Going, going, Gan
Rhiann Marie - Round the World
Stewart Graham
Mon 16 May 2011 09:49
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Monday 16th May 2011 1305 Local time 0805
UTC
01:40.231S 072:53.431E
We arrived in Addoo Atoll the southermost of the
Maldives on Friday the thirteenth of May. In the Muslim world Friday is prayer
day and at least in the morning nothing much happens.
It was not clear how we should contact authorities
or in fact where we should anchor as there are designated anchoring areas but
none which are clearly marked on the chart and there is no pilot book. Dear
Mr Heikell et al .... If ever there was a place that could benefit from a Pilot
Book it is here in the Maldives. Also there are bound to be more yachts
following our route over the next couple of years as things don't look to be
improving with the Somalian pirate problem anytime soon.
So, Addoo Atoll just south of the equator is our
clearing out point from the Maldives. For twenty years from the fifties
till the seventies the British were based in Gan in Addoo Atoll where they
had, displaying typical arrogance effectively annexed the three southermost
atolls from the Maldives and "installed" a puppet leader who ran things for them
acting effectively as a separate country from the rest of Maldives. That
was the situation until someone did the sums and found out "Britain" could no
longer afford these colonial outposts and they effectively
walked away.
I guess they must have thought there was
duplication with the Chagos where unbeleivably they had cleared the indigenous
people out from. So the "British" kept the Chagos Islands as an Indian Ocean
outpost presumably to be a military base should such a strategic location
ever be needed in the future. Perhaps cleverly though the costs and
the military presence was "sub-contracted" to the Americans who established and
maintain a military base on Diego Garcia which is not only a no go zone for us
it is still a no-go zone for those who were once resident there.
Anyway back to Gan. On the western side of the
atoll all the islands from Gan to Hittadhoo are joined by a causeway. On
the easten islands the upmarket resorts of Shangri La are based. The
airport, a legacy from the British times operates mostly domestically but
has one International flight per week from India I am told. We
anchored up and waited knowing that someone either commercial or from one of the
authorities would contact us soon after morning prayers. And so it was in
quick succession after prayer time two agents contacted us and we went with
Mas-ood who was excellent.
Though we had hoped to do some diving in Addoo our
main priority was to get our fridge working again, refuel, and provision the
boat for the next few weeks as we were about to enter some extremely remote
territory and we would not see civilisation for about three
weeks.
On Saturday Mohamed turned up to start work on the
fridge and he had vacuum pump, and guages but no R134 refrigerant which I
managed to buy after Mohamed scouring the southern islands. It seems the fridge
system has a blockage in the capilliary or evaporator and gas is not flowing and
therefor not cooling the fridge. I have to say Mohamed was thorough and was
desperate not to be beaten but over two days we tried everything and could not
dislodge the blockage. It could not be frozen moisture as the temperature in the
fridge compartment was now 30 deg centigrade and also I boiled a cloth and with
tongs applied that to the capilliary and across the evaporator to no avail. I
got Mohamed to fill pressurised gas from the low pressure side awhile we
vacuumed from the high pressure side to try to suck the block out. We vacuum
pumped the system and refilledsebveral times but no success. So more food
over the side (Grrrrrrrr....!) and our reprovisioning now needed to take account
of the fact we had no fridge in the tropics.
Refuelling was completed on Sunday morning
and only a few hundred lites were needed this time - most of which were
delivered to the teak deck.... You see we have been sailing everywhere again as
we have wind and we only used up the fuel the the generator consumes. Clearly
not thinking I opened up the fuel tank (we have three) and proceeded to fill the
fuel at high speed and high pressure ..... into an already full tank. It erupted
out of the filler before I could stop it and humiliatingly I confessed my error
in trying to fill the wrong tank... plonker!
During all these comings and goings, we also had to
check in with the authorities here and also clear out, we made many shore
visits. Not actually to Gan but to the next island Feydhoo. There were several
restaurants, cafes and shops along the shore and it was not to long before
we knew quite a number of people. If walking along someone may stop and give us
a lift. Regularly people would come up and introduce themeselves and sit with us
in the cafes while we waited for fuel, or gas, or paperwork or something. Older
people told us about the "British" times, we learned about the history of Addoo
and the differences between southern and northern Maldivians. We heard about the
politics of the new government compared to the old semi - dictatorship.
There were mixed views, the older people, one of them a doctor, preferred
the previous government. Some younger people preferred what the new
government were trying to do - but they had only been in for two and a half
years so it was too soon to tell. The country is suffering badly as its currency
is almost valueless outside the Maldives and the governement have to fix rates
artificially. It depreciated 20% recently increasing prices of everything, which
is imported, by a similar amount.
Though people we have met have been very
friendly they are not openly welcoming and don't tend to lead with a smile. Also
of course relatively few women are encountered. The cafes and restaurants
and the area in the village centre under a tree where chess is played, are
all frequented by almost exclusively men. Trish feels this a little hard to
take and is always self concious. I can also say when i have entered small
villages and do meet women in the street, they rarely make eye contact
and almost never smile and say hello. However in all cases when we
have made the approach to people they have been friendly often taking
my local phone number. It is quite common for local people to phone me up
for a chat to see how I am getting on, how the weather is where I am and if
everything is Ok! Though it seems many Maldivians dont have jobs most of the
labour is imported Sri Lankan or Bangladeshi and any business wishing to employ
them on work permits must pay a fee to the government to do so. Clearly the
Maldives is seen as a high wage economy in comparison to Sri Lanka and
Bangladesh and people move where there is work and where there is financial
incentive. However outside of the resorts we found prices very cheap with a
"very good" dinner for two in the evening with drinks (soft of course)
costing three pounds
each.
So late last night our passports and clearance
papers were returned to us and we headed off for a few hours kip before rising
at 0400. Which we did, just as the pale yellow moon sunk to the west. We hauled
the anchor and cleared the southern pass in the dark at 0500 and Trish headed
back to bed. We sailed nicely for most of the day so far averaging seven to
eight knots with light winds ahead of the beam. Heading south to Addoo and now
on leaving Addoo we have experienced a big Indian Ocean heaving swell. The last
time I saw a swell like this was out at St Kilda. It is very long in pitch but
the troughs and peaks are deep and high. I am not sure if this is foretelling
bad weather coming or just a result of the open ocean all the way to the
antarctic and the south easterlies which we would expect from Chagos to
Mauritius once we are in the southern Indian Ocean. Time will tell.
Early this morning we had our first strike on the
rod but it got away before I could get to it. The next strike was ferocious
and though I desperately tried to slow the boat down bu furling the genny I
could not do it in time and the fish headed deep and fast with all of my line. I
had to ramp up the tension on the brake before all the line was gone
and this eventually meant the lure was snapped off. So it is game on again and I
am heading back to the locker for the heavy gear.......
Before this strike we passed five or so Maldivian
Tuna boats to Port. They were circling very slowly and closely behind each
one the sea was boiling and birds were everywhere. Right on the flat, wide and
low-to-the-water transom there were about ten men. Each with a pole,
fixed line and hook and they just dropped the line with unbaited hook in
the water and flicked fish out over their heads onto the deck where the fish
came off into a pound and the rod was flicked back in the water to repeat the
process. It all starts by the boat baiting the water to attract small fish
which in turn attract the Tuna, then when the Tuna are there they spray the
water with a type of fish slurry while steaming ahead slowly and the guys
on the poles get fishing. These are not some rickety old boats, these are
modern new boats about 80 - 100 foot in length! And I could not even land one this
morning........................
Over the last few days to a week I have been
experiencing sometimes quite severe pain in my back especially if I am twisted
in position in any way. It almost feels like it "locks out". I certainly hope I
have not done any damage to the fixing of the screws with all the activities. My
daily lie downs are a thing of the past and in fact a whole nights sleep is now
not guaranteed either so I probably need to take it easier and try to take the
time to lie flat and hopefully the steelwork alignment and fixing will be
OK.
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