Riung, Flores

Anchored at Riung
Palau Flores
East Nusa Tenggara
Indonesia
8'24.6S/121'01.7E

We motor sailed 35 miles to the anchorage where Sandpiper is currently anchored next to our friends on SV Uterus (Norway) and SV Mico Verde (USA). The town of Riung was a Rally stop last year and for some reason the town did not get on the list this year. We decided to stop here because one of the boats from last year said that this was one of their favorite stops.

There was some bad write-ups about Riung from the previous year. Some boats had difficulty entering the anchorage because the surrounding reefs are not marked, and one boat hit the reef. I am not sure why anybody had any issues entering this anchorage. The reefs are visible and easy to pilot through. The good side to this as we are the only boats in the anchorage since the other rally boats decided to sail on past and anchor at a spot called Monkey Beach, 2 miles from where we are.

We dropped anchor at about 3pm and decided to fix a few Sandpiper issues. We have been having problems receiving SSB radio signals. It has been affecting our ability to hear our friends when they call us. And it has caused problems getting connected to Sailmail. This is why some our blog entries have had to be bunched together.

Based on advice from my old boat neighbor in Oakland, I removed the SSB antenna wire off the backstay, stripped off 3 inch's from the old wire, added 3 inch's of new wire, then reattached the antenna to the backstay. After this fix the radio already seems to be working better. We will know more in a few days after some more use. Thanks for the advice Tom!!

After getting our chores done, we went ashore for dinner with our friends from SV Uterus & SV Mico Verde. We found a small restaurant ashore owned by a Polish man. He has owned this small hotel and restaurant for the last 40 years, and it was recommended by cruisers from last year. We all drank lots of icy cold Bintangs and ate a chicken buffet with rice and soup that was quite good.

Hanging out with the crews from SV Uterus and SV Mico Verde are fun. They are young, and are low-budget cruisers like us.

Team Sandpipers plans are to leave in the morning for a short 25 mile run to the next anchorage.

Tom and Amy

Notes From Ron:
I found this about the little restaurant in Riung...

In particular, we liked a restaurant that was known as "the Pastor's Place," which was in a small hotel that looked more like a seminary, situated in the middle of town. "The Pastor" was an elderly Polish gentleman who has lived in Riung for 40 years. He puts on an excellent meal in a large room in the hotel that looks more like an austere church's chapel, and it was evident that he believes cleanliness is next to godliness. Dinner for two with a couple of cool Bintangs was $US 10. A clean, comfortable, basic room with a western style bathroom is available for about $US 7 a night.