Nadia and Justin joined us for a three-week west coast of Thailand island hopping trip. We previously sailed with them in Madagascar for two weeks and once again had a great time. We ventured 454NM in total, starting and finishing at Yacht Haven Marina.
All of us arrived at Yacht Haven after being awake for more than 24 hours. The first night we arrived at Skylark at 9pm after too many hours in airports, and shared a bottle of wine and then got some much-needed sleep.
We completed a few tasks before departing the marina. Electrical Marine installed a new inverter and new 100amp charger, and Jai from Rolly Tasker delivered our staysail and lifelines. We had the UV strip replaced to match the rest of the boat's sand Sunbrella color scheme. (If you look at previous photos of Skylark, the staysail is blue and white.) We also had a large delivery from Tesco for our provisions, which would last a week if not longer. Maybe it looked like we were provisioning for a month when the truck rolled up, but it all went quickly!
Justin and Nadia kindly brought hot sauce all the way from their recent trip to Brazil. All of these hot sauces only require a small drop or two. Anything more and you are either really brave and/or going to suffer at some point. Unfortunately both applied to me.
My ratings of these hot sauces:
Carolina Reaper
Trinadad Scorpion
B.Jolokia Indiana
Carolina Reaper extra nuclear
T. Scorpian Bhut Jolonkia
All of them were amazing. Some meals we put all five on the table and other meals we chose one hot sauce. Every meal was enhanced to euphoric levels with these hot sauces!!
The first night we dined at The Deck at Yacht Haven. It was bingo night and we were hoping we could win. We all had tuna burgers and huge slices of cheesecake. The amount of wine consumed was in proportion with the amount of fun we had. A lot!
We lost the first game of bingo, however, the Bingo MC (is that a name?) offered me and Nadia a beer while we were on the way to the bathroom. We didn't need any pity beers when we had a nice bottle of wine at the table. When the next game of bingo began and the MC was near, he told Justin and Chris they were winning at life. That's right.
Our first day out of the marina, we devoured bacon and brie sandwiches. It is always the beginning of a trip when bacon and brie are fully stocked in the fridge. It never lasts long. The hot sauce also made an appearance, as it would do with all future meals.
Nadia and I completed a post-breakfast Tabata workout with the bands they so kindly brought for us. Cruising through Phang Nga Bay listening to upbeat music, hammering out squats, lunges and bicep curls, we felt this was the beginning to a trip filled with many more high-caliber workouts. However, ultimately we would have more breakfasts with bacon than productive workouts.
Our first night out, we anchored at Koh Roi. Unfortunately, we got a small hole in the dingy when lifting it onto the rocky beach to go visit the hong. The hong was filled with bats, and after a short walk around we went back to the boat and inspected the dingy further to find the source of the leak. It was difficult to see but we could hear it. When we got back to the boat it seemed quite flat. We could not find the patch kit, so used some flex tape as a temporary fix. We ended up buying a kit several days later in Phuket and later discovered we had about two on board already tucked away. This is why an inventory list is important!
We had sundowners next to a bonfire on the beach…Thank goodness for lots of practice making fires in Madagascar... and Nadia and Justin are South African and experts at bush life. We drank white wine and watched the sun go down. The boys discovered how fun it was to make a torch out of a log dipped in fire and illuminated the sky.
After dinner and back on the boat, we remembered we have a loud speaker system and decided some singing was in order. We sang 'Shallow' by Lady Gaga and some Elton John hits from the movie 'Rocketman.' Thankfully, there were not many boats around to witness our talent. Only one Sunsail charter of Americans who also seemed a bit rambunctious.
The first night out was a massive success and we knew we were going to have an amazing trip with Justin and Nadia! It will definitely be spicy at every meal!