Sailing Thailand

Welcome to Island Cruises Blog,

on our blog you can get the latest news provided by Island Cruises ….

Such a good way for all of us Island Cruises Sailors to keep in touch long after your time with us here on Koh Tao is over!

You can share all of your experiences and fond memories of your time on Koh Tao with Island Cruises here and we are able to share all of our upcoming events and how we continue to run and learn all the finer details of operating a sailing yacht charter company as true Sailing pioneers to Koh Tao.

Because every and any sailing charter with island cruises on Koh Tao or any destination within the gulf of Thailand is unique and memorable in it’s own way, your stories and adventures of sailing with us deserve to be heard by our ever growing community of Island Cruises sailing recruits.

Freedom Fargo has hosted her first engagement proposal.

Long time visitor to Koh Tao and friend to the Island Cruises team, Olli from Germany, has for a some time planned on asking his gorgeous girlfriend for her hand in marriage.

With over 3 kilos of orchids laid out upon her deck and fully equipt with champagne and strawberries Freedom Fargo had never looked better. With a golden ring prepared in a buddah sheath of Jasmine for the unsuspecting bride to be, sails were set in the fasion of a typical Koh Tao Island Cruises sunset charter.
As the sun began to fall from the sky Olli presented his somewhat surprised future wife with the buddah sheath and popped the big question. After the shock surpassed the answer Olli had been hoping to hear was delivered. Yes!!!!!
Now the happy couple have returned to Germany to build their lives together and we here at Island Cruises wish them all the happiness they deserve. May many wonderful things grace their long lives together. Who knows, perhaps we are even lucky enough to have them back here on Koh Tao for their big day!!!!!

Those of you who have sailed with Freedom Fargo, weather for a day or for a few days on a Safari to Angthong National Marine Park are all aware of how beautiful she was.

Well you should see her now!

She has undergone some severe cosmetic surgery, complete with a new coat of paint, her kitchen area is like new, she appears to have a new bathroom and living area also, new carpets (or rather varnish) curtains and cushions. Not to mention all the other extras easily overlooked such as the doors, hinges etc.
Thanks to all the hard work of Captain Alf and his first mate Fabian, Freedom Fargo is yet again prepared to cross the southern seas of the Gulf of Thailand to make your stay with her even more spectacular, comfortable and enjoyable. She is now even more equipped to take you on Sailing Safari as Freedom Fargo The Island Cruises Princess of the Southern Gulf of Thailand.

Jan Riebell has successfully completed The Island Cruises Ocean Hiker Course/Competent Crew Course and is now a fully certified member as an Ocean Hiker from Island Cruises on Koh Tao.  Jan opted to do the 2 week internship on Koh Tao to gain his certification for on going ocean hiking. He was tempted to extend his internship to 3 weeks given that in the beginning he did encounter some problems with the Dinghy Handling components of the course but he soon over came these problems and completed the course with full competency in all areas of training. Koh Tao in addition to the Island Cruises Ocean Hiker course is offering as well the Island Cruises Sailing Introductory Course which is a less intensive training program and will not give you the same certification but the basic fundamentals of sailing are able to be obtained through participation in this course.
So congratulations Jan, the team here at Island Cruises Koh Tao looks forward to awaiting the stories of your voyages as an Ocean Hiker.

In my last blog entry I was writing about one special incident here on Koh Tao. Now I want to look at the issue from a more generalized angle.

Sailing in Thailand and the rest of SE-Asia

can be very rewarding and weather conditions are usually much more friendly than in other parts of the planet.

That’s true, but there are a few things to consider more than somewhere else.

Like in most 2nd and 3rd world countries the nautical education of sailors is relatively poor compared to the standard of western countries.
This doesn’t really matter in the vastness of the pacific ocean. Rules of the road can be freely interpreted and the usual replacement of our western rules by “the smaller vessel gives way to the bigger one” works pretty well.

This changes dramatically as soon a yacht is reaching, coming from the Pacific, the Java Sea. Watchkeeping becomes absolutely essential and a really safe passage for single handers is virtually non existing.
In the pacific we can cruise for days without seeing another boat but now you feel happy if you see less than 10 at a time.

In Indonesian waters there is even one more danger apparent which drove more than one crewand captain really nuts when I was crossing the Java Sea in 2005.

Indonesian Sailorsare very superstitious. If there are many problems occuring caused by the lack of maintenance the reason for those problems is, that the boat is infested by some evil spirits.
So, how to get rid of them?
Very easy! You just get as close as possible to another vessel to give the evil spirits the chance to hop over to the other one. Problem solved. 

Not for us yachties. For the fishermen it doesen’t really matter if they touch another boat. Those boats are painted every year while not a small percentage of cruising yachts feature sparkling two component spray paint. You know what I mean…
On my crossing I was cut off by a approximately 60m long commercial indonesian vessel coming up from the port quarter. After the collission the captain of the vessel gave full throttle and disappeared as fast as possible. If you understand german you can read the full story in the “logbuch” of my cruising website: Bali to Jahore.

Another ineresting feature is the reaction in head on situations:

It’s quite common, especially experienced in Thailand, that the captains of fishing boats put the rules of the road on land to the sea. Thailand and Indonesiaare countries where you drive to the left side of the road and in opposition to their collegues in the U.Kwho would hardly do this they will move to the left to avoid a collission.
So, really focus on the upcoming vessel and it’s reactions! It’s always better to do the wrong thing according to the law, than having a collission! -and forget about compensation for any damage.

to be continued 

Assault in the morning.

The telephone rings at 6:45 am. “Wake up! There is a dragging raft comprised of 7 fishing boats just in front of your yacht!” my business partner Sasch is yelling into the phone.
I stick my head out of my cabin. In front of Freedom Fargo I can see the sterns of 7 rafted up fishing boats in not even 10m distance, getting closer. There are a few fishermen awake, not showing any concern about the situation.
I take the signal horn out and go to the bow. After emptying the pressure bottle half way combined with some yelling there is some more movement to be noticed on the boats.
But still-no action taken. With the next gust the entire raft comes that close, that I have to jump from the bow onto the stern of one of the fishing boats to keep my boat away and to avoid damage.

Some of the fishermen are regarding this as very entertaining…

Finally two boats start their engines and move a little bit foreward. Another 15 Minutes later they realize that this doesen’t solve the problem. The bundle is untied and they’re moving back to the spot where they started dragging and tie up again.

My luck was, that Sasch could alert me because he was fiddling around with those guys since 5:00 am. He wasn’t as lucky as I was. They crashed into him already last evening before he came back from work, rafted up(about 200t to a 34f sailing boat), using his mooring to stop dragging. In the morning then, when the wind picked up, he had to untie them to prevent further damage.

So what to do?
In our cruising days we would just have stayed on our boats having a sharp look out for everyting further happening. Nowadays that’s not really an option for us any more because we’ve got some work to do.
Go there and talk to the captain would be utterly useless since on an island like Koh Tao you don’t really learn thai and Thai captains hardly speak any English. And we’re only the farang-if we weren’t here there was no damage on our boats.

But now we’ve got the first time an advantage out of registering our boat commercially in Thailand. Technically, our boats belong to our Thai business partner. We call Tum in Bangkok who is calling herself the police.
We still have to provide our taxi for the police to get to Hin Wong Bay on Koh Tao-the local police hasn’t got a 4 WD-but at least we get them there.

Even with the police it’s still laughing and no concern at all but as we hand over the phone with our business partner on the line they become suddenly very understanding. Hearing the voice of some educated and tough business woman from bangkok claiming our yachts as hers makes a much deeper impression than the police or us.
You never know what family stands behind this voice and how powerful it is. And a Bangkok woman owning two sailing yachts could come from a very powerful family…