Sorry for the wait but for some reason I've been really slow at doing any up dates lately, it could be because of the intense heat that we're getting at the moment which makes sitting down at the computer dripping in sweat a pretty uncomfortable experience - but here goes...
Our trip up the river to visit the Orangutans in Tanjung Putting national Park was once again one of the best experiences I've ever had. We stayed on a large 'Klotok' (wooden river boat) along with Ingvil & Gunnar off s/v Helen Kate - Astrid, Jasper and their 2 year old son Marijn off s/v Antares - and Pete & Cathy off s/v Wave runner. It was a fantastic two day trip and we couldn't have asked for more, the Orangutans are absolutely beautiful and we were lucky enough to see many of them at all three camps...I won't write any more about it here but keep an eye out on the main blog page and I'll give you all the juicy details!
For now though we are underway and have been for five days from Kumai to Batam island which is just 20 miles south of Singapore. Batam will be our final stop in Indonesia where we'll catch a ferry over to Singapore for the day and then check out and head on to Malaysia. This trip has been extremely frustrating so far as our wind died out after the first 24 hours and so we've been motoring a lot only turning the engine off when we get hit by a thunder storm which brings way too much wind and plenty of rain! The rest of the time the boat is like an oven reaching up to 37*C and the seas are flat calm like a mirror... we found that pegging up towels and sarongs around the cockpit to block out the sun drops the temperature just enough to be bearable. Our usual cooling off system of dumping a bucket full of sea water over our heads is also useless as the water temperature here is about the same as our bodies so we just get wet!!
The big excitement today however was that at 10 am we crossed back over the equator and are now in the Northern Hemisphere once again. It's a strange feeling as we both feel a lot closer to home all of a sudden like we've crossed an invisible barrier back into own part of the world. It certainly feels like we're at the equator though with eerily calm conditions much the same as we experienced over a year ago when we crossed into the southern hemisphere on our way from Panama to the Galapagos! There were very little celebrations this time though as it's just too hot and we're keeping a constant eye on the thunder storms around us just hoping they'll head the other way.
We have roughly 100 nautical miles to go to get to Batam and fingers crossed we should arrive at Nongsa Point Marina before dark tomorrow night...we're all very excited about the large swimming pool at the hotel so finally we can cool off!
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