I’m woken, as usual, with the sun at about six am. I keep the large square hatch above the head of my bed open for the night time breeze, and enjoy the gentle waking that comes from the slowly rising morning ambient light levels. The nearest other person is well over a hundred meters away, so I can practice my yawning and stretching routine without fear of embarrassment.
I’ve treated myself to a coffee this morning. ‘Treated’, not because coffee is a precious commodity here- you can even get a decent espresso if you walk across the causeway to the next island- but because it’s a bit of a hassle boiling the kettle for one person or one preparation. The gas needs turning on (and off) in three places (for safety). What’s more, my trendy yellow kettle has developed a slow leak from its bottom.
The breeze, which has been a constant fifteen to twenty knots for the last few days, has dropped off. I’m glad that it’s cleared the sea-grass sea weed collection that was starting to gather around the boat. Sea-grass is great for turtles, but not for toilet water intakes, and mine was beginning to protest at the annoying foreign bodies struggling to enter the pipe system.
It’s not often that I write the blog in the morning, but on this occasion I’m pleased that I’ve matched the “theme music” to the task and mood of the moment, with Dido on the stereo. Actually, its Helen’s stereo. I gave it to her for Christmas, and she was kind enough to allow me to install it on Aroha. I’ve been quite successful on the “theme music” to date, missing the target once, but significantly. Jamiroquai is definitely not the right music to set the mood for changing engine oil.
The anchorage is quiet. The French registered yacht has returned to Chagos, before heading to Phuket. Bernd has returned to Dubai for a week to sort out ‘real life’ stuff, leaving me to have a look over Chimani every other day.
Two large motor boats arrived yesterday. They are of the “trawler” type. Up ‘til now I’d only seen them in magazines. They have the working look of fishing trawlers, but with lashings of stainless steel, dark tinted windows, and a plethora of communication antennas and dishes. These displacement craft are designed for motoring long distances at low speeds with ranges in the area of three thousand nautical miles. I chatted to the captain of one- a family man of confused nationality (French-Italian-South African...) and found that they’d come from the Seychelles. The pirate situation seems to be completely out of hand now; they found it necessary to pay a private security firm twenty five thousand dollars (!) to escort them the first three hundred miles off shore.
Dominique didn’t have anything nice to say about the Seychelles- claiming the islands as expensive, inconvenient, and the locals as ‘less than friendly’. I’m disappointed to hear this, but also glad in a way, as we’ve already decided to take this destination off our itinerary.
I’m really enjoying my coffee. Its mornings like these that make me want to stay on board and do nothing more strenuous than read my book for the whole day...
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