singapore marina fees for visiting yachts

[Emerald Sea]

Alex.
Fuel:In our case we filled up in Singapore at the fuel dock where the fuel cost is S$1.15/liter (best price around S'pore); located outside RSYC; call Maureen at Victory Fuel for appt at +6581829279; its low sulphur and cetane is good. You would need to raft up next to their 15m fuel boat - make sure you put all your fenders out and use your dock lines.
We didn't stop for fuel while up in east Malaysia/Thailand but had the contingency plans. You can get fuel in Tioman at the local gas station but need to arrange a few days in advance as it comes from the mainland - Mersing - cost is S$2.00/liter and comes in drums - you'll need your baja!
If your in the Redang area then you need to go into Kuala Terengganu, its an offshore town and services supply vessels, etc. Fuel is available here but haven't any more details.
In Koh Samui you can get fuel at Petcharat Pier in Bo Phut bay by appt. They also charge for docking and handling.
You can get fuel in Songkhla Thailand but haven't any details.

There is a OK charter's guide book you can dlowload for Koh Samui and area which is fairly good when it comes to locations around the islands and anchoring.

Gulf Charter Thailand - Yacht Charter - Sailing School - Sail Holidays - Keelboats and Catamarans from 32ft to 52ft

Plenty of fishing and squid boats around to keep a watch for, lots of nets and cages out there with small buoys. Not a lot of sail boats around - at least this time of year. Redang and Perhenlian are great islands to visit and enjoy. Plenty of turtles!

We are leaving Koh Samui this morning for Redang so will be out of touch for the next few days. Drop me a line later or at spoulson77 at yahoo dot com.

[atoll]

thanks steve thats great info,will download the guide.
will probably get some extra fuel containers.
what sort of wind strenth and and direction do you think we will be getting by the end of the month,our ultimate destination is pattaya,any tips?

(the new owner is under the impression his boat does 10-12 knots in all conditions!)

[Alan Mighty]

Originally Posted by atoll

what sort of wind strenth and and direction do you think we will be getting by the end of the month,our ultimate destination is pattaya,any tips?

Currently E Asia is in the second inter-monsoon of the calendar year, with the next season with reliable prevailing wind being the Northeast Monsoon likely to start in late Nov or early Dec.

The Madden Julian Oscillation drives the intensity of local weather. Predicting the MJO is not easy. The US NOAA Climate Prediction Center aggregates the forecasts for the MJO on: CPC - Climate Weather Linkage: Madden - Julian Oscillation

If you follow the MJO predictions, you get a feel for which national met bureau is better in a particular season. I like the Taiwan Central Weather Burea (TCWB). If you hover your pointer over the TWCB bar, you will see their forecast.

The MJO peak has been slopping around the Maritime Continent (i.e. maritime SE Asia) and the West Pacific.

The results are clear: the ITCZ has remained 3 - 5 deg N of the Equator (even though we're two weeks past the equinox); cyclogenesis in the NW Pac has continued; the series of Low Pressure Areas that have developed (some fading, some developing by cyclogenesis into typhoons that then head N towards Japan) have continued pulling winds over the Kra Peninsula into the NW Pac. Depending on where a LPA is, the winds have varied in direction from S to W.

The best large scale reporting of the best numeric model for the region is done by Singapore National Environment Agency. Each day Singapore NEA publishes a forecast for tomorrow at 07 hours local. The forecast is presented as a graphic of surface streamlines (at 10 m above sea level, which is just about right for the metacentre of Led Myne's sailplan). Of course, surface streamlines are only valid for, say, greater than 5 nMiles off the coast because land- and sea-breeze, island effect, etc disrupt the theoretical gradient wind in locations close to coasts, islands, and in the lee of mountains.

See the Singapore NEA Regional Weather Chart (and check their hourly satellite images of ASEAN too). Tomorrow's forecast will be released early afternoon Singapore time.

Zygrib (and some other software) shows CAPE and CIN values from GRIBs. As you likely know, high CAPE values (eg 2 kJ/kg) with low CIN values guarantee weather phenomena that aren't fun to experience on a small vessel.

The US Navy publicly releases small scale surface streamline forecasts on its Fleet Numeric MOC website and has forecasts to more than 144 hours ahead. The US Navy has a particular interest in the South China Sea, so their forecasts are interesting.

Bottom line is the state of the season: SE Asia is in the 2nd inter-monsoon of the calendar year. Expect light variable winds, with S and W winds slightly more dominant that other winds, punctuated by occasional squalls associated with high CAPE values, and a fair chance for predawn or afternoon thunderstorms.

The Singapore NEA has a few educational resources freely available on their website. And in 2012 they published a neat book 'The Weather and Climate of Singapore' which you can buy from their office.

Al

[Alan Mighty]

If the learning curve for interpreting MJO forecast diagrams is too high, just check the realtime Western North Pacific Monsoon Index, which is shown below the Indian Monsoon Index at:

Monsoon Monitoring

The US Navy FNMOC page for the S China Sea is at (ignore all warnings from your browser that the target website is unsafe):

https://www.fnmoc.navy.mil/wxmap_cgi...oc_scs&set=All

You should be able to run the model out to +180 hours. That's further than the reliability of a GFS model forecast, so but it's the best there is (unless you have the rights to visit the US Navy's private site, of course!).

Al

[Alan Mighty]

Moderator?

Should this thread be moved to Destinations/Pacific & South China Sea?

[atoll]

Originally Posted by Alan Mighty

If the learning curve for interpreting MJO forecast diagrams is too high, just check the realtime Western North Pacific Monsoon Index, which is shown below the Indian Monsoon Index at:

Monsoon Monitoring

The US Navy FNMOC page for the S China Sea is at (ignore all warnings from your browser that the target website is unsafe):

https://www.fnmoc.navy.mil/wxmap_cgi...oc_scs&set=All

You should be able to run the model out to +180 hours. That's further than the reliability of a GFS model forecast, so but it's the best there is (unless you have the rights to visit the US Navy's private site, of course!).

Al

thanks alan
i have used the nogaps fnmoc weather a lot in the past and find it pretty accurate,though i suspect for this trip i will have a lot of nothing!,punctuated with those nasty 20-50knot squalls that arrive just after nodding off at 4am

i would like to think there is still a bit of the SW monsoon left,though it looks like ~6knots is about average between the squalls!

in a bit of a quandry as the owner has no sailing experince,but would like to learn,so if we sail it he will soon find out drifting along at 2 knots and taking 8-10 days to do what he thinks should be a 4 day trip is not what you read in the sailing mags!

we could of course motor all the way......but then he will be left with the lasting impression that he has a very expensive motor boat,.......with sails!

hope fully we will not have the oportunity to encounter a "sumatra",though fear of an over canvassed boat is always a good thing to learn for the prospective novice skipper!

thanks again for your posts,i think we might have met in lankawi at the then "PIER resturant"about 11 years ago just before the sunami if you are from south africa.
cheers alex

[Alan Mighty]

Originally Posted by atoll

i have used the nogaps fnmoc weather a lot in the past and find it pretty accurate,though i suspect for this trip i will have a lot of nothing!,punctuated with those nasty 20-50knot squalls that arrive just after nodding off at 4am

i would like to think there is still a bit of the SW monsoon left,though it looks like ~6knots is about average between the squalls!

I like the Singapore NEA Regional Weather Chart for its large scale. But it's only valid for the day ahead, whereas FNMOC lets you consider 7+ days ahead.

Super Typhoon Vongfong - which is the BIGGEST in the NW Pac this calendar year - makes it look like the SW monsoon is still running. But once Vongfong moves N, the picture will change: see the Singapore Regional Weather Chart for 20141011: Vongfong has 115 knot winds around it and is jolly large.

Originally Posted by atoll

in a bit of a quandry as the owner has no sailing experince,but would like to learn,so if we sail it he will soon find out drifting along at 2 knots and taking 8-10 days to do what he thinks should be a 4 day trip is not what you read in the sailing mags!

Having run zygrib through the latest GRIB and looking at FNMOC, I reckon you can be optimistic. (see more below)

Originally Posted by atoll

hope fully we will not have the oportunity to encounter a "sumatra",though fear of an over canvassed boat is always a good thing to learn for the prospective novice skipper!

I've run zygrib through the next few days of GRIBs. Some high CAPE convection likely to develop just W of Singapore in the next few days which might bring Singapore a Sumatra.

But, as hopefully shown (attached) below from the GRIB of 20141015 at 0000Z (08 hours local) there's considerable CAPE convection in the S China Sea just S of the Indochina beak. I've not checked the sea surface temp, but I'd guess that that CAPE convection is not something to take lightly. Note the winds varying from 5 to 10 to 15 knots and note the changing direction. Note that such winds (and any squalls running down the wind stream from that moderately high convection area) might put you on a lee shore (depending on your location etc). But might also give you good sailing. If you can adroitly miss and handle the t-storms.

Originally Posted by atoll

thanks again for your posts,i think we might have met in lankawi at the then "PIER resturant"about 11 years ago just before the sunami if you are from south africa.

Led Myne and I were in Penang in 2004 for the tsunami (thank goodness - only 60 people or so died on Penang; Led Myne was safe in a flow-through marina). One of Led Myne's sister ships was in Telaga Harbour, Langkawi, and spent 10 minutes bashing her hull against a concrete marina pier. The pier suffered no damage! And insurance paid for most of the hull and mast repairs. I'm an Aus (but with a family name that -as you can see - comes originally from Scotland but now is more often spelled with a c than a g and is supposedly correctly pronounced as a hard c or k), but have been trying to spend half of each year cruising out of the country.

Al

[atoll]

yes always a worry these "white" squalls that come through with a 180 degree wind shift,wether at sea under full sail,or on the anchor sheltering from the seasonal prevailing wind.

spring tides at the moment,and a full moon,so understandable the weather is a bit fierce up north!

we should be leaving sometime around the 24th so the the tides will be smaller,and with a bit of luck less convection,and possibly with the wind back out of the ENE if another depression forms.................,the gulf of siam looks fairly active as well with a nice depression forming there as well.

[Emerald Sea]

Alex,
We arrived last night from Koh Samui - 329km in 59hrs; we had 32hrs of no wind/motoring and the final hours with moderate 15-25kts and squally but we managed to dodge or catch the outside of these to our advantage. As Alan says we are in a inter-monsoon period thus the weather is quite unpredictable. I receive 3 forecasts and all were wrong after 24hrs. I expect it will be a slog from Redang to Tioman and then to Singapore.

We expect to be in S'pore approx 20-22 Oct.

10-12kts in his 440? He may get it but he won't enjoy the ride - particularly in the choppy conditions of S China Seas. We hit 10.8kts - for a moment - yesterday in 25kt on the beam but averaged 8kt.

Im going to read Alan M's notes above a bit more closely!