We were up early and underway from that first anchorage after a good night's sleep. We motored out through a narrow cut between the ends of two islands, with wharfs and villages on each side. The crews of boats from freighters and ferries to small oddly-shaped punts called out as we passed and waved "Hallo!" or "assalaamualaikum" (peace be on you -- which is the standard Muslim greeting, and these islands being very traditionally Muslim.) Most vessels of whatever size were heavily loaded with big blue bags which we guess to contain rice.
On the far side of the cut was a shallow bay, whipped to a brown frenzy by the strengthening breeze, stretched across which was a formidable line of bamboo fishing structures that we would have to get through. It's a strange feeling motoring through this motionless unattended "fleet" of spectral structures
It seems in this part of the world, wind builds in the mornings then die off in the afternoons. Hence, Ivory Street starts the day sailing hard and ends it motorsailing hard. Her mainsail is 94 square meters, plus she has both a genoa and a screecher -- a larger, lighter headsail. Like most skippers, Greg has a motoring "rule" -- a threshold of speed-made-good below which the engine comes on. Or in the case of catamarans, one engine comes on. Also like most skippers, that threshold is always pegged a little too high, so that to get where they're going in the time planned, odds are there will most often be a little motor assist.
During the daytime, the vessel traffic on the Java Sea is relatively modest. There are the odd (in all senses of the word) local boats that pop up from the sea either to protect their nets or drift lines (marked Mexican style with a jerry rigged buoy of lashed timbers with a black flag!) or to intersect your course just for a closer look. These are easy to see and avoid, if their flagged nets are not! There is also, of course, big ships -- freighters and cruise ships, but they all appear on the plotter as we do on theirs via AIS, the automated radio-based position information service which is a damned handy development since our day.
At night, however, the sea seems to become a congested highway, filled with vessels of all types undertaking all kinds of unidentifiable endeavors, mostly to do with fishing, we suppose on top of the same ships trafficking during the daytime. The radar screen is filled with blips, large and small, and they display a whole range of lighting schemes.
Through all this, Ivory Street hurtles along at her warp speed of 8-10 knots. It is not the most relaxing of sailing, and it will only get worse as we get closer to Singapore.
From Bali to Singapore is 1000 miles, more or less. Our deadline to get there ASAP is pegged to getting 12-year-old Michael back to Mooloolaba for his fourth semester of eighth grade (he attended semesters one and two and missed number three) most particularly in time to sign up for team sports. So we are moving more quickly than the typical leisure cruiser. Our hope of time to stop at Kumai to partake of the orangutan experience fizzled with the visa delay in Bali.
However, at the moment. after two nights at sea, we are stopped for an overnight in the quiet anchorage at Karimunjawa, the main island of a group of 26 in a small archipelago off Java where we are hoping to get a dive in this afternoon. After the dive, if it happens, it will be back to sea for another two nights!
Gwen Hamlin
Cafe Getaway
Sent from my iPad
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