1. Sunfish

My very first sail boat was nothing much but a piece of plank with a sail on it. It was a Sunfish. There was a centre board, rudder, a mast and one sail. It was even too small to be called a dinghy. The hull was made of fibre glass and it was small, meant for one person only. I first launched the Sunfish in the river near the Lutong bridge. It was a mistake as I knew next to nothing about sailing at the time. The sea would be a more suitable place to learn to sail as the beach is not as deep as the river bank and would be less muddy.

Once, I even invited Bong Han Chuon to come along. He sat in the front and when we turned the corner around a bend in the river, the wind came from the rear and the whole contraption became a submarine and we progressively went under! Any way, we had a lot of fun and there was no real great danger because we were wearing life vests and the river bank was close by. Bong was also a very good swimmer.

2. Optimist

The next sail boat I bought was an Optimist from Peter Hammer for 1000 ringgit. He was overjoyed to have found a sucker
buyer at last! That lousy pakeha (expatriate)did not tell me that the boat was suitable for kids only! It was very slow; but it cannot capsize because it was as wide as it was long and had three flotation chambers built into the plastic hull under the seats. I bought a small 2 horse power Suzuki for it and took the children for a ride in the river on my days off. This boat was later sold to Vincent Chin for $600 when I bought the three 470's. He is still paddling it around in a pond behind his house in Riam road.

3. Yamaha Sea-hopper

The Seahopper was built by Yamaha in Japan to similar dimensions as the Laser. It actually looked very much like a Laser. It cost me 2000 ringgit; but it was worth every cent because this sail boat some times forgot that it had no engine! At about 15 knot cross wind, it would plane and consequently, the speed would increase suddenly with most of the hull out of the water, behaving like a speed boat! It was a very exciting boat to sail because it would capsize unless a good balance was maintained constantly by hiking out on the wind ward side. It was especially risky when launching through breaking surf with an onshore wind.

I sailed this dinghy very often on my days off from the rigs. It was much more exciting than playing golf! In Malaysia, the game of golf has been spoilt. It has become a game played mainly by timber tycoons, politicians, snobs and social climbers who liked to rub shoulders with the rich and famous. I gave up golf and took up sailing as my new hobby for the next 25 years

After a while I was looking for an even faster sail boat. There was this Hobie 16 for sale. It belonged to Chris Knight, our MD. He wanted 11K for it; but a catamaran was well beyond my budget. Finally, I found the boat I wanted in the Salam, a 4.7 metre two men dinghy which has a main, jib and a spinnaker.

4. 470

The Panaga boat club was buying a whole new fleet of 470’s and they were selling their old boats in 1985 by auction. I entered a bid for 3 boats and was successful! All in all, including trucking, the 470’s cost me 2000 ringgit, a very reasonable price indeed.
A Pujut friend, Chin Luk Choi bought one hull for 400 ringgit for conversion to a fishing boat and that took care of the trucking fee and import tax for all three pieces. I was able to cannibalize the good bits from all the masts and sails to make one complete sailing boat and have one spare hull left over.

One fine day, I took all three children sailing with me. There was not much wind and I was able to raise spinnaker! However, I was unable to get any of my crew to test the trapeze! The boat proved too much of a hassle to rig up and rig down with its three stays for the mast and numerous other lines used for controlling the kicking strap, the spinnaker pole, spinnaker, the centre board, the jib and trapeze for the crew. I continued to sail the Sea hopper or the Laser most of the time because it took only 5 minutes to rig up and launch!

I reinforced the transom of the spare hull for installing an outboard engine. I bought a 14 hp Johnson outboard engine and immediately invited friends to go explore sungei Liku! The group consisted of my colleagues: Kho Boon Ming, Steven Shim, Gregory Tan and John Liaw, my neighbour. It was a first time for all of us. We went up the sungei Adong to the sawmill and beyond and also went all the way up sungei Liku to the Shell pumping station where cooling water for the refinery was obtained and pumped through a 8 inch pipe line all the way to Lutong. There was a narrow gauge railway line running there from Pujut corner. This railway line was built by Shell for the technicians to come and service these pumps on a regular basis. They used an old converted Land Rover for transportation. Its tyres were replaced by old railway rolling stock for wheels! In NZ I saw a more practical option: a standard Land Rover with an extra set of wheels which can be lowered hydraulicly on to the tracks! Transrail use this for inspections of all the railway tracks. On completion of the job, the spare wheels are simply raised and the vehicle becomes a normal Land Rover again and can be driven on the road.

Once, my wife joined me in the converted sail boat. We explored the water village at Pujut corner and also went for a ride up the sungei Adong. It was a great pity that there were no lakes in Miri. I heard that there was a shallow lake, up the Baram river somewhere between Miri and Marudi. Rose even managed to go fishing there once with some native friends. However, the road was too rough for my boat trailer which had nylon bearings and plastic rims for its tyres. Actually it was only a beach launcher, not a proper road trailer at all. Otherwise I would have enjoyed sailing Logan Bunut.

During dry seasons this lake also dries up because it is very shallow. This suits the Berawan natives who are closely related to the Ibans and the Kelabits. They harvest the fish from the lake and guard it jealously from outsiders. On the Baram there are also native tribes, Kayan, Kenyah and Muruts. These are very friendly and gentle people like the Kelabits from the Bario Highlands. Helen Buang is a Kelabit. John Seliman is an Iban from Saratok. Vivian Imang is a Kayan. Our domestic servant with the long ears was a Kenyah. Edward Lingan is an Iban from Bakong. Taib Mahmud is a Melanau from Mukah. He has done extremely well for himself as chief minister of Sarawak; but not as well as Mugabe, Marcos or Sadam Hussein!

My next purchase was a wind surfer. An expatriate brought it with him from Europe and was selling it before he went home at the end of his contract. I found that this was the most difficult water craft to learn to sail. A beginner is not brave enough to go into deep water where it is usually calmer. The sea is not exactly a suitable place to learn to windsurf as there are swells and breakers in the shallows. A lake or harbour is ideal. Kevin and I spent an entire afternoon at the beach near Kuala baram trying to learn to windsurf. Our time was mostly spent climbing back on the board. First we fell into the water from one side, then we fell from the other side! We gave up after making no progress at all. A great pity, since it was ideal weather for wind surfing in Malaysia; 34 deg C and no requirement for wet suits all year round in the tropics. Kevin and I missed a good chance to become first rate wind surfers!

5. Laser

My most worthwhile purchase was a Laser dinghy for 650 ringgit! The expatriate owner came from Oman and he packed this dinghy inside his 20 ft. container together with all his furniture. On arrival he discovered Piasau boat club which has 14 brand new Lasers and six 470’s! All of them were available for his use, as he was entitled to free memberships to all the three expats social clubs! I was the only person interested to buy his boat. It turned out to be an excellent boat, still in very good condition. I had many enjoyable sailing hours on it on my days off from the oil rig. One time, I went out to west Lutong C platform on the Laser, to say hello to my drilling crew on the Trident 1 jack-up rig! It was a distance of about 12 km. round trip, not really advisable for such a little boat! Another time, I went all the way to Hawaii beach at Bakam in the 470, a distance of 35 km. round trip. That was my greatest achievement!

Mostly, I launched my boat at the sea jetty, sail to Luak bay and back across the sand bar of the Miri river, that’s all. Usually I stopped for angtao peng at Tanjong beach. I have met no one else in their own sailing boats during the 15 years I was sailing in Miri. It was a very lonely sport, unlike golfing; but you can do either sport with friends or alone. Not many sports can be played alone. I was lucky.

On arrival in New Zealand I found that there are so many sailors here, in all types of sailing boats, mostly keeler, perhaps even more sailors than golfers. However, most of the sailing boats here are larger yachts with fixed keels and they cost a lot of money just to berth them at the marina. (a parking space or berth can cost up to 6K, depending on size and location!) Keel boats are great; but they are very expensive to maintain! I compromised by buying a trailer yacht. The retracted centre board made it easy to winch the yacht onto a road trailer for towing it home. Normally the boat sits on its trailer and is stored on the front lawn where it is easily accessible, especially during the winter months. I spent a great deal of time working on small improvements on the boat and it is a most rewarding past-time especially for a retired person.

One big disadvantage of having an unusual hobby like sailing was the fact that I could not sell all my dinghies when I was ready to emigrate to New Zealand in 1995. Eventually Eugene was able to sell the whole lot to one buyer in 1999 for 1.5K! Eugene was spending his holidays back home one year trying to look for a vacation job while he stayed in the old house in Pujut. Kong Teck employed him as a mechanic for a while; but he soon ran out of money and he was very motivated at that time to find some pocket money! His colleagues introduced a buyer from Krokop. Must be his birthday and Eugene’s too! Just the Laser alone was worth that much money, lucky buyer! Lucky Eugene. Lucky me too! He got rid of all my boats in Borneo in one shot! Win-win for everyone!

6. Kestrel

The first boat I bought in New Zealand was a 17 ft. trailer yacht, a Kestrel. I drove to Raglan to see the boat. The owner had the sails all rigged up waiting for me to inspect the boat. I walked around the boat twice and informed him that I would buy it for 2.8K if he would throw in the 2hp Yamaha! All I was interested in, at the time was whether the hull was sound and water tight. I did not even go inside the cabin to check it out! I could see where everything went because it has a simple rig-up. The sails looked like they were in reasonable conditions. Perhaps I should have asked for a test drive! The launching and recovery can be done easily by one man.

The water in New Zealand is too cold for me to go sailing in Laser dinghies and doing capsize drills. So I simply decided to buy a larger boat that does not capsize! Although it was bigger, it was much slower than the little dinghies which I was used to. However, it was a more relaxed type of sailing: cruising. I went sailing first at Huntly lake, Ngaroto, Rotorua and Rotoiti. Mostly at Ngaroto, my club near Te Awamutu. After two years learning to launch, recover and sail this larger boat, I finally decided to sell it and upgrade to a 22 footer, a Noelex which is slightly larger but faster! This new boat cost me 5.5K and is my most expensive boat so far. At present I have no plans to get a bigger boat. A 40 footer should be able to take me to Fiji or the Gold Coast. It is good to have dreams!

7. Noelex 22

This is the ideal one man boat for all the lakes in the north island. At 22 ft., it has a cabin large enough for a small family and therefore is very spacious for a single hander. It is like a floating caravan, completely self contained with a small galley and a porta loo. I have used it to explore lake Rotorua, Rotoiti, Tarawera and parts of Taupo near Kinloch. Each trip, I stay one or two nights on board. I have written the launching sequence for a trailer yacht in the previous entry. It is easy for one man to launch or recover this small yacht. On the trailer there is a 10:1 hand winch which can haul the boat up the trailer with very little effort.

Nanook's action photos