Dell, Peter & Pacific Express

FINAL TWO WEEKS IN MIRI
Well the time has flown by. The cushions came back and luckily they look a million dollars – we are very happy with them. And the life raft is back where it belongs. We have two schools of fish under our boat – Archer fish and Happy Moments (apparently they sting if you touch them). The archer fish can spit very accurately and if the skipper hasn’t fed them in the morning they will spit and hit him in the head till he feeds them!!

We finally hired a car and went to the Niah Caves but unfortunately we took a wrong turn and only saw the great cave and missed the best of it but the less said about that the better!! But what we saw was fantastic and it was fun to follow the walkways up and down in the dark with our own torches. And we actually saw someone collecting the swiftlets' birdsnests. We stayed the night in the national park which was really lovely and were able to drive to town for dinner. We returned to Miri and finally also went up to see the museum of the history of oil here in Miri but it is closed for refurbishment. We did see a bit of Miri and it really is a lovely place.

We actually ran out of water on the boat. It has been so lovely to be able to use water as we like that we ran the tank dry – that’s the first time we have ever done that!! Oh well it will be back to austerity next week! Wednesday night found a heap of us in the Ming Cafe for dinner to watch the state of origin – great result! And a really good night.

We are fuelled up, gassed up watered up and doing some last minute shopping (and getting the spokes on the skipper’s bike fixed – again!) and get some Indonesian rupiah and we are off. Leaving here (weather permitting) on Tuesday 11th to sail leisurely north to haul out on the 25th. Its lovely here and we have enjoyed Miri very much but we don’t want to live here so it is time to go. So many people seem to arrive here and never leave!! We are really looking forward to being back out on the water.

Hope you are all well. For those of you in Brisbane, our son in law Pete is the supporting act on the 28th July at the Queen concert at the Tivoli so get along and give your support to the cancer fund.
http://premier.ticketek.com.au/shows/show.aspx?sh=KILLERQU12
Cheers
Dell and Peter