For those who responded to the last email, I’ll write back soon, but don’t have internet yet, just borrowing a computer for this update here!

I’m trying something new here.  Rather than trying to remember the eventful parts of the passage I’m just going to try and keep a daily log, I hope this doesn’t get too wordy for some of you, and for those that really wonder what life is like underway this should provide a broader glimpse of life on Salsa at sail.  Maybe it will even make up for the lack of entries I made in Australia !!  If you actually read all this and like the format let me know and I’ll try to keep it up, and if you just want the Bali Approach and Marina details see the last paragraph.

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SALSA LOG, DARWIN TO BALI

TRIP SUMMARY / PASSAGE REPORT: Departed Darwin  Sunday August 1, 2010 11am.  Arrived Benoa Harbor Bali August 9 11am Total distance sailed 1025 nautical miles.  Average speed 4.7kts.  Motor used about total of 8 hours so roughly 3 gallons of diesel consumed.  Three hours escaping boat traffic during calms first night out of Darwin, and 3 three hours dealing with the currents on the approach to Bali, and then 2 hours mid route in neutral only for charging batteries.   No fishing this passage, unusual for me!  Most days the wind was between S and E and between 15 and 30kts.  Strongest winds were around 40kts with 3 to 4 meter seas, after getting 30 miles from land, I was able to maintain a minimum boat speed of  around 3kts, so there ways always some wind, and an about an average of 0.5kts westerly setting current (it did reverse at times especially closer to Darwin but overall you could expect a passage at 0.5kts faster than your average).  Days 2 through 4 during the strong winds I had only a very small jib poled out to stabilize it, I was rolling like hell.  The rest of the passage was mostly steady wing and wing, I only had to gybe once or twice total.  I had about 2 or three days where it was calm enough to hang out in the cockpit without getting soaked.  I had 2 or three days where the rails were generally awash, constant spray and waves in the cockpit.  It was truly a mixed bag of weather but the trades did prevail overall as it was 95% down wind from the SE quadrant.  I ran the radar 90% of the time (but only in one minute cycles every 15 minutes) to watch for traffic and squalls, the fridge was turned off around day 7 to conserve power. I watched about 10 movies on the notepad (only consumes one amp at 12v) and read two novels.  I can’t imagine what other facts would be of interest to you guys but if you want to know more keep reading.

August 1 2010: 820PM 12.17s 130.15e

It’s been a rough first day of passage leaving Darwin around 11AM this morning.  I have been waiting for the last three days for a decent breeze to carry me out of the harbor and to Indonesia and the forecast said it should start filling in around 3am this morning, and it did.  It was blowing up to 25kts as I was trying to get the anchor up and I was making a very nice 7kts of boat speed out of the Darwin Harbor with the max ebb tide flushing me out.  This lasted about an hour at which point the forecasted 20kts became a big joke and I had winds out of every direction at about 5kts, hahahah.   Anyway, I decided to drop the sails and drift since there wasn’t much of a swell but after the tide reversed I started drifting back to Darwin, neat.  So now I’m motoring at 2.5kts (no wind and counter current still against me).   I guess things could be a lot worse, I wouldn’t even be motoring if I didn’t happen to be in the middle of the local commercial fishing hole.  I have 5 big Tuna boats all within 2 miles of me so I’m getting out of here even if I have to motor a few hours, by then the tide should be pushing me west again and I’ll just drift if the wind hasn’t returned.  Sorry there isn’t anything more exciting to write about !

August 2  2010, 8AM, 12.17s, 130.15e

You have to LOVE these weather forecasts.  They called for steady SE 20ish, and I’m in 30+ kts gusting over 45.  I would have estimated them slightly lower but the customs aircraft gave a nearby boat the current conditions and another boat 30 miles out reported a gust at 46kts on his instrumentation.  So what does that mean for Salsa?  Last night the wind finally filled in from the wrong direction, SW, and it was a perfect 8kt breeze meaning I could sail into it at about 4kts with no waves to speak of.  This lasted till around midnight when the wind went south both literally and figuratively.  I skipped the first reef in the main and went straight to the second reef, minutes later the jib reefed, then within 20 minutes later again I had the third reef in the main that carried me for a few hours until I realized that the wind was too strong to support ANY main at all.  That’s one of the things that really frustrates me about Salsa.  Seems that I spend a lot of time sailing in wind that is so damn strong I can’t even fly my mainsail.  And when you take the main down in these seas the boat starts rolling to the point that anything not tied down inside becomes a projectile with me the likely target.  So I’m reduced to just a little scrap of jib, only unfurled about 8’ of it right now and that’s pushing me 5.5kts, plenty enough with some occasional surfing down the 10’ swells.  My biggest complaint is all the spray coming in the companion way but I wont put in the last hatch-board as I will surely die of heat exhaustion.  I have plenty of fresh food, meat, veggies, etc, so I eat a can of soup, its just too rough to cook anything.  Well I guess I could if I had to, maybe I’m lazy.  I really shouldn’t complain as this is way better then the 5kt winds that were taking me nowhere.  At least I have a new Grisham book for the passage.

August 4th.


No entry yesterday and not for laziness but truly nothing to write about!  The Grib-file weather forecasts have been a bad joke, still.  Winds are around 25kts, I haven’t seen less than 20 since the second day out.  Seas have been pretty big but I‘ve managed much bigger.   Yesterday I was taking my bucket-bath in the cockpit when a BIG wave jumped inside the cockpit (luckily I had the companion way entrance shut!) and filled the cockpit with water.  Well if you know Salsa then you can imagine the cockpit as something like a bath tub  once filled with water so I just jumped in and had a great rinse!!  Otherwise there has been little to do, still have just a working size jib unfurled and poled out, haven’t hardly touched it and still doing 5kts, maybe some of that is current pushing me but its fast enough and keeps the wind vane happy.  Finished my Grisham novel in just two days, starting a Stephen King now and probably watched 5 movies so far.  No ships in sight, but was over flown by Australia Customs and had a short chat with them.  I guess that’s it for now, and don’t feel bad about the boring passages, these are the best ones !!!

August 5th, 11:30am.  11.25s, 122.49e.  Course, 280’ speed over ground 6.1Kts.
Just watched a great movie, “The fastest Indian“, about an old Kiwi who tries to break the a speed record in his 40 year old motorcycle.  Salsa was getting about 1kts push from the current an hour ago, still getting nearly that making my speed over ground a nice 6kts without pushing the boat at all.  Last night the wind died a little down to about 20kts, and the current wasn’t helping so I was tempted to put up more sail around 2AM but didn’t feel like putting up the main and glad I didn’t as I would have been taking it back down with the current wind just over 20.  You would think running dead down wind as I am now I could support the third reef in the main and some jib as well but the boat speed gets up to around 6kts and the wind vane starts working very hard so I’ll pass on the extra canvas for now.  Now that the winds are closer to 20kts rather than the 30+ I started out with, the current 8’ seas or so actually seem pretty mild!  Only thing I can think of complaining about is my fruit rations are down to three oranges, that’s it, and the boats very rolly without the main up, buy hey, this is actually great sailing now, plus the wind is forecasted to drop even more which  with a little more sail up I wont slow down a bit and should make for a cherry run for the second half, OH YEAH, I’m basically exactly half way, about 30 miles south of Kupang Indonesia and 30 Miles north of the Isolated Ashmore Reef.  Total distance from Darwin Harbor to Benoa city, Bali Island, Indonesia 946 Nautical Miles (as the crow flies) even though I’ll go a little further to avoid some islands and reefs but right now I’ve got exactly  474 NM to go!

August 6th 345pm 10.42s 120.24e

Everyday at 8AM and 8PM about five or ten of us meet on the SSB Radio at a predetermined channel, we call it “the net”.  We share weather, information on the upcoming ports, and anchorages, conspire to rendezvous for little parties, and generally fight boredom underway.   I’ve gotten into the habit of turning EVERTHING off during the net (all electronics) as it seriously improves my ability to hear the other boats.  Anyway last night after a 45 minute long net I stuck my head out the hatch and saw a flashing light right off my stern!  First thing I’ve seen in days and it looked very close, I had either just passed it dangerously close while on the radio or it was following me, or both…  So I turn my lights back on (I don’t always turn them off for the net but I had this time) and then I turned the radar back on which has been on non-stop the entire trip except for the nets.  I saw a small target on the radar about 14 miles behind me even though you almost never see a light like this from 14 miles away, not even on a freighter, it would have to be on a tower, an airplane, or it was VERY close, because the curvature of the earth hides about everything on the water after just a few miles.  So, I call on the VHF radio channel 16 and pick up a freighter (the one I saw on the radar) and ask him why he has a green, red, white strobe light flashing and he sounds very surprised because he has no flashing lights on.  I then realize what I just said earlier, no chance at all I would see a freighter that far so this light was something else, and I still have no idea what it was, maybe some kind of sea-buoy in water around a mile deep OR maybe a very low airplane, couldn’t have been a tower out here.  The weather has improved dramatically so that I’ve had the fwd hatch open for 2 days now, sunny, and even got the main sail up wing and wing doing exactly 7kts right now, but that’s because I’m getting a 2kt push from the current, got to love it!  Watched two more movies, and am on page 156 of this Stephen King novel I started yesterday.  So far I like Grisham about twice as much.  I also knocked out some minor jobs like cleaning out the bilge and a bilge pump screen one of the three bilge pumps.  It was basically getting plugged up so that job wouldn’t wait. I also reattached a few sail-cars to the main sail (sail cars go up and down the sail track holding the sail on), otherwise there hasn’t been too much work to do on this trip.   My friends on the radio have reported light and variable winds as they are north of the Indonesian Islands just day hopping their way west.  I’m jealous that I will miss some great Islands and anchorages but I’m getting perfect weather and have not had to motor since the first day except for two hours this morning (in neutral) as I was only trying to produce power from the alternator rather than propulsion.  I have 110 watts of solar and 600 amp hours of battery bank which normally covers all my needs but at two movies a day, running the fridge since Darwin, and the Radar cycling on every 20 minutes has collectively put a slight drain and my batteries were around 50%.  I still have some meat and cheese that I’m not willing to part with so rather than turning the fridge off like I normally do I just ran the motor for two hours, hopefully that will be enough to get me to Bali, ETA Monday morning now, maybe Sunday if the wind keeps up but I will slow down first or make an illegal pit-stop at a remote island and wait till Monday morning as I don’t want to pay overtime to the officials for checking in on a weekend.  I’ve become a very cheap bastard.   In fact the fridge will be going off tomorrow since I don’t even want to pay for the 1/2 gallon of diesel I consume when running the engine for two hours to charge the batteries, plus I just hate the noise and heat from the motor.   OH!  I just cant shut up with this entry!  I just got my first glimpse of Indonesia!  My goodness these islands have HUGE mountains, I could clearly see the island of Sumba from about 25 miles away, too bad I won’t be stopping.  See if you can spot the island in my picture.

August 8th 8PM

Just got a photo of my last sunset before Bali.  Only 60 miles to go.  So I should be arriving  shortly after sunrise tomorrow.  Last two days have been near perfect sailing.  Straight downwind, wing and wing, full sail.  The swell has the sails luffing a little bit but nothing to complain of really.  Only interesting thing to report is that I had my first try at canning some food.  I said I was going to turn the fridge off rather than running the motor so supply power and I did but I still had a pound of wonderful, thick cut, smoked Australian Bacon, they call them “rashers” I think.  Plus I had a pound of Cheese.  SO I had a few empty jars and a vague memory from some Austrian friends in Panama that said canning was easy in the pressure cooker.  So that was two days ago, today I couldn’t wait any longer and just HAD to see how the Bacon-cheese jars were doing.  I just heated one up and poured it on Pasta, MAGNIFICENT!  I might have to try this again!  Some friends on other boats from ‘the net’ asked me if they should start saving jars for me, haha.  Otherwise I just had a little bit of the Kava from Vanuatu and then chucked the rest overboard as I hear the Indonesians don’t tolerate any kind of drugs at all and I’m just not sure if “Kava” qualifies.  Google it if you don’t know what it is, maybe I even blogged about my Kava experiences in Port Villa but I’m not sure.  Technically it’s a narcotic, so I’m told.  But really the affects are less than alcohol.  I won’t get into it here.  Funny thing about these Indonesians that don’t like drugs in their country, apparently hallucinogenic Mushrooms are perfectly OK (since arriving I realize they ARE illegal but widespread on islands where there are no police, and available elsewhere)!  I’ve actually read a few blogs of travelers there that have been out of their mind on these mushrooms, not sure If  I’ll partake or not, don’t count on hearing about it here in the blog if I do!!  I was almost a little depressed yesterday as it looked like I wasn’t going to make it into port tomorrow because the incoming tide is at 830AM and I wasn’t quite moving fast enough plus  it sounds like you really need the tide to get in, but now I just caught a little wind and current and it looks like I will make it!  Hallelujah.  Also looking forward to seeing Phil from Happy Hours, a friend I haven’t seen since Fiji in the South Pacific, he should be getting into Bali any day as well as we have been chatting on the SSB net daily.  Basically, eight days underway, started out very windy, and now it’s great, hardly a swell to speak of out here.   I was talking to a boat that I don’t really know, name Unicorn and he was explaining to me that sailing basically sucks and it’s all about getting to the destination.  Basically anti “its not the destination, it’s the journey” philosophy.  I don’t know if I can fully agree but I‘m I‘ve had my share of times when I felt that way, maybe we live for days like today when the sailing is great, maybe that’s the icing if the cake is the arriving at a new country every now and again.  Don’t get me wrong, maybe as much as 50% of the time I’m out here I have to ask myself… “WHY!”   Starting to feel like I’m rambling,  maybe I shouldn’t blog after taking Kava!

August 10th, Sitting at Bali Marina!  8.44.45s, 116.12.80e

WOW, the last two days were just a tad bit tougher than the rest.  I arrived yesterday August 9th at about 11:00am.  I would have been in closer to 8AM had I not underestimated the southerly set in the current running between the Islands of Lombok and Bali, what a mistake!!  But I’ll get that in a minute.  First All go back to the night of the eighth, my last night on passage.  That night was tough to get any sleep at all, the winds became a bit variable so I was reefing and unreeling to keep the boat speed up for my AM arrival in Benoa, and then the freighter traffic became painfully apparent.  A lot of ships cut through the straits between Bali and Lombok.  This pass is only 15miles wide but that takes me around 3 hours to cross!  Then I started seeing smaller fishing boats and other traffic on my approach, still many miles offshore so it was a little unexpected.  Either way I didn’t manage to get much sleep if any but was only 15 miles from Bali so at least I would be able to get some rest soon… NOT.  That’s when I started feeling the full effect of the current driving me south.  I noticed it somewhat earlier on but it wasn’t significant enough for me to worry or even alter course much at that point, I should have had a better strategy from the start.  But basically as soon as you pass south of Lombok you get a knot or two setting you south, and some rips and over falls  from the currents, nothing to bad.  Then you get in the lee of a small island  Nusapenida, this blocks the current until you about 15 miles from Bali, and then I got around 5kts driving me south, and I can only sail around 5kts, so I was basically going backwards (over land) but moving forward at 5kts (over the water) not to mention nasty little breaking waves and overfalls, I was already exhausted when I watched my speed and course change go from 5kts to 1kt (in the wrong direction!).  I fought it for an hour hoping it might slack while I consulted the few guide books I had copied.  Basically this time of year current here always sets south, it does decrease its rate at some point only briefly but there was no way for me to calculate when without an almanac, I never needed one before so of course didn’t have one.  It turned out OK, just a little challenging, I turned back into the wind, And tried to sail up to Nusapenida allowing it to effectively block the current from pushing me south, even though this required sailing back east into the wind for a few hours.  This worked great I even got in a little eddy that was pushing me north.  After about three hours of this I was north of Bali and very close to the Island I was hiding behind and started to venture west into the current to approach Bali (about 15 miles away still but north east rather than south east) Now the current should help me rather than make the approach impossible.  It worked great, in fact I probably didn’t need to travel quite so far north, but at first I was pointing and sailing in a North West direction, and actually moving South west over water, a full 90 degree set from the tide, I put full sail up and motored hard as I passed the worst of the current, doing over 8kts at time over land with the current push and then after an hour or two, things calmed down, I knew I would make Bali as once as either the current diminished or I simply passed the worst of it and I could have proceed against it if I wanted to, albeit at a very slow pace!  But I was still north of Bali so I just went with it and into the harbor.  I was exhausted.

BALI APPROACH

I’ve been very lucky up until now by usually having friends on faster boats arrive in every port and anchorage before me then feeding me all the tidbits that you want to know on the radio before I even arrive.  I had done a bit of research on Bali but I didn’t have any hard-copy recent guides since they were selling for around $75-100 in Australia, I just made a few copies.  So the approach to Benoa Harbor in Bali is easy enough, there was A LOT of traffic running out, dive boats, fishing boats, charters, etc, and they pretend like they are going to run you down at a high speed so they can check you out, and then just before you panic, they turn off and wave, bastards..  Once inside the harbor you could easily find a place to anchor if you only want to sleep but I have no idea where you would get to shore unless you are near Bali Marina, I’m sure somebody less tired and more resourceful could work something out.   I tried to anchor outside the Marina but it just didn’t look safe to me, the anchorage is small, full of boats, some are on moorings, some are anchored, some have two anchors, point is you can’t tell who’s going to swing what direction and the tides prevail at time as well.  I didn’t like it and I read that I could get a birth in the Marina for only $10, plus I had to deal with customs and immigration so I opted for the marina at least for the first night.  Turns out that a birth is really $20 (they don’t tell you until you are already tied up) the $10 deal is a med-more situation where you still have to use your dinghy and they only had one spot left, maybe 5 total from what I saw, I plan to move to that last spot today and then see what I can work out anchoring but it may not be worth it as they still charge $5 a day just to use the dinghy dock.  My first taste of Bali was very interesting, checking in wasn’t too hard just a few hours of walking around to find the 5 different offices, made friends with some locals along the way, everyone here is VERY VERY friendly, on par with the Fijians that until now I considered the friendliest people I’ve come across in my sailing.  I was little disappointed that there seems to be no anchorages with dinghy access to shore that are free, and none at all that are near a city.  Best I can see there is nothing of interest here near the marina, you either need a taxi ($5) or a rent a moped ($5 a day) to get anywhere you want to go.  Beers at the yacht club are about $2.50 USD, I hear that’s about double the going rate in towns and bars / clubs, but once again if you are at the Marina you have no other bars to choose from nearby.   Food looked good and reasonable on the menu at the Marina with dinners ranging from $4-8 USD if I remember correctly.  Well that’s the end of my report for now.  I Think this is most writing I’ve done in such a short time period, I’ll try to keep bloging about Bali as I hope to do some exploration while here, maybe rent a moped and tour the island a few days.   I typed all of this onboard using solar to power the computer and most it was done underway so sorry for all the errors and typos but I’d rather write more than write well and correct errors!  I hope to type up my actual log with daily coordinates and distances and add that to this post in a few days so if that’s of interest to you check back soon.  And thanks for reading all the way to the end of this entry!!

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