Hello again!!
I'd like to say that I haven't blogged in a while because we've been so busy and having a whale of time, but we've really just been struck down by a rather persistent case of what I'm branding, "the Gili guts"...need I say any more?!
Right, without further adieu, let's move to the Gili Islands (where the showers are cold salt water and you have to rinse off with a freezing cold bucket of fresh water - brrrrr!).
Day 25! Friday 1st August 2014
We had a very smooth journey to Gili Trawangan (Gili T for short). It was just an hour on a coach to the harbour at Padang Bai and then an hour and a half on the Ocean Express Boat (which had not one, but FIVE engines!). All of our luggage was loaded and unloaded from the boat for us - a luxury that wasn't afforded to us for the next couple of boat journeys we took...more on that later!!
When we arrived on the island we decided to deny the offer of a horse cart (the only form of transport on the Gilis other than pedal bikes) to our hotel and ambled around the island for a short while before we found Coral Voice 1, where we were booked in for 4 nights.
We were very pleased to find we'd been given a free upgrade to one of the newer bungalows free of charge (I assume they were just short of rooms). This meant we got air conditioning and hammock on the porch - winning! Although we did have a little trouble staying upright in it...
After we'd settled ourselves into the room, we headed out for some lunch on the beach and I befriended what seemed like most of the local cats (don't worry Mum, they haven't given me rabies!).
After lunch it was time to explore! We decided to walk round the entire island to gauge what was actually about on the tiny dessert island that is Gili T! It only took us an hour and a half...teeny! It is rather pretty though!
I'm still looking rather pasty in the above picture...I promise my skin has changed colour slightly since then...pale girl problems!!
We also spotted an amazing swing which one of the hotels had put out in the ocean - I really wanted to have a go but I wasn't appropriately dressed... sometimes I wish I weren't so sensible!!
Soon after the swingset, we came across a cute little beach bar and stopped for a Bintang before continuing our trek (humour me here...okay...mini trek) around the island.
We finished the rest of our island tour and went back to the bungalow to get ready for dinner!
Once again, restaurant choice confirmed by Trip Advisor/Lonely Planet, we headed to Cafe Gili. I ordered the fresh grilled tuna steak and was very pleased with my choice!
Informed that Fridays are a big night on Gili T, we finished up with dinner and started up a makeshift bar crawl...where we basically just went in anywhere that was busy!
We started at Sama Sama reggae bar. Then we headed to "Horizontal" bar, which seemed to have a little bit of what Lonely Planet would describe as "a loose sexual vibe" (I kid you not, that's actually a direct quote from our guide book!)... the staff were all wearing t-shirts that read "What's your favourite position?". I really hope they are just making reference to the fact that bean bags are their choice of seating arrangements!! We went in nonetheless, lured by the promise of two for one cocktails!
We then headed to the "Surfer Bar" at the end of the main "strip" of Gili T which seemed to be where everyone was going! It was right on the beach and there were fire dancers, which was pretty cool to watch!
Day 26! Saturday 2nd August 2014
The next morning I was woken by a very strange noise...I looked out of the door to find one of the hotel employees trimming the rather shabby patch of grass opposite our bungalow with a large pair of kitchen scissors...only on the Gilis!!
As I was awake already, I went to the reception to ask about breakfast. They said to just order from the menu and they'd bring it to me on the porch. I ordered myself a banana pancake and sat happily in the sunshine before it arrived.
I was joined by a ginger tom cat...I'm sure he was just hanging around for he leftovers but he had no such luck!!
We spent most of that day just chilling at the bungalow. Jack was in the hammock reading yet another book that requires him to look up every fifth word (although he does know quite a bit about old shipping terms now...). He didn't fare too well in the hammock though...the material is what you might call a little harsh on the skin...
I spent most of my time battling my way through my uni reading list and writing the previous blog post. We did stop for a lunch break on the beach though and I made yet another cat friend...would you believe I used to be scared of cats before this holiday?!
We then decided to spend the rest of the afternoon on the beach as the midday heat had passed and I was safe to sit in the sun coated in factor 50 sunblock without getting frazzled!
Interesting fact...people on the Gili Islands water their dusty, sandy paths numerous times throughout the day...we've speculated that the damper your path is, the more wealthy you are in Gili T terms. How's that for a wealth indicator...path wetness - they'd think we were all loaded in the UK if they visited during April Showers...imagine if they went to Wales?! Minds would be blown...
That evening we had dinner at the Trawangan beach bar, which was lovely until we saw a rather bright sign for magic mushrooms on our way out and wondered what they'd put in our food...if you can't read it from the picture, it says exactly this:
"We have super duper mega radical maximum f***kin' bloody fresh sexy magic mushroom organised by Dr Feel Good. Get fly up up away". Interesting.
Day 27! Sunday 3rd August 2014
On Sunday we decided to rent some snorkelling kit and head out into the ocean. We were told we could snorkel straight off the main beach and still see some amazing fish, so we donned our masks, snorkels and flippers and off we went!
I'm not gonna try and name all of the different fish we saw because I'll probably get it all wrong but I do know we saw some parrot fish and moorish idols, which were pretty cool and colourful!
But the best thing was that we saw an amazing green sea turtle! I wasn't even looking when Jack pointed it out and freaked out more than a little bit when I saw this massive thing swimming literally right beneath me!
When I realised it was a turtle not a shark of some kind, I chilled out and was amazed to have been so close to the turtle, so close to the shore too! We followed it for a bit but it then swam into a darker, deeper, scary looking bit of water so we retreated for lunch on the beach!
We then went back to the bungalow and chilled for a bit and made use of the unusually good wifi to make a few FaceTime calls home.
That evening we had dinner on the beach...again! This time at The Beach House Resort Restaurant. Jack ordered chicken and mushroom pie...he likes to stick to local cuisine...!
We're going to be so shocked when we get back to the UK - we'll be all "what do you mean your restaurant isn't on the beach & you want to charge me £10 for my main course?! This would never happen in Indonesia!". Everything is so cheap here, it's actually surprising if you have to shell out more than £5 on a starter, main meal and a drink, so being back in the UK is going go be a shock to the wallet!
Day 28! Monday 4th August 2014
The next morning I was unhappily awoken at 04:20 by the call to prayer at the local mosque. Not being a practicing Muslim myself, I felt it was a slightly unnecessary alarm clock...I only ever get up at the time to go to the airport, gosh!
Luckily I managed to get back to sleep until a reasonable hour of the morning. We then had breakfast and, realising that we were missing our "Starbucks with a view" in Ubud, headed out along the freshly watered paths in search of a coffee bar!
We found "Eco Coffee", they claim to serve "the best coffee on the island", along the beach front and I had a Mochaccino...I was obviously feeling in need of caffeine and calories that morning! It was an iced mocha with whipped cream on the top...I shall provide you with a rather unfocused (stupid iPhone) picture of it below...
We then spent the day on the beach at the Pearl Beach Lounge, mainly so I could get a sunlounger...I can't be doing with this towel on the sand rubbish - sand gets EVERYWHERE!! This place have nice bean bag loungers and give you fresh fluffy towels as long as you spend 100,000 IDR ( ~ £5 ) each whilst you're there, so that was lunch sorted!
After our day at the beach we went to climb (it was more of a scramble in my case) the "South West Hill" on Gili T...it is in fact the only hill on the island! At the top there is an old Japanese gun emplacement which Jack was keen to see, I just had the great view of the sunset in mind!
From the top you could also distinguish between the two other Gilis (Gili Meno then Gili Air) and Lombok in the distance, which was pretty cool!
When we got to the bottom my feet were coated in gross mud and dust so I insisted on washing my feet in the sea, which Jack found amusing enough to take pictures of...
We then went to a beach bar we'd walked past a few days ago and had a Bintang or two!
The post sunset sky was amazing so it was nice to chill there for a while!
There was also a really cute little swing hanging from a tree that the bar staff had put candle on, it was all very picturesque.
Unfortunately it started to rain (at which point I felt I had been misold the whole paradise island thing!), so everyone at the bar bundled into the little pagoda to keep dry until the rain stopped. We did meet two nice German girls in there though!
So you might be wondering why I've titled this post "no police, no terrorism, no worries" and haven't mentioned it yet. Well let me enlighten you!
In the course of our time in the beach bar pagoda, one of the locals invited me to stay on the island and live with him...naturally I politely denied his...kind(?!)...offer immediately whilst one of the other locals (who introduced himself as Monkey Ugly) was offering around a massive pile of weed (balanced on a sheet of paper) with no trepidation whatsoever.
He kept saying his favourite phrase "no police, no terrorism, no worries" over and over, encouraging everyone to partake in the weed smoking. On the Gilis, they don't actually have any form of police force or written laws. It's still a kind of tribal based legal system where the elders have control. And they don't seem to be adverse to a bit of the green stuff floating around!!
We took this as our cue to leave as the rain had stopped, but not before Monkey Ugly: beach dweller, mermaid spotter, time skewer & weed smoker, tried to convince us to stay to see the mermaids, "Katie and Charlie" come out of the sea at 3am (he thought it was already 2am at this point...it was 7pm...).
We concluded that he was high as a kite and left him and the pagoda behind as we went in search of dinner, seeing some amazing sheet lightening as we went!
We ended up having dinner and drinks at Tir Na Nog, Gili T's very own Irish bar/restaurant! Apparently it is the smallest island in the world to have it's own Irish bar, so that's pretty cool. The mojitos weren't half bad either!
So we had a very interesting last evening on Gili T, which of course had to feature another cat friend!
Day 29! Tuesday 5th August 2014
On Tuesday it was time to head to Gili Air. We were up bright and early to make sure we got tickets for the 9am local shuttle boat off of the island, which you can only purchase on the day of travel. In hindsight that may not have been our brightest idea...
It was very difficult to actually get on to the boat as it hadn't come all the way up to shore, so I had to climb onto the boat with my front and back rucksacks on whilst fighting the waves, which resulted in my dress getting soaked and me wishing I was wearing a bikini! The boat was very cramped and there was no space for luggage which resulted in the bags getting soaked along with the passengers - thank god our North Face duffels are waterproof! However, we don't seem to have been the worst affected!
When we arrived at Gili Meno, the first stop, the boat couldn't get anywhere near the shore so the people had to wade through waist high water if they wanted to get off. The people who wanted to get on to go to the next stop also had to wade through said water with all their luggage and some even got left behind because the boat was too full! I can't tell you how annoyed I would've been if that were me!!
After the ordeal and an incredibly graceful (NOT!!) dismount from the boat, we finally arrived on Gili Air!
We knew our hotel was at the north end of the island and would be a fair walk through the sand (no proper paths on Gili Air apart from the "main strip"), we decided to get a horse cart to Bintang Beach, despite my qualms about how the poor horses are kept. Sad face :(
It turned out that it actually was a fair way and I was very glad that I didn't have to lug my bags all the way there!! We arrived at what we thought was our hotel, Bintang Beach Bungalows, only to be sent further down the island to Nusa Indah where we were given a lovely bungalow. I'm still fairly sure we weren't in the hotel we booked and paid for online but they didn't seem to be concerned!!
We were happy because it had aircon and the bungalow was practically on the beach - we could see the sea from our door! Also, the hotel had some nice furniture to chill on by the beach, which was ideal!
Having left our hotel in Gili T before breakfast started, we were pretty peckish by the time we'd settled in on Gili Air. The hotel had a little beach cafe/restaurant so we ordered some food.
Here's the funny part. Jack ordered "fried fish with rice"...here's what he got...it was rock solid and pretty much raw all the way through, a great cause for amusement on my part as I happily tucked into my chicken satay! He was not so amused!
After lunch we decided to do what we did with Trawangan and walk the island to work out where everything is! It was a lot more difficult to get around because the paths are so rubbish, it's deep sand everywhere so isn't particularly easy to walk on for extended periods of time. Never did I think I'd be missing roads and pavements!! It was pretty though...
It took us about an hour and a half to walk around the island, the same amount of time it took walk around Trawangan, which is bigger!
Unfortunately when we got back to freshen up for dinner, I seemed to suddenly have developed a fever of some kind. I was burning up and my whole body ached so I decided the best thing for it was bed...at 7pm. I ended up sleeping for 14 hours and woke up feeling much better but was still left with a stinking cold and cough...ah well!
Day 30! Wednesday 6th August 2014
The next day was a recovery day for me, we just chilled on the beach by the hotel for the day.
We had our free breakfast, I picked the ever faithful banana pancake option but was slightly put off by the fact that the pancake still appeared to be pretty raw inside. I decided to skip out on the food part of breakfast for the rest of our stay on Gili Air and survived on a nutritious breakfast of Lombok coffee with "indomilk", which is basically really thick, sweet condensed milk (they have no dairy cows in most places in Indonesia).
I also finally finished the rather disturbing book that is Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita after weeks of battling (it's on the reading list...not my personal taste if I'm honest!). So pleased that is over and done with!!
That evening we went to a very prettily lit restaurant called The Beach House for dinner. They also do nightly movie screenings on the beach, which I think is a fab idea! We stayed on after dinner to watch "Dallas Buyers Club", I hadn't seen it before and I thought it was a great film!
Day 31! Thursday 7th August 2014
I should point out that we didn't actually do an awful lot on Gili Air...mainly because there wasn't an awful lot to do...it's like Gili Trawangan on a smaller scale!
On Thursday we spent the whole day on the beach reading our books again...I was actually tempted to call this post "lifes a beach", but I thought my alternative might provoke more intrigue!
It turns out that desert islands aren't really my thing...I found myself getting a bit wrestless actually and I started thinking about all of the home comforts I was looking forward to getting back to. You can take your beaches, a field and some proper English tea (with PROPER milk) will do me just fine thank you. (Not to sound ungrateful or anything...too late? Oops...).
We did also hire some rather dubious bikes for our last two days on the island in an attempt to make it easier to get around the island. They didn't. Ah well, it was only 20,000 IDR ( ~ £1 ) badly spent. My bike had no breaks and Jack's was stuck in a high gear...ideal!
After our day on the beach we headed to the main bit of the island for some pre-dinner drinks...on a different bit of beach...beach beach beach!!
We then decided to treat ourselves to dinner at Scallywags, a more upmarket kind of place that we'd wanted to try on Gili T (it was too busy when we tried to get a table). It is really prettily decorated and they have some awesome chairs!
We went for some tapas after reading great things about the tuna sashimi on Trip Advisor.
The food was really nice, unfortunately we didn't hear until the day after that there is a famed "Scallywags surprise" that often "affects" patrons the day after their visit. Lovely. Thankfully we were both already suffering with food poisoning of some kind so it didn't affect us much. Or so we think...
Day 32! Friday 8th August 2014
The next morning I was booked in for the day at the Ocean 5 resort to do the day long (08:30-18:00) "Discover Scuba Diving" course. I braved the journey there on my own as Jack wasn't doing the course. It was horrendous.
I tried to cycle along the beach because the sand is usually firmer but that failed because the tide hadn't yet gone out enough at 7:45am. So I had to wheel the bike alongside me as I struggled along the sandy path around the island, cutting up my legs with the errant pedals and cursing as I went! By the time I got to the centre at 8:15am I was not a happy bunny and must've looked like a madwoman to anyone that passed me en route!
However, it was all worthwhile as I had a great day on the course, learning all the skills in the pool and then going out to Hallicks, north of Gili Trawangan, for the ocean dive. We got to do a backwards roll off of the boat to get into the ocean with all of our dive kit on, which was really fun despite my initial fear!
It was a really nice dive, we were down there for 45 minutes at a maximum depth of 12 meters. There was quite a strong current that helped us to bob along the edge of the coral wall and see all kinds of beautiful fish! We also saw two green sea turtles which made me happy!
We were a group of 4, an Italian guy (who was just doing the day course like me) and two girls doing the full 3 day open water course, one from Quebec, one from Spain. We also had a lovely Swiss girl called Shirin (who had nearly completed her Dive Master training) accompany us on the dive.
Our lovely dive instructor was called Manon and she was from Guadeloupe. She said she wanted me to do the open water course because my "eyes looked so happy down there" - bless her! I do really enjoy diving though so I really must get round to doing the PADI open water course at some point, I probably would've done it with Manon had I not been leaving the next day, sad times!
I actually had a rather pleasant cycle ride back to the hotel - it only took me 15 minutes as opposed to 30. I had clearly timed it unintentionally perfectly - the tide was out and sand was firm enough to cycle along the beach, the sun was also starting to set - beautiful!
Day 33! Saturday 9th August 2014
The next day it was time to leave Gili Air! Our horse cart arrived at the hotel to take us to the harbour at 7:30am, ready for the boat to Bangsal, Lombok, which was leaving at 8:30am.
I was actually very happy to leave Gili Air with it's shoddy food & equally shoddy paths - desert island life is clearly not for me!
This time the boat ride was very pleasant, I managed to get on and off the boat without getting soaked, my luggage stayed dry and the crossing was smooth. When we arrived at Bangsal a horse cart was waiting to take us to the bus that would transport us to Kuta. The driver kept calling me a strong woman after he attempted to take my rucksack off of my back. I wasn't sure whether to be proud or embarrassed!
When the bus arrived, we couldn't help but notice it was rather small. However, they managed to fit 17 people in what can only be described as a slightly oversized people carrier...perhaps because the seats were only half the size of my bum each and all of the luggage was tentatively strapped to the roof...
There was another slight issue with our lovely "bus"...the door didn't close, so Jack kinda spent the entire journey being close to death...naturally there weren't any seatbelts!!
All in all, the two hour journey down to Kuta, Lombok, wasn't too bad, the bus even dropped us right at the door of the hotel we had booked and paid for online.
Unfortunately the hotel room we were given was nothing like the pictures advertised on Agoda. They had cheekily only uploaded pictures of the air conditioned rooms and kept the pokey, grubby little fan rooms a secret. (I shall be writing reviews on both Agoda and Trip Advisor to make people aware of this) The bathroom tap didn't even work! It was pretty much on Kuta beach though...
Thankfully the hotel owner sympathised with us when we voiced our concerns and told us that he had another hotel that we could stay at for just 300,000 IDR ( ~ £15 ) extra a night. Considering we were only paying £14 a night for the other room (£7 each), we decided we could stretch to paying the extra for the better room, especially as we're staying for 8 nights, quite a while to be in a rubbish room.
It is more central and has air conditioning and hot water. Yes, hot water - I get to have daily hot showers after over two weeks of enduring the cold water - eeep!
One of the guys from the original hotel even took us across to the new hotel in his car so we didn't have to carry our luggage. We also arranged a surf lesson with him for the following Monday so that was all very convenient!
We have borrowed an automatic moped from the family that own the hotel (for just 80,000 IDR a day, around £4) to help us get around to all of the best beaches along the coast, so it has been fun getting used to that. I haven't actually dared to drive it yet, but I've been a very good passenger I think! Don't worry parents, we have very cool helmets!
So...what were my first impressions of Kuta, Lombok. Well, it seems to be an extended branch of the Gili Islands - another version of the arse end of nowhere - if you look out to sea from Kuta beach, there is literally nothing on the map until you get to the South Pole. Wowza.
That evening we had dinner at "The Spot", where I shared my dinner with a rather lovely old doggy, and then headed to bed after a long day of travelling and moving between hotels!
That's all for now folks!
Expect more on Kuta, Lombok in the next post and find out how we decided to spend the last part of our six week travel extravaganza!
Toodle-Oo!
I couldn't possibly end the post without chucking in a selfie!! Vain? Me? Never...!
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