Belitung 7th – 16th October

Oh my, Belitung and it’s people are just tops and this is one clean island. The people are just wonderful and once we go ashore, they crowd around practicing their English and asking if they can take our photos with them. The children have obviously been learning English and we learn that most of our appointed Guides are their teachers.

Of course, we are taken on tours of this lovely island to visit the dam that the Dutch miners built in the early 1900s which is very impressive except they don’t catch the water and pipe it to anywhere, it just pours over the spillway. We visit the main city of Tajung Pandan that houses the museum/zoo – sorry to say the birds here are housed in very small, barren cages and the crocodiles and snakes also have small enclosures but the exhibits in the museum are very good. They have a small resident monkey here who makes a beeline for the crew while she is walking around (why do they do that?) but by her actions the keeper realizes she is not taken with the little …. and steps on his chain to avoid contact. Thank you. 

The Dam

The bus - pretty fancy eh?

One of the guides and three of his students

We also visit a smaller museum on the eastern side of the island before lunching with the Regent of East Belitung who is a very well educated man and speaks excellent English. These lunches are spectacular, the food is prepared by local people and it just keeps coming. Because Belitung is the rally’s exit point the majority of boats are here and there was over 100 people for lunch. Following this lunch we are taken up into the hills to visit a Buddhist temple – absolutely spectacular views from up here but unfortunately the gardens are suffering from diminishing Buddhist occupation – none the less, the temple has been kept in good order.

 Entrance to the Temple

The entourage at the temple - extra cars needed for this trip

Each day brings something new either in the form of a tour or meeting a local family who are more than happy to have you come into their home. We met, through one of our guides, a couple who are relatively influential on the island (he owns the petrol stations) and they could not do enough for us. We are treated to lunches, shopping, sightseeing (all of which we are not allowed to pay for) and told that now we are part of their enormous family. They both adore children and are godparents to over 60 (including our guide). They have 8 children of their own and conduct classes once a week in their large home. We invite them to visit our boat but they decline as they suffer from seasickness and are not keen on being on the boat so we give them a photo of the boat and a hat with ‘Bluestone’ on it. It seems very little after what they have given us but is accepted with enthusiasm and graciousness. 

We hope they liked the hat and photo

Lunch with our new friends - also friends from the yacht 'Amulet

A private visit to a school is also scheduled via our guide as she is a teacher there and four of us are taken to meet the children and teachers. We have to stand in front of the entire school and talk with microphones answering questions fired at us from the students. Absolutely delightful. 

One tour takes us to a natural mountain spring that feeds into man-made swimming pools where we are very grateful for a cold dip after a hot day in the bus. Once again, we are spoilt with food and drinks and entertained by the dancing lions below.

The people of Belitung love their recreation and the coast is lined with lots of small huts that serve as restaurants that they frequent at the weekends. There are many picnic-type tables and chairs everywhere and also, I am pleased to say, rubbish bins! At one such location our hosts offer to buy us the traditional ice cream and we happily accept. Well, this is a first, the ice cream is made from the local fruit Durian quite a nice tasting sweet fruit we have had previously and the ice cream is the consistency of gelati – nice – however, this is then served in a small hotdog roll. Hmmm, first taste is very unusual but it turns out that the roll is the perfect receptacle for the gelati and by the time we munch our way through this concoction we all agree it was very nice.

One local proudly shows us a model of his fishing boat

Someone wanted her photo taken at our favourite eatery

 Our anchorage is also lined with these restaurants and while the rally is here they are open every day. So most nights we enjoy the local noodles, rice, calamari or fish and vegetables for a very small price. We managed to find a restaurant that served cold Beer as well – YAY from the captain. One restaurant owner remembered the skipper well as he would say every time he ordered dinner “tidak timun” which means “no cucumber”. The owner would then call out to him each time he saw us “tidak timun” whether we were at the restaurant or not. They have a good sense of humour.

Each night entertainment was undertaken on the huge stage and dancing and singing ensued as the guides would drag us up to dance with them. We were also encouraged (dragged) to join in the traditional dancing and once again, laughter is paramount.

Now, I have to say, the skipper has a new friend. The Regent of West Belitung is his new best friend. While attending a kite-flying afternoon at the beach, skipper is asked to sit with the Regent for the afternoon. They hit it off and the regent made sure there were plenty of journalists taking photos with him and Neil. We actually made the papers twice while we were there being interviewed for the ‘Sail Indonesia 2010’ page. We also lunched with this Regent and again, made the media with photos aplenty. A strange phenomena occurred during the kite-flying demonstration in that the sun produced a huge, perfect rainbow halo around it which brought oohs and aahs from the locals. The skipper thanked the regent for organizing it. I think that won him over.

Mr Neil, the diplomat

Instruction from the Regent on how to fly the kite

Now an expert !

(with the Regent) My new buddy .... Mr Neil

Welcome to the Regent's house

Lunch is served... traditional-style

A slightly more formal Regent after lunch

We could rave on for ages about this island but we have to leave (as Immigration and Customs have said we must leave on the appointed date) so we bid farewell after taking 8 guides and their friends out to the boat to have a look and have photos taken with them. We both feel that we would like very much to return to Belitung and spend some time just exploring and mixing with these lovely people.

Not once have we felt unsafe or threatened while we have been in Indonesia and very least of all at Belitung. The island has homes constructed of timber and concrete not like the traditional huts seen on Rote, Sabu and Sumba and they are the most pleasant people who love to talk with us always asking our permission first. A few of our guides also asked us to their homes but unfortunately time ran out. We arrange to keep in touch with them via email and hope that we can once again visit Belitung.

One of our guides and the two journalists who interviewed us presented us with drinking mugs emblazoned with their photos as parting gifts so we will always remember them. And a couple of days later we receive phone messages asking us where we are and are we ok. 

Farewell from the guide and journalists

Our 5 day sail up to Malaysia gives us plenty of time to reflect on the wonderful time we have had since arriving in Kupang almost 3 months ago. Our main aim was to get to Malaysia and to tolerate Indonesia as we have to go through it to get the Malaysia, but now, we feel very differently. We are not saying that everywhere in Indonesia you will get the same warm welcome and definitely the rally has a lot to do with the local people accepting us and treating us so well, but we feel deep down the Timorese and Indonesian people are a gentle, generous and happy people who so much want to learn western ways and fit in with the world in general. They have so little and give so much, a lot of westerners could take a lesson or two from them.

We crossed the equator into the northern hemisphere at approximately 0400 hours on 18^th October. We toasted Neptune and thanked him for a safe journey thus far. Hopefully, the next few months will be as good.

Bali - September 2010

Lovina Beach, Bali is our next anchorage and here we can pick up our extended visas and head on up to Kalimantan (Borneo)…. Or not? We have heard via the cruising grapevine that there has been a recent increase in the risk of Malarial outbreaks in Kumai and we are not convinced that sailing all that way to see some Orang Utans, with the increased Malaria risk hanging over our heads, is what we want to do. Maybe we can visit the famous Singapore Zoo and see them there.

Our overnight sail from Lombok began quite uneventful until it came to crossing the Lombok Strait. At one stage here we had 5 ships registered on our radar and we were in the middle! Lombok Strait is a busy shipping channel and they seem to appear out of nowhere to converge on us. They of course, are going a lot faster than a yacht. Skipper has cause to call at least one tanker on the radio who seems to be on a collision course (or near enough) with Bluestone and after a bit of negotiating with another tanker, all 3 of us change course to avoid a close encounter. Phew. A fellow cruiser likened crossing this strait to “a mouse crossing a room full of cats” - not quite that bad but busy enough. As the night wears on it is apparent the Skipper is coming down with some sort of flu virus most probably caught from the Resort owner who has been coughing and spluttering for a week previous – passed onto his visiting sister-in-law and subsequently to him. The crew is keeping her distance.

After dodging the many ‘fish trap’ contraptions that litter the seas in Indonesia, the anchor is firmly set in Lovina Beach and the skipper retires to try to catch some sleep while the crew visits a nearby cruiser for a haircut. We hear that we need to take many copies of ship’s paperwork ashore and ‘clear in and clear out’ – what the? We have already cleared in to Indonesia, why do we have to do this again? Well they will have to wait until we are ready and skipper is well enough to go ashore. Secretly we hope that if we slip under the “official radar” we can just leave without all the hoo haa of lots of paperwork. Not to be, apparently we need “port clearance” papers from here that state our preferred port for “clearing out” of Indonesia. Darn it, but we don’t want to be delayed in Indonesia do we, so a quick run to shore and amazingly all is finalized efficiently and without fuss. At least we got out of the “clearing in” process which apparently was woeful. We then took a stroll along the waterfront shops and restaurants before returning to Bluestone for the skipper to continue his recouperation.

One of the many UNLIT fish traps

The statue that was our landmark to come into the anchorage

One shopping alley

And.. the elaborate entrance to another shopping alley

A few days later poor skipper is still under the weather and we sit and watch a good many of the boats depart for their next destination. We will wait another day or two. While we wait we manage to take a walk along the main road and visit the local market (sights and smells you have never experienced), a small supermarket (amazing how the skipper manages to find these little supermarkets), an internet café and ATM. We are also able to take in some dinners on the foreshore restaurants with a few cruisers we haven’t seen in a while. All very nice but we need to start moving again and skipper is just well enough to take a day trip to the next overnight anchorage at Raas Island. Funny though, the crew has a scratchy throat!

We have a leisurely cruise (no wind again) to Raas and arrive only just before the sun completely disappears to anchor quite a way off shore but secure enough for a night’s sleep. The morning sees us depart for Bawean Island which will incorporate an overnight sail. (Crew now has really sore throat). Bawean is very pretty – from the boat at least – and we speak to a couple here from South Africa on the last leg of their circumnavigation. We don’t go ashore at Bawean but have heard some very nice reports about the people and the island. We do however, meet some local fishermen after some food and water again. They were also after some sunglasses, binoculars, fenders etc., but ‘no go’ guys, a couple of Red Bull drinks, some biscuits and an old cap we had in exchange for some fish and they went away very happy. So fish it was for tea. Not bad. A couple of good nights’ sleep and we can depart for Belitung which will be our last official stop and ‘clearing out’ place before heading to Malaysia.

Crossing the Java Sea was not a walk in the park. The weather has been slowly deteriorating since we left Bali and at Bawean it does not look like improving much. However, the South African cruisers depart and inform us via radio that it’s not that bad out there. So we depart next morning confident that “not bad” is in fact not bad. Huh! Twice we talk ourselves out of turning back, thinking it’s going to get better.....and eventually the squalls and seas do subside and we continue on. The first night the crew counted 5 thunderstorms 4 off in the distance and 1 close enough to just kick us with its tail on the way past – phew! Second day no wind, no storms, no rain just humidity plus (crew feeling poorly today and the humidity does not help) so a shower on the foredeck is required to cool off and clean off. At least now the seas have abated to just a gentle roll and meals can again be prepared without bruises. Third day looms overcast, rainy, thunder and squalls but nowhere near the first day’s strength thank goodness. The Java sea is the colour of charcoal and relatively calm even through the thunder and wind – strange. Fourth day, finally, after dodging shipping and brightly lit local fishing boats throughout the night we arrive safely at the anchorage. Just prior to entering the anchorage we spy our friends on ‘Amulet’ emerging from the rain fog, they have been stooging around (‘jilling’ around actually) waiting for the visibility to clear so they could make their way into the anchorage. So we both enter together during a short lull in the weather under the guidance of those already anchored. Ahh, our own bed again – not the cabin floor or couch. (Crew is not keen on 4 day crossings).