When Chumpon called me to invite us to sail from the southeast coast to the southwest coast of Thailand (Samui to Phuket), I immediately said “yes” as I knew Jim loves to sail. I thought little about myself and whether sailing is my thing. Hmm.. It should be interesting to be in non-orientated (no land in sight) environment on the ocean for a half month.

Oct 4 – 6, 2009, Phuket, Thailand
Nothing significant done here; just some napping, lounging and generally goofing off. My Plumeria are all doing well. What an amazing plant. Just stick it in the ground and it will grow. No fertilizer, no root hormone, just add water.

Jim and I rode the motorbike 10 minutes down the road to buy some soil and gardening stuff from my friend in a neighboring town. We met a boy sitting in the wheelchair who gave us a big smile. He had trouble speaking when he said h….e…l….l….o to us. I learned that he is my friend’s son who has brain damage from being hit by a car one day when he was walking home from school. The driver was an expat who worked in a management position at a five stars hotel in Phuket. According to my friend, she received financial support for the first six months for hospital expenses. During those 6 months she kept receiving bad news from the doctor that her son would probably not make it. Then the expat guy disappeared. It has been six years and the boy is still in need of monthly hospitalization.

The reason I wrote about this is to point out it how strange it is that Thai laws don’t seem to protect the victim when it comes to a road accident. Three months ago my cousin lost his daughter in a car accident. The expat guy lost control of his car so his car flew from the other side of median in the opposite direction and hit my cousin’s daughter’s car. She died instantly. I was asked to be an interpreter in the negotiations with the expat. He offered 300,000 baht ($8572) compensation for the grievance and the life of my cousin’s daughter. I really felt like someone slapped me in the face. How dare he put a value of only $8572 on someone’s life? He didn’t know I was related to his victim, so he told me when there was a car accident that caused death in Thailand, the victim received 300,000 baht at most and because he is an expat the price would probably increase to 500,000 baht. It is sad and disturbing to hear of such attitude and thoughts. I am wondering if the guy has any conscientious or guilt or responsibility; and if he sleeps well at night. I don’t know if it is really true (Thai laws are that bad). My cousin, however, didn’t acccept this shameless offer and told the guy to go to hell. The case will be presented in court. I am curious to hear the verdict.

Oct 7 – 8, 2009, Koh Samui, Thailand
We got up early and packed our bags for our sailing trip. I had a backpack with 6 pair of shorts and 6 tee-shirts. Figured I could wash a set every other day. Swim fins, mask and snorkel rounded out my luggage. I also took a couple of hats, cameras and my toothbrush. I am ready to go. Sim’s luggage was a little more extensive but that is to be expected. Sim called Jai and he came to pick us up to take us to the bus stop. We met Pon there and at about 9:30 we boarded the bus to the town of Don Sak in Surat Thani province where we will take a 1.5 hour ferry ride over to the island of Ko Samui. The bus ride was OK. The seats were fairly comfortable albeit small. There was not enough headroom for me to walk the aisle to stretch my legs. I kept banging my head on lights and other stuff every time I tried. Leg room was marginal, but the bus was not crowded and I had no one sitting next to me. Sim and Pon sat together at the back of the bus.

We arrived at Don Sak at about 3: 00 after a couple of stops along the way for potty breaks and lunch. We all had to get off the bus, even though the bus was getting on the ferry too. So we could leave our stuff on the bus until we all got to Samui. The ferry was pretty full, but we found some empty seats up on the top deck where there was some shade and a nice breeze blowing once the ferry got underway. We got to Samui, got off the ferry, found the bus and got our stuff. Sim and Pon headed off to find a taxi. I was told to follow at a reasonable distance, pretend like I was not with them so they could negotiate a better rate on the taxi. Apparently the presence of a farang drives up the price. Once the price was negotiated, I was called up and we all got in the cab and headed off. We got to the Lawana Resort, dropped our bags at the front desk, met the other 2 guys that would be sailing with us and went out to eat. First things first in Thailand; EAT! After eating, we got in a dinghy and headed out to the boat. The boat is a 53 foot sloop rigged X-Yacht built in Norway. It is owned by 3 Thai guys and every year it needs to get from Samui to Phuket so it can race in the annual King’s Cup Regatta. There is a problem with the engine and it needs to be fixed before we can head for Phuket, so it looks like it will be a couple of days before we can take off. No problem. Sim and I got a room at the resort.

The boys are busy fixing the engine for two days. I help once in a while by winching up and down the engine using the sail winches while they replace the rear transmission seal that is leaking oil faster than it can be added at the top of the engine. We did take a break one morning so the owner of the resort could take some guests out on a day sail over to the island of Phang-ngan, home of the famous annual Full Moon Party. Apparently several hundred tourists come to the island in early October on the night of the full moon, and party on the beach. Based on the booze stands we saw on the beach, it looks like it is a night of drinking and revelry. We missed the party by a few days. We spent a couple of hours lounging, walking the beach, finding money dropped by the party goers, and just goofing around until it was time to head back to the resort. The owner’s guests, all from Hong Kong, slept the entire way back to the resort.

What a perfect sailing today. I was sitting on the deck the entire trip enjoying the nice breeze, the smell of the sea, and the beautiful clear blue sky. Umm.. I cannot wait to our big trip. I told Jim that I was 90% sure, I would be enjoying the 15 days sailing.

Oct 9 - 13, 2009, at sea and Songhkla, Thailand
The engine is back in order. Sim has gone shopping for supplies with our boat captain Lek, Chewy has fixed everything that he can find broken on the boat and Pon and I have had our fill of swimming in the resort pool. We must be ready to go. We pulled up the anchor and headed south for Phuket. We will sail down the east coast of Thailand to the Malay Peninsula. Then continue to the end where we will turn right and round the tip by passing Singapore. Then we will head north through the Straits of Malacca with Indonesia to our port and Malaysia to our starboard. After we leave the Straits, we will be back in Thai waters and keep going to Phuket. The voyage should take 10 days, give or take depending on weather and interesting stops we find along the way.

Our first night at sea, we had a beautiful sunset. Hope they are all like this. We sailed and motored all night. Chewy and Lek are doing the night watching and it looks like Pon, Sim and I will be doing the day watches. Navigation is a breeze. There are several GPS aboard. One hooked up to a chart plotter with real time position displayed on a nice 13” color display. The boat has autopilot, so you just plot out a course, enter the heading and press AUTO and away you go. The main problem was that the wind was a lot of the time on our nose so we could not sail and had to motor. We got used to the sound of the engine after a while, but it would have been more fun to sail a bit more. We did sail of course whenever the winds were favorable.


Our first couple of days at sea was spent becoming more familiar with the boat, finding a good spot to sleep and getting our sea legs. Sim was seasick the first few days, mainly due to the smell of grease and oil due to the repairs down below that remained for a few days and a lack of good ventilation in the cabin. So it was difficult for her to stay below for very long. The smell dissipated after a few days, Sim got her sea legs, and got over her seasickness. Our first stop was a small island about 80 NM south of Samui. Ko Kra is 30 NM off the east coast of Thailand, is uninhabited and looks just like one of the tropical islands you see in the movies. We spent 4 or 5 hours there. The boys went off to dive and get fish, while Sim and I went swimming, snorkeling and napped on the beach. Then it was back to the boat, weigh anchor and sail/motor all night. Our next stop was the harbor in Songkhla, 96 NM from Ko Kra, and we arrived in the very early morning. It was still dark and negotiating the channel was quite challenging. There are fishing nets that extent several hundreds of yards out into the channel. They have no lights on them so we were dodging them all the way up the channel to our anchorage spot. We arrived without taking out any nets and everyone crashed for a few hours of sleep. We are here to take on water and fuel. We are carrying about 30 five gallon jerry cans of diesel on the deck of the boat along with about 20 gals of water. The boat’s water tank holds about 150 gallons of fresh, but I have no idea how big the diesel tank is. Over the course of the trip, Chewy would put about 10 gals of fuel in the tank daily from the cans on deck.

After we all got up, we moved the boat into the queue at the fuel/water/ice dock. We were third in line behind fishing boats taking on fuel, water and ice in preparation for the next days fishing. We are the only sailing yacht on the water in these parts and get a lot of attention from the locals. We got our fuel and water and moved the boat over to the Police dock and tied up next to an 80’ police cruiser. It seemed odd to me to be blocking a police boat, but apparently there is not enough police business to be taking the boat out very often. They had a couple of 40 footers there as well which never left while we where there either.

Pon’s wife has a sister that lives in town so she dropped off her car and we were able to use it to go to this restaurant that Pon said had delicious food. We took 45 minutes at least to get to the place and it was crowded; always a good sign. We found a place to sit and were looking over the menu when our waitress came to take our order. There was a picture posted on the wall showing about 10 of the restaurants signature dishes, so Pon just pointed to that and said that what we want. The waitress said. “All of that?” Yep, all of them, plus two big pots of soup, and a couple bottles of Heineken please. We ate really well, and it was delicious, just as Pon had said.

Speaking of food, many of you may be wondering how we ate on the boat. Well we had fish. We had fish for breakfast, fish for lunch and fish for dinner. Cap’n Lek is a great cook. We had fried fish, boiled fish, curry fish, steamed fish, raw fish (the sashimi was to die for), and poached fish. The Thais are used to fish everyday and almost every day we caught fish by trolling lines behind the boat or from fishing at night if we were anchored at an island. I ate fish for lunch and dinner, but just cannot get into fish for breakfast. Sim bought cereal for me and a couple quarts of milk so that is what I had for breakfast every morning along with some decaf coffee.

It is here that we officially checked out of Thailand. For some reason all Thai have to check out when they leave the country. I had to check out because I am a foreigner but I have no idea why they do. In any event, we went to Immigration and it took several hours of waiting, filling out forms, officers consulting among themselves, re-filling out forms, passport stamping, paperwork stamping and whew, finally we were good to go.

The morning before we left everyone went grocery shopping except me. I volunteered to stay and watch the boat. They brought back a big load of food and it all fit in the boats gigantic refrigerator.

Oct 14 - 15, 2009 at sea and Tioman Island, Malaysia
We left Songkhla and headed south once again. Cap’n Lek got on the bow of the boat and offered flowers and food to the Thai god of the sea, praying for a safe journey for us as we left the harbor entrance. He also set off a string of firecrackers, which I was not expecting and nearly jumped off the boat when he set them off.

We were at sea for 3 days before stopping again. This stop was at Tioman Island in Malaysian waters. There is a big island and a small island. Naturally we stayed at the small island away from all the people and had the place to ourselves. We arrived at night and came in to the lee side of the island, found a mooring ball, tied up to it and went to bed. In the middle of the night when I got up to take a pee, in the moonlight I noticed that we were not where we started at the mooring ball. We had drifted almost all the way across the bay and were now about 100 yards off the next shore. Not knowing at what rate we were drifting or dragging the mooring, I woke up Chewy and he woke up Lek and they both checked the lines and the mooring ball. I guess the weight/anchor at the bottom of the mooring ball was not enough to hold this big of a boat so it bounced along the bottom all night as the wind pushed us to the opposite shore. They let out more line to increase the scope and we all went back to bed. Speaking of bed, I bet you are wondering where we slept. Most nights we slept up on deck, either in the cockpit that had a couple of bench seats with cushions about 6 feet long or up on the foredeck with one of the cushions. I slept OK, but woke up with a sore back several times. The most comfortable place was the forward cabin, but a lack of fresh air ventilation and a rough ride during inclement weather was the drawback down there. Sim can sleep anywhere anytime so it does not matter much to her. She did prefer sleeping topsides however. The boys slept anywhere and everywhere but, mostly on the transom seating area, on the couch in the dining area down below and on the foredeck.

In the morning we did some beachcombing and more napping. The boys went fishing and came back with fresh fish that they had speared. Lek prepared food. It was a great day. We had some visitors for the first time too. A group of Malaysians came in a small boat. They came to snorkel and play in the water. I think they were Muslim based on the head scarf the women wore. Interestingly they played in the water and even went snorkeling fully dressed, head scarves and all. The men too wore long pants and long sleeves shirts in the water. I am not sure if it was for religious reasons or sun protection.

Oct 16 -18, 2009 at sea and rounded the Malay Peninsula & Singapore
We are now approaching Singapore. It is daybreak and we have to be alert for the big freighters that ply these waters. We have traveled over 600 NM now without hitting anything and it would not be good to get in the way of one of these monster container ships. We are staying closer to shore and out of the main shipping lanes but these behemoths still cross or path ahead or behind us. I read that 55,000 ships make port in Singapore yearly. That is a lot of traffic. It takes us all day to round Singapore Island and head north towards Phuket. We have only 550 NMs to go.

We had some terrific squalls in this part of the Singapore Strait. You can see the squalls coming and you know you are going to get dumped on. When they hit, the wind increases in intensity, the temperature drops 5 to 10 degrees and the rain comes pouring down. On several occasions we used this opportunity to wash our hair and bodies, hoping the rain would not stop with a head full of shampoo.

We had only a couple of days where it rained for several hours and one night when it stormed all night long. We could not sleep up on deck and had to endure sleeping in the forward cabin with the boat rocking back and forth as well as pounding up and down. The mast boot leaked and water would come pouring in occasionally and soak your feet. It was quite fun. LOL.

Oct 19 – 20, 2009 Langkawi, Malaysia
We are on the water for the next 2 days and nights. Our next stop is Langkawi, an island in Malaysian waters. This is a big harbor, with lots of people, tourists and boats. We arrived at night but, most of the boats had their anchor lights on, and the lights from the town made entering and anchoring pretty easy. Now the official way to enter a foreign port is to anchor, raise the Q (called the Quarantine) flag and if it is after work hours, remain on the boat until a customs officers sees your Q flag and comes out to do your entry paperwork. But this is what we did; we anchored, launched the dingy and Chumpon, Chewy, and us went ashore. Our trip up from Singapore was rainy, squally and pretty wet. Sim and I wanted a bed with clean sheets and a proper shower so we checked out a couple of hotels. The Bay View wanted 3000 bath ($90.) for the night. Pass. We walked down to another hotel that was cheaper but it was really old and the room smelled. Not to be discouraged we walked down a main street and found a shop owner that had rooms upstairs for rent at 600 baht ($20) a night, air con, private bath with shower, internet access and TV. It was a done deal, so Sim and I stayed and the boys went back to the boat. The next day, we still did not bother to check in with the local immigration officials; instead we went shopping for vegetables, fresh fruit and supplies. I found a fishing tackle shop and was really tempted to buy a rod and reel, but they were just too darn expensive. I have been fishing with Lek at night and during the day when we are sailing. To troll, they just use 100 lb monofilament line wrapped around a 12 inch spool. Caught fish are brought in by hand. They use an ingenious device to know when they have hook up on the trolling line. A piece of bungee cord with some string and a couple pieces of wire to form 2 hooks are used along with an empty Pepsi/Coke can with a few rocks inside. The bungee is tied to the boat with the Pepsi/Coke can at the end. Off the Pepsi/Coke can is a string with the flexible wire hooks. The fishing line is tied with a slip knot to the Pepsi can line and the hooks are connected. When a fish strikes, the hooks come apart, the slip knot unties and the Pepsi/Coke can rattles. It was always funny to see everyone jump when the Pepsi can rattled. We would pull the boat out of gear or head up into the wind if sailing and haul in our fresh fish. At night, when Lek and I fished, we just used 20 lb. monofilament wrapped around a plastic water battle. We don’t need any fishing pole man. I caught several large, good eating fish on more than on night. Just have to watch out for the really big ones burning your fingers when they run for the rocks.

We left Langkawi without ever checking in or out to Malaysia. It all seemed just too easy, but no one ever came by the boat or even gave us a second look. We headed out and sailed for several hours before stopping at Ko Rock. I have forgotten the real name of these islands, but one was nothing but rocks, so Ko Rock it is. It is a national park island and known for its beautiful rocks. There are lots and lots of pretty rocks on one of the islands. Sim and I went ashore here and explored for a couple of hours. We did not take any of the pretty rocks, because there is a legend about a curse that will be set upon anyone that removes any rocks from the island. They even have a sign up telling you of all the bad stuff that will happen to you if you take any of the rocks. Sim forgot her shoes when we took the dinghy to the island, but we found about 12 singles that had washed up on the beach. These looked the best.

Lek and Chewy went fishing and clamming while Chumpon snorkeled. The boys came home with ten different kinds of fish and three gigantic clams.

So, now we have enough fish for lunch, we headed to a near by island called Lepae where there is a fresh water stream coming form the hills. We played and swam in the ocean for awhile and jumped into the pond of fresh water to rinse off the salt. Lek was planning to fish for some catfish from the fresh water. We need more fish?

Oct 21, 2009 at sea in the Straits of Malacca
We are back at sea for another day. The weather is much better now and we turned off the motor and sailed with main and jib for most of the day. It was heaven, except for the part when Pon started to tighten everything up and the heel angle got really high, and Sim fell off the windward rail and crashed in a heap in the cockpit. Except for that it was fun.

We arrived at the Thai island of Ko Rok just before sunset. This is our last stop before arriving in Phuket tomorrow. Chewy’s boss has been calling him for the last 2 days telling him to hurry up the delivery, so we cannot spend any time here. We will rest for a bit, eat and then head out again. The place is beautiful and Sim and I resolved to come back to spend some time here. Maybe rent our own boat and sail here for a week long getaway. Yeah! This is a Thai National Park so they supposedly charge for using the mooring buoys, but no one was around to collect. There was one other boat in the bay; a catamaran from the Moorings Charter Co. with a family with 4 kids. The kids were having so much fun.

Oct 22, 2009 Phuket, Thailand
We left Ko Rok after sunset and started out on the final leg of our journey. We arrived at the island of Phuket in the wee hours of the morning and since we had to go to the north end of the island, it took several hours to get to Yacht Haven Marina, our final destination. We arrived just after sunrise, dropped anchor and straightened up the boat and gathered up our belongings. Chewy’s folks have a restaurant on the water there and we went over to eat. Pon ordered a pizza. It tasted so good.

We have to check back into Thailand today, so we agreed to meet at Immigration down at the Chalong pier at 1:00. Pon dropped us off at the bus stop and Jai was called to pick us up. He drove us home where we showered and got cleaned up. I shaved for the first time in two weeks. LOL.

We headed out for Chalong, but Pon called and we stopped for him to catch up with us and then followed him to one of his favorite restaurants for a late lunch of noodles. They had 7 tastes there as well. 7 tastes is one of my favorite snack foods here. I forgot the Thai name but 7 tastes is a green leaf, some small dried shrimp, bits of ginger, bits of chilies, and small chunks of lime, peanuts, and shredded toasted coconut. Then there is a sweet brown sauce that goes with it. You fold the leaf to make a pocket, the put a pinch of each ingredient inside, spoon a bit of sauce on top, fold the leaf over to cover and pop it in your mouth. It is sweet, sour, spicy and delicious all at once. A taste explosion in you mouth. Yummy!

We all arrived at Immigration together, walked in and filled out more forms, got our passports stamped and we out and on our way in 30 minutes. Overall it was a great trip. We are already talking about doing it again next year. Don’t know if Sim will go however. Next time I am taking an air mattress and maybe a small tent to put on the deck so I can stay topside even in the rain. We are also taking more memory for the cameras because Sim’s camera got full half way into the trip. We travelled over 1000 Nautical Miles in 15 days and had a great time.

Oct 23 -24, 2009 Phuket, Thailand
All the next day we rested and relaxed. It felt good to be back on solid ground, sleep between clean sheets and take proper showers. I don’t think Sim could live the sailor’s life because she has to wash her hair at least every other day.

The end of October is a special time in Phuket. The annual Vegetarian Festival gets under way on Oct 18 and runs until October 26. In the old days during the tin-mining times a traveling Chinese Opera company came down with a mysterious illness and managed to cure themselves by adhering to a strict vegetarian diet. Impressed, Kathu (Phuket) residents adopted not only the vegetarian aspect, but also the variety of complex rituals related to the worship of the Nine Emperor Gods. The gods are welcomed on Oct 26 and sent off again on the 26th. In the meantime many of the residents are possessed by the gods. During this possession they are absorbing the evil sprits and feel no pain. To show this they pierce themselves with all sorts of fake guns, swords, plants, baskets, and steel rods. There are almost daily processions of these mah songs as they are called. Sim’s hometown has a Chinese temple so we went to one of the morning parades. We stood in the road just down from the temple and watch as some of the mah songs took axes and repeatedly swung them over their heads to strike their backs. Then other mah songs came up the road with all sorts of piercings through both cheeks. Some were taking knives and axes and rubbing their tongues on the blades until their chest was covered in blood. It was pretty gross, but really fascinating at the same time. Other more normal people dress in all white; abstain from meat, sex and alcohol for the duration of the festival. In the evening we went back to town to watch the mah songs climb a tower with steps made from sharp knives, then walk across a bed of nails. About a 1000 other people were there to watch as well.

You will have to go to our Picasa Web Albums to see the pictures at a later time. I cannot get at the last bunch of pictures I downloaded to the Mac of the Vegetarian Festival, because the power cord on the MacBook died and I am waiting for a new one coming from the US in Dec.

Oct 26 – 31, 2009 Phuket, Thailand
It is the last day of the festival. Sim and I dressed all in white, went into town and had a vegetarian lunch. We also abstained from sex and alcohol too. Tonight all of the nine emperor gods will be sent off at midnight. There is going to be a lot of drinking and fornicating after midnight. LOL.

Happy Halloween everyone! Not much Trick or Treating goes on in Thailand. We were out shopping this week and I did see some Halloween masks for sale. I did not see anyone dressed in a costume, but you should see what some of these tourists wear around here. You would think it might be a Halloween costume.

Happy Birthday to Tag, my brother-in-law, I missed your B-day because we were on the water, and to Todd and Sally, Tag and Judi’s kids. Their birthday is on Halloween.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2009 - BEESWAX FOR A BEEF BAYONET - LAMPANG: Youths in the North have found a dangerous new way to impress the ladies: a home-made penis enlargement therapy using beeswax. The new trend came to light when a 21-year-old unnamed man checked into hospital at the end of October with a badly infected member. The man sheepishly told doctors that he had injected his penis with warm beeswax to pump it up to a more impressive size. The trick worked perfectly at first, but after a few days his penis started to hurt. A nasty wound appeared where he injected the wax and continued to spread. The young man told doctors that he bought a tube of beeswax ointment used to treat cuts. He put it in hot water until it was soft enough, and then injected it straight into his penis. This was a very popular trick among Lampang’s young men, allowing them to gain an extra inch or so, he said. Doctors operated on the young man. While they managed to save most of the infected penis, they had to remove some tissue. When they are sure the infection is healed, they will transplant skin from another part of the youth’s body to try and restore his organ to its original appearance, doctors said. As for whether the man’s penis would still be able to work as well as before the impromptu enlargement, doctors said it was too early to know. Dr Sirichai Phataranuthaphon from Lampang Provincial Public Health Office implored youths in the province not to follow in the unfortunate patient’s footsteps. Provincial authorities cannot legally prevent youths from trying to enlarge their genitals because it is their personal right, but they should be aware of risks that include infection and potentially fatal septic shock, he said.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< PHOTO OF THE MONTH >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


Buckets of booze for sale on the island of Phang-ngan
for the Full Moon Party.