Girl next door?

Pulau Pangkor is an island just about 10 - 15 nautical miles out from UniKL and a popular holiday place for local tourists. We went there last weekend. Knocked off around two in the afternoon on Saturday, so we arrived early in the evening and had roughly 24 hours to relax and enjoy.

"Pulau Pangkor is more of a girl-next-door island as opposed to the supermodels of the east coast and Langkawi"
Lonely Planets Southeast Asia on a shoestring

They are lying. Pangkor and Langkawi are both supermodels. Langkawi may be dressed to kill whereas Pangkor is more like lazy Saturday afternoon, at home doing the laundry, no makeup. Apart from that they could be twins. Look at the pictures and judge for yourself.

Phat as wave in the Pacific Ocean

Just passing on some info that reached me through FB and email.

Søren Larsen, the beautiful brigantine who was responsible for me leaving Sweden in the first place, has run into some trouble. She was scheduled to leave New Zealand around mid April for a three week voyage heading for Cook Islands, the first leg of her annual South Pacific itinerary. The ship hit a storm only a few days out from New Zealand and had to return due to severe leaks. Back to refit in the yard in Whangarei, and another month of hard work before the great adventure could start.

She set off again on May 29. This time things went fine for two days, then the weather started to deteriorate. Wind speeds reached gale force, touching a full blown storm. A ship like this is solid, and built to handle this type of conditions. But the sea can be a tricky bastard, it is not to be trusted. In the morning on 1st June, a while before watch handover, an unusually nasty wave hit the starboard side of Søren Larsen. The bulwark is made of solid oak planks, supported by timberheads coming up through the deck, doubled with reinforcing posts. The wave smashed about half of the starboard bulwark down flat on deck, leaving only the parts that are supported by the shrouds and their chainplates. It then proceeded over the deck, thrashing the entire deckhouse to total rubbish. People were in the deckhouse at the time. The galley is in the forward part of it and I was told that one of the cooks was actually washed overboard - and back on the ship again with the next wave! No one was seriously injured, a miracle to anyone who has seen the pictures of the ship after the accident.

After the accident the crew worked hard to cover the damaged parts with storm boards. The ship sent out a mayday message, it was escorted back to New Zealand by a large cargo ship and Coast Guard helicopters dropped down extra pumps. The ship and all the crew returned safely to Whangarei harbor a few days later and now she is scheduled for approximately four more months in refit. Sometimes things end up a bit rough...

For more details, have a look at the ships official web page:

http://news.sorenlarsen.co.nz/pebble/

Langkawi Permata Kedah - Langkawi, the Jewel of Kedah

Last Saturday was not only the Constitution Day of Sweden, it was also the birthday of the King of Malaysia. The nominal birthday anyway. The King is elected among the nine Sultans of Malaysia for a five year-term, so to the real birthday varies, but to avoid confusion it is always celebrated on the sixth of June.

The birthday of the King means national holiday, and that means the day off for the crew of the Albatross. On Thursday I asked Richard (Ulf being away), if I could take Friday off. Thursday evening, a little bit after midnight, I set off north bound in the Cutlery Drawer, the car which Ulf and I are renting. Fairly unplanned holiday trip, in other words. And just perfect!

I left the Cutlery Drawer in Georgetown, Pulau Penang, and took the early morning ferry over to Pulau Langkawi. Driving to Georgetown was an interesting experience. A lot of really old-school trucks (retarded slow!) out on winding roads in the middle of the night. Little rural looking towns and villages, with small night open eateries catering to the truck drivers. And as I approached Georgetown, the road turned into a toll highway, buildings got more and more citylike and all of a sudden i was on a huge six lane bridge crossing the strait to Pulau Penang, big complexes of highrises and skyscrapers standing tall on both sides of the bridge ahead. The central part of Georgetown has a lot of character, with old colonial buildings and intense nightlife. I fell asleep after four o'clock in the morning, in the dodgiest hotel room ever. Two hours of sleep, and then the morning ferry.



Two and a half day in Langkawi was spent scuba diving, swimming in a waterfall and talking the nights away on the beach. One main goal for the weekend was to have loads of good time and another was to relax and charge up the batteries. I succeeded beyond expectations with the first goal, but shamefully abandoned the second one without even giving it a try. The high season for westerners is over, but I still managed to speak a fair amount of Swedish during the weekend, and also a wee little bit of Japanese. It was school holiday however, and the Kings birthday on top of that, so a lot of Malaysian tourists visited the island. It is also the beginning of the Arabian tourist season and I have never ever before seen so many women dressed in cover-all burqas. Interesting sight on a tropical beach resort.




Gecko Guesthouse at night, view from the front of my room. Friendly budget place with a super cozy garden, pretty worn rooms, and a lot of globetrotting backpacker travelers.


Afternoon on Pantai Cenang. This is a five minute walk from Gecko Guesthouse, at holiday walking speed. It is the location of Babylon, the reggae bar where I spent most of the late evening hours.



Me in the water on Saturday. Diving in Langkawi is not very spectacular, compared to the few other places I have tried. But to me it was just marvelous this time, hovering around weightless again, blowing bubbles among colorful corals, after more than four years without leaving the surface.



Well, fish...



And more fish...


...and a shark!


But not very big.



Pulau Payar, this is the marine reserve island where the diving took place.



Fishermen outside Kuah harbour.



Bear. No, dog.



Me and Bren in Seven Wells Waterfall. She is from Peru/USA. Globetrotting architect/pedagogue/backpacker, sort of.



Last picture this time shows the sunset over Cenang Beach, as seen from Babylon, kind of the epicenter of the past weekend.