Philippines 2009 Balut Island and Davao arrival

Next day Saturday by low tide we could see that there are many reefs around (not mentioned on the charts). I could make a temporary fixing from the chain (luckily I had a junction link in my spares). In the afternoon, we had the visit from Ayob; he is second in charge of the security on Balut Island. He came on board and wanted to know what we are doing here. One’s he
knew the reason, he became very friendly.





He told us that they were on red alert having night watch around the island looking for treasure hunters. I told him we would leave next day early for Davao.

As we were ready to leave we had the visit from the Philippines Coast Guards section of Sarangani. They were very friendly. I received a paper to present on arrival.







We had an overnight trip of 100NM up the Davao Gulf. This was the part of the trip that needed most attention. Plenty of little fishing boat with small lights all around the place. Radar does not pick them up.


Monday 10.00 o’clock local time we anchored at the quarantine place (Pos: 7°04.50 N; 125°37.70 E) and had the visit of the officials.



Guys! Pirates are not on the sea, they are on land. Quarantine officer charged us 2000P with recipe, Custom and Immigration 3000P each with no recipe.
I was asked to give something to the pilot boat that brought these people on board.
Our friends from Helena zwo made landfall in Puerto Princessa and got charged 500 P only for special services.
No comment!

The trip was 610NM and we sailed 7 days.

We have to thanks Allan Riches from Brunei Bay Radio. We had HF contact wit him every morning.


Also many thanks to Ellen and Kjartan from Wiskum a Canadian Yacht. They are involved in a marina project NE of Samal Island.



For more details, see webside: http://www.sailsamal.com/

We had email contact with them. They informed officials about our ETA.

On their website they also wrote a nice report about our passage called Cruising Notes - Sandakan to Davao.