I arrived in Yangon Myanmar (originally Rangoon) at about 6.30 p.m., the place was already dark as the clocks had changed again. Ten dollars got me the twenty kilometers into the center of town and to the backpackers. I was already surprised about the size of the place and how modern it was, i was expecting somewhere another step back compared to other Asian cities i had visited but not at all. Apparantly Myanmar was undergoing a bit of a transformation with lots of development, power cuts were quite frequent as the grid couldn’t keep up with demand. The people seemed instantly friendly and the taxi driver very pleased to hear that it was my first time there, even giving me a guided tour as we went past various sights.
As tourism hadn’t fully taken off yet there isn’t a glut of accomodation and it isn’t as cheap as other asian cities. I could normally find cheap hotel rooms in most Asian cities for about 20 dollars to include breakfast but i had to resort to a newly opened backpackers hostel which gave you a cubicle in a dormitory for 15 dollars. Owned and run by a very enthusiastic man originally from Singapore it was a wealth of information and well worth my first few days in Myanmar.
My first stop was the impressive Shwedagon pagoda, completed in the 6th century it stands 99 meters high and is gold gilded. It is one of the most sacred sites in Myanmar for the local people –
Shwedagon pagoda Yangon Myanmar
Shwedagon pagoda Yangon Myanmar
Shwedagon pagoda Yangon Myanmar
Shwedagon pagoda Yangon Myanmar
A day of pagodas and temples in Asian heat deserves a reward, the local Myanmar beer tasted good and at 2 dollars a bottle was good value !!
The beer of Myanmar – Myanmar !!
I had a tour around downtown the next day which showed off some of the old colonial buildings and hotels. The Strand hotel is particularly well known but at about 500 dollars a night was slightly out of my budget, i’ll stick to the 15 dollars a night cubicle thank you very much. I did pop in to have a look around and popped to the bar, the cheapest thing on the drinks menu was 3 dollars for a very small glass of beer but it came with some peanuts, i ended up being charged 4 dollars but i think i got off lightly looking at the other prices.
I think probably due to a previous curfew whilst under military rule the capital city quietens down early and the restaurants are normally shut by 9 p.m. Street life goes on but nowhere particularly for the tourist to hang out.
I left Rangon and headed east out to Bago on the local train. Somebody had already described it to me as ‘hilariously bumpy’ and they weren’t wrong !! I splashed out an upper class seat and the two hour journey cost me a dollar !! The carriages must have been fifty years old and so were the cobwebs, pull down shutters, no A/C and people spitting out the windows completes the picture.
Old locomotive arrival –
Living the dream in ‘upper class’ !!
At every stop theres normally something going on, even small markets on the train tracks –
I arrived at Batam Indonesia just south of Singapore and a taxi was waiting for me at the airport to take me to the marina. Saol Eile was there and i met with Myra and Paraic, it was good to be back on the boat again and with friends. We set sail the next day and checked into Malaysia, after all the formalities were done we continued and joined the shipping lanes heading west around Singapore. Being the busiest shipping lanes in the world there is always oil tankers/cargo ships/huge vessels everywhere, in between all of this are pilot boats/fuel boats and provision boats that are going around amongst all the boats that have anchored. You do really have to have eyes in the back of your head and be alert at all times watching for anything that moves.
An intimidating site !
Boats everywhere –
Lots of ships
We were motoring along quite nicely when all of a sudden the engine revs dropped then came back up slightly. I looked out the back of the boat to see if there was anything obvious we had gone over, Paraic appeared and asked if i had altered the engine revs. We had a slight vibration and the revs had dropped, we definately had something caught around the prop. My first thought was to put the engine in neutral and then in reverse to see if we could shake anything off, Paraic wanted to get out of the shipping lane and find somewhere shallow enough to anchor in case the prop jammed whilst trying to loosen any debris. This of course was the right thing to do and shows the experience of a skipper. We only had a slight vibration so could continue without trouble for another mile or so before we found an inlet to pull into. Putting it into reverse and back into forward threw something off the prop and it felt much better, still a slight vibration but only minor so ok to continue to our destination.
We had done 3 days and two nights so far but couldn’t quite make our destination on the third day, we were about 15 miles short so about 3 hours but the sun was already setting. Our destination Pangkor has very shallow areas in front of the marina entrance and to try and approach at night time wouldn’t have been wise, in fact at low tide certain boats can’t get into the marina. We anchored a couple of miles off shore as the depth was very shallow still, still only 8-9 meters that far out. We awoke in the morning to see dozens of fishing boats on the horizon, we counted up to 65 at any one time, probably all fishing for squid during the night. After an hour or so we got under way just as all the fishing boats were heading in our direction, we managed to evade the fleet and set sail once again.
We saw a couple of storms brew up during the days but we managed to dodge them.
Storm a comin !!
Water spout formed off in the distance, looked like it was about to suck the fishing boat up !! –
Water spout at sea
We arrived at Pangkor where we were guided into the marina and given a berth number, for some reason they gave us a berth fit for a 30ft boat not a 53ft boat, the skipper wasn’t happy and protested until they found us another berth. We later found out that they had tried to put an exact same boat in the same berth only two days earlier. Safely moored up we sat and had a lunchtime beer, the weather was hot but fortunately there was a nice breeze blowing. Although my part of the trip was over i said i would hang around until the maintenance was completed on the boat, the boat was scheduled to be hauled out for a bottom scrub and other normal service items.
Normally boats have to be hauled out every year or two to have the anti fouling dealt with, this is a type of paint that prevents marine life growing on the bottom of the boat. Normally this means alot of scrapping, stripping,cleaning and painting which is a tiresome and time consuming job. Fortunately the owners of Saol Eile had applied something called copper coat which is a type of resin mixed with copper powder which should last for ten years. The boat still needs to be taken out of the water every couple of years but a good power wash and scrape sees most things come off the bottom, after that a light rub with some fine sand paper revives the surface with some new exposed copper which oxidises and makes a barrier which marine life don’t like to grow on. Apparantly very time consuming to originally apply but it appears to pay off in the long run.
Saol Eile on the hard in the yard –
When i originally joined Saol Eile in New Zealand in March 2013 i spent the first 6 months aboard with another crew member Brian. Brian was rejoining the boat to take it across the Indian ocean and potentially back to Europe. Brian arrived with his new lady friend and it was good to see him again, he arrived just in time to carry out some new maintenance which he enjoyed the most !! Brian had met his new partner whilst being stranded at a Carribean airport over Christmas time, the airport had flooded and flights were delayed. She had been helping deliver boats as her previous husband was a delivery skipper, in fact they had both just finished a delivery when they met. So Saol Eile now had two new crew members to help take her across the Indian ocean.
Myras shoulder was improving day by day, Saol Eile had a nice clean bottom, new crew members had joined so it was time for me to leave for a second time.
Fair winds Saol Eile.
I got a taxi from the marina to the coach station and boarded a coach bound for Kuala Lumpur International airport some 5 hours away.
