Living and working on a luxury yacht

Mark and I had kept in touch after our travels together on SV Compass Rosey. About a year later, I was teaching again, back in my hometown, and dreaming of sailing again. I contacted Mark, who had scored himself an engineering job on a beautiful 105' schooner. He told me they had just passed Cairns and were on their way to Indonesia. It felt weird knowing he had just passed by me without seeing him! I asked him to put in a good word for me if any positions opened up. The following week, Mark told me the chef was leaving, and I immediately applied for the position. Two weeks later, and I was sailing again, with Mark, in Raja Ampat, a pristine archipelago in West Papua.

The job was certainly challenging as I am no chef. But I love to cook and I do it well, so I survived. As the chef I had to prepare 3 meals a day for a total of 7 people, taking into consideration their dietary preferences or allergies. I provisioned when and where I could, which at times could only be done at the local village market, where the selection was very limited.

It was nothing like cruising. We worked hard and long hours and were lucky to have time off. It was heart wrenching sometimes to not have the time to get out of the galley and explore the beautiful places we had sailed to. So when we did have time off, we took the opportunity to jump into the water or take a walk on land.

 We visited the Banda islands, home of the nutmeg spice and the nutmeg wars and took a hike up the volcano.

   

We also visited the Komodo islands and got pretty close to the Komodo dragons!

In Bali, we made a two day stop in preparation for the passage to Singapore. We were expecting some bad weather and were told it would be a two week trip motoring into the wind. We would be passing through the Strait of Malacca, an area that was renowned for piracy and the unpredictability of small fishing boats. It is also one of the most important shipping lanes in the world, which means it is extremely busy. Also small fishing boats passed in front of us dangerously. We had to be extremely vigilant on watch.

One day we passed by a group of search and rescue boats. They were looking for the remains of the Malaysian Airlines plane (MH 370) that had disappeared. This event was all over the news and it was an eerie feeling to be passing so close to the site.

As we arrived closer to Singapore, we scanned the horizon and counted more ships than we had fingers. Despite being on a 105' vessel, we were dwarfed by these ships. There were so many vessels transmitting their position reports on AIS, it kept crashing our computer system.

We were anchored in Singapore for less than 24 hours. Before we had a chance to see anything more than ships and fog and the outline of a bustling city, we pulled up anchor and headed for Langkawi. Back to the rough seas and the constant slamming motion of the hull on the water. The boat was hauled out in Langkawi for maintenance, and the owners left for 6 weeks.

It was a nice change from the routine of being onboard. Mark and I got an apartment to ourselves with gym and pool facilities. We would drive to the yard and work roughly 8 hour days. We had afternoons and weekends off and it was fantastic to have time to explore the island and have some privacy for ourselves. We indulged in restaurants. This close to the Thai border the food was heavily influenced by Thailand and also Malaysian. We hired motorbikes and circled the island, finding our favourite secluded beach spots. Langkawi is a duty free island, so tourists flock there to shop. We took advantage of the super cheap alcohol and imported chocolate.

   

After 7 weeks hauled out, we put the boat back in the water and sailed to Phuket. We got the boat ready for the next charter and even got to squeeze in some dinners out and some diving in Koh Phi Phi!

 When the owners arrived we left the dock looking forward to a month of island hopping.

One anchorage we stayed at, we couldn't help but notice the islands around us looked ahem...very phallic. A trip to shore by kayak and we discovered a shrine in a cave filled with wooden penises. Turns out we were in Phra Nang cave, Krabi.

By the end of the charter, Mark and I had decided we would leave the boat together. We had itchy feet and were ready to move onto the next thing, though we didn't know exactly what that would be. We thought it might be fun to visit the US, maybe do a cross country trip in Marks truck. So I flew home to Australia to sort out my US visa and we agreed to meet up in San Diego when I got the stamp. Well that process took 6 months, so we ended up in Mexico instead, waiting for the stamp. That was a fateful mishap because we ended up buying SV Timoneer in Mexico!