Our arrival into the Santubong River was heralded by the smoke-laden atmosphere which became evident at least 50NM out as we approached the NW cape of Borneo, Tanjung Datu. Not only could we smell it in the air but we had to turn off our running lights on the bow as they were reflecting too much light off the smoke particles making visibility difficult in the almost total darkness. The half moon was hidden behind cloud but a thunderstorm over the 
land was flashing away giving some relief to the black night. We arrived at the approaches to the river at about 8.30 and finally caught sight of Mount Santubong, almost hidden by low cloud and covered in smoke haze. The smoke is from fires out of control in the Indonesian state of Kalimantan on southern Borneo. It has been reported that a severe El Nino has created extremely dry conditions on the entire island.
We entered the estuary, crossed the bar and dropped the anchor in the calm waters of the river. As the tide commenced its runout we dropped into bed and slept until early afternoon. Today we are totally refreshed from our 3-day passage from Tioman Island and decided to take a walk through the local village of Santubong. It is now Ramadan and most of the locals are fasting during the day and several villagers had food stalls set up for the Muslims to buy their food to break their fast - in Santubong this would be about 6.45. They encouraged us to buy some of the sweets and also to eat as they wanted to know what we thought of it. They weren't too worried that we could eat but they couldn't. The sweets were delicious and the fish cooking on the barbecue looked very inviting but we didn't try it - we would wait for dinner.
land was flashing away giving some relief to the black night. We arrived at the approaches to the river at about 8.30 and finally caught sight of Mount Santubong, almost hidden by low cloud and covered in smoke haze. The smoke is from fires out of control in the Indonesian state of Kalimantan on southern Borneo. It has been reported that a severe El Nino has created extremely dry conditions on the entire island.We entered the estuary, crossed the bar and dropped the anchor in the calm waters of the river. As the tide commenced its runout we dropped into bed and slept until early afternoon. Today we are totally refreshed from our 3-day passage from Tioman Island and decided to take a walk through the local village of Santubong. It is now Ramadan and most of the locals are fasting during the day and several villagers had food stalls set up for the Muslims to buy their food to break their fast - in Santubong this would be about 6.45. They encouraged us to buy some of the sweets and also to eat as they wanted to know what we thought of it. They weren't too worried that we could eat but they couldn't. The sweets were delicious and the fish cooking on the barbecue looked very inviting but we didn't try it - we would wait for dinner.
