Hello Again Rebak

Hi everyone,
Zen Again is now back at Rebak Marina in Langkawi, Malaysia. We had a great passage from Phuket, logging 121nm in 24 hours. The nice westerley breeze (10-15 knots) and fine conditions lasted until 0300 this morning. Then we had a brief rain shower with 20-25knot winds. A good opportunity to try out the new reefing arrangements.

Zen Again's track

After the rain the wind was light but still westerly. We continued sailing at 2-3knots until about an hour away from Rebak. We motored in from there, with the only drama being when the motor stopped when just 100m from the entrance (and on a lee shore). We unrolled the jib, turned around and beat off under autopilot while I bled the fuel system. With the engine running again we entered the marina and tied up at pen B30.

There are several yachts here which took part in Sail Indonesia with us last year - good to see them. Some of the boats have had major "makeovers" as we have. An hour after we arrived a violent storm arrived and it blew 30+knots and poured rain for nearly two hours. Glad we arrived before that!

Moored at Rebak shortly after arrival

Rainstorm a short time later!

The direct passage from Phuket certainly exposed us to far fewer fishing boats and fishing nets. We passed half a dozen pair trawlers near Phuket but after that only saw individual trawlers occasionally, and stationary squid boats overnight. We passed through one big field of net floats in 50m of water west of Ko Rok Nok. Just after dawn we narrowly avoided a large tree trunk - just as well we weren't further ahead!

Zen Again at Rebak Marina

For those interested in single-handed short passage watchkeeping, I used the ten minute scheme. So day and night I set a 10 minute alarm, rested until it went off, looked out all round for traffic, checked sails, wind etc, and then set the alarm again. It worked well for me and it seemed it would be OK for up to perhaps 48 hours. Could be used when watch keeping on crewed passages too.

All in all, twas a great sail!