Familiar Names Halfway Around the World

We recently paid a visit to Raffles Marina on the northwest coast of the sparkling island nation of Singapore. It’s an upscale facility with nice docks, a great pool and a fine restaurant and bar. Unfortunately, it’s also about a 30-minute taxi ride from the dynamic downtown, and there aren’t many stores or shops within walking distance. On the other hand, if it wasn’t illegal, you could easily swim over to Malaysia.

While chatting with the folks in the marina office, we noticed a big blue guestbook. As soon as we opened it, we began recognizing the names of cruising friends from California who had stayed in the marina. Jim Foley and Linda Moore of the Santa Cruz-based SC 38 Dana. David Crowe’s 70-ft M&M catamaran Humu Humu, which has been in Paradise Marina in Mexico for years now. And Steve Salmon and Tina Olton of the Berkeley-based Valiant 40 Another World.

One of our pet peeves is when people don’t give complete information about themselves and their boats, both when writing to Latitude and on guest lists. For example, lots of cruisers who signed the Raffles guest book only gave partial information. Such as Osprey, Newport Beach — boat owner and boat type unknown. Stormvogel, Newport Beach — boat owner and boat type unknown. Gigolo, Gary Ward, San Francisco — boat type unknown. Fog City, Ken Coleman, San Francisco — boat type unknown. Pilgrim, Steven Whitmore, San Francisco — boat type unknown. Dream On, San Francisco — owner and boat type unknown. Albatross, Santa Barbara — boat owner and boat type unknown. The list of familiar boats in the blue book went on and on, mostly with incomplete information. The moral is, if you’re going to leave your mark, do it right or maybe it’s not worth doing at all.