E77 – PUTERI HARBOUR, MALAYSIA TO NIRUP ISLAND MARINA, INDONESIA
Departing Puteri Harbor, Malaysia
We motored out of the Puteri Harbor marina early morning and into the Johor Strait, a narrow waterway separating Singapore from Malaysia and constantly and jealously guarded by both Singaporean and Malaysian Maritime patrol boats.
In the Singapore Strait, we wound our way through both shipping lanes and into Nirup Island Marina in Indonesia where we underwent the check in process.
Nirup Island Marina
The Nirup Island Marina is first class and is brand new but also priced at the most expensive we had encountered anywhere since leaving Australia and even many marinas in Australia are considerably cheaper. We paid a significant amount of money to use the marinas check in process with Indonesian authorities CIQP, but in my opinion, the check in process was anything but smooth. In the end though, the check in was completed after some interventions from me and arguing over additional fees that the agent wanted to impose. Would we go back ? No, I don’t think so, but I suspect once the marina gets rid of the agent they are currently using and do the process themselves, the price will come down and the process will be smoother. I’d want to hear from a number of other yachts though before I went back confirming that things have changed. The manager though, was apologetic and I think will change things as he realizes there were significant shortcomings for our check in.
