Splish splash

Perry ready to splash. Photo courtesy
of Dave of Tortuguita (as are all the
splash photos).

Perry is now in the water after ten months on the hard. Since our return from land traveling around Cambodia and Vietnam, we have been working double-time to get her ready to splash.

What comes down, must go back up.

The parts we needed came in on time and the rigging company got our mast up 2 days before we were scheduled to go back into the water. There are only certain times of the month when the tide allows boats to be put back in (or taken out of) the water. If we had missed our launch date, the delay would have put us more than a week behind schedule.

Au Wei of Doyle Malaysia working
diligently on our rigging

Can't we just leave it like this?  It's a nice breeze...

In the meantime, we replaced our cockpit windows because the sealant/glue was coming off the windows. Despite our best efforts, the old Plexiglas broke when we tried to remove it. Oh well, it was a bit crazed and hazy anyway.  Fortunately, Pangkor Marina had new Plexiglas on hand. We were very grateful for this because the lead time on ordering new Plexiglas could have caused another major delay.

Matt with his big gun.  Because the big 
caulk comes in "sausages".  Yes, lots of 5th
grade humor there...

Our friends on another boat suggested using a guitar string to cut the old sealant and it worked pretty well. The messiest and most time-consuming part of the process was removing the old sealant. A multi-tool and hours with a razor blade and 100-grit sandpaper did the trick. 

The new glass waiting to go in.

Cutting the new Plexiglas, shaping it, and painting it went relatively smoothly. Matt carefully planned the placement and used bolts and washers to hold the Plexiglas in place while the sealant cured (the proper spacing had to be maintained around the sides, front and back of the window). Amazingly, we had ordered the right amount of sealant (Dowsil 795) and didn't make too much of a mess.

Splash day arrived and Perry was back in the lift. She still groaned a bit about being lifted from the middle, being a heavy gal, but tolerated the 300-foot ride to the water.

The skilled lift-driver, Abeh

Matt had a bit of a freak out when the guys (underneath the boat) started to
 push Perry away.  He couldn't see the guys and didn't understand why the
boat was accelerating, though out of gear. Quickly
sorted, though.

Once in the water, we checked to make sure that there were no leaks. There was a small leak in the starboard engine heat exchanger that the mechanics had worked on, but it was manageable and could be fixed later. 

We held our breaths to see if the engines would run after being out of the water for so long. The starboard engine fired up just fine. The port engine, on the other hand, just made a clicking noise. Matt hit the starter with a hammer, but it still didn't work. A small knot of fellow cruisers was on shore watching our launch and providing moral support. They yelled, 'Hit it with a hammer' and when we said we had, they yelled, 'Hit it harder!' That actually did the trick and the port engine fired up.

Joss sticks (giant sticks
of incense) for Chinese New Year

Matt is in the midst of fixing the things that have broken after many months of disuse: the tachometers for the engines and Conrad's toilet (that stubborn port starter works just fine after being banged around a bit). The generator seems to be working and the outboard eventually got going after a bit of convincing. He finished up the final caulking of the cockpit windows, re-connecting the wiring in the mast, and replacing the kinked hose for our holding tank.

Pretty soon, the only things keeping us here will be a visit from mechanics for our engine and outboard to re-fix some previous fixes and a package coming from the States (with boat stuff of course). We are enjoying the Chinese New Year festivities at Marina Island while we wait. It is celebrated over multiple days and you can hear fireworks every night.

We have also revised our plans for the upcoming year. Instead of sailing to Europe via the Red Sea, we will likely head across the Indian Ocean towards South Africa. While we'd love to see the Med and parts of the Middle East, the decision not to go is primarily due to timing. For the Red Sea route, we should be leaving now to get the right winds and we just aren't ready yet. If we've learned one thing over the past few years, it's not smart to fight the weather.

Road Trip Part 2: Vietnam

Sunset in the Mekong Delta

The Vietnam War makes Vietnam part of the American lexicon in a way that Cambodia isn't. We noticed some movie-fueled familiarity: Non Las, rickshaws, rice paddies, and scantily-clad young women offering massages (not exactly 'me love you long time' but a little imagination and artistic license will get you there).

This post card is a much better
picture of a floating market than
ours.

Vietnam and especially Ho Chi Minh City (which many locals still refer to as Saigon), on the other hand, has skyscrapers, Starbucks, and lots of traffic. There's even a sky deck with a Heineken tour.

A less picturesque view of
the Cai Rang floating market

We took a ferry from Phnom Penh to Chau Doc (boat #1 on our 'road trip'). We met a man who was one of the boat people in the 80's that escaped Vietnam as a refugee, surviving a grueling 6 days at sea where his boat ran out of food and was attacked three times by pirates. The final set of Thai pirates ended up helping the refugees, who were much worse off than the pirates. He lived in the U.S. for twenty years, became a citizen, and retired to Vietnam.

Banh Mi sandwiches from a
vendor on the river

We spent a few days in Can Tho in the Mekong Delta. We visited a couple of floating markets on a sunrise boat trip (road trip boat #2). Boats sell fresh fruits and vegetables to locals in their own boats. Also, there are vendors selling coffee, sandwiches, and noodles. There was even a karaoke bar boat, which didn't have too many takers as the sun was rising.

Our kind driver and
his boat dog

We spent some time at the War Remnants Museum. It used to be called the Museum of Chinese and American War Crimes, which gives you an idea of the primary perspective (history is written by the victors). And there wasn't too much about what the Chinese did. It's a comprehensive and sobering reminder of the terrible things that people did to each other during the war. In the museum, most of the blame for atrocities committed falls on the Americans and South Vietnamese (or the "puppet regime" as it was--pretty accurately--called). 

A French guillotine used on prisoners. But the
French also introduced baguettes and croissants...so
their influence wasn't all bad?

Saigon traffic from the public bus
on the way to the Cu Chi tunnels

We visited the Cu Chi tunnels (if you go, the Ben Duoc tunnels are supposedly the more authentic and less crowded area). This was an elaborate system of tunnels used by the Viet Cong to live, hide, and fight from. The resident tour guide (who was excellent) used the phrase 'to kill Americans' several times in describing the primary goal of the guerrilla soldiers. The mostly uneducated peasants came up with some ingenious ways to combat the technologically-superior Americans. Seeing how extensive and well-hidden the tunnels were brings home how difficult a job the American soldiers had.

This tunnel has been enlarged. The
smaller ones would allow a small teen-aged
boy to crawl through.

On our last full day in Ho Chi Minh City, we took a water taxi (third boat on our road trip--we just can't stay off the water) towards the north of the city and walked the rest of the way to the Saigon Zoo, which has a large variety of animals. 

The spectators are a lot closer to the animals than in other zoos we have visited. Usually, in the US there is a barrier in addition to the glass enclosure. At the Saigon Zoo, you can touch the glass enclosures and some cages (like the leopard cage) even have sections of mesh that a small finger could poke through. The animals seem to notice you a lot more and one leopard snarled and leaped at Conrad a few times, banging its body into the glass. It's probably disturbing for them to have people so close.

We're back at the boat yard now, doing boat stuff. When we turned on our fridge, the evaporator plate wasn't getting cold enough, so Matt had to vacuum out the coolant and refill it. Cruisers seem to spend an inordinate amount of time on refrigeration.

The mechanics came to align the starboard shaft and one of them accidentally set off our automatic fire extinguisher by bumping the handle with his head. So now we have to find a place that can refill it with the necessary HFC-227, which can be hard to find. 

If our rigging parts come in when they are supposed to, we go back in the water in about a week. Keep your finger crossed!

Road trip to Cambodia

Royal Palace, Phnom Penh

Our visa run to Cambodia, which we ended up extending to also include Vietnam (pictures to come in the next blog post) because we have to wait for rigging parts, was a nice break from boat work. In Cambodia we spent our time in more citified and touristy areas than we normally visit with the boat. There was no ocean or beaches, though we did end up on a couple boats on the Mekong when we were in Vietnam.

The Killing Fields (Choeung
Ek Genocide Center)

We visited many of the places that our cruiser friends have gone to before us, which made them seem familiar but no less interesting.

Cambodia's history is heartbreaking. The Khmer Rouge massacred nearly a quarter of their own civilians, including brutally murdering children and babies. It wasn't that long ago and the evidence has been preserved to make sure no one forgets.  Nowadays, the capital Phnom Penh is like many bustling cities around the world, with some differences. 

Angkor Wat

Crossing the street through the never-ending streams of traffic is the most challenging we have experienced (even worse than India). You can't wait for traffic to stop because it never will (at least not all the way). You have to pick a less busy section, take a leap of faith, and then just start walking--waves of motorbikes will kind of flow around you. 

And once you have made it across the street, your adventure isn't over. Sidewalks are not for walking.  The serve primarily as motorcycle parking, extensions of storefronts and an alternative to the street whenever a motorcyclist feels they can get to their destination a bit faster by zipping along the sidewalk (which is almost always).
  

Naga bridge

From a base in Siem Reap, we spent a couple days visiting the famous Angkor Wat, Ta Phrom (of Tomb Raider fame), and other temples. We spent a lot of time and money to see these temples, so you're going to see them (wait, sorry--you're not the kids complaining about being dragged around; but still, here are a bunch of pictures).

Selfie proving we were at Angkor Wat.

Can you see the reclining person
in the stones?

Ta Phrom--no Angelina Jolie, sorry

We tried some new foods.

Lotus fruit. Labor intensive
snack; sort of like a bland nut.

Piles of spiders and bugs
(mostly fried--proving that
frying makes everything better)

Peeling a beetle to get
to the 'good' part

We don't have a shot of the 'after'
but the beetle was 'not his favorite'

Bamboo rice - coconut flavored
rice cooked over a fire in bamboo.
Delicious!

We also ate some familiar food and played tourist. There is an excellent Boston-style pizza restaurant and gourmet gelato.

Virtual reality sky diving

Phare Circus, a sort of Cambodian
Cirque du Soleil that helps disadvantaged youths

Apopo Visitor Center - Rats
trained to find land mines

Our ride on the tours

We also spent a couple days in Battambang. On a full-day tuk-tuk tour, we took a ride on the Bamboo Train and watched an endless stream of bats leaving a cave at dusk.

Baby croc

Croc farm - Overcrowded
crocs that are statue-still most
of the time

Bamboo train

There is only one track so when
two trains meet, they need to be
disassembled and put back together

These trains can move and the
rickety track makes it feel like an old-fashioned
wooden roller coast

Bat Cave (Phnom Sampeau)
at dusk. Watch a video here
(it just goes on and on).