Subic Bay at Lunch

An old friend from Majuro came by for a visit yesterday. She had a camera! We decided to go to lunch with James (also met in Majuro) and his girl Marg.

Trinda in the cockpit, in Watercraft Marina. James managed to pay for two slips and only has one boat, so we ware helping him use one of them. Ha.

James and Marg

Getting the mast ready to take down, or as we say "Prepare to step the mast".

At lunch at Dos Amigos. Actually god Mexican considering the distance!

Jenel, me and Trinda in the cockpit of the Katie Lee

James can be a little ornery sometimes.

Change of Plans

We have noticed a problem with some of the work done on the main mast step in Carmen. Looks like some of the epoxy didn't quite work right.

So we are now headed for Subic Bay, Philippines, near Manila because the yard there has better facilities to solve this minor problem. The yard at Kudat Malaysia is not reported to have an easy way to lift the mast off while we repair the epoxy, otherwise the pricing for the haulout and bottom paint job are very nearly the same.

We will go back thru Coron over the next week or so then north to Subic Bay. It is about 200 miles from here and the wind has been really light and variable. During the NE monsoon season, normally it would be against the wind the whole way, but this is just beginning the transition to the SE monsoon season.

More than 2 weeks round trip to Port Barton, about 40 miles south of El Nido. Still the sharp and pointed islands sticking up out of the water. No more than 10 miles in a day between anchorages and often as little as 3 miles. Lots of sitting, drinking coffee and telling stories. Trinda watched a lot of movies. There were tiny clear jellyfish that only stung a little, but they took the fun out of swimming.

I had to scrape the barnacles off the bottom. It took 3 days because I was too lazy to do it all in one day

More islands. We came from between these.

Another bangka hauling people somewhere.

M

We have been just 'gunkholing' around here, A night in a new spot nearly each day. Sometimes snorkeling or just dinghing around looking.Some of the anchorages only 3 or 4 miles apart. It is great to relax!

View from coffee shop in El Nido

Getting fuel in Lingcongcong.

Anchored in a small bay south of El Nido

Drinking coffee with Denny on Jubilant, Katie Lee in background in another small bay by El Nido

In front of El Nido town

El Nido

We took a couple day excursion into the islands south of El Nido, Palawan in the Philippines.
The camera is still broken, but I managed to convience the laptop to do a still with the webcam. as we were motoring back to Corongcorong and El Nido.

These are of just one of the small islands we passed. Very tall!

Busuanga to El Nido

We left the Wild Animal Park and went only a few miles south and anchored in a very quiet bay north of the town of Busuanga on the island of Busuanga. Our route is the purple line below. The next morning we planned to go an easy 17 miles to Galoc island. Started off an came out into Busuanga Bay to a sea of hundreds of buoys! They are 5 or 6 floats tied with a rope about 100 feet long with traps hanging down to the bottom from the top rope. So there are these strings of floats that we cannot cross with the boat. The ropes would get caught in the propeller. They are not oin order, just randomly strewn about the bay.

I noticed that they seemed to stop toward one side where the chart showed a small reef. I thought I could squeeze between them and the reef so moved ahead slowly. I was only 10 feet from the buoy and doing fine, watching the computer and the water on the other side for the coral. When bump! bump! bump! Then stopped! Trinda, below, yelled "What was that"! Arg!!! The reef only had 6.5 feet of water and we really need 6.75 feet!

I had this chart up, zoomed in even more and still....Google Earth photos are old, so the buoys don't show of course.

I tried reverse with a lot of gas. No good, then there was a breeze so pulled out the jib quickly to see if the wind would turn the bow off the reef. Still no good. Trinda helped me get the new dinghy off the davits and into the water. Then put the outboard on it with the gas tank too. I tied a long line onto the main halyard (rope that pulls up the mainsail) and took off in the dinghy. As I pull on the halyard to the top of the mast and the angle out to the dinghy 50 feet away it leaned the boat over just enough that with full throttle it started to turn. I eased up and let the outboard rest 15 seconds and tried again. This time I got a running start and it leaned the boat over just enough. It started to move again! Trinda cut the throttle and steered away from the buoys and stopped. We lifted the outboard abd fuel tank bacvk out of the dinghy and pulled it back up on the davits again.

Then we started looking for a different way through the buoys. What a mess! Staying well away from the reef we tried several paths into the mass of buoys. Finally with only 3 or 4 wrong turns and backing out, we got to the last row of them. An hour lost!

I hear another outboard racing up and see 3 guys in a local small speed boat. They come along side and ask where I am going. I point to Culion. They say, "Follow me I guide you".  Great, now that I've run aground and wasted an hour and am through the buoys, now they want to help! I say ok and they take off the wrong direction. I wave them back and by now remember the name of the small island we're headed for. They lead off again. There is not a buoy in sight so I finally wave them back, thank them and say I can probably make it myself.

Almost to Galoc we turn around a rock and there is another patch of buoys! Oh well, now I've figured out the pattern they use, so it is only a 10 minute delay to thread our way through these. We anchor and have a restful night.

We were headed for Halsey Harbor but I get a text from Denny, of Jubilant. He says he's left Puerta Princessa and where should we meet. Trinda really wants to see El Nido cause everyone has been talking about it. Sitting in the restaurant in Coron waiting for the package to arrive, she saw the local bangka providing transport there for the tourists each day too. So I tell Denny we'll meet there. So we skip Halsey Hbr and head for Linapacan. I really wanted to stop there to see if I could get a pie! Thought it might have limes or linas or something! hahaha. Or maybe they spell those different. No pie, not even cell phone coverage, much less internet access!

We anchored and then the mosquitoes came out! The biggest yet and lots. With repellent on, I killed 15 in the hour that I read in bed before dropping off to sleep! This morning we left early, 6:30 for El Nido. Half way across we spotted Jubilant coming up from the south.

As we cruised down the channel to Bacuit (El Nido) the sheer cliffs to the water are extra ordinary! Yep the camera is still broke.

We'll hang around here a few days then explore the bays a little further south then back to Coron.

North Busuanga

We took the camera snorkeling ans the previous post shows. Big mistake. I have a deep dive case for it, but it had some corrosion and the push buttons didn't work so I skipped it! It got water inside and I can't make the display come on.

So, no more photos for a while.

This is significant cause we went to the Calauit Wild Animal Park yesterday. It is the small island attached to the very north end of Busuanga, on the north end of Palawan. The guide first stopped and gathered a handful of small limbs from a tree with leaves. He gave Trinda one and she fed a miniature Palawan deer. Right from her hand. I could draw a picture, but you wouldn't get it...

Next we rode in his jeep around the other side of a corral and stopped by a couple of giraffes. They both walked up and wanted to be hand fed just like the deer. They have 19 giraffes counting 2 babies. We didn't see the babies though. Then across the small valley we stopped by a water tank where about 20 zebras were licking a salt block and enjoying the shade next to the tank. These were black zebras with white stripes. Don't know if that makes them special, but that's what the guide said.

They also had a few fresh water crocodiles, monkeys, porcupines and a couple special wild cats in cages.

It was a beautiful setting and a very picturesque passage up to the park. The volcanic cliffs in the entrance pass and a sand bar with maybe 8 foot waves breaking was very neat.