Some kind of crazy!
You are only young once.
From the very first time we started sailing Hobie Cats at Singapore's Changi Sailing Club in the mid '80's, the call of the coast could be heard! In those early days, life was much simpler and we could decide on Friday afternoon to just sail up the Malaysian Coast. We had a Hobie 16 for the first few forays from Changi to Desaru and then when we got our first Nacra in 1990, we could stretch this to Rawa Island (about 100nm's north).
On one of the first occasions to sail to Rawa Island, we'd organised a long-weekend event with a fleet of from the Keelboat Squadron of Singapore. Up on Friday and back on Sunday was the plan! The Keelboats departed Changi Sailing Club early on Friday and we as the only beach cat, kicked off mid morning into a building NE Monsoon. Much to our dismay, as we rounded the most eastern tip of Peninsular Malaysia and started heading directly into the NE breeze, we past the first of the keelboats. But something was wrong it has heading south! Over the next two hours the remainder of the fleet were past, all heading south. The wind, the chop and the pre-departure party proved too much and they elected to head back to the flat waters of Changi! Since we were out there, we may as well continue so we modified our plans sailed for 4 hours then splashed the Hobie through the surf at Desaru and went and checked in. The following day we headed off for another 40 miles to Pulua Sibu for another overnight! The on Sunday we headed off back to Changi Sailing Club arriving home Sunday evening.
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Our experience grew as we stretched our horizon as did our night vision! Often is the case where the wind fades out in the day and then freshens to frightening levels after dark! Numerous forays on the Malaysian East Coast meant only one thing, to start to head south, into the Riau Archipelago of Indonesia! Our first 'raids' were Singapore to Batam Island for which the sailing record stands at 2 hours 35 minutes!
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We did that a few times and then decided we need to go a bit more to a more 'remote' spot. This happens to be called Pulau Lobam and is now one of the Gates for the Neptune Regatta! Lobam ended up as a big adventure for the 2 Nacra Sport Cats that made it. A squall in the middle of the night nearly swept the cats off the beach and were only saved my a midnight swim! Upon returning to Singapore one of the sailors checked himself into hospital with a dose of double-Malaria. Today Andrew has a Corsair Dash with us and his sole purpose for owning the Corsair is, to go further into the Riau Archipelago - you could say that once the adventure bug bites you, it doesn't really go away.
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All of our sortie's only lead us to a further goal, to sail the Nacra 5.0 Sport cat from Singapore to Phuket for the annual King's Cup Regatta and so the "no limits Nacra epic" came to be! We didn't realise it then what an achievement it would be or how tough it could get. After 28 days on the trampoline of the Nacra, we'd sailed to Phuket, won the King's Cup and sailed back to Singapore covering roughly 1100 nautical miles in the process without support!
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It was an Epic and we're glad we completed it!
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The daily round up can be followed by clicking the link, which is incidentally, to our cat sailing archive - EPIC. Beyond All Limits | Pro Sail Asia (wordpress.com)
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Eight days to get from Singapore to Phuket included only 3 overnight stops along the Malaysian coast, two morning stops for hits of hot coffee! The rest of the time was spent on the trampoline, sleep in the sun, sleep in the rain!
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During the eight north bound days, we lost the breeze during the day and fell back on our schedule. That meant we had to try to make up time by constantly sailing. During the night we were mostly bombarded by squalls that race across the Malacca Straits from Sumatra. One of most hairy encounters was at 3am in the middle of a Sumatra dodging fishing stakes while sailing at what felt like 25 knots!
Us.
If you can think it... Just go do it!
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We're grateful to have been encapsulated by Lim Boon Yang art for the Changilog. As with all things in life, do them with a pure heart and the rest will sort
itself out!
Maybe 'adventuring' came easier to me than most.
Growing up in Papua New Guinea to a bush pilot
father and nurse mother certainly had a huge influence!
At the time we made our Epic Phuket trip, my father finished an elliptical circuit of the globe in a PBY Catalina WWII amphibian and my oldest brother completed a walk across a section of the Australian desert from Katherine to Brisbane.
It was my brother who said "if you can think it, just do it because the opportunity only comes once".
_ Scott
p.s most of the time, Alice just goes along with the ideas! There's something really wrong there!
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Core Values
Why
Opportunity knocks but once in a lifetime! If you don't jump on it, it will leave you regretting in its wake.
How
Practice in the light, in the heavy, in the dark and in the rain. Ensure you know how to repair stuff!
When
During the NE Monsoon, head into Riau. During the SW Monsoon head up the East Coast of Malaysia. Simple as!