Fujairah

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Here's a little bit about Fujairah (Fuj).... When you approach Fuj the radar is cluttered with hundreds of vessels.  At a quick glance it is easy to notice that almost all of the anchored vessels are tankers.  Within the anchorage limit there are various designations - they are lettered A,B,C, etc.  For the most part B (bravo) is the busiest because this is where vessels do dangerous liquids transfers.  Fujairah is one of the cheapest bunkering ports in the world (for my non-nautie friends...bunkering means taking on fuel - for ourselves).  It is sometimes much more cost effective for vessels (especially large ones) to go out of their way (i.e. burning fuel) to receive bunkers here.  This is sheer speculation however, I would say that of the vessels not briefly stopping in Fuj for bunkers 85%  are spot chartered and are simply waiting for cargo orders.  Fujairah is very strategicaly located - vessels can quickly head into the Persian Gulf, cross the Indian Ocean, head down into the Gulf of Adean and up the Red Sea, etc.

The air quality here is awful.  The haze is thick and slightly discolored.  Think L.A. at its worst!

When you enter the Fujairah basin there are at least 100 supply boats rafted up just waiting to make a run to the outer anchorage.  On a scale of one to ten Fujairah gets a one in the picturesque port category.  Beautiful port it is not.

The Seaman's Center is within the port limits and it is one of my favorite places to get a diet 7-up.

I've officially been trying to post photos for an hour.  I'm going to chalk it up to a poopy satellite connection (it would probably be more accurate to say it is due to sharing a poopy satellite connection with 20 other people) and give up.  Maybe tomorrow.

Jebel Ali

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Goood Mooorning Jebel Ali!  Thank you for such a beautiful sunrise this morning!

Fish piles galore!  The birds and dolphins were  having a feast!  My watch partners were laughing at me because I got super excited and yelled out 'Holy smokes!  It's a Marine Wildlife Frenzy!!!'  My shipmates have been teasing me all morning about my wildlife enthusiasm....

We were in prime fishing boat real estate.

I really liked these fishing boats were because they were a little different from the traditional Dhow hull.  They were playing with eachother...racing eachother to fishing traps.  It kind of reminded me of Singapore and the junks through the Straits of Malacca.

I figured I better add this photo as well.  We  had so many delays entering Jebel Ali (which is pretty much the norm) that well...it wasn't morning anymore

And now...for the rest of the story...

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Last night I laid in bed stewing about yesterdays blog entry.  I was able to chat with a buddy from school on facebook.  He offered me some really great suggestions for how to fix my steering light vibration issues.  I pride myself on being an honest person.  Since honesty is mostly the best policy.  I've decided to lay all my cards on the table.  I haven't been proactive about fixing the steering light because I hate it.  I hate it because I hate being on the forward mast.  I hate being on the forward mast because I might fall.  Wouldn't that suck?!  If anyone onboard this ship was going to fall off the forward mast it would for sure be me.  I get up there and I look around and I think 'Wow, it's really pretty and peaceful up here...'  that thought is quickly followed by 'Oh crap!  How on earth am I going to get down?!'.  Once I have that thought I can barely use my channel locks.  All I can think about is how I'm going to position my feet to most safely step off the platform onto the ladder.  Then everything else feels completely overwhelming....the wing nuts are too tight for me to unscrew....the channel locks are the wrong tool - I should have brought the vice grips....WD-40 never works!  Why can't they supply PB Blaster in the Middle East?!  If I had PB Blaster these things would come right off....it's not the vibration this must be caused by a short - those freakin' engineers!  Why can't they take a look at this?!....finally I get all the nuts off and the bulb changed.....and then I screw the stripped wing nuts right back in without making any modifications and think 'Who the hell needs a steering light anyways?!  Steering lights are for pansy's!'  Then, because I know the bridge is watching me with binoculars and that my standby is staring up at me from below I play it cool like I'm not ready to wet my pants.  I clip my harness as close to the ladder as possible and I tip toe to the edge of the platform.  I get both hands on the ladder with a death grip and edge my right leg till I feel the rung.  Then I follow with the left .  Then I wrap my arms around the ladder as tight as I can and unhook my harness.  This part sucks the most because I know that I have to just climb down.  Inevitably when we enter port the helmsman will ask for the steering light I'm usually like 'do you really need the light?!  It's dim anyways....can't you see the mast?!  I can totally see the mast!  OK fine....here you go'.  At this point I start scheming to figure out who I can coerce into going up the forward mast for me.  Now you know the rest of the story.... So, my buddy also told me that I shouldn't start so many sentences with 'so'.  (I did that one just to spite him)  heh heh.  This blog has made me very aware of how atrocious my grammar is.

Deck Sports

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Today's deck sports consisted of me talking the Third Mate into changing some bulbs for me.  This is poor form on my behalf.  However, he was pretty excited to climb the forward mast so it was a win win situation.  The trade was he changed the bulbs and I played paparazzi to give him some good facebook fodder! This particular light is our steering light.  It is used as a mark for the Helmsman so he can judge swing / rate of turn when making a course change or as a tool to pick out the mast against a brightly lit backdrop (city lights).  This is a blue light and not actually considered a navigation light.  The steering light is my nemesis.  The vibration of the forward mast makes the bulbs burn out like clockwork because the filaments shake loose.  It burns out almost every other week.  When I stand on the platform he is standing on I can't actually reach the bulb.  I have to stand on the ladder and rest on the guard.  I HATE it.   Thank goodness there are people out there willing to trade mast climbing for facebook photos!