This morning we decided to go shore while it was still cool. We walked along a road that paralleled the beach. Not much to see, another resort and a couple of nice rental properties. Then we cut down to the beach and walked through the three resorts. A nice little walk.
We also dinghed overto Koh Kham and beached our dinghy. We were going to wander around the island but they wanted 200 baht per person. It was getting hot so we headed back to the boat.
We returned to the boat and relaxed for a while before pulling up the anchor. The anchor came up on to the gypsy (the name of the place where the anchor rests) upside down so we fought with that for a while, but eventually got it straightened out.
Then we were off. Our tentative plan was to start off by exploring the southern most island in the chain, Koh Kut. Based on the weather report that we received from Phil there were three potential harbors that would be good anchorages for that night. We selected Ao Bang Bao, a very well protected harbor on the southwestern side of Koh Kut, about a 2 1/2 hour trip. We motor sailed most of the way. With just an hour left to go, the low oil pressure alarm started going off intermittently. We tried slowing down but still the alarm was going off. Eventually Rick looked under the motor housing and he said there was oil everywhere. We turned off the motor, put up the sails, and called Phil. We were nervous about trying to sail into Bang Bao because the cruising guide said that the harbor entrance as narrow. We sailed by it and it didn’t look too bad. Phil said it was ok to turn on the motor if needed when anchoring. So we went for it and it worked out just fine.
Phil had sent one of his mechanics via speedboat. About an hour after we had anchored the mechanic arrived. The engine has two dip sticks and one of them had come lose. He spent about an hour fixing the engine and cleaning the bilge, which was full of oil. When he was finished we were as good as new. We had spent the last several hours thinking that the engine was toast and coming up with scenarios about what we would do, but we were back in business. That evening we went ashore and had a nice dinner at The Beach Nature Resort. We came back to the boat and I had to work hard to stay up until 8:30.
What a day! We always say something will happen and we had our first something today.