It’s cold but the sun is shining.  We are seeing the sites and eating too much of the wonderful food.  We plan to be in Istanbul about three more days. 

Loading DoraMac

BBC Everest tied to a wharf on Thilafushi the “garbage island” 6 miles from our anchorage off Hulhumale’.

Thalifushi was the 3^rd site for loading the yachts and the best since Everest could be tied to a wharf to stabilize her.  There is a gigantic yacht taking up way too much deck space and between her and the ballast containers there was only just enough room for our 16 yachts. 

The yacht Raven being reloaded just before we were to be loaded. 

Because of the tight space on deck boats were loaded and then reloaded to make more room.  We were told to be ready for loading Thursday at 11 am but we were loaded about 11:30.  Then it went quickly which was a good thing because the weather changed and winds and rain came.

Heavy duty lines were attached to our lifting points.  Ian, the load master in the blue shirt said we were the easiest boat to load since divers weren’t needed to position straps under our hull.  We’d had underhull straps in Rebak when we were lifted onto the hard.  Ian chose to use our lifting points so we wouldn’t need to take down stays, lines, whatever that other yachts had to do.

The giant crane lifts DoraMac.

We look like a toy boat!

Being lowered onto the deck of the BBC Everest.

Straps hold the boats in place

Our Ukrainian friend Nikita tightening down some of DoraMac’s straps.

From left to right, Songster and BeBe and I don’t know the last boat.

Being set into place like Gulliver!

Some of the crewmen were women!

Nikita setting the fastening line.

When we were told we could go back aboard DoraMac to make sure she was set for her voyage and to collect our stuff, we also found out we had about 20 minutes before the launch would be available to take us to shore.  We raced like mad so I have no final photos.  Then we sat around for another hour or so waiting for someone to actually call a launch as the weather worsened.  By the time a launch came it was raining and the sea was pretty choppy.  Our friend Nikita helped us with our luggage as Randal and I climbed over railing and down rope ladders onto the unsteady launch.  Confusion to the end!  The last boat, Mustang was finally loaded and settled in with just enough time for all of the cruisers on Heartsong, Lurline, and Mustang to make it ashore, get a bite to eat and then catch the 11:55 flight to Dubai.  And hopefully they lived happily ever after!

Ru

DoraMac

  Our flights to Istanbul were smooth and almost on time.  The food was the best airline food ever.  We were picked up at the airport with no problem and spent the first night in the NAZ Wooden House hotel parts of which dated back to the 8th century and parts to the Ottoman empire as the house was built around old arches and walls.  www.nazwoodenhouseinn.com is the web address. Railroad tracks behind the hotel were part of the route of the Orient Express.  We saw trains pass but they never woke us during the night and they were withing "spitting distance" as Randal would say.  We heard nothing at all and slept well for about 10 hours after being up for almost 2 days.  I took photos but it will be a while before I get around to formatting and sending them.  Too much to see and do.  "One falls instantly in love with Istanbul."  I’m quoting myself there from my journal that I wrote this evening sitting in the roof terrace drinking tea and watching the sun set over the Sea of Marmara.  We spent the day with Linda and Michael from the boat B’Sheret.  They had arrived Thursday night since their boat had been loaded first and they left Male’ Monday morning but chose to spend a few days in Dubai.  We chose just to come to Istanbul eager for cooler weather.  Cooler weather is what we have.  I wore a turtleneck, a wool sweater, my Sox hoodie sweatshirt and my heavy rain jacket and at times I was chilly especially when Linda and I went to the top of the Galata Tower to take photos.  We also visited the Pera Palas Hotel where Agatha Christie wrote Murder on the Orient Express.  Unfortunately the room was booked so we couldn’t see it.  For 300 Euros you can spend the night there.  We started our day visiting and touring the Dolmabahce Palace.  It was the home of the last Sultan who bankrupted the government building it.  We made our way back to the Sultanhamet part of the Old City and visited a wonderful book store and met the owner who was really helpful with his suggestiions.  Randal and I returned to our new hotel and are calling it an early night still tired from our travels and busy day.  We had eaten a late lunch of a chicken pita sandwich and it was simple but good.  The food here is wonderful and so far the people friendly and helpful.  Most speak some English but understand enough to point us in the right direction.  This is a rather rambling email and I hope to do better. And also to send photos. 

Now that we have the boat loaded and are here in Istanbul I have time to worry about the Sox.  It’s getting really scary. 

So good night for now.

Ru

We were loaded yesterday and it was quite impressive.  Then we were watched over by our new Ukrainian friend Nikita, a crewman on the BBC Everest who got us coffee and helped get us onto our launch in the bumpy seas.  We arrived at the Male" airport about 3pm having paid the "cheaper group rate" and there was no problem with immigration since we still had one more day of grace since our check-out."   After we were loaded there was a storm that delayed the next 3 boats but by late evening the last 3 had been loaded and everyone made it to the airport on time.  Our flight left at 11:55 pm and we arrived in Dubai at 3 am.  We’ll leave Dubai at 11:20 and arrive in Istanbul at about 3 pm.  We’ve arranged with our hotel for transport from the airport so that will be great.  So things are certainly looking up for us.  Now if things could only improve for the Sox.  Amazingly we saw 4 Sox hats at the Maldives airport all worn by Koreans!  Go Sox. 

  So that’s it

Ru

  Our loading time is 11 am this morning.  We are the first boat to be loaded which is good because that means we’ll be loaded some time today.  Three other boats are to be loaded after us and I really hope they get everyone on because it would be heartbreaking to be left for another day, especially if they’ve booked their flight for this evening.  Of course that’s a whole other story.  Friends emailed us with the upsetting information that Emirates doesn’t have flights to Istanbul on Thursday night or Friday. They were one of the lucky boats that was loaded last Sunday.  I’ll call the airline this morning.  We have already missed the cheap group fare so have no attachment to Emirates.  If they have no flights we’ll check with Qatar or British Air.  If we don’t leave by Friday our visa expires and that could be a bunch more money to renew since you can’t renew for just a day, but must renew for a month!  But that will be something we can deal with since we will have the peace of mind knowing DoraMac is loaded on the BBC Everest!  We have much fonder memories of the real Mt. Everest than we will of the BBC Everest!  This saga is starting to read like The Perils of Pauline.  If we must stay until Saturday, at least our friends Rick and Suze are here awaiting a package from home before they can set out for South Africa.  They have two aged cats which require special food and non was sold in India or here so it’s being shipped from the US and will be here in about 10 days.  Rick and Suze worked on the Space Shuttle and I imagine that might have seemed simple compared to tracking down special cat food diet around the world!

So that’s how things stand.  So far the sun is shining though it has an odd haze.  We’ve hit the rainy season and it has rained almost every day the past several days.  Just now I see a beautiful rainbow so that surely must mean good news!  Go Sox! 

Gotta go get ready!

Ru

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  The sun is shining and there is a slight breeze and we’re miserable!  We weren’t loaded Sunday, our original load day, and we weren’t loaded yesterday, our second  load date and we will NOT be loaded today.  Tomorrow there will be  boats left to load.  We are supposed to be loaded tomorrow.  At this point when isn’t as much of a concern as "if" though the loadmaster seems very confident that we’ll all be loaded.  He finally came around yesterday to look at the keel of some of the remaining boats.  About bloody time!  He may be a great loadmaster, and thankfully he seems to be, but he definitely feels no need to communicate any type of reassurances to the cruisers; updates come from other cruisers and that’s about it.   He did tell us that we would be lifted by our loading rings rather than the way other boats are being lifted so we don’t have to take down our front headstay.  We’re guessing that might mean we’ll go last if they have to change rigging to do it. They won’t want to change things and then change them back for the other boats even though on the paper list we should be first.   Thursday is the last day to fly and get the cheaper group rate.  Friday is the last day of our check-out time after which we are here without permission.  Friday port offices are closed.  Best case scenario is that we’re loaded early enough on Thursday to fly out Thursday night with the group ticket rate.  Next best scenario is that we fly out Friday morning and pay an additional $100 per ticket.  If we miss that we may have to wait until Saturday and then extend our visa…and who knows.  But all that will be acceptable if we at least get loaded.  Randal seems fairly confident and I guess I am too but not 100%.  We’re not even thinking about the possibility of not being loaded because that’s just too awful to contemplate.  We have no Plan B.  And really there’s no reason to think we will need it.  Actually I just really want to stop thinking about it at all.  We will get everything totally ready for our load tomorrow.  That’s all we can do at this point. 

We have taken down all of our shade canvas so it’s pretty hot during most of the day.  We have taken up our dinghy so can’t go anywhere, partly because the loading order kept being changed so you just never knew if they would call.  My Internet card expires tomorrow just to add to the level of uncertainty.  Randal has some on his time card but not much so we’re saving it to make our hotel reservation in Istanbul when we actually know we’ll be going.  This morning the remaining boats are discussing what will happen today and all the info is coming from cruisers and not from the loadmaster.  The Netherlands office of Seven Stars has reassured us that no one will be left behind and that is reassuring.  Their office actually caused some of the problem by taking on too much cargo for the hold so the ballast containers have to sit on the deck taking up enough room to make the loading of the yachts like a very tight puzzle.  After they are loaded then they have to be moved again into a tighter fit.  Also, it appears that one yacht will have to be loaded on top of the ballast containers!  With a good CAD program and a bit less greed this all could have been avoided.  You would think they would have planned to have too much space given the odd shapes of boats and rigging. 

  As I said in an earlier email, this time next week we should be in Istanbul and we should.  And I guess we won’t miss the cold weather there because Randal received an email from cruisers already there and heavy coats are being worn by the Istanbulites, I think that’s what they’re called. 

  So that’s where things stand.  We’re down to about 6 slices of bread, peanut butter, one apple, some cranberry juice and lots of canned stuff neither of us really wants.  At least we have water.  Some yachts have almost run out and their watermakers have been shut down to prepare for disuse over the next several weeks.  Ours is shut down too because it has been "Pickled" and to use it after that would be a major production.  But we have lots of water so we’re ok and have offered some to others.  Our friends on Voyager are just speaking with us now asking if they can do anything for us.  We’ve just decided to go with them to Hulhumale for lunch and just to get off the boat which will be great! 

  So that’s it.

Ru

  They have changed the order of loading…this came as a surprise after everyone had made plane, hotel, etc reservations and now half of us have to change everything!  This has been handled very poorly by the loadmaster who never bothered to contact anyone and is staying miles away at a very expensive resort…paid for by us in our hefty fees no doubt.  Instead of being loaded 6 pm on Sunday or (we thought maybe Monday if it didn’t go like clockwork) now we are being loaded Tuesday morning at 9 am.  We were supposed to be flying out Tuesday morning.  So today we have to change our flight ( we think at no cost) and yesterday we contacted the hotel in Istanbul where we’d made a reservation and pick-up arrangements and that was no problem.  They just switched the date to Wednesday though we  told them we weren’t sure if we’d get there Wednesday or Thursday.  We are being loaded Tuesday morning but don’t trust any of this so we’ll make flight reservations for Thursday.  There are 16 boats being transported.  4 are being loaded Sunday, 8 Monday and 4 Tuesday.  But who knows if they’ll get everyone loaded Monday and that would push us back later.  We also have to go 6 miles away to get loaded so the transport company doesn’t have to pay some huge dockage fee to get us closer to where we are.  Cruisers are furious even if they haven’t had plans to change just because it has been handled so poorly.  But we have no second choice so.  Later this morning we’ll go back to the airlines to rebook.  We haven’t actually paid yet, we had to wait until Sunday, the beginning of their work week,  so that makes things easier. 

  And the Red Sox aren’t doing well!  But I predict that by this time next week everything will be fine.  We’ll be in Istanbul, DoraMac will be loaded and on her way to Turkey and the Red Sox will be winning. 

I have a favor.  My Outlook email seems to download really slowly on the Netbook.  So could you not just hit reply if you respond to an email from me.  I know it’s a pain to have to start a new email but it would really help.  The other thing you can do is "reply" but then highlight everything I wrote and hit the back button and it will erase it all.  Then you can type your message and that’s all that will be sent.  Make sense? 

Guess that’s about it except that we’re listening to an Indian warship trying to contact the Male’ Port Control and no one is responding.  That happened to us but, who are we?  This is an Indian warship!  Another vessel responded to the Indian warship and told him to contact "his agent" at 7:30 on a different channel.  (That’s what we had to do.)  Guess the Indian military didn’t like that answer because they’re still trying to call Male’ port control.

Ru

DoraMac

ps We can actually see the transport ship from here and there is a giant yacht already loaded seeming to fill the entire deck!  But apparently it will move for the loading process. Who knows!

Late yesterday afternoon we received our loading date and time.  We will be loaded 6pm this Sunday, the last boat of the day.  The rest of the boats will be loaded Monday.  Since we are scheduled as the last boat Sunday we are open to the possibility we will be loaded on Monday unless everything goes like clockwork Sunday.  But nothing lately has gone like clockwork, so maybe it will be Monday morning.  Sunday morning we will go to Male’ to purchase our airline tickets for Istanbul and then with our E-ticket begin the checking-out process from Male’.  Now if the Sox could just quit losing, everything really be looking up. 

Ru

DoraMac

National Library of the Maldives

Randal and I finally visited the National Library. It’s another one of those, “had we known how long we were going to be here…” I learned that we could purchase a library card and that the library has quite a good collection of English language titles. It’s a small collection, but well selected. The card would have cost $28 but that’s cheaper than one hard back book. But we learned about it just a few days ago. Until then I wasn’t so desperate for something to read. But with little else to do here I’ve gone through most of the books I brought with us from the US. Usually places we stop have a few used book shops where Western travelers can go for books, but not here on Male’. I’ve just dug out my old battered copy of Thoreau’s Walden and Other Writings and with little else going on, I actually have the patience to read it. I started The Girl Who Played With Fire, sequel to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, but, though I like the characters, there is too much violence so I’m making myself read it rather than enjoying it. In India I bought Alice Walker’s Anything We Loved Can Be Saved, a collection of essays and read that when the Larsson book gets too depressing or Thoreau too long-winded. I’ll be glad to get to the book shops in Istanbul. But I’m still not dying for a Kindle yet or any computer generated reading….Unless it’s from the Boston Globe or MLB telling about the Red Sox finally winning a game! PLEASE!!!!

The path by the Islamic Center offers shade so we walk past it almost every time we’re in Male. We haven’t gone in but all are invited according to the sign at the front of the building.

It is actually a very pretty building though we see more people at the small mosques located throughout Male’. But this photo was taken mid-morning and not one of the times of prayer.

Looking across at the National Library.

We’ve visited the National Library and the small National Art Gallery but not the American Center. Next time we’ll have to check it out. The Chinese and British apparently have offices in the building too.

A building on the main road had a sign indicating that the Turkish Consulate was located on the 2^nd floor. I gave up after walking 4 ½ floors with a heavy pack and finding nothing but a locked metal door blocking entrance to the 5^th floor. Maybe next visit I’ll try again though hopefully we’ll actually be in Turkey soon.

These look familiar. No “NO Photos” sign.

Once you know the Dewey Decimal System you can find books anywhere in the world. I think that’s actually quite amazing! Go Librarians! This giant Silence sign seemed to work as the room was actually quiet, though the students did speak with each other. My guess is that these are either college students or older high school students or they would have been in school at the time of day I took the photo.

It was quite busy for a week day mid-morning.

This room had Reference, Fiction and Non-Fiction. The Reference books were interfiled with the Non-Fiction but distinguished with an R. Maybe a good idea, maybe not. But interesting.

Randal reading a local English language newspaper which included articles from the world press.

I found a wonderful book on watercolor so sat looking through that. I wanted to copy a few of the pages so asked at the staff desk. One of the ladies smiled, got up, made the copies, remade one page that didn’t come out perfectly, and charged 2 rufiyaa for the 4 pages; about 15 cents. That makes the National Library one of the best bargains on Male’.

Our friend Suze from Voyager looking at the books on an earlier library visit.

The Good!

    The big transport ship is supposed to arrive some time this week and then a few days later the 15 boats will start being loaded.    After waiting around for so long it will be rush, rush, rush!  We have all sent our boat size, shape, weight info to the shipping company so they can make a stowing plan for all of the boats.  When the loadmaster gets here he should be able to tell us the day and hopefully approximate time we will be loaded. (We go to the transport ship: it doesn’t come to us. It will be anchored not far from where we are anchored so that should be an interesting sight!)  Once we know our load date we have to make a hotel reservation, an airline reservation and also go to Male to officially check out. (We need an E-ticket out to prove we are leaving before we can be checked out from Male’.)  That official check-out process takes at least a day and if it falls on Friday, two days since offices are closed. Also, with 15 boats all trying to do the same thing at the same time, it will be a bit chaotic at Emirates Airlines and the Antrac Agency we have all used for all of our official processing here.  The transport company will take care of checking the boats out from Male’.  Once DoraMac is loaded onto the transport ship, we can finish closing her up, get everything we’re taking with us (not much) and then be transported to shore.  We have experienced being hauled out of the water onto land, but never onto a ship though the process is similar.  We will not be on DoraMac when she is lifted from the water; we’ll already be on the transport ship.  I’ll try to take photos but commercial ships have strict regulations and I’m not sure where we’ll be.  Another last minute task will be to clean out and turn off the refrigerator.  Luckily our friends on Voyager will still be here.  They have chosen to make a passage around Africa instead of shipping to the Med so we can give any food we still have to them.  There aren’t many places to provision along their route so they will really have to stock up.  We have already taken down our front sail but still have to take down our canvas sun covers on the fly bridge, cockpit, bow, and side awnings.  We have to really secure the motorbike.  Adding the possible strong Red Sea winds to the wind generated by the faster speed of the huge and more rolly transport ship means everything must be really secure.  Blowing sand is an issue too we’ve been told.  Every vent or opening that water, sand, bugs, or even mice could get in must be closed up.  We’ll put out buckets of powdered laundry soap to absorb smells.  We’ve never had to close up everything like this before, but hopefully it won’t make the boat stinky when we open it again in Marmaris.  Oh, and Randal even had to write instructions for someone to be able to start DoraMac in case that’s necessary though the plan is that we will be there to retrieve her when she is put into the water in Turkey.  This morning on the "morning net" we listen to over the single sideband radio everyone is talking about preparing their boat for passage and contacting the Emirates Airlines.  Also, mentioned was that the price of gasoline and diesel on the Maldives apparently has gone way up and is even being rationed a bit.  A cruiser was limited to the amount of gasoline he was allowed to purchase just the other day.  Luckily we loaded up on diesel in Langkawi and bought gasoline early during our stay here. 

The Bad.

I finished most of my really good books and now have to read "whatever" since there are no real English language book shops on Male’.  We will have to rush around a bit at the end and I really don’t like to have to rush.  It makes me worry.  Also, had we known we were going to spend so much time here, we would have gotten a cruising permit and seen more of the Maldives and its lovely islands.  We both do love to snorkel. As for diving, I hate my wetsuit and I seem never to get my face mask to fit properly so I’m just not so enthused by it all.  Maybe it’s because we’ve never been anywhere like the Maldives with its clear water so here would have been a great place to get enthused.  Oh well.

The UGLY…

The Sox lost their first 3 games of the season!  Texas destroyed them.  Maybe it is my fault for losing my hat!  The only saving factor is they started out this way last year and were 1/2 game out of first at the All Star break.  Then everyone got hurt and it all fell to pieces.  So if they just stay healthy, things should improve.  PLEASE!!!!