I can’t believe we’re in March already and Christmas was two months ago! We went back to England for the festive season. We spent a week in Devon with Dad and Anne and then Mum, Toby came over for a few days too so there was some good family get-togethers. We had New Year in Crans-Montana with Josephine, Mimi and Andre. There was not much snow but luckily it snowed the day we went up so we got a few days of great skiing/snow-boarding.  

It sounds like the weather over in the UK has been completely horrible since then. The storms were bad enough at Christmas but they just got worse and wetter and were relentless. Luckily both Mum and Dad live on hills but I do feel sorry for those people on a lower gradient. We’ve had our share of floods this year in Jakarta and, as usual the poor people suffer. Unlike Europe in Jakarta a riverside residence is not definitely a desirable address, those areas are about the only kampongs that haven’t been developed!

At the end of January Neil headed over to New Zealand to check-out the boat and see how Maya was going. . . . very well by the sound of it. She’s just finished her second year at University of Victoria in Wellington. She’s loving it which is fantastic. Distant Drummer was also in good shape after the extensive fit-out we did last year. It’s the first time one of us has been back so big thanks to Ken for keeping an eye on her.   

Neil got the boat ready then Anthony flew in for a week’s sailing around Tasman Bay. Anthony was Neil’s skipper on his Scandi sailing adventure last year so this year the roles were reversed. They found some good winds and peaceful anchorages in Torrent Bay and on D’Urville Island on the east side, so I hear a good time was had by all. Neil spent another week in Nelson catching up with friends and doing boat stuff then came back to Jak in mid- February. 

While Neil was in NZ I went to Penang with a friend, Lisa. The first time I went to Penang 25 years ago I stayed at the Lone Pine in Batu Feringghi and it’s still there, but now surrounded by a lot of high rise neighbours. It was Chinese New Year hence we had a three day weekend but we hadn’t anticipated the bedlum at breakfast in the hotel. Out-of-control kids running around tripping up over-weight over-tanned tourists with loaded trays. . . insane!

We hired motorbikes and scooted around the island, stopping at “highlights” including the Snake temple, but I think all the snake’s had taken to the hills – probably too many kids around. We stopped at the Macalister Mansion for lunch which was fine, but when we took off on the bikes, we found out that Lisa had had her tank siphoned! As luck would have it we found a garage about 2km up the road so were saved. It cost about a dollar to fill the tank – why would anyone bother stealing that!   

Since I got back we’ve had a new GM at the office so we’ve been helping him get his knees under the table. We have also started our drilling programme, this has been long anticipated so of course I’m quite excited about the outcome. Fingers crossed please! I also sat my final assessment for my RYA Yachtmaster theory. I did the navigation and chartwork paper first and was a bit nervous. When the expected position of the vessel the second question plotted half way up a hill things weren’t looking too good. Anyway I got the boat back on track and it all went very well after that. So fingers crossed for that too please! 

Thanks to Neil for the photos. Cheers for now.

Suzy and Neil