Misadventures in Ambon - Amahusu, Ambon Island, Maluku Province, Indonesia
Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Sat 14 Aug 2010 06:37
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03:43.532S 128:08.485E
After five days in Banda, we reluctantly left for
Ambon on August 1st. We had to go because the Indonesian
President was calling us. Yes, the President was scheduled to visit
Ambon, the capitol city of Maluku Province, to welcome the
Sail Indonesia fleet. So, not only had we been welcomed to Banda by
a couple military ships, an Indonesian hospital ship and all
15,000 of the local people including every dignitary in what appears to be a
very complex governing structure, but we were scheduled to be welcomed to Ambon
by the Indonesian President himself. This place just never
stops.
We motored the entire 130 miles to Ambon in
dead calm seas and no wind. After 20 hours with the engine running, our
batteries were very happy and our water maker well exercised after working
overtime to fill our tank. We arrived in the huge Ambon harbor mid-morning
on August 2nd to be greeted by a long stream of about 30 Indonesian military
ships steaming this way and that across the harbor preparing for the next day's
presidential sail past parade. As we picked our way around the ships, we
were also greeted by a stream of parachutes raining from the sky, the last of
which trailed a giant 'Sail Banda!' banner. This was also practice for the
next day's presidential extravaganza. We proceeded to the fisherman's
wharf, where we were told to tie up and take our papers to the harbor master for
check-in. It sounded easy enough. We've done the Med-moor thing
quite a few times before - it involves backing up to a dock, wharf or
wall while simultaneously dropping anchor. The trick is to place the
anchor with enough chain out to secure the boat forward, tie off the stern to
the wall and put enough fenders on each side to keep from bashing neighboring
boats. On our first attempt, we backed in smoothly, got the stern tied
off, and then when Don attempted to snug up the anchor chain to secure the bow,
discovered we didn't have enough chain out and the anchor was dangling from the
bow and not touching bottom. Oops. The bottom shoaled up steeply
from 45 meters to 5 at the wall, so it was difficult to get the anchor down
quickly to the bottom 45 meters below while backing the boat up in swell caused
by passing military ships. The fact that our chain counter was not working
at the time didn't help. It's difficult to gauge how much chain is
out when I'm on the stern throwing ropes to shore and Don is facing backward at
the wheel backing us in and no one is looking at the chain with its 5 meter
markers as it runs into the water from the bow. Ok, so a second
attempt. We untied the stern, pulled up the dangling anchor, went forward
and tried again. This time Don put plenty of chain out and we got the
stern tied off just as several more ships passed by causing all kinds of swell
to roll into the moored boats. Don started to snug up the anchor chain (we
had too much out this time), but the swell pushed us back into one of the steel
girders on the wall before he could get the bow secured. With a lot
of yelling from shore and from us, the stern was once again untied and we were
motoring forward and out as fast as possible pulling up anchor as we went.
Suffering from wounded pride and a newly split stern bumper, we decided it was
pure stupidity to try and med-moor on an unforgiving wall with 30 military ships
milling about in the harbor causing havoc. We dropped our papers off with
John in Storyteller's dinghy, and retreated to an anchorage about five miles
away from downtown Ambon and the fisherman's wharf. The split in our stern
bumper has since been repaired, but the bumper is sitting off-kilter
at the moment because the bolts attaching it to the stern were bent when we
bashed the wall. Not a big deal and easily fixed at some point, but that's
the first real damage we've sustained since leaving home. Not such a bad
record for three years at sea.
We stayed only two nights in the anchorage at
Amahusu, just outside the city of Ambon. The weather turned
ugly, bringing a constant series of rain squalls over the course of 48 hours,
some packed with 30 knots of wind. By this time, most of the other rally
boats also gave up on the wall and came to anchor where we were, making for a
relatively crowded anchorage. On top of that, the holding in the anchorage
was sketchy, so boats were regularly dragging, which caused other boats major
anxiety. Like us.
The first night, four yachtsmen were chosen to have
dinner with the Indonesian President. Nope, Don wasn't one of them (and he
wasn't necessarily disappointed after having already done his part in Banda to
represent the fleet). We heard later that one of the English boaters tried
to get to the President's dinner, but his taxi couldn't find the designated
address and he ended up touring Ambon for several hours before admitting defeat
and returning to the anchorage. The next morning, all the boats in the
fleet (including us) joined the sail past parade, lining up in some
disarray behind the military ships for the viewing enjoyment of the
president. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate and there
were times when we couldn't see the boat in front of us as we paraded around the
harbor. Not sure if the president enjoyed the spectacle, as it's unclear
how much of the spectacle he actually saw. The parachute show and military
jet fly-by were cancelled due to the abysmal visibility, and after the parade
was over, we motored back to our less than desirable anchorage, wrapping part of
a floating plastic bag around our prop in the process.
The second night was the official welcome to Ambon
party, so about half of us hopped into the complimentary taxis to be taken into
the city (remind me some day to describe this taxi ride because it was something
- a very scary something), and the other half remained on board to watch the
boats in the bad weather. While John, Sue, Suzy (American boat Priscilla)
and I enjoyed the show, which came complete with speeches and a buffet dinner,
Don, Barry (Storyteller guest), Tom (from Priscilla) and Peter (from English
boat Camille) spent the evening rescuing a wayward rally boat. Barry
noticed the boat Magnetic dragging anchor near Storyteller and quickly realized
no one was aboard. He gathered the troops and a dinghy brigade went out
into the latest rain squall to drag Magnetic back into the harbor and re-anchor
her. Around the same time, another boat with no one aboard dragged out of
the anchorage and wasn't found until morning. You can bet the owners of
that boat were a bit concerned when they returned from the show to find their
boat gone. We never heard for sure, but it sounded like the boat was found
the next morning with little or no damage. They were very
lucky.
Looking back now, the whole Ambon
episode was pretty miserable. Ambon, although very welcoming, is a
big, dirty city crammed with 370,000 people surrounded by a
harbor strewn with floating trash. The anchorage at Amahusu would
have been fine in settled weather, but it was a nightmare in 30 knots of
wind with 25 boats squeezed into a small area. On top of all
that, we, along with many others, had picked up some kind of cold/cough thing in
Banda making us all feel lousy. After our second sleepless night watching
boats drag by, we decided it was time to get out. Don taxied in to town
with Suzy and John to check-out (4 hours round trip battling snarls of
traffic). I was left to fend dragging boats off Harmonie and had to employ
our obnoxious air horn at one point to get the attention of an extremely
stubborn Australian bloke on the dragging boat next door before it drifted into
us. When Don finally got back from the city we were underway with
Storyteller and Priscilla within twenty minutes without a single glance
back. It really is too bad because the little we saw of the city showed
that they had gone through as much preparation for us as Banda had with hundreds
of banners and bunches of stalls set up. Oh well, at least we did our part
in the presidential sail past parade.
Picture 1 - Part of the crowded Ambon waterfront. Note the mosque in the
center.
Picture 2 - Some of the less desirable Ambon waterfront.
Picture 3 - The presidential reviewing
stand with Intiaq, one of the rally boats, sailing (motoring)
past.
Picture 4 - The Maluku Province
'fashion through time' models caught relaxing in costume after the
welcome show. Once again the pageantry was amazing and the Indonesians not
shy about posing for pictures.
More on our much more pleasant experience in
Wakatobi later.
Anne
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