When There Are No Shops

Remote Salamon Atoll, Chagos, Crystal Blues In The Foreground.  Photo / Mark, SV Merkava                         

If we had a mission statement for our cruising life it would be shaped by what we truly enjoy - that is travel by boat, to experience new cultures, cuisines and music.  The past few months have offered a smorgasbord of this mix.  But none of this could have happened without a lot of planning. Before leaving Langkawi, Malaysia, all boat systems were checked, upgraded where necessary, the spares list re-checked and every empty space on the boat was filled with food and more than a little bit of wine, before we began sailing through the Indian Ocean.

We provisioned extensively in Phuket, stocking up on bread flour, pork, bacon, sausages and ham. Then we continued in Langkawi, stocking up on tinned and dry food, steak, salmon, toiletries, tinned butter, and duty free wine.  Over the previous months Ley had taken careful note of our consumption per month of all these items. Then we multiplied all this by six, hoping that our supplies would last around six months.

With those stores on board, the real provisioning challenge was fresh food - principally fruits and vegetables. What we can buy in Sri Lanka or the Maldives ? Will it last us for the 6-7 weeks after we depart Gan Atoll for Chagos and then Rodrigues ?

Fortunately the cruising community share information quite freely and efficiently, so we already knew that it was wiser to purchase fresh eggs, pumpkins and fruit in Sri Lanka, as nearly all produce in the Maldives is imported from there (plus India and Pakistan).

The Maldive Islands have very little fertile soil, with most of the new villages being built on reclaimed land.  Very little produce is grown locally.  It is not a great provisioning place.....

So the challenge was buying ten to twelve weeks of fresh provisions and doing our best to keep this produce fresh and edible in the tropical heat.

Indian Ocean Weather Forecast Areas

For boats traveling south and west across the southern Indian Ocean, local weather forecasting is hard to come by.

The Saildocs service on the Sailmail email system provides access to a range of forecasts, including those covering the southern Indian Ocean.

The Mauritius Meteorological Service prepares a very detailed short term forecast, available on Saildocs as "Met.8s / Southwest Of Indian Ocean".   It is also available via the GMDSS forecast tab on the Predict Wind Offshore application.

This forecast covers the complete GMDSS Area VIII, including relevant storm warnings and valuable weather interpretations (see today's forecast by clicking on "Continue Reading" below).  However the forecasting is segmented into sub-regions, 1 thru 7, that are not identified in terms of latitude and longitude, within the forecast.  To actually use the forecast you need to be able to identify the sub-region boundaries.

Via the friendly meteo office here in Rodrigues we were able to obtain a copy of the sub-region map, as shown at right (click to enlarge).  You can also click here to download a PDF copy of the map.  The Met Area VIII forecasts now make sense.

Departing Maldives, Bound For Chagos

Chagos has always been on our cruising radar - the place is big in cruising folklore.  Recent administrative changes by the UK government have limited the permit time to just 28 days, so the old cruising culture of three and four month extended visits has now gone.

Crystal Blues is as ready as she'll ever be, and Ley has provisions that will feed an army on board.

We expect a slow three day passage, as the Equatorial Counter Current is running at up to three knots from west to east and we need to cross it almost at right angles.

In the image at right our departure point is Addoo Atoll at the top, and our destination is Chagos Solamon Atoll near the bottom.  Its a distance of around 300 nautical miles.

But just look at those current arrows !

We have just dived and cleaned the waterline, propeller and shaft.  The outboard motor is stowed and the dinghy is lashed into the davits.

Immigration and customs was handled last night, the weather forecast is for calm conditions, so at 12:00 noon we're off.

Adoo Atoll, Maldives - Sailing South Of The Equator Again

After a very twitchy and uncomfortable overnight voyage south, Crystal Blues is anchored in 40 meters of clear water at Gan, in the Addu Atoll.  Turtles and dolphins swim around us and the environment seems pristine.

We did manage to sail for the entire passage, a rarity in this part of the world.  During the voyage we crossed the equator, sometime around the change of watch at 2:00am, but neither of us had the heart to celebrate - we were too busy just holding on.

We entered the atoll via the northern pass around 9:00am and were safely anchored within the hour, just before the first of many squalls bore down on us.

We have a 100 meters of anchor chain out here, but I'm always very watchful the first day or so after anchoring, specially when it repeatedly blows at 30 to 40 knots with little warning.

This is the most southern point of the Maldivian island chain, and will be our stepping off point for Chagos and then Mauritius.

Adoo Atoll is small, but heavily populated.  The British military ran an air base here until the 1970's (see the airport in the bottom of the photo above).  The old officers mess has been converted into the low key Equator Village resort, so we can go ashore for a beer if the need arises.  Right now the original runway is being extended, and the airport has recently qualified for "International Airport" status, though the only international flights so far are private jets delivering the rich and (sometimes) famous.

Kudahuvandhoo Island, Maldives

Continuing our journey south, we spent two nights in the protected fishing boat harbour at Kudahuvandhoo, South Nilandhe Atoll.  As you can see from the image at right, the local people gave us a very warm welcome.

Our second day there was "National Language Day" - a celebration of local culture that included a special lunch time meal at the school, with all the food cooked and served by the children's families.  The children dressed in traditional costumes, instead of the standard all-white uniforms.

For the entry here, once again we sounded the pass through the reef before entering, using a Laylin SM-5 handheld depth sounder from the dinghy.

This is another harbour that offers a typical minimum of 3.5 meters at low water.

We berthed stern to the quay, with the bow tethered to one of the buoys provided within the harbour.  Handling that maneuver was a first for us, with only two on board we needed to get it right first time.

Once we had the bow tethered we paid out line and reversed towards the dock, then used the dinghy to land the stern lines to the wall.  Managed to avoid tangling lines with the propeller, no stress at all ....

One thing about the Maldives, when you pass a line ashore to someone on the dock, they often actually know what to do with it.  On this day the guy who put his hand out for our stern line whipped a perfect bowline onto the wharf ring in about 5 seconds flat.  If only that happened all the time !

Solar Power Plant Project

The Maldives government has committed the nation to being carbon neutral by 2020, an adventurous target.

Kudahuvandhoo is home to a pilot project to test PV (solar) power as an augmentation to the existing diesel generation systems.  We met Joachim Gaube and Harald Gaube, German engineers who planned and implemented the PV project here.  Panels installed on the schools, the power house and the hospital have produced 44,000 kilowatt hours in two months, saving around 15,000 liters of diesel fuel.

Nilandhoo Island, Maldives - Paradise For 2000 Peaceful Souls

Anchor Off The Bow, Stern To The Wharf At Nilandhoo                                             

Traveling south down the Maldives atoll chain, we decided to look for a town with a friendly harbour - being enough water for our keel and space at the wharf.

We found that and more in peaceful Nilandhoo.

There are two harbours here, though the eastern entrance and harbour is very shallow and less attractive.

The north-western entrance provides deeper water (5.0 to 7.0 meters all the way) and leads to a small concrete wharf that has a fueling station, ice works and fresh water supply.  There is room for four or five vessels moored stern to the wharf.

What more could we want ?  So in we went ....

50 Shades Of Blue - Maldives South Ari Atoll & LUX* Resort

Never Mind 50 Shades Of Grey - here there are 50 Shades Of Blue.  We spent three delightful days on the Lagoon at Dhigurah, South Ari Atoll, Maldives.

While others were chasing whale sharks on the outer reef, or manta rays on the inner reef, we relaxed, read books, swam and beach combed.  This is a very peaceful anchorage, with easy access from the ocean.

The entrance over the inner shoal showed around four meters at low tide (03deg 31.77 North, 072deg 54.34 East).

The anchorage is marked just off the sand spit islands in the this image (03deg 31.03 North, 072deg 54.74 East).

Whilst you could anchor further to the north, it is advised not to anchor further south, to stay clear of the seaplane landing area there.

Many resorts in the Maldives do not welcome cruising sailors, applying steep landing fees or simply banning yachts all together.  In fact we have friends who were literally chased out of the anchorage by security guards, at the nearby Hilton resort.

So we were pleased when on our second day a catamaran approached us with a crew and guests from the Lux* Resort, to the south in the image at right.

View Open CPN On The iPad

Open CPN is a very popular navigation program for cruising sailors. Now, with the advent of accurate charts derived from Google Earth satellite images, it plays a very important role for us in tropical areas.

Like many boats, Crystal Blues has the navigation PC installed below decks at the nav station, locked down in a safe and (hopefully) dry location.

However we really want to see those Google Earth charts when we are up on deck, moving around in the cockpit and at the wheel.

The iPad is the perfect tool for this, portable, stable and with good battery life - but Open CPN doesn't run on the iPad.

The iPad does have WiFi capability, so in theory at least we could connect it to our PC down below at the navigation station, which is exactly what we do.

We use Splashtop Streamer, a free shareware application, to stream the PC screen directly to our iPad. This allows us to see the PC screen from anywhere on deck (in fact anywhere on the boat), and provides basic mouse and keyboard functions to control the PC as well.

So, I can stand at the wheel and see the display from Open CPN, or from our Transas Navigator ECN  package, in real time.  I can review my Sailmail GRIB files as well, without having to "go below".  So how does this work?

The Maldives - Viewed Through A Plastic Bottle

Beautiful, Idylic Sand Spit Island ?  Not Really ....                                                 

Every country we've sailed through has its share of waste littering the shore line.  Of course much of this pollution is plastic, blown across the seas from who knows where.   Going ashore yesterday on a nearby sand spit we were not surprised to see the typical range of shampoo and water bottles, rubber thongs (why are they always the left foot ?), coke containers and chunks of fishing net.

However we were not prepared for the local rubbish.....

Google Earth Charts - A New Aid To Navigation

The Red Icon Shows Our Position, Safely Anchored In The Lagoon At Dhanghethi Island

 We have multiple electronic charting systems aboard Crystal Blues, with multiple sources of navigation data.  But they are all inaccurate in many parts of the world.

In some cases smaller nations simply can't afford to fund extensive maritime surveys.  Further, the electronic charting companies often simply won't pay for the latest data, so we rely in many cases on data and soundings that were collected by master mariners (sometimes) centuries ago.

This means that many islands and reefs are not exactly where the charts say they are, with the errors being both substantial and dangerous.

The image above is captured from our Open CPN navigation software, using charts created from Google Earth images.  It doesn't have depths and soundings, but in these tropical areas we can use the water color to plan our route and we certainly know exactly where we are at all times.

Contrast that with this image of the exact same area, extracted from our (expensive) ECDIS based charting package.

This puts our position as outside the lagoon !  In fact it doesn't show the lagoon clearly at all.  I estimate the charting error places the island at least 500 meters further east than it actually is.  Not surprising, when you think it was probably positioned by a 19th century chronometer and sextant.

So charts made from Google Earth images are now a valuable part of our navigation tool set.

You can produce your own, it's easy and fast so long as you have a decent internet connection.  Here is how it's done :

Cruising South Ari Atoll, Maldives

As you can see, the weather here has been dreadful ..... some boats (including us) complain about the heat in the afternoon, when its well above 90 degrees farenheit in the shade.

However the mornings are glorious and the sunsets are special.  The water is clear and the swimming is fabulous.

We're 210 miles north of the equator, which we plan to be well south of before the end of this month.  But its slow travel, a few miles each day.

We're re-adapting to cruising in coral reef areas - it has been a while for us.

Today we moved from Dhangethi to Dhigurah, choosing to stay inside the Ari lagoon instead of making the transit at sea.  Only a 10 mile transit, but Ley stood watch on the bow looking for coral patches and we navigated completely using charts made from Google Earth - they are the only accurate reference we have.

Each day we explore our new locale by dinghy, looking at sea life and the shoreline.  Today we saw numerous turtles, a beautiful grey crane, many bats and of course a lot of fish.  Ley was escorted on her beach walk by four small reef sharks - tracking her from the shallows.


Further off shore, our local friend Captain Najib took his guests swimming with the whale sharks, then brought them in closer to us to see the manta rays.

Najib captains Dream Maldives, an 82 foot catamaran that hosts just 12 guests (check it out here).

We've been fortunate to spend some time aboard with he and his guests, and to learn the whale shark locations from him.

Cruising In Malé, Maldives

Ley, Diving At Last In Clear Water, Just A Few Miles From Malé                                                     

Malé was a surprise to us - certainly more sophisticated and "switched on" than we expected.  From a cruising sailors perspective it is an excellent place to provision before exploring the atolls and offers a very complete range of boating support services.

Arrival Formalities

You should appoint an agent well before arrival, agreeing on fee's and charges at the time.  If you are clearing in at Uligamu in the north, Real Sea Hawks provide great service through Assad, one of the business managers.  Unfortunately that same level of confident service is not always provided in Malé.  So if you are clearing in to Malé you will need to "manage" the local representative somewhat more.  Alternately you could utilise Antrac, a competitive agency in Male who provide outstanding service here, though at a more expensive price.

Clearance here is simple enough - call Harbour Control on approach and advise them who your agent is.  Anchor at the nominated location and wait for the visit from Customs, Immigration and Coastguard.  They will all come together, along with your agent.  Calling your agent on arrival will speed things somewhat - in the end we waited four hours, anchored in 42 meter water on the northern side of the island.  The arrival inspection location, provided by Real Sea Hawks, can be downloaded here.  All of the officials were perfectly professional.  There were a brace of forms to be completed, and they did want a complete schedule of all drugs and medicines on board - we keep that document on file and updated, so it was simple for us to print it and hand it over.

Hulhumale Anchorage

After clearance yachts are required to move to the lagoon anchorage at Hulhumale.  The new entrance there is shown accurately on iPad / Navionics, and the lagoon is generally 6 to 8 meters deep throughout. Anchorage at the northern end is suggested to keep away from ferries and commercial traffic.

SY Morning Glory Loads Diesel From The Fuel Barge In Hulhumale Anchorage

This is a busy place, specially on Friday's and Saturday's when the expedition boats discharge and reload with passengers.   Aircraft and construction noise also make a contribution during daylight hours.

 The water is clean enough to run your R.O. plant, and potable water can be delivered by barge or taken on-board at one of the docks (south of the ferry terminal).

Diesel fuel can also be delivered by barge - we paid US$0.72 per liter for excellent quality fuel.  The contact details for fuel and water are included in the Cruising Services Guide you can download here.

Hulhumale Island

Hulhumale Island is a dormitory suburb, growing rapidly and housing many airport workers.  A causeway now connects it to the airport, and a regular bus service is available.  Local taxis are available, and shops near the ferry terminal offer a basic range of goods, including some restaurants.  However the real action is across the water on Malé.

Good Friday In The Maldives

Today was our first morning away from
Malé, in a quiet tropical anchorage.  Ley woke, checked our favourite newspaper The Age online, and realised that today was Good Friday.

Oops, we do lose touch so easily out here.

After breakfast she started on a bread recipe, and by 11:00am we invited friends from a nearby yacht for coffee and Hot Cross Buns.

What she produces in that compact galley is amazing. I am the best fed crew that I know.

Arrival In The Maldives

Before we can see the land, we study that landfall on our charting system.  The approach to Male, the capital of the Maldives, is specially exciting - just look at all those reefs.  Crystal Blues arrived in Male on Sunday morning, after a five day crossing from Trincomalee in Sri Lanka.

From closer in, Male rises from the sea in an amazing display of tight communal living on a very small tropical island.

We had planned an early morning arrival and all was going to plan until huge black clouds began dumping rain on Male ahead of us. So we altered course and headed out to sea, away from the tropical storm. We tracked the storm on the radar and when it started to dissipate we headed back to Male.

Our emailed instructions from our agent, Real Sea Hawks, asked us to drop anchor in 40 meters and wait. Ley lost sight of the anchor at 17 meters, the water colour and clarity is stunning. We waited for 4 hours, but the officials were pleasant to deal with and after clearance we motored to the anchorage near the airport.

The lagoon anchorage in Male is just past the end of the runway and with building construction at the far end there is plenty happening. Neil is in "plane spotting heaven"with ancient Twin Otter sea planes continually flying overhead. We slept well at anchor that night and headed into Male town the next day for provisions.

Indian Ocean Clearance Diving

Can He Touch The Bottom ?  No Way....

On Tuesday night we hooked up on a surface net, where the top rope was directly buoyed on the surface.

I felt it pass under the keel around 9:00pm and then was amazed to see Crystal Blues slow down to a crawl as the line hooked onto the skeg and we started to drag the net to the south.

It was strange to be heeling over, sailing on autopilot, but going absolutely nowhere. As I turned to get the diving gear ready it broke free, assisted by the boat heaving on the light swell that was effecting us at the time. A lucky break.

Then on Friday, Ley noted a small white object trailing the rudder, about half a meter behind the stern. It danced and dived in the water, and got kind of excited when the boat speed hit 8 knots. Having sailed through an area of fishing nets we figured we had something hooked up somewhere under the boat.

Fish Line & Float Trailing Us For Day

Yesterday I took the plunge and swam in the deepest water that I've ever been in - 4,484 meters according to our charts. I must say it was amazing - so perfectly clear that I felt like I could see forever. Crystal Blues was like a toy floating above me in a light blue field. The clarity was at first disorienting, I've never experienced anything like it.

It took only seconds to cut the light line holding a fishing float to our skeg - looks like we hooked up the vertical suspension line on a submerged net, and it broke away from the net as we passed over it.

Passage To The Maldives

Three days in to our passage from Trincolmalee, Sri Lanka, to the Maldives the weather has been kind to us once again. Sunny days, dry weather and just enough wind to sail. As you can see here the sunsets have been beautiful.

All is well on board, the basil is growing like mad and we expect to arrive in Male on Sunday afternoon. Ley has caught no fish, except for the squid and flying fish found dead on the deck this morning.

We have sailed 406 NM and have 259 NM to go. Luckily we have had up to 2 knots of favorable current for the past two days so we covering miles very comfortably.