We left Marina Bandar on Monday the 3rd of January to sail the 650 miles to Salalah. Unfortunately the rules require that we checked out from Port Sultan Quaboos in Muscat not from the marina, so we had to motor 4 miles in the wrong direction. At the port we moored against the wharf designed for big ships and getting off the boat was a bit like climbing a mountain. Our agent arrived and we tried to check out but guess what the officials didn't like the visas we...

Out on the blue was re-launched on Thursday the 2nd of December without incident and we left the hotel and moved back on board. There have been fireworks all week. The world fireworks championship is being held at nearby Qurum park. Teams from several countries are competing and each team is using over 4000 fireworks in displays lasting about half an hour. We watched the first team's display on Monday night as did most of Muscat judging by the amount of traffi...

We flew back to Muscat from Heathrow on Tuesday the 16th of November, arriving on the 17th. Since the boat is still in the boat yard we can't live aboard so we checked into the Mutrah hotel.The hotel is the oldest hotel in Mutrah. It may be a bit dated now but its fine and the rooms are clean with air-conditioning. The restaurant serves very good curries so Paul's happy. We hired a car at the airport so that we could get to and from the marina. The boat was OK...

Unfortunately we hit something about half way across the Indian ocean while sailing from Galle to Salalah. There was an awful grinding sound coming from the vicinity of the propellor which got worse and became a loud banging noise. We stopped mid ocean and snorkelled down to investigate. Nothing obvious could be seen. We were meant to be joining a convoy of yachts to traverse the Gulf of Aden (safety in numbers) but could not risk the journey up the Red sea where...