on tour in Singapore

The HIP and colorful Hippo bus

I the local, went on the Hippo and Duck tours! It was a company sponsored event and I merrily hop on. I have been wanting to do some of these local tours for a long time… but I never made time for it .. am definately happier to do it on company time and expense.. 🙂

I thot this colorful decal of the Merlion is so cool! I am sure happy to be seen travelling with him.. or her..?

Thats my duck! Pretty long eyelashes.

1st on the itenary, the “topless” Hippo bus comes to pick us up from just outside our gates. What a great idea! … but it was a rainy day, so it was not so fun in the open top.. but I dun care! I am sitting out side all the same!

The so called, best view of the sands building..

It was about 45 mins ride from Woodlands to the duck tours base at the ferries wheel. By the time we got to the Duckies, it had stopped raining, which is great!

The duck tours start by doing a dry route around a few landmarks in the city.  

<yawn> … I recently walked this path..

<yawn> Singapore city center buildings seen from on board the duckie

Belly of the Helix! Look at those struts!

I love getting on the water part tho… and splash, there she goes… I am so looking forward to going under the Helix.

Somebody is watching...

Its quite fascinating really, the construction of this bridge.. and I am very happy to get these not so common pictures of the under belly.

The Singapore Flyer... maybe I will try this ..

And here is one with people on the pod, watching us duckies go by. .. perhaps wishing to be ducking around and not just gawking at us. I guess I am just a wet duckie tour fan.

Air-conned street food. Looks there a curb and double yellow lines!

And my pictures of the ferries wheel, from being almost directly under it.. I wanna ride in it someday… fingers crossed… maybe it will be the next company sponsored event… 🙂

It certainly is not open air...

While waiting around for the next part of our city tour, I took a walk around the base of the ferris wheel.. gift shops <yawn..> candy shops… <yawn>… food court…? .. just browsing.. cos I am not needing to buy dinner tonight..

How do you create a oldie street hawker eating ambience, combine that with peoples need for air-conditioning around here… well.. using old signboards, props and antiques… a bit fake, … and the prices are nothing like the past. Snapping back to reality! Would I pay this much money for hawker themed food. .. nah… $20, I could eat real food in a mid range restaurant. ..

Thats us doing the "topless" ride

Back to the tours… Hopped onto the Hippo bus again and headed downtown for a peak hour congested traffic ride.. .. that us going by the old police headquarters. A relic from our colonial government days. Now its some gov office for media censorship.. somebody has gotto foot the bills for painting these windows…

Changing building skin!

Cameleon building named Ion. With all the advancement in LED and semiconductor technology, and this is what we get!

The lobby at Prima Towers

It was a nice evening… but I could do without the smog… it wasnt really bad, considering that this is such a densely populated city, the air quality isnt as bad as some of our neighbours…

Too much reflections spoiling the whole experience of dinning with a changing view

Ok, here we are, at the lobby at Prima Towers.. The was a time in our history that flour was actually milled in Singapore. .. and this was a silo? The lobby is kinda bizarre looking with this nipple like thing with a chandelier hanging above our heads while we wait for the very slow lifts…

Dinner was the most forgetable part of the day… View from the revolving restaurant was pretty good and quite fascinating… its changing all the time.. tried to take pictures, but none of them came out well.. reflections on the glass problem. .. Was happy to be there for the experience of changing views while having dinner… but it was not worth $20 IMO.. .. Yes I know, it was alot more than $20, but it was paid by somebody up in mgmt…. well… I am crossing it from my list of touristy things to here around here.

5 weeks at Marina Yacht Services

Oh my oh my! We cant wait to be floating again… … yeah.. by the time I get around to blog posting, we are in the water and have gone back to Keppel and I have my trusty internet at home to actually post pictures .. right.

Calliste oil damaged anitfoul being sanded away.

Calliste’s oil damaged antifoul is sanded down to the white primer by the worker at Marina Yacht Services. It only took they 2 days or so..

Patches of antifoul painted on.

I thot it interesting that the sanding workers were still going at it, and the painters came by and saw opportunity to paint patches of grey primer, followed by blue interspeed and even the red antifoul. They painted the patches where they want the cradles to be, where the pads will cover up the area. Its interestingly that you could paint it patches before the job, or move the boat and paint the covered up areas after the job.

Where is everybody...?

I thot this is a really cute picture. Its like we came back to find Calliste all exposed… 😉 There were other boats around to hide her “nakedness” earlier, but suddenly they were gone! Now, where is everybody?

Interspeed blue going on.

Ok, so Calliste was only exposed for a while, then she was moved to the “painting booth”. Our antifoul is color coded. Red on blue on grey on white. When blue starts showing, we know its time for new antifoul paint.

The mobile painting station.

The mobile paint station allows the painters to set up next to the target boat. They spray on antifoul around here. Its not usually done this way, but they seem to be done much better here than other yards.

Our painters. The master and the apprentice.

Painters posing for us. The master and his apprentice. Seems like they are happy with the results. Red is looking good on her.

On deck view with Calliste on the hard. Interesting perspective.

Meanwhile, Doug has been working on the mast… and me too!

Gooping carefully around each fixture with some silicon..

Things are looking good. It seems like the antifoul painting and the mast building will complete around the same time. .. Doug work 16hrs days and well into the night, rain or shine, 7 day weeks. It was tough. I provided the food and the beer that kept him going… how about that! .. and the decals…

Oh look! Its done. Mast raising the next day.

We are close to sailing again… with Calliste’s new mast! We are not there yet.. but we are closing in on the target. Lets see.. we still need to replace the rigging wires, halyards, boom gallows… these are small things, a little here and a little there…

Vandalized prop! Hee hee... I did that!!

Its been so long. .. I thot its another never ending project! .. but here we are, 1day away from mast raising.

The final moments at MYS. Mast installed

Ah HA! I had fun vandalizing the prop with squeaky pen.. some say its really effective at underwater growth control… we’ll know in 3 months if it work or not..

Calliste in the slings!

Alright! The MAST is IN! This is a nice crane, kinda overkill for this task, but nice job all the same. 

Calliste in the slings again! Ready for launch.

In the soup.

There she goes. I could almost hear her “quack” … like a duck happily getting its bottom wet and its little feets paddling away.

Seems like we be needing to go to Phuket for the wires soon, and maybe Rolly Tasker have a good selection of halyards too. We have the gallows almost ready. ..

Yes yes.. we have more than just these things.. but we need to take a break and celebrate this milestone!

I dun want to remember Sendai as a diaster area

1 week ago, I was sneaking a little snooze after lunch in my chair at my desk in my little cubicle… I dun remember exactly what time it was, but I woke up with a start and I thought we were experiencing tremors… like we usually do in Indonesian earthquakes… I asked my “cube” mate if shes feeling it too, but no. I checked my little tremor marker, and it seem to be moving very slightly, maybe its nothing. ..

I was going back to my dreams… when another colleague across the aisle exclaimed, “Japan earthquake!”. That was about 10 mins after I thought I felt the quake… My cube mate and I were like “<Shock> Really!? could it be!?” Is it possible for one to feel an earthquake in Japan from Singapore.

I guess its not really important that if I really felt the quake or not. All the same, I feel terrible for the people who are so badly affected. From a natural disaster of earthquake, followed by tsunami and finally to radioactive disaster, things are getting from bad to worse in hours.

Overnight, the unknown city of Sendai became instantly known to the world. Its not a good thing. Sendai is a city of no consequences to anybody, except for those who were fortunate to be aquainted with it… before this happend. Now, people will remember it for this incident.

I remember Sendai for the good 9 months when I was working and living there in 1998. It was my 1st experience of living through 4 seasons at 1 go, at the beautiful subburb of Izumi ward of Sendai city. I enjoyed the excellent sushi made with the most fresh sea produce from within Miyagi district, I enjoyed my walks through the flower fields, rice fields, trails… etc. I drove several times to coast at Matsushima and I love that fishing and seafood farming village. I guess thats gone now.

The survivors of that village, I am not sure they are really survivors. . For the rest of their lives, they will be mourning their lost family and friends, they will have a regret so deep in their hearts that nobody will truly be able to understand. The lost of ones’ roots! No more family house or happy family moments. Pictures and heirlooms washed out to sea, nothing to hold on to except for the memories.

Insurance may buy that car that was lost, or that house thats gone, but not the album of family gathering pictures, not the file of newspaper clippings made by proud parents of they exceptionally talented child. Aid money may buy food and help in rebuilding of lives, time will help heal the extreme pain in their hearts. … or will it? really? Dah says, its not a moment in time, its a missing moment in life that can never be recovered.

I have great respect for the Japanese. The spirit of unity in the Japanese will help the country recover from this shock. I feel bad that I cant do anymore than just writting my thoughts in my little blog, but I hope that there be others who, like me, remembers Sendai for better things.

Finishing touches on Calliste mast

Calliste waiting for the lift.

We are so busy these days, working as fast as we can on finishing up Calliste haulout at MYS. Everyday on the hard is costing us money… we have to continue to pay for the phantom slip at Keppel and each day is about S$50 on the hard… ouch! … wait, is it S$70 now.. DOUBLE OUCH!

Calliste in the slings

Here we are, just arrived at MYS waiting area. The lift is launching a big blue hull.

The travelLift is a great piece of machinery. Every boat owner should have one 🙂 … if money and space is no object.

Ah.... the pool

We have fond memories of being here at Raffles Marina in 2005.. and bad memories too, but just try to remember the good ones.

Chubby dog waiting for its people to finish breakfast!

Look, whos ready to go sailing! 

Ok ok.. enuf lazing around. Get to work! <whip>

Calliste new mast... before the decals .. see! theres a cute umbrella at the end.

This is Calliste’s new “hard clear” anodized mast being assembled, while her bottom is being sanded and prepped for new anti-foul.

Reflective yellow from 3M.

Her rudder had some old primer blisters… which we suspect is due to the painters neglience 5 years back. We had re-fibreglassed the rudder then, and new primer and anti-foul. Now we find that the primer had adhesion problem with the fibreglass because it was not sanded smooth before painting on the primer. How could the most reputable yard around here not know that this was going to be the problem!!??

New mast with the wiggles and old yellow mast in the back.

We are adding bright yellow reflective decals to the mast! 🙂 Doug wanted a gold anodize mast, but thats gonna cost us S$4000 more! Decals are just S$100 + plus 2 days of our time… and its reflective!

Its all going to turn out well. I’m sure! And I am looking forward to our trip back!

Assembling the bits for Calliste Mast

Putting "locktite" onto the screw

Our bits have returned from anodizing. Next step, assembling the bits.

Putting “locktite” onto the screw, screw in. When locktite is hardened, put locktite on the mini screws on the corners, screw in and expose only 2 threads on the other side.

Finally. 1 inside mast track car for holding the electric conduit.

These mini screws are for sliding in the inside mast tracks, while the plate is for holding the electrical conduit… Huh? What? … Yesyes, more pictures on the way.

This is just a quick post to show “locktite” in action! If not for this goopy red stuff, vibration in the mast will cause the screws to simply unravel itself and fall to the base of the mast, leaving the conduit to slap inside the mast… I dun suppose most people understand what kind of problem this is for sailors and sail boats. .. Anyway, the point is, we do what we can to take care of the details.