Lovina to Kumai Day 1 - Fishing boats and oil rigs

Caduceus
Martin and Elizabeth Bevan
Tue 10 Nov 2015 12:00

Position           06:21.61 S 114.11.53 E

Date                1200 (UTC+8) Tuesday 10 November 2015

Distance run    In 21hrs 15mins 125nm over the ground, 128nm though the water

Trip total         125m over the ground, 128m through the water

 

Monday morning was busy as Elizabeth went off with the excellent Zai to shop at Carrefour in Singaraja and I dropped he genoa hauled out the sewing machine and re-stitched the leach of the sail.  Both tasks took up the complete morning and I finished just in time to respond to the call from shore for a pick up.  We got away at 1445 and headed for a 12 mile pass between an island and reefs at 65nm aiming to pass through in the middle of the night.  As there was some wind the temptation to try and sail was too much and this slowed us down a little.  We did hope to get away from the risk of fish attracting devices, or more accurately yacht attracting devices before it got dark but as dusk fell we could still see the odd one in the distance waiting to trap the unwary.  Our luck on this occasion was in.

 

Indonesian yacht attracting device – we understand that they also attract fish

 

We also encountered an interesting selection of other obstacles.  The gap that we were heading through is currently the site of a very large anchored gas or oil platform, it appears to be a focus for half the shipping in south-east Asia and of course there are the ubiquitous fishing boats.  The Mate coped manfully with that little lot and handed over to me at 0100 facing a wall of 8 to 10 fishing boats in random motion across our path.

 

The wind of course dropped away after a few hours and it was on with the engine.  The forecast shows wind strengths of 1 to 2 knots for the whole passage so we will have to take what benefit we can.  We are resigned however to basically engining our way through the remainder of Indonesia.  We are very much at the end of the South East monsoon when the wind dies away to nothing.

 

One of our smaller targets in the light of day