Filed November 25, 2008 at 9:32 am under Boating by Administrator
We are in Munnar, on a trip to see some of the beautiful countryside high in the ghats. This is the area that the British would escape to in the heat of summer, and is cool and even cold in the evening. Now Munnar has become a bustling town, but is still surrounded by forest, tea plantations and lots of streams, rivers and waterfalls. We arrived yesterday evening, and today went for a 20 kilometer hike through a tea plantation and down to Deviculam, another little village. It rained on and off, but the weather wasn’t really bad, and we had a good time- Sheva really enjoyed herself, and got very muddy! In Deviculam we found a tiny restaurant serving Iddli, a kind of rice dumpling with two kinds of sauce, one white and spicy with a coconut taste, and the other a curry vegetable sauce, and also fried lentil cakes, and had Chi, which is like English tea, AND rice pancakes ( dosa), for the grand sum of 50p for both of us!!! Then we walked back, stuffed full, and had a play with the remote control on the TV ( well, we haven’t seen one for quite a few months!). On the way we met the son of one of the workers on the plantation, who works in a hotel, and he explained all about the process of tea picking and drying. His mother earns 120 rupees per day, but the conditions are quite good since the family gets a house ( well, shack) and food, plus schooling with a school bus for the children. He works in a big hotel now, and earns less!
On the way back a motorcycle stopped, and a journalist asked if he could put a photo of Sheva, the tourist dog, in the paper tomorrow! We agreed, but Sheva didn’t really have much to say in the interview! We will get the paper tomorrow to see if she is really in. It is very rare to see people with dogs here, and she makes quite a stir wherever she goes, although the Hindus are fine about her, not like the Moslems.
Chasamba has been attacked by hackers, so the pictures are down- this is temporary and Anat and I will get it back to normal as soon as possible (thanks Anat!). I will put the latest pics of Munnar in now.
Filed November 22, 2008 at 1:58 am under Boating by Administrator
We have been here two weeks already- it seems like much longer! We have got to know the city and the ferries that link the different areas- each ferry goes between two islands, and some carry on to another island. Each ferry costs about 3 rupees- 25 agorot, or about 10p. Sheva is having a great time, we take turns to take her in the kayak for her morning walk in the grounds of the Bolgatty hotel. It is very nice, wooded and with lots of birds and lizards, and even a big snake which we surprised sunning itself on the lawn! There is a little golf course here too.
Today we will meet Ofer, Orens brother, who is in India on business, and will be in the Taj Malabar hotel, but first we will go into Ernakulum to change books at the great second hand bookshop we found on Press Club road, and buy more boat bits- the metal working industry is well developed here, and stainless steel parts can be made to order cheaply and are well made. Oren has asked for a quote on fuel tanks, so today we will see if it is worth while. Meanwhile we have got 12v fans installed in the bedroom, no more cursing and tying bits of string to things to get the one fan to turn round on both of us! And we have got a new pressure cooker, Indian style, and a toaster which is heated on the gas stove. Also lots of stainless steel bowls, which are really nice and cost about 100 rupees, or less, depending on the size.
Yesterday we bought lots of yoghurt, which comes in plastic bags and is called curd ( took a while to find that out!) and made labane by pouring it into a cheesecloth bag and hanging it over the sink. It came out really good, and afterwards I made balls and covered it with olive oil. For some reason the Indians don’t have cheese at all. We also got some pork and some beef, which was probably buffalo, and I made a curry and a chinese stirfry. The meat is not too good though, the beef needed an hour in the pressure cooker to soften it, and the pork was mostly fat. I can see why vegetarianism is so popular here! Inbal would have a great time here, and really, the vegetarian dishes are very good.
Filed November 14, 2008 at 5:08 am under Boating by Administrator
So… we are finally in Cochin, India!Since our last update we have;
·been at sea for 50 days
·crossed the Indian Ocean
·been caught in a force 9 gale
·hand steered 850 miles with an emergency tiller
·been becalmed for three weeks
But we got here!
It all started with a really good wind which took us out of Assab and whisked us almost to Aden in less than 24 hours. Then the wind died, and after a few hours up came the wind which was to be the bane of our lives for the next two weeks. It was a strong easterly, dead against us, and turned out to be helped by a strong current setting north west. For five days we tacked back and forth, and arrived opposite Aden every evening. This was annoying, since as Israelis we can’t enter Yemen, and it really looked inviting. Also, it is nerve fraying tacking in and out of the shipping channels at night, especially without lights. ( So the pirates can’t see you!) Actually we were mistaken for pirates ourselves a few times, and had to light the sails with a projector to calm people down. The hysteria in the Gulf of Aden is amazing- ships seeing us on radar would take a 2 or 3 mile detour round us and put on all their deck lights to make sure they weren’t boarded. The French warships which patrol up and down were amazing, they really made us feel safer, and kept on checking to see that we were ok, sending a plane several times to fly over and check us.
So, gradually we made our way up the Gulf, tacking all the way, and eventually got out. Then we had another good day of wind, which left us near Socutra, where we bobbed up and down for 5 days without a breath of wind. The North-East monsoon gradually filled in, and we had a few good days sailing before hitting a huge storm 850 miles from Cochin. Thunder, lightning and torrential rain were accompanied by waves of 15 metres. Oren put out a sea drogue, we shortened sail to a handkerchief and set the autopilot to keep us running before the waves. Then we got into bed, wearing lifejackets, and stayed there for 3 days, while Chasamba was blown south, handling the enormous waves without complaining, but pitching and rolling quite violently.We took turns to keep a lookout, and it was lucky we did, because Oren stuck his head out at one point and saw a huge container ship about 400 metres away on a collision course for us. The waves were so big that even at that distance we could only see the bridge, and there was little chance that he could see us at all. We raced to the radio and tried to call the ship, but there was no answer. We were towing a drogue and slewing down waves with very little control, but there was no choice- we made a sharp starboard turn and came side on to the waves. As the ship steamed by, barely 50 metres from us, slicing through the waves at the spot where we would have been, I looked up and read the name on the bows. Oren called again on the vhf using the ships name, and a laconical answer came- “Oh …yeah, well sorry about that…”.
By the way,Sheva was under the table in the front cabin, and felt quite safe there- she didn’t want to come out after the storm!
After 3 days the wind and waves started to calm down, and we managed to get under way again. We had been blown south, and considered changing course to the Seychelles, but decided against it because from there it would be hard to continue on our way. We got some canvas up, and two things happened- first of all the stays fell out of the shrouds, leaving the mast unsupported at the sides above the shrouds. We were very lucky to catch this and immediately took all the sails down, then somehow managed to persuade the stays to get back onto the shrouds and tightened them up. Probably they were loosened in the storm from all the vibration, but if they had fallen during the storm we would definately have lost the mast! The second thing which happened was that the hydraulic steering failed. It must have taken a beating too, with huge waves banging the rudder about. But it too kept us safe during the storm and only complained afterwards! So we got the emergency tiller out, and for the next three weeks, through calm after calm we drifted our way gradually closer to Cochin, hand steering in shifts.
About a week before we got to India we met three Sri Lankan fishing boats. Apart from accidentally ramming us and breaking two stanchions, they were very nice, and we traded some old bottles- quarter of a bottle of gin, some old Cinzano and so on, for a huge tuna, 25 litres of water and some packets of milk shake. This really made our day, and most of the tuna I dried, so that it provided food for the next week, until the dog got at it and finished it all!
On the 9th of November we finally entered the Cochin channel, and as a finale thick weed blocked our path, and clogged the propellor when we tried to plow through it. But we were unstoppable, and even though the engine started to heat up and our speed went down to 1.5 knots, we just kept on in, and in the end the weed gave up and we anchored off the Taj Malabar, in the customs anchorage, looking just like a boat sitting in the middle of a field!
Soon we will update on Cochin, for now I will just say that the food is marvellous, and that we are very glad to be here!
