Sail with Jenny in the fjords of Norway

Archive for September, 2013

A small paradise in the Indian Ocean – a good stop for us.

Arrived Cocos Keeling anchorage mid day Wednesday 18 September – and it was a good
feeling when the anchor was set in 7m of crystal clear water.
This is a little paradise atoll in the Indian Ocean (part of Australia) with green/blue water, white sand, dolphins playing, sharks, turtles, manta rays which has a cleaning station just outside the anchor, beautiful white birds and nice very clear water. There are three islands – Direction Island, Home Island and West Island. We are anchored at Direction Island and it is a long dingy ride to Home Island where most of the people live.

Saturday 21. September we had a barbecue at the beach with all the yachtees.
All the boats in the anchorage are more or less going the same route to South Africa so we have decided to have a net on the short wave radio
together. It feels good to know that there are boats out there on the way to Mauritius which is 2300nm away.

We have been working with repairs and doing maintenance work more or less since we came, the kick was the most important and it is now fixed with a new hole through the deck, because the fitting for the hydraulic hose in the mast broke. But we also have had time to go swimming and snorkeling, the water is much colder here that in Indonesia and at night we put on sweaters and trousers – what a change. I will also dig out the duvets before we leave, we do not need them here, but my be when we get closer to Mauritius. The boat is now slowly getting ready for one of the longer passages – and we hope it will be a good with fair wind and not to many problems. We will keep you updated – the plan is to leave Tuesday if the weather forecast is ok. We always have some butterflies in our stomachs before a long passage and therefore we do a lot of preparations. I have made a lot of dinners that are just ready to be heated up after our experience with the disturbed sea on the way to Cocos, because we do not
expect it to get any better on the next leg.

Cocos Keeling here we come!

The day has been good and we made 192nm on 24hours, so the passage will be fast but not comfortable the sea is very disturbed. The day was very nice with less wind but in the afternoon the wind and the sea came up again. Lucky for us that we had sailed us upwind so we
could bear off a little. Just now there are a lot of rain showers around us which means squalls and more sea, but it is good to get the salt of the boat, sometimes we have been a little submarine.

I do not even want to think about that this is a very short passage compared to the ones we have to do before get to South Africa, but still we have a good time specially when we get to new places.

The boys managed to put out the fishing line today – there was two bites but we never saw any fish, which was a disappointment for them
(but not for me). We also had some dolphins visiting the boat and it was great to see them again it has been a long time since we saw dolphins playing around the boat.

We have a problem with the “kick” the “hydraulic cylinder” that holds the boom down, there is a leakage in the hydraulic hose to it because  we found oil on the deck. That is one of the issues that have to be fixed when we get to Cocos Keeling. Another one is that we can not get the vents on the deck watertight. There are not a single day without maintenance so it is good that the skipper is a handy man.

The wind has just dropped dramatically so I have to go out and see what I can do with the sail.
(One hour later) Nothing to do about the sails there are black clouds all around us so I will not put out more sail before they have passed. I can see the light of the day and that is always nice to know that in an hour it will be daylight.

Our eta is still tomorrow morning – only one more night watch and we will be in azure blue clear water again – and a new place for us.
Cocos Keeling belongs to Australia so we need visa which was very easy to get online.

All good for now the wind picked up and a rain shower came along with it, so the boat got a nice wash from fresh water.

All good for now
Crew on Jenny

Reisebrev Jenny 17. September 2013

Det Indiske hav er akkurat så urolig som ryktet sier.

Som de fleste sikkert har fått med seg forlot vi Singapore i midten av august med nytt mannskap ombord – Svein Jarle fra Kvinesdal. Kursen var satt mot Bali, men pga. sterk motvind ble det ikke Bali denne gangen. Etter at vi traff våre gode venner Maria og Warren på Nightfly på Biletong dro vi rett til Jakarta.

Som vanlig var det endel saker og ting å reparere (kjøleskap og rortetning) vi lå i Jakarta i 10 dager mens gutta gjorde vedlikehold og jeg forsøkte å komme igang med studiene igjen (nytt semester denne gang “High performance leadership”). Yacht club Batavia var et fint sted å være, men selve Jakarta som beboes av 12mill innbyggere var et trist sted å være (kloakk, søppel og skitt overalt). Bortsett fra alle de flotte kjøpesentrene uten folk, men det var det kun meg som syntes og ikke gutta. Vi hadde tenkt å reise til Bali eller Java for litt sightseeing, men vi ønsket oss klart vann og rein luft å puste i så vi dro så fort vi fikk delene vi hadde bestilt.

Inngangen til marina Batavi var kun 1,8m dyp på høyvann så vi ploget oss både inn og ut, men det gikk bra. Vi dro onsdag ettermiddag ut av havnen og det var en stor lettelse, for oss alle.

Vi satte kursen mot Sunda stredet og fikk god vind og fant en fin ankerplass rett før mørket senket seg og kunne for første gang på lenge kose oss i cockpiten uten å bli oppspist av myggen som herjet vilt med oss i Jakarta.
Vi hadde enda 2 overnattingen før vi kom oss ut i det Indiske hav og søndag morgen satt vi kursen mot Cocos Keeling.
Det har vært mye sjø og vind – til tider veldig ubehagelig ombord, men det er vel bare noe en må vende seg til for det Indiske hav er beryktet for sin krappe sjø som ofte kommer ombord (vi har hatt flere i cockpiten de siste dagene).
Nå har vi ca. 200nm igjen til Cocos Keeling og vi gleder oss til å svømme igjen i krystallklart vann, men som alltid er det litt ting må repareres også denne gangen før vi setter kursen videre mot Mauritsius.  Vi har fått lekkasje i hydraulikken til “kicken” (stangen som holder bommen nede) så vi har fått en masse hydraulikkolje på dekk. I tillegg må vi få tett ventilatorene i salongen for det kommer stadig ned vann gjennom dem. Så livet er ikke helt en dans på roser, men vi har det bra og føler oss fremdeles veldig priviligert som får lov å oppleve dette.
Om et år er vi hjemme i Norge til en helt annen hverdag så vi nyter hvert minutt av turen selv om det til tider er litt strabasiøst.

Ja, dette var den Norske utgaven av statusoppdateringen, for dere som sikkert har savnet litt reisebrev på Norsk.

Vi legger det inn under oppdateringer underveis, men sender dere samtidig gjennom min kjære tante.

Hilsen Eli og “gutta”.

Left Jakarta and Indonesia

Thursday 12 September at high tide we finally managed to leave Jakarta and for all of us it felt like a relive escaping from the very polluted dirty city with all the mosquitoes.

We got both our parcels (the gator and the control unit for the freeze) with good help from the Norwegian Embassies.
Our further sightseeing plans was skipped due to a lot of maintenance work (engine, wash down of the mast, gator repair, etc. etc.), and our desperate needs to get out of the town. But again the people of Indonesia are very friendly and nice and we never felt unsafe walking in the city. The last day after checking out I managed to take the “boys” to the shopping mall and to a nice Indonesian restaurant (Oasis) with local food and music, but we had to little time to really enjoy it.

After we left the marina we had a very nice sail to the outer island of Jakarta and stopped for the night outside a village. Next morning we repaired the main sail halyard before we set off to Sunda Strait. Before rounding into the Sunda Strait we were circled by an Indonesian Frigate  which was escorting a large bulk carrier that was on fire. At night we anchored of the main land before dark and next morning there was no wind so we had to motor some time before the wind came up so much that we had to put in two reefs and hide in the channel for the night. I made pizza and we went early to bed but because of the wind we did not get so much sleep.
Today Sunday 15th September we left our shelter and set the course for Cocos Keeling, it is still a lot of wind, but the forecast tell us it will come down tomorrow. We have good speed and at the moment we have an ETA for Cocos K. early morning Wednesday.

More news tomorrow, as you know the first day at sea is not very pleasant.
Lucky me I only have one more hour to go on may first night watch.