September 26th: did a few chores Robbie went and spoke to the Hotel boat staff as they had a lot of boats all with Yamaha outboards and we are having a problem with the rev counter – it has stopped working and the engine has stopped charging the battery. Robbie had pulled it apart and couldn’t find anything obvious. Elizabeth, Heidi and I spoke to the Hotel staff and ordered some vegetables, bread and meat from the chef. We knew it was going to be expensive but he took us through the kitchen and into the cold storage room and we picked out our vegetables which were just beautiful quality. We agreed we would collect it after our walk and snorkel. We had decided to do the 2 hour ridge walk on the hill behind the resort while the mechanic looked at our outboard. Peter, Heidi and Elizabeth joined us. It was quite steep and extremely hot but fantastic views over the bay. They have had no rain for 6 months so it was extremely dry and dusty. We saw the most beautiful bright teal blue butterfly’s flittering through the bush and towards the end of the walk there was a lot of monkeys. We wandered back through the resort and had a cold beer as we were all so hot, dusty and thirsty. We had brought our snorkel gear and all jumped in off the Hotel jetty. WOW – the coral and fish were amazing. We saw schools of quite big fish, lots of bait fish, fingermark, dolphin fish and lots of others. Great way to cool off after our very hot walk. Back to the boat for lunch, a nap and another game of cards. This time we introduced them to Misere (a cool part of the game of 500 where you have to lose every trick) and, Peter and I won! Our luck has changed at last. Almacantar (Scottish couple Clair & Steven, also on the rally) had arrived in the bay and Steve came over for sundowners, along with Per & Elizabeth. Another stunning sunset. Clair was sleeping as they had left Komodo and done an overnight passage to get to Moyo Island, and were leaving at 2.00am for their next destination. They were really happy with the results of the Scottish referendum.
