they are getting closer to Mauritius, which means closer to internet!  It will be nice to finally be able to FaceTime with Martin.  He's been at sea way too long and we are really missing him these days... 

Enjoy!


"All Is Well on AMARA

AMARA is currently 4 days from arriving in Mauritius.  We have been experiencing light winds and a mild sea today as we crossed the major shipping lane between South Africa and Singapore.  We saw 5 large ships today, the biggest being a gigantic 1200 feet long and 200 feet wide.  Thanks to our AIS (Automatic Identification System) we can see their ship details including their course and speed, and they can see us as a small sailboat.

On board we are currently well stocked with fresh Mahi Mahi and Yellowfin tuna, having caught 3 large Mahi Mahi the day before yesterday.  One fish was 30+ pounds.   In the calm sunny weather, we have been relaxing and each been doing a lot of reading.

The latest crew pastime seems to be to outdo each other in the kitchen. Yesterday David baked fresh bread and cooked up a Moroccan Fish Stew for dinner, while today Doug baked an apple pie, and John served up a Carrot Curry Cashew Soup with Mahi Mahi.  I'm on the hook for dinner tonight, and will be feeling the pressure.  We all are most grateful to Sue for creating all these great recipes in our AMARA cookbook.

The temperature has been getting noticeably cooler as we continue further south.  The shorts and tshirts are being exchanged for long pants and polar fleece. It is still 73 F, but it feels like 60 when you are sitting on watch for 3 hours in the wind.

Best to all,
Martin"

Today's Update on Amara

Martin called last night and reported that this past week they have been in 24 knot winds for the past week and reported that he was actually cold (even though it was 75 degrees).  With the wind blowing all day and all night, it made it a little cold and uncomfortable—especially while on watch.  Today the wind finally started to die down and is now a lot more manageable than this past week.

Every time I talk with Martin he is in great spirits and is truly loving his experience crossing the Indian ocean.  We are in talks whether I should meet him in South Africa or he should come home.  We just aren't sure as of yet and have a week or so to think about it.

Martin sent out an email today to all his fellow cruisers on the same route as Amara and I thought I would share it with you all to let you know about Amara's current position.

"Hello fellow Indian Ocean sailors.

As of noon local time (0700UTC) Amara was at 17d 56m South by 72d 36m East.  During the night last night we passed the halfway point between Bali and Durban.  Yeah!  We are now 2540 miles from Bali and 2380 miles from Durban.

Winds are in the low teens out of the eastsoutheast.

We caught three Mahi Mahi's yesterday.  The largest was about 35 lbs.  Not enough to beat Christine and Guy's record, but close. If you add all three of them together it was probably at least seventy lbs of fish.  Not bad for one day's haul.

—Martin"

I always love hearing from Martin and am so glad that he is still enjoying his journey.  More to come later this week!

A Quick Update:Thoughts on the Cocos Islands and Amara's Current Position

Thoughts on Cocos Islands, by Martin:

"We spent 4 days in the Cocos Islands. An atoll west of Bali by about 1200 miles.  The islands reminded me alot of the beautiful palm covered islands of the South Pacific.  We anchored in a small lagoon off of Direction Island with a beautiful sandy beach and the trade winds providing a nice cool breeze.  Black tipped reef sharks circled the boat endlessly waiting for a handout. Snorkeling in the marine reserve proved to be spectacular as we saw the largest unicorn fish of the whole sailing voyage, manta rays, and several large sharks and a barracuda .  We hosted a party onboard AMARA with the seven other yachts in the lagoon. As a result we made some good friends to keep an eye on each other as we do our crossing of the Indian Ocean.  We were also able to catch up on the internet and reprovision in the local store, but had to pay dearly for it.  A head of lettuce was $9, bread was $8, and tomatoes were $2 apiece.   We made some friends that took us diving to a wreck with some great fish life and then crayfish hunting (clawless lobster).  

On our last day, we traveled over to West Island and got the full tour by our friends.  They were proud of having the only international airport that wasn't fenced in and was indeed the center of a golf course.  I didn't want to tell them that there is another unfenced international airport I'd been to in Antarctica.  Local life moves pretty slowly in these parts without much changing day to day.  There are only 80 adults living on West Island.  The one exception is that they have a perfect location for kiteboarding and have a school there that supports the sport.  We considered giving it a another go, but then decided we would be better off if we got an earlier start toward Mauritius.

We are currently 500 miles out to sea on our way to Mauritius, with 1700+ miles still to go, and the Indian ocean proving that it is indeed rougher than South Pacific.  We debated at length the pros and cons of sailing over the top of Madagascar versus under it and finally made the decision to sail beneath it, knowing that we will be more exposed to any of the dreaded storms coming up from the southern ocean.  I've finally found my sea legs again and have just finished reading the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, a book by Clayton Christiansen called "How to Measure Your Life" and also a book about the Australian outback.  Unfortunately the hard drive with all our movies aboard crashed, but we were able to salvage the TV series Newsroom and have been enjoying it immensely, tonight being our tenth and final episode.  You take what you can get when you're a at sea."

Amara's Current Position and Some Messages to Fellow Travellers:

"AMARA is at 14 degrees 27.3 minutes South and 87 degrees 41.4 minutes East doing 184 miles per day.
I think we are about 140 miles to the north east behind Sanctuary and ahead of Doug on Fellow Traveler.

After much consideration regarding Ken's council (another cruiser), we decided to head for Mauritius instead of Madagascar.

Christine, congrats on a 40 lb Mahi Mahi unless of course your 40+ meant you caught more than 40.  Save some for us!!"

Komodo Island and Manta Rays–Bali: Installment 2

Once we got the filtered gas and back in Amara's fuel tanks, we took off to Komodo Island.  Komodo Island is about a half a day sail from LBG.  

Right when we arrived at Komodo island, we jumped into the tender and headed for the tour of the island.  As we got closer, I could see the ground start to move.  I quickly realized that it was Komodo dragons coming out to see the tourists.  I think they have had enough bologna thrown their way that word has gotten out among them that the first one to the beach gets the food.  They came trailing out from all corners of the beach heading straight toward us.

Martin and Doug jumped right out of the tender and were able to get just close enough to snap a picture and then jump back into the boat.  The bacteria is so bad on these dragons that it can cause a terrible infection and worse case, death.

It was so amazing to see the Komodo's so close up.  We just sat in the tender and watched as they strolled the beach.

After sitting there for quite some time, we headed back to the boat to go diving in what was probably the most magnificent sea aquarium that I had ever seen.  I had never seen so much colorful fish and coral gathered together.

I think Martin and Made dove at least 3 times because the diving was so incredible.

We stayed near Komodo island for the rest of the day and then took off the next morning to go and dive with Manta Rays.  Made kept saying that we would really enjoy this next experience.  Having dived with Manta Rays in Tahiti and Suwarrow (Cook Islands) I wasn't sitting on pins and needles.

When we got to the spot where we were going to dive, there was a large commercial dive boat loaded with tourists and their were snorkels scattered throughout the water.  We decided to wait it out and let them have their time before we jumped in.  Again, I wasn't all that anxious.  You've seen one Manta Ray, you've seen them all.  I had become quite calloused.

Finally after the boat left,  we jumped in Amara's tender and headed for a spot smack dab in the middle of nowhere.  I was amazed that Made knew exactly where to drop us into the water.  The water was really rough and I hesitated getting in because I thought it might be a little too much for me.  Just then Made pointed and said, "There, jump in there."  As I looked over to where he was pointing, all I saw were fins poking out of the water.  Made said for us to get in and hurry!  Being curious, I jumped in without hesitation.  We swam for a little while to get closer to the fins and then ducked under the water.  I COULD NOT BELIEVE MY EYES!  We counted at one point 12 manta rays just swimming around us in circles.  Again the water was super rough, but non of us seemed to care.

Doug and his first encounter with a manta ray.

Martin reaching out to touch the manta ray while I swam underneath it.

We stayed out in the water for a good hour just playing with these amazing creatures.

On the chase.

Doug getting a closer look.

Martin is an amazing diver.  He can go incredibly deep in the water and stay down there for what seems forever.

In this photo of Martin, you can see three of the Manta Rays that seemed to just want to play with us.

After fighting the waves for an hour, we were all a little exhausted so we headed back to the tender where Made picked us up.  A few weeks after we were in this area, I heard on the news about a tourist boat carrying 25 passengers sank in this exact same area due to the waves being so high.  Here it is in the news.  

We had an amazing time visiting the islands in Indonesia close to Bali.  It really is a beautiful part of the world.  After we had our fill of diving, we headed for Bali which was a two day journey.  

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

Finally we arrived in Bali after being at sea for 5 days.  I was anxious to get to land.  Even more, I was anxious to get to a restaurant.  I had appointed myself as Amara's cook for those 5 days and was ready for a break from boiling potatoes and making spaghetti.  When we arrived in Bali, I was surprised by the teeny tiny marina.

Amara backing into it's slip at the Bali marina.

One thing about sailing in Indonesia is that the cruising community was almost non-existent.  The thing I love the most about cruising is meeting the other crews and owners of boats.  There were none where we were at and that was a tad bit disappointing for me.  But hey, we were in Bali, who can complain?

It is interesting to note that our port side engine failed about half way through our journey, even with our best intentions of trying to clean the gas.  Losing an engine isn't catastrophic while sailing, but it makes for an interesting and INTENSE time while getting into a TIGHT marina and backing your boat into the slip.  Martin did an amazing job getting Amara into such a tight spot and was able to maneuver her with ease.  I on the other hand was a nervous wreck.  We arrived right when all the tourist boats were filling up with passengers and we could see people clicking away on their cameras.  

Once we got in and settled into the marina, we immediately also became tourists.  We quickly found all the hotspots and some fabulous restaurants.  Bali is super inexpensive.  We ate like kings during our stay and our average meal for three people was always less than $50.

Made and Doug enjoying a typical Balisian meal.  Suckling pig, rice and potatoes. 

Hanging in Bali

I have some more great photos of us in Bali, so come back in a few days to see the last installment of our adventure!

                                                                    *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Meanwhile, Martin and his crew of three (David, Doug and John) are in the middle of the Indian ocean making their way to South Africa.  They arrived in the Cocos islands last Friday, stayed there for a few days and are now making their way to Maritius.  I talk to Martin via satellite phone almost everyday.  Yesterday Martin sounded pretty miserable since the wind was blowing at 24 knots and they were fighting their way through rough waters.  With that combination, there is no way to avoid a queasy stomach.  I talked to Martin again today and he sounded much better.  He said the wind had died down to 20 knots.  Although not that much of an improvement, at least he didn't feel quite as nauseas.  Martin and his crew are anxious to get to South Africa.  More news on their travels tomorrow...