 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Product Search |
 |
 |
 |
|
||||||||||||
|
 |
|
|
Photo of a photographer. Al - Phi Phi Island. |
Langkawi has about a 2.5m (8.2ft) tidal range. There are also a lot of shallow areas, so it pays to keep on top of the state of the tide. If you are at Rebak Marina or Langkawi Yacht Club, the floating docks make getting ashore quite easy. If you are out in one of the more remote anchorages the tide is not a problem either. Just watch the beach and go to or from the beach before the tide drops into the mud line. Getting into town from one of the nearby anchorages is quite another matter, and knowing the time of high and low water is quite important.
A longish dinghy ride up the river in protected waters brings you to the fisherman's kampong at Kilim. There you can tie up to the shore just in front of a small restaurant. Makes loading all the stuff we carry easily done. However, we came back one afternoon to find our yellow dinghy grounded in soupy black mud. It was a 2-hour wait for the flood to bring enough water back in and float it again. Now we leave the dinghy at the end of a long boardwalk if we think the tide will be low on our return.
A longish dinghy ride across quite open water. You can tie the dinghy to a very long wooden jetty leading to a fish farm. The jetty is in poor shape, with many rotten or missing boards from the jetty walkway. A real peril carrying bags and packages, especially when it rains and the boards get slippery, but at least it is accessible at any state of the tide. Then it's about a 20 minute walk out to the main road where the buses can take you to town.
The main town of Langkawi. Many boats anchor in front of Kuah, and we do too. There are several options for dinghy landing, but all of them depend on the state of the tide. Now the westerly monsoon winds add another variable into the landing equation, as nearly all of the beach type landings face westward. Some choices:
We should've parked the dinghy in the lagoon....
We should've skipped the last soft drink with friends....
We should've watched the tide better....
We should've brought the dinghy into a better loading position first....
We should've not tried to load precious cargo into a bouncing boat....
We should've not both been in the bow of the dinghy....
We should've known better....
We should've parked the dinghy in the lagoon....
But we didn't. I guess it's always easy to look back to the "should've's", and I'll bet you have already guessed what happened.
The dinghy was tied to the steps of a little pier with a stern anchor keeping her off. The tide was ebbing, and the offshore winds had kicked up a sloppy chop in the shallow waters. Al had a time moving the dinghy around another one that was in the way. The bottom steps of the pier are slippery with green slimy stuff. I was concerned about slipping and falling as I handed him the bag of fruit, then my backpack. Last to load was his backpack, heavy with important electronic equipment, including this computer. I tried to calculate the bounce and stepped into the dinghy bow before Al had a chance to move aft. It all happened faster than it takes to type this!
The unbalanced dinghy swamped with water coming in over one side. We both grabbed for Al's backpack unbalancing it more. At the same time the chop hit the other side launching us into the waist high water and flipping the dinghy upside down on top of us both! Somehow he managed to flip it back over, we placed the important backpack in a big inflatable next to us, followed by my backpack. He must've grabbed the oars as I pushed the swamped, but floating dinghy toward the beach. A friend, Sharon, started bailing as I raced back up the pier. Al yelled at me to get some towels from the restaurant there.
By the time I reached him with 2 towels, he had removed all the items from the backpack, spread them out on a table for inspection and drying. Incredibly, very little got even minimally wet! Al rowed the dinghy back to SUNFLOWER and Sharon brought me and all our salvaged cargo back with her boat. I had to deal with all the stuff, including lots of paper, from my backpack and saturated fanny pack that did get wet, while Al stripped down the outboard. It was operational the next morning, and all the "stuff" strewn about the cabin was drying out OK.
This could have been a REAL DISASTER. Thank goodness neither of us were hurt. Thank goodness Al's backpack is new and is "waterproof" material. Thank goodness for the tupperware and zip lock bags we had put the equipment in! Thank goodness we both reacted quickly and were in shallow enough water to stand up.
We should've parked the dinghy in the lagoon....
| previous |
|
|||||||||||||||
|
Powered By
|
