Malaysia
Casamara
John & Susan Simpson
Sun 19 Jan 2025 11:55
When we leave Casamara for extended periods of time whilst we travel on land it’s important to find a safe place to keep her. It’s best if she’s stored out of the water and somewhere with access to maintenance services so that we can keep her in good condition for when we eventually return to her to continue our sailing journey. In SE Asia there aren’t many places that fit the bill as not many boatyards have a crane big enough to haul out her 33 tons weight. It’s a skilled job too to stand her on her keel and chock her up safely. Fortunately, we discovered Pangkor Marina on the western side of Malaysia, about 130 miles north of Kuala Lumpur. Storing Casamara here until August puts us a bit further north than we needed to be to continue our journey across the Indian Ocean, but there weren’t really any other suitable options to avoid the detour. A bonus point was that we were able to store Casamara under cover. The sun is so strong here that plastic fittings and ropes degrade very quickly if they’re exposed to the sun all the time, so leaving Casamara in the shade is much better for her. That did mean we had to have her mast lifted off, which was a scary operation, but it also gives us the opportunity to have a close look at the mast whilst it’s on the ground and to do any maintenance necessary before we set off again. We were able to supervise the mast removal before we returned to the UK for Christmas but had to wait for the space in the shed so hadn’t seen her in situ until our return on 12th January. We are pleased to report that she’s looking very good tucked up under cover. There was a slight issue that she’s a bit too long for the shed for her to be completely under cover but that has been solved by stringing up some garden netting over her bow.  Lifting Casamara’s mast prior to putting her in the shed  Casamara in the shed with bow shaded under netting. Her boom and rigging are on the ground to the right and her mast is wrapped in netting outside the shed. So, after a wonderful few weeks visiting family and friends in the UK, we returned to Casamara with our suitcases fully laden with stuff that’s just easier to get in the UK. We’d also had a box of spares shipped from the UK for items that can’t be sourced in Malaysia so we had quite a bit of unpacking and putting away to do when we got back. We’re very aware that, whilst we’re not going to be sailing again until August, when we do set sail again we’ve got thousands of miles of sailing to do and it will be difficult to find spares. This last visit to the UK felt like a real milestone in our 5 year journey because all the talk of ’next year’ was about the final leg home. When we set sail again in August we will go south to Indonesia, then across the Indian Ocean to Cocos Keeling (an Australian protectorate), Mauritius, Reunion and South Africa. In South Africa we will make our way to Cape Town by Christmas 2025. From there we will go to Namibia, across the South Atlantic to St Helena and on to Brazil. From Brazil we will head north to the Caribbean, then onto Bermuda, the Azores and home, arriving in the UK in June 2026. It seems incredible that this will be the final leg of the journey and easy to forget that we still have 15,000 miles to go! Flying to and from the UK via Kuala Lumpur international airport gave us the opportunity to see a bit more of Malaysia as the journey takes 3 to 4 hours each way in a taxi. What struck us immediately was the extent of palm oil cultivation here. For virtually the whole journey all you can see is row upon row of palm trees, stretching out in neatly planted rows. Palm oil is the most widely consumed vegetable oil in the world and has many uses in foods, cosmetics, biofuel, detergents, pharmaceuticals, etc. Palm oil trees were a British import to Malaysia in the 1870s, shipping the plants originally from Nigeria. They were first cultivated for their oil commercially in 1917 in Selangor, one of the towns we drove through on our route to the airport. By the 1960s Malaysia had become the world’s largest exporter of palm oil and by 2012, in response to international incentivisation schemes, more than 15% of Malaysia’s land area was given over to palm oil plantation. Today it’s recognised that there’s an enormous impact on the natural environment when such huge areas are cultivated to grow one species of plant. The European Commission decided in 2019 that the use of palm oil in fuel should be phased out by 2030 and this has created tensions with the Malaysian government. They argue that the U turn in policy is an example of rich nations trying to impoverish poor ones. Malaysia has adopted a number of sustainability initiatives in an attempt to respond to environmental concerns.  Palm oil cultivation Some things we were pleased to discover about Malaysia: people are as friendly, helpful and welcoming as they were in Indonesia; they use 3 pin electric sockets like the UK; they drive on the left; the Malay language is so similar to Indonesian that I was unable to detect a difference. I don’t know how the people of those nations would view that last statement, but I was just so pleased that I could still understand some of the signs and labels!  Pangkor Marina Island accommodation. We are staying in D’Ocean; the other block is called D’Sea!  A typical street scene in the towns along the Malaysian west coast Over the next few months we will be travelling overland in SE Asia before a brief return visit to check on Casamara at the end of March. So a few days ago, it was back in the taxi and past all the palm trees to KL airport where we hopped on a flight to Bangkok to experience life in Thailand. |