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08:22.143S 123:24.63E
Friday 10th
September
Kuwala, Leba Leba Bay,
Lewoloba town.
Dawn was magnificent at
7 a.m. the big orange sun just rising behind the mountains of the island of
Partar we had passed during the night, and which had so many fish traps. The
sun lit up the smoke emanating from the Lewotolo volcano on Lomlen Island, now
known as Kuwala. We could smell the sulphurus odour emanating from it,
before we had boiled eggs for breakfast that is!
The mountains of the island
of Pakara passed during the night are lit up by the sunrise
Having
tea motoring beside the smoking volcano of Lomolomo
We
could just see the smoke out of the crater of the volcano on the opposite
island of Adunara
A
cruise ship was in the harbour, we watched it motor away towards Kupang, so
the AIS on our computer told us
Ollie
got up in time to take this photo of David and I with the Boling volcano behind
us at 5, 440 feet
Here’s
the proof that he’s up in time to see the views
Captain’s log:
As dawn
broke we were awed to see two beautiful smoking volcanoes quite an awesome
sight, like a pair of massive breasts. With the risk being too Freudian we
had to dive between the magnificent cleavage to enter the harbour we were
motoring at a sedate 6.5 knots, then I glanced at the GPS to see we were
covering the ground at over 10 knots!
The town of Lewaloba was rather
disappointing. Lots of houses on stilts close to the anchorage, and a lot of
plastic debris floating around us, and plastic floats holding up very large
nets close to the shore
Boats like this man’s are the bane
of our life on night passages, he has bright lights to catch the fish with,
but
They do not see us, and we could easily
run them down if they had their lights turned off at any stage
This is the first Dhow we have seen with
a mast
Kanaloa anchored just behind with the
same volcano view
We find a jetty to get ashore, and see
all these people waiting for the ferry!
Luckily, we meet up with Kalib, the
captain of a tug. He speaks reasonable English, as he used to work in Dubai,
helping with the building of Palm Island. He lives on an island close to
Java, but hardly ever goes home.
He rang his agent to see if he could
arrange for us to have 500 litres of fuel, and transport into town to pay for
it. However, nothing happened, so we decided to walk, needing the exercise.
David had not been off the boat for seven days, due to his skin infection!
Virtually no cars or buses, just mopeds,
of the quieter variety thankfully, here a 30km speed limit on the wall.
I am still astonished to see a Church
being constructed, in what is meant to be a Muslim country! Obviously
Indonesians are being very respectful now of the Christian upbringing that so
many of their population have received. After hearing on BBC world news that
New Yorkers went crazy at the possible construction of a mosque in their city
on the day of the 9/11 memoriam, it’s nice to see the opposite
happening in an overwhelmingly Muslim State.
We found the TELECOM building, and found
they had ‘speed’ internet. No quite as speedy as we would have
wished, but at least we could send and receive emails! David also managed to
get a connection on his i-phone, but once he changed the SIM card to a local
one we bought in a small store, to keep in touch with ‘KALIB’ he
lost the connection again! Never mind, at least we had been able to advise
our nearest and dearest that all was well on board after 7 days out of
contact!
‘Kalib’ helped us negotiate a
delivery of fuel with this driver. However, first of all we had to check out
if we could come alongside the pier with Kanaloa.
Ollie is carrying the fruit I had just
managed to buy along the roadside. Very expensive apples, melon that had
been imported by a Chinaman. There was no market that David noticed here,
when he was whisked away by a young lady on her motorbike to go to the fuel
station. She spoke good English, as she had lived in Cardiff for one year.
She saw David walking alone on the roadside and offered him a lift, very kind
of her. Ollie and I were doing internet at the time.
This is Kalib’s tug, a real rust
bucket!
He invites us on board to meet the rest
of his ‘two’ crew.
Here’s Kalib on his
‘captain’s seat’ We see no navigation instruments, no log,
no depth sounder, NOTHING. He seems to just operate with charts and a
compass. No wonder the tugs do not see us when they are towing barges at
night!
We check out the ferry dock and
ship’s dock to see if there is room for Kanaloa. There’s room,
but it’s too rough for us to lay alongside, its for ships, not smart
yachts!
We enjoyed a rest back on board, watching
the numerous white bellied eagles fishing amongst the fish nets
The
town proved to be rather disappointing, we tried to buy 500 litres of diesel,
but it meant going alongside a very bad quay - I doubt if we would have had
much of a boat left if we had tried it. Still we did manage to find an ATM
for Ollie and do a little shopping.
Position 08:22'.15s 123:24'.62e
Days run 155 miles Average speed 5.7
knots
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