Sadly this stop has brought extremely sad news. After we anchored we found out that our Australian friend Steve Nisbet died following a heart attack at 02:00 a.m. whilst anchored in Sugai Santi Bay having rounded Singapore, the anchorage that we had left the day before. We did the Indonesian Rally with Steve and his wife Lorraine in 2011 and celebrated Steve’s 60th birthday with a big 60’s party in Pangkor, Malaysia in October of that year.

This year they bought a new bigger boat called Patamba like their previous boat. Not having seen them for a while we were looking forward to sailing with them again and enjoyed the East Malaysian Rally inaugural dinner to kick things off.  Steve looked well and was in excellent spirits, he was so pleased with the new boat and excited about this rally.

Neither of us can grasp what has happened. We last saw Steve early in the morning at Danga Bay in Johor state. He helped to cast off our lines and said goodbye as we left to do the Singapore passage the day before them. It is so nice that he had some time to enjoy the new boat and feel the pleasure of the rally starting. We have been anchoring overnight in the islands wondering where they might be and looked out for Patamba as we got in sight of the anchorage here.  The rally just won’t feel the same now, this has had a sobering effect on this small flotilla and we are now thinking of Steve’s wife Lorraine. She has lived through the yachtswoman’s nightmare, they were alone in the anchorage when this happened and she had great difficulty getting help; being a nurse she knew the worst had happened. Eventually and thankfully the authorities were alerted and took over to enable her to have a proper cremation and Christian Service which she says was very helpful to her. The yacht was taken back to Danga Bay by a friend who was still there and not on the rally so for the time being sailing vessel Patamba is okay.

Lorraine is now with friends and family back in Australia where there will be a memorial service. She is considering selling the boat. All so very difficult for her but at least she knows that this was a very happy time for Steve as he was so delighted with their new boat as well as being on this rally but at just 61 it feels very sad indeed.