Usukan Bay

A good anchorage at Sapangar but we won't be going there again. We were anchored of a new navy facility and our charts weren't marked that it was a restricted area! Consequently we were visited by five Royal Malaysian Navy personnel at about 8:30 p.m. They arrived in a black inflatable and were dressed in black. However, they had visited our friends on Ambrosia first so we were expecting them. The officer in charge was very polite and after informing us that we would be allowed to stay for the night but would have to leave first thing in the morning he inspected our passports and ship's papers, took our picture and left.

Today we have sailed 33 nautical miles further north to Usukan Bay, 06 deg 22.141 N, 116 deg 20.461 E. We have had blue skies, blue water, a visit from a pod of dolphins and good winds but being from the NE we had to tack several times to make our destination. The port tacks were great - across the swell instead of into it - and we were doing high 6s to over 7 knots. Mt Kinabalu dominated the eastern skyline, towering over everything even though more than 50 kilometres away.

Mt Kinabalu was visible for a long way up the coast

On The Way

After a few days delay waiting for the weather to quieten down, we departed Sutera Harbour Marina at Kota Kinabalu just before 10:00 this morning. We motored the short distance of 13.5 nautical miles to anchor in a small bay protected from the swell near Sapangar Bay, 06 deg 05.085N, 116 deg 06.016E. The water here is relatively clean compared to a couple of sections we crossed inside Sapangar Island where there was a lot of floating rubbish, seaweed and spilt diesel... yeuk. When the engine gave a bit of a surge we suspected the worst and after anchoring Jon dived on the prop and removed a long piece of 4cm rope! At least it hadn't jammed the prop or caused any damage.