Al and Beth Liggett - An Introduction

Our first boat was BACCHUS, a long keel, deep draft, heavy displacement, 40 foot wooden ketch, that took us slowly and comfortably around the world back in the pioneering years of cruising: 1966-1970. We had intended just to sail to Australia, but circumstances made us keep on going West until we eventually crossed our outward track at Panama for a westabout circumnavigation.

Before we returned to the "real world" we had decided another boat, of more modern design, would be in our future. Ideas, realities, and compromise finally resulted in a 42-foot flush deck cutter. SUNFLOWER was built in Taiwan one-off Airex foam core fiberglass. She was launched in 1976, and we sailed her back to our home port in Guam. Since then we have covered more than 150,000 miles I suppose, cruising and adventuring to places we liked or thought would be interesting. The cumulative roaming around finally led us across all the oceans again, this time for an eastabout circumnavigation.

After 5 years of working in Guam, we set sail again in 1997 for Asia. Spent 5 months in Hong Kong, cruised briefly along the western side of the Philippines, then a re-visit to favorite spots in Borneo. Now (October 2003), Al and I have celebrated sunflower's 27th birthday in Malaysia, where we have been for the past 5 years. The people are very friendly; many speak English. The composite cultures and religions of the Malay, Chinese, Indian and European provide interesting contrasts, non-stop holidays and festivals, as well as terrific food! So we will stay in Malaysia for the rest of the year. We make the island of Langkawi our base. Quite a cruising community has developed there, with 2 excellent marinas and plenty of habitable anchorages in either of the monsoons. There are many cruising destinations in Malaysia and Thailand to explore, as well as the whole Indian Ocean. For instance, the change of Monsoons made it easy for us to sail to Chagos (twice) and return to Langkawi.