15th to 24th October - Denpasar & Gili Trawangan
Early into the evening we had arrived in Indonesia, after a minor panic about bringing alcohol/tobacco into the country we discovered it was alright and we headed through security with reasonable confidence. We split the tobacco between ourselves but even when it was clearly seen, nobody flinched. The first guy we saw attempted to hook us for a taxi and even after clearly stating “we’re ok thanks”, he followed us out of the airport, stood with us for ten minutes and then when we got in another taxi, for some reason he appeared shocked! I was placed with Ingham, Ronchetti and Jenny and we set off to our new home in Denpasar. I don’t think i’ll ever in my life have a more histerical taxi drive than that day, the driver instantly riddled us with questions which is quite normal but he continued to point women out on the streets and telling us how to pretty much hook up with people. He defiantly didn’t shy from details but the best comment from our new friend was that some Australian girls drink far too much beer, Bintang to be precise and because of this, they’re often ‘larger’. His words not mine. As you can imagine this conversation for over 20 minutes broke us up into laughter continuously. We didn’t even reply to much!
Denpasar was not quite what i was expecting at all, in some fashion it reminded me of Thailand, which worried me, it seemed like there was one large strip littered in bars, tourists and locals selling everything under the sun. We dropped our gear off at Pop Hotel and ventured to get ourselves grounded, luckily we discovered quite quickly the crowd was much nicer but hawkers were definitely in full force. After a few casual beers and a superb carbonara me, Paul and Jenny broke from the group and got an early night. It had been my graduation back in England the same day and i had a Skype call with the university group, it was brilliant to see everyone so happy and with that the next morning i had planned absolutely nothing, purposely. I wanted a day of just sitting on the beach, drinking some gin and eating fresh fruit. I did exactly that! Four of us sat there and watched the day go by pretty quickly, we spoke to some interesting people, one in particular that Paul for reasons unknown bought a blowpipe with darts from. This man told us about how it took him two weeks on a boat to travel from his home country Papua New Guinee where these ‘weapons’ are made by his uncle and sold to tourists as something for the mantle piece! Not a bad story at all. The rest of the group began to arrive into the late afternoon and we sat and watched the sunset on the beach, one of the best i’ve seen out here! The sun illuminated everything in an orange glow and its outline in the sky was visible as it disappeared over the horizon. The night continued with bars, pool and conversations before we arrived at yet another rooftop club, people opening doors for you, marble everywhere and Western priced drinks. I didn’t actually see much of the place before i needed taking home, i had enjoyed my graduations too much it seems! Thanks Ben for getting me back!
We wasted the next day with just relaxing by the pool at our hotel and heading out for a good meal knowing we had planned Waterbom the next day! It’s the third largest waterpark in the world, first in Asia. An early morning and off we set, we were far from disappointed when we arrived to see huge, spiralling slides across our peripheral. We started with the lazy river, something i’ve never given much time but they’re brilliant! Floating around a designed course on a tube where you bounce around gently through little water features and greenery. Afterwards we began on the larger attractions and almost all of them were brilliant but theres on in particular, Dan and Robin went on it first whilst i was busy on another, they came over afterwards and convinced me to follow them back up the stairs to this specific waterslide. Turns out it was a trapdoor kind of system where you stand at the top of the slide and after a countdown the floor opens up and you pretty much free fall into this ride! Obviously nervous i get in and prepare for the drop, i wasn’t disappointed! Apparently as it opened i screamed “like an old man” was just one of the quotes. You crash land onto the slide at good speed then thinking i’m about to come out the other end i began flying upwards from the momentum, around a slanted loop. Best ride there by a long shot, and literally zero people there all day! The staff there were also incredibly friendly, couldn’t do enough for you and actually had a laugh with you. I’d recommend the place to anyone else heading this side of the world.
Travelling to Gili T was relatively easy with a travelling package bought at a tourism office, a quick taxi followed by a few hours on a ferry beached us on the island, we jumped into the shallow water with our bags and once again felt the horror of wet feet and sand combined. The island was nicely quiet with only horses and carriages going past us because engines are banned! I’m always most fond of the peaceful places we’ve visited on this trip. We booked our bungalows and headed down to the beach for a quick swim, snorkel kit attached and under i headed to have a look for some fish. Literally only 30 meters from shore the ground disappeared beneath where i swam into this infinite dark blue sea, it was an eery kind of emptiness that surrounded me! As i’m not incredibly fond on deep water that was enough and back to the beach with an iced coffee i headed.
Our next few days consisted of mainly late nights and zero sightings of the morning, well deserved! Finally we pulled our act together, stopped wasting our time and got a boat hired to take us on a few hours snorkelling trip. Alas not everybody woke up so just me, Robin, Paul and Jenny appeared at the docks ready to go. Once again the trip was brilliant! We saw yet more sea turtles including me managing to swim quite far down for a better look, it was great for Paul and Jenny who i don’t believe had done this before. Later on we were told to jump in before our driver pointed further down the coast and he set off, luckily we can bloody swim! It was a good 30-40 minute journey through the coral gardens which was crowded in both fish and colourful coral before we reached a huge ship wreck that the driver spoke about at the beginning of the day. We saw loads of scuba divers swimming below us exploring the boat but even from above it was very interesting.
We arrived back later in the afternoon and told the group of our trips success and with that we headed back to the beach and booked a longer, better sounding trip for tomorrow. Five hours of both snorkelling and fishing and we got it for a bargain as well! I’ve never tried fishing and wasn’t by any means fully committed to what the day would hold but the morning came and we began at first with snorkelling. Unfortunately the current was strong meaning staying in one place was very difficult, you could even see the fish struggling as the zig zagged between the coral but to top things off my goggles kept leaking and there was nothing i could do about it, our driver had moved the boat and he wasn’t brilliant with English so i got nowhere. But still, swimming around is not the worst way to spend the day.
We began fishing later on in the day which by all means started brilliantly, i got myself sat at the front of the boat in the baking sun and with a quick tutorial cast my line with a tasty chunk of tuna into the deep blue, my competitive streak instantly came through and i was game for catching the first fish. A good 20 minutes passed before my chance of victory was shattered by both Ingham and Jenny screaming out they had a bite, reeling it in to our amazement it was fairly big! The day went on and alas beginners luck didn’t kick in for myself and i ended up catching absolutely nothing, from my knowledge everyone else did very well and by the end of the day we had a good haul! When we arrived back at the docks we said our thanks to the driver and he bagged up the fish and left, guessing he was going to have a good BBQ later on at our expense. The next morning it was time to leave and we arrived at the beach nice and early, after a horribly long wait on my own with a very uninterested staff member he finally told me we couldn’t get on the boat as it was already full and we had to come back the next morning! I’ve been stuck in worse places so we spent our extra, unexpected day at the beach relaxing on bean bags and planning our next destination, Ubud.
Paul & Jenny
Preparing for our first scuba drop
The happiest photograph of Robin i've ever seen!
The beach at Gili Trawangan
One of our overly friendly bar staff
Can't beat beanbags!
Paul & Jenny highjacking my camera
Biggest catch of the day by Ingham and Jenny. Rep Snapper i believe?
Robin fishing
My first and probably last attempt at fishing
From one side of our boat
