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We have finished our travels through Indonesia. Definitely our favourite country so far. The food was amazing and the scenery was spectacular.
After Gili Trawangan we headed to the second smallest Gili Island, Gili Air. The Water taxi was an old wooden boat with a motor on the back and the sea was very choppy, there were moments when it seemed like we were going to capsize. Thankfully we didn't but we did get very wet! Gili Air was a lot more tranquil than Gili Trawangan, when we first arrived it didn't seem as if there was anyone even really on the island. We found a nice homestay type place to sleep and spent our days on the island cycling around and sleeping by the beach. You could cycle around the island in under an hour, so we did, several times. Along the way we encountered beautiful deserted beaches, ginormous lizards and more than a few bars selling "magic" shakes. Mum, Dad, you will be pleased to know that we stuck to banana. We also fell in love with the Indonesian dish 'Mie Goreng'. Fried noodles and egg - but really good.
After two days soaking up the sun in Gili Air, we headed for Flores. A 32 hour journey. A longtail boat, a minibus, a coach, a ferry, a coach, another bus and another ferry. It was awful. We shared our bus with a chicken, half the islands post and packages, an indonesian who constantly played guitar and a driver who was an "international DJ".
Flores was a beautiful island, made up of vivid green hills, mountains, small deserted islands and a deep blue sea. We stayed in the town of Labuanbajo, a dilapitated harbour town with amazing views. Although the trek up to our bungalow in the hills was not so amazing and the room was a sweatbox. During our few days here we went caving - a very muddy and very spider infested cave which we decided to tackle in flip flops (RIP Max's flip flops). Our guide took great delight in pointing out all of the massive spiders to Max and having to help Hayley to get unstuck from the mud every two minutes.
The highlight of Flores was definatley the trip to Komodo. The boat was loud but smooth and we met some weird Aussie women (who were clearly divorced) and on a mid-life crisis adventure. We trekked for 2 hours and spotted wild Komodo Dragons; which are seriously huge. The guides warned us that recently there had been 3 accidents resulting in 3 guides being flown to hospital. It was worrying therefore that our guide had only a big stick to defened us! Anyway, we saw some amazing creatures, tucked into some chicken and rice and then went to a few deserted Islands to snorkel and pretty much potter about doing sod all and enjoying the sun. Here, we encounted the worlds angriest fish; fish that would swim up to your face and bite until we swam away.
We then decided to leave the next day, checked out and got to the small airport to find it was shut because of religious holiday. So it was back to town, to a new hotel which seemed nice, for a while...
Max went to the toilet and came running out, naked, screaming and pretty much crying like a baby. Now, we all know Max has an irrational fear of spiders (as seen by his constant inspection for them in bathrooms) and a tendency to exagerate their size. However, when Max said this spider was huge, he was not lying. It was a tarantula, a real life, hairy, huge tarantula. Even the hotel manager did not want to disturb it! So he got his mate, gave him a flipflop and sent him into our bathroom. After a good few seconds of slapping sounds, bangs and a tiny scream the b****** was dead. It was still a sleepless night after seeing that thing!
After this ordeal, we needed a nice dinner. So we went out to the treetop restaurant and ordered a grilled fish and some beans with spicy anchovies. Now, it is no secret that Asians love spice, so when in Asia you do not order a dish that states it is spicy on the menu unless you want SPICY. Not even a milkshake could cool our mouths down from this fireball. We didnt even manage to make a dent in the dish. The waiter simply remarked, "At least you tried". Well, we definitely wont be trying again in a hurry!
The next day we finally made it back to Bali but unfortunatley from here, we didnt make it onto Borneo as we discovered that March is the worst time to visit because of the abundance of natural fruit in the forest and so chances of seeing the wildlife are less. So instead we spent two nights in Kuta before heading to Ubud. Kuta was just the same touristic beach resort as the first time, although we did have a fun night out with a Canadian guy and two Swedish girls in the local club Skygarden (which is massive!!) After being ill and not really drinking for most of the trip, we ended up getting nicely inebriated with the help of double-doubles (double vodka redbull for 1 pound!) So the next day we did nothing but swim and walk around.
Ubud, a pretty little town and a definite highlight so far. We nailed down cheap accomodation however had a few ants in the walls, which is nothing new. It had a lovely terrace and was above a shop so had a decent view and great place to chill out. Upon arrival we just walked around, admired the scenery and ate awesome food. The next day was monkey forest day, which deserves its own paragraph...
We woke up early, grabbed our waterproofs (it was a bit wet outside) and walked to the forest. Lets make this clear from the start, when you go to a zoo or safari and see the warning signs you see the same general rules and know nothing will ever happen and the animals will stay well away at a safe distance; so we laughed at the last rule which was "if a monkey jumps on you, drop all food and walk away slowly". We laughed at this and headed in with a bunch of bananas thinking nothing of it. First we saw a female monkey with her baby and it was cute and it was all fun and games, then we came across the whole pack of monkeys. Which was fine until all of a sudden one of them jumped on Max and began scratching at his pockets and biting his arms, then another jumped on him whilst Hayley shouted, "Just drop the bananas!!". Once max had been robbed of all his food, more monkeys began to arrive so we followed the advice of the sign - and ran. We decided instead to explore the path up into the hills which was lovely and monkey free. however it did involve a stick bridge over a hundred foot drop into a very fast flowing river. We got halfway across, clinging on for dear life before deciding the monkeys were a safer option. More people had arrived by this point and we watched and laughed as several people were attacked for their food and we felt relatively safe now we were banana-less. This was not the case. As we walked away from the main group, we noticed some big, male monkeys coming towards us and so we hurried up. All of a sudden one monkey was running at us hissing and screeching so we also began to run. Hayley ran, misjudged the slope and how wet it was and went down harder than a lead balloon. I have never witnessed such quick reactions and in a flurry she was back up, screaming and running away. Luckily for her, everyone saw and it was hilarious. It was time to call it a day.
The rest of Ubud we just soaked up th atmosphere and went to dine at Ibu Oka-Max's best part of the entire trip! It was a simple local eatery but famed for its incredible suckling pig (babi guling). It was a menu of just pork with one dish that everyone gets, 'The Special'. It consisted of pork belly, perfect crackling, deep fried pork, blood sausage, fried trotter and stuffing served over rice. It was brilliant, perfection, a piece of heaven on a plate!! It was, by far, the BEST thing I have ever eaten in my life. So good, we went back for breakfast the next day before heading for the airport. We will for sure be returning to Ubud soon.
We wrote this blog from the Ambassador lounge in singapore airport (Sorry it has taken us so long to actually post it, we have been busy doing lots of things and a blog on thailand will be up in a few days!!) We flew from Depansar, Bali to to Singapore where we had a twenty four hour stopover to start our Thailand adventure - more about that later!!
Overall, Indonesia was an amazing experience and an awesome country which we would definitley recommend and will definately be returning to. We ate some fantastic food, met some brilliant people, saw spectacular places and wonderful wildlife. What an incredible country.
Selamat Tinggal Indonesia, Sawadee Ka Thailand.
- comments
Nan and Grandad Indonesia sounds beautiful except for the spiders!! You seem to be having some lovely food and meeting lots of nice people and monkies!! You and Hayley write a brilliant blog, keep it up, and carry on enjoying. Loads of love, Nan and Grandad xx
carol bristow OMG you are obviously hallucinating with visions of giant hairy spiders and wild rampaging monkeys this being the effects of magic shakes (dont think for one minute that i buy the line "we stuck to banana" im your mother remember !!! ) Have checked you in for therepy and rehab - come home immediately. love you, miss you, v proud. mum xxxxxxxxx