(Daniel) This morning I woke up early and decided to wash my dirty clothes, which meant all of them!  They had accumulated throughout my time in the jungle, I had only just survived the two dinners which I had attended by buying two new t-shirts!  I have brought washing powder with me from England, so I used this to fill up two buckets in the back to wash the clothes.  After putting about 20% of the dirty clothes in the bucket and washing these, the water was so dirty that I had to change it.  In the end it took me the whole morning to wash everything, which I hung on lines outside the house to dry.  This job finished, I felt good, and decided that just for a laugh I would take the boat out and go to visit Zi at her restaurant.

The boat was hot from being on the top of the trailer.  But once I had filled it with air, it cooled down a little, so I dragged it down to the water.  Then I returned to the truck and got out the outboard which I carried down to the boat where I fitted it on the back.  The outboard started easily after I had paddled out to the deep water.  I pulled out the throttle and let the boat get up to plain a I headed down the beach towards Zii’s restaurant.  Even on the plane, and travelling at a good speed I realised that it was taking a long time to get there, and that I hadn’t brought any more fuel with me.  I started to turn around, just as the engine died, it fired again, and took me as far as the shore, but then died again, so I dragged it up onto the shore and checked it out.  Soon I was surrounded by fishermen, wanting to see what was happening.  I figured I could limp a bit further down the shore and then walk the rest of the way to the Wolf.  Then I could drive back along the beach and pick up the boat. I pushed the boat back out in the water, she started and drove another 100meters along the shore before dying again.  This close inland the waves were breaking hard and I struggled to get the boat in, but finally managed to get it onshore, where I dragged it up the beach and then got out any valuables before walking back towards the house.

It was further than I thought, and took me about 15 minutes to walk.  By the time I got back I knew that I had to hurry, as soon the tide would come in, and could possibly take the boat out, as I didn’t think I had pulled it that far up the beach.  I jumped in the Wolf and drove down to the sand and onto the beach.  The sand felt very soft, so I drove towards the waves, in the hope that the sand here would be a bit harder.  I pictured the Wolf splashing through the waves as I sped along the beach.  The image was short lived as I got closer to the shoreline and sank axle-deep into the sand where I got well and truly stuck, a good 60 meters from the nearest trees.  There was no-one around, and I was stuck at a 90°angle from the closest tree, making winching very difficult.

I jumped out, and seeing that the waves of the incoming tide were already lapping at the wheels of the Wolf knew that I had no time to spare.  I grabbed the sand waffles from the sides and a shovel and dug out the wheels, then I tried to drive up them, but with only two waffles and being on my own, the other wheel always slipped somewhere, stopping me from getting a proper purchase.  I decided to get the winch out straight away, and pulled the line to it’s full length.  This was no-where near long enough, so I got several bow shackles, and my tow rope and kinetic tow rope, then I attached these in series to my trees strops which I also attached in series.  In all I had the full 120ft winch line, my standard tow rope, my kinetic tow rope, three tree strops and I still couldn’t reach the tree, which was another two feet from me.  I spotted a blue nylon rope, which I looped around about ten times times.  It was old and rotten, but hopefully the coils would be strong enough to hold as I winched close enough to not need them.

As I ran back to the car, I noticed another man walking towards me, he had obviously spotted the farcical self recovery, or was possibly watching in amusement form the start, when he realised that I needed help.  He started digging with my shovel and relocated the sand ladder, as I jumped in and began to winch.  It was slow going, and I heard my spring pop out on my side, and not relocate, for those reading this, buy spring locators for your defender or Wolf, they are bloody useful when it comes to serious articulation!

As we winched I removed the various other ropes as they were not needed, finally after 40 minutes found myself on firm ground again.  I drove onto the road, and then returned to the beach where I picked up the various bits of equipment and threw them in the back before speeding off to find the boat.

First I pulled up at the wrong place, and couldn’t see it.  But two young guys pointed me in a direction, an ominous sign, and I pulled up further down the beach, where  crowd had gathered.  As I walked towards the crowd, a man approached me, and showed me a cut on his leg.  He kept making a drinking action, which I took to mean that I now owed this guy a drink!  As I got closer I could see that the boat had been dragged out to sea, and in the waves had turned over, the wooden floor was gone, and the engine full of sand.  The contents of the boat locker were gone too, a knife and some flares.  As were the oars.  The group around the boat, were all making the drinking action now, and I suddenly felt quite alone out there with all these fishermen, several of which had injured themselves pulling my boat out of the sea.  I made a split second decision, and told them to keep the boat.  And took the outboard.  They seemed contented, and so I walked away, leaving the boat without a floor and taking with me an engine that would probably never work again. 

I drove back to the house, where I took out the boat engine and checked it for damage.  The worst case scenario had occurred and the engine was filled with sand, I took off the head and found that the cylinders too were chock full.  I used the airline to clean it, but even after spending several hours there was still sand coming from various nooks and crannies.  I left the engine there for now, and went to see Zi at the restaurant.  She wasn’t there, so I drove out to the market and bought some supplies of noodles and vegetables.  On the way back, I stopped in at the restaurant again, where Zi had returned.  I tried to talk to her about what had happened that day, but she didn’t seem to understand.  I drove back to the house and made myself a dinner of Tom Yam noodles with tinned anchovies.  Then had some beer and watched a movie before going to sleep.

Before I fell asleep, I got a call from Lawrence, the guy who I had met at the Land Rover Club anniversary, and had found that he had lived in Caterham just near my own village. He had said that he might come and visit me, and now he was ringing to confirm that he would probably come in a few days time.  I told him that I should still be here, and to call me when he knew for sure.

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