How Do We Avoid Pirates in the Malacca Strait?
Sailing north-west across the pirate waters of Indonesia into the Malacca Strait used to be dangerous…
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pirate
Finally, ‘Quest’ Crew Murderers Are Brought To Justice
Depending on your definition of what justice is, the Somali pirates who murdered the crew of s/y Quest have been brought to justice.
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Cast Aside The Technology
Broken steering, hurting backs, sweaty cupboards and incessant chat on the VHF enough to drive the calmest person up the wall. Sometimes it’s best to just turn off the VHF, stop looking at the chart plotter and put to one side all the stuff that interferes with what sailing is really all about.
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EXCLUSIVE: Navy Trades Secrets With FTB About Piracy
Exclusive! This is a classified recording between the Royal Navy and followtheboat about anti-piracy tactics. Much of this conversation is secret and for the safety of future sailors making the same passage we are obliged to not broadcast any strategy undertaken by the British Royal Navy and the Vasco Da Gama rally.
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A Vessel Is Pirated
On the 24th March this year we published on followtheboat.com a transcript of the communication between a NATO warship and a vessel that was being boarded by pirates. It makes for harrowing reading. In this podcast we capture the warship relaying the unfortunate news to a neighbouring Omani warship. We also catch the Net, which is the rally’s daily VHF forum, and listen to the implications of this attack.
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Pirate Alley: They Think It’s All Over…
The home-run! At least that’s what we believe before we get to Salalah. More on that in a later episode but in the meantime we make the most of our last part of the official Pirate Alley stretch and amuse ourselves by tuning in to the VHF. The freaks really come out at night you know.
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Pirate Alley: Relax, It’s The Canadians!
With just one more day to go before our arrival in Salalah we’re under the impression that it is almost all over. The group relaxes in the dead calm seas, but there’s nothing like the sight of a warship on the horizon to excite these intrepid sailors. It’s time we pulled together to show these naval chaps exactly how coordinated we really can be!
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Pirate Alley: Pirate Skiffs & NATO Warships
We only spent two nights in Mukala but it was enough to relax, refuel and flirt with the local fishermen… and that was just Millie. We depart and start off with a positive attitude. It is soon erroded as we catch again and again communication between Nato warships and commercial vessels who have spotted suspicious fishing skiffs in the vicinity.
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Pirate Alley: Told Off In Mukala
Pirate Alley: In last week’s podcast there was drama after drama, with boats being towed, colliding vessels, more fishing nets and some even taking on water. The next day, feeling that we deserved a rest from this stress, a number of boats, Esper included, decided to break rank, make the most of the favourable winds, turn the engine off and go for a well-deserved sail. Unbeknown to us we had chosen THE most dangerous stretch of water in which to have our fun. Only a week previously there had been a pirate attack in the exact spot we hoisted sail. Only one person was aware of this, though, and boy did he have something to say about it when we dragged ourselves into Mukala.
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Pirate Alley: Rhumb Do, Rhumb Don’t
This week’s podcast is our 40th episode! It finds us caught up in fishing nets again, slap bang in the centre of pirate alley. In last week’s episode Lo Brust, the rally leader aboard his boat Mistral, had successfully thrown a line to Jean-Claud and Marlene aboard Anthea. Anthea is now being towed by Mistral. It didn’t take long for another two boats to run into trouble… as well as each other. Patience is a commodity that can run out. Hope you enjoy this week’s drama, and don’t forget we provide a direct download link if you don’t use iTunes.
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Pirate Alley: Towing The Line
The next part of our Pirate Alley excursion is quite unbelievable as we encounter three major problems within the same night! We’ve split the podcasts up and in the next couple of episodes we have a collision, more fishing net problems and you’ll also hear how one boat starts taking in water. Today’s episode, however, deals with the minor issue of a boat breaking down in the middle of nowhere!
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Pirate Alley: Birthday Close Encounters
It’s Jamie’s 40th birthday. No partying for him though as we move into our second day in Pirate Alley where two boats have to tend to dysfunctional alternators. One of the boats is Esper.
To make matters worse the inevitable happens: two fishing dows are spotted on the horizon, suspiciously following the rally. Could they be pirates? And if so, what chance do we have of reinforcing our safety in numbers strategy if Esper’s group is all over the place?
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Pirate Alley: Night Diving
The hilarious departure from Port Aden raises our spirits as we begin our journey into Pirate Alley. Within two hours disaster strikes as one of the boats runs into a fishing net. In the dark.
This collective of boats isn’t called a rally for nothing. Listen to the boats rallying together to get us through the first of many hurdles lying ahead
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Dancing Our Way Out Of Yemen
The day before we left Aden we were invited to another leaving do put on by Colonel Mohammed the Coast guard-cum-port police-cum-general bigwig. We also got to chat to a Yemeni woman, covered head to foot in black with just her eyes visible. Her English is excellent and makes for a great little interview.
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Arabian Pirates Been Around Forever
Finally we leave Salalah! Long haul ahead of us so time to grab a book and get reading.
My brother, Tim, bought me ‘Unknown Seas, How Vasco Da Gama Opened The East’, by Ronald Watkins. I couldn’t think of a more suitable book to be reading on this journey, since we were taking part in the Vasco Da Gama Rally. Right now we are in the middle of the Arabian Sea, very much aware of the recent pirate activity.
It seems, however, that we were not alone in keeping a keen eye open for the odd marauder in these waters. According to the book, which opens with the early spice trade scenario, Watkins notes thus:
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