Penang is an island about 65 miles south of Langkawi. That makes it an easy day's run from Langkawi. It is one of our favorite places to visit on this coast. Penang offers a fascinating Chinese/English history and heritage. It has great shopping--both for personal needs and for the boat. The medical facilities are excellent. The food is SUPER! We love to go to Penang. But...(Isn't there always a but?)...the anchorage sucks.

It's called the "Junk Anchorage." I'm sure the name comes from the times when the old sailing junks used to moor there to service and supply the needs of Georgetown. Now, remnants of those old wooden junks are part of the debris that strangles the muddy shorefront. It is thick with junk. And junk is now what flows back and forth in the currents around your boat at anchor. An incredible amount of junk. Nasty junk. Unnamable junk. Stinky junk. Oily junk. Pink foamy junk. Dead everything junk. Junk that bangs and clinks your topside at night. Junk that swirls 2 feet beneath the surface ready to clog intakes or snag props. Junk that catches and wraps around your anchor chain. Junk that coats waterline and topsides as you roll in the wake of the ferry traffic. Yuk.

Nevertheless, we like to go to Penang. It will make a good first stop on our way south to Singapore. We left Langkawi at 3:30am to make use of a south-flowing tidal current. There was a bit of wind from the west, not enough to sail with, but a useful boost for motorsailing. The wind swung to the south, then SW--directly from our course. That seems to be guaranteed to happen in these waters. Oh well. It died completely by the middle of the day anyway. About 5 miles from our waypoint close to Penang we got hit by a 20-knot southerly wind, a direction too close for sailing without a lot of tacking. We were already in the shipping channel, which is fairly wide, but is surrounded by a daunting amount of soundings less than a fathom. By the time we reached the harbor and could swing in toward the Junk Anchorage we could see rank after rank of whitecaps marching toward us. We chose to bear off and find an anchorage along the north shore of the island, just off Fort Cornwallis and a park called the Esplanade. We dug the anchor in well, the waters were smooth despite the current flow, we had good protection from the Southerly winds now. Yet Al and I were nervous. We were in this same position ten years ago. Our memories of that time will last forever. It wasa disaster.

Stay tuned--next week we'll tell the Saga of SARI TIMUR.

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