I woke up at first light and immediately raised the main and
pulled the anchor as we had a long way to go today if we were going to reach
Medana Bay which was 109 miles away.
I had wanted a shorter passage and to go to Potopaddu Bay
for the night, but Putu was keen to get home. If I could keep up a fast pace of
6 to 7 knots, I should be able to get to Madana Bay just on sunset, but I was
dreading a night passage and entering the anchorage in the dark.
We got off to a bad start with the lite breeze right on the
nose, but I was hoping as we sailed around Lombok the wind angle would slowly
improve to a point where we could sail the rest of the way.
We passed many small fishing boats, lots of FAD’s and a
large Aussie dive boat heading for Komodo.
Unfortunately the wind persisted directly on the nose and we
had a strong current against us slowing our speed to around 4 ½ knots and I
knew I would have to sail the last few hours in the dark in a very busy part of
Indonesia and I was not looking forward to it and I swear I wont let this
happen again.
For about an hour we had many dolphins riding our bow wave
in the crystal-clear water and it was such a great site sitting up on the bow
watching them swim effortlessly as they were watching me. I never get tired of
watching these beautiful animals.
The further west we traveled the greener the terrain got
and the higher the terrain got with huge volcano's dominating the horizon.
Underwater the sub terrain was quite spectacular also as the seabed went from
20 meters to well over 2000 meters in less than a mile.
I also passed over many active seamounts that were venting
either gas or hot water that was clearly visible on my sonar.
As we worked our way around the North coast of Lombok, the
wind followed us remaining directly on the nose as I prepared for a stressful
night as the sun slowly went down as I dodged hundreds of small fishing boats.
With the boat lit up and the radar on, I carefully picked my
way through all the boats hoping they would see me and move out of my way. Around
21:15 we reached the approach to Madena Bay that was full of anchored yachts,
moorings and jiggered dangerous coral reefs. By now I was fried from intensely concentrating
on the radar, looking through the binoculars and checking the chart.
I carefully negotiated the reef and slowly made our way into
the bay and found a nice place to anchor between several yachts and I dropped
the pick. Unfortunately, when the boat swung around with the current, we were
too close to the reef for my liking, and so I pulled the anchor and slowly edged
forward between several yachts using the radar and the spotlight.
One of the cruisers yelled out to us telling us there was
mooring in front of his yacht which I had already seen, so I decided to pick it
up for the night so I could sleep peacefully. After a quick bite for dinner and
a couple of beers I was sound asleep.
Track Sirocco’s
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