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Hey Hey, its been about a week since my last update and ive dont quite alot in thjat time!
soo after last time i have said goodbye to justin a guy we met from canada. we met him and his buddy garritt at our hotel and ended up chilling for a while! we then headed off to the gilli island of trawangan with garritt. this took about twelve hours to get to as it is one of a small cluster of islands off of Lombok. we took a bus then a really SLOW ferry then a bus through the mountains where we saw monkeys and amaziong jungle! we then got a small boat over to the island. its pretty small and you can walk around it in about 2 hours! the journey was boiling but we just slept loads to pass the time! charlie was being hassled by some guy to buy some necklaces and we had made it pretty clear we didnt want any but he carried on for about 15 minutes until he told charlie he was going to kill him... not nice but we told some of the other locals and they told the boy to get lost. so all was fine! any way when we got to gilli we walked around for ages and met some russians who tbh were pretty annoying! all they cared about was money. but thats a different story i will explain in a moment! we ended up in this really nice place owned by a lovely lady which was further back from the sea and cost 110 000 rupiad whiuch we split between 3 of us. very cheap. the owner was alocal lady who was so friendly and remembered my name which was nice! we had no a/c though so the nights were pretty sweaty and we were eaten alive by mosquitoes!! all over my body and had about twenty on just one foot!
next day we went snorkelling and it was clear blue skies, white sand an we could see the mountains of lomboik in the back ground! ended up seeintg a ridiculous amount of fish and 6 turtles and a lobster! amazing. the water was so clear! especially compared to thge dirty water in kuta. gilli is very chilled out and there is practically no internet. there are a few expensive places but a week away from a computer was nice!!!! the power goes on and off as well as the island is powered by petrol generators. but this just added to the chilled out feel of the island! the food was alot more expensive than kuta though which i gfuess wasnt much. a pizza was... 40 000 rupiah. less than 4 pounds but we ate the local food instead... 15000 rupiah. much better but my stomach had a bit of a hard time if you know what i mean! (excuse me for being crude)
loved the island, but it hasnt decided what kind of people it wants to cater for! there is development going on everywhere! (as well as in bali. there is stuff being built EVERYWHERE) they are such hard workers! but yer there were some crazy bars where they sold magic mushrooms and then really posh hotels.... which were crazy expensive. as well as a traditioanl irish bar! ( the smallest island in the wolrd to have an irish pub!) but yer so it trys to cater for party people and back packers as well as richer/older/honeymooning kind of people. gilli meno and gilli air the other 2 islands look a lot more undisturbed and natural and less tampered with.
any way the next day we decided top start out ssi open water diving course. awesome. all the instructors were really chilled out and we had a really cool guy named adam who was english and had been out there for 4 years! 4 years on a tiny island is alot! impressive. he had done nearly 5000 dives. but the first day was reading books and watching a dvd. it was like being back at school in summer where you ars tuck inside not allowed to leave while you can see other people mucking around outside! wasnt that bad but nursing a hang over in a hot room is never that much fun! we went out that night to a couple of bars and there were loads of locals there breakdancing and stuff. good times!
next day we went scuba diving in the pool and learned sme skills. such a wiuerd feeling just sitting at the bottom of a pool! that night we chilled on the beach with out guitar and sang songs. the island was so chilled out and as we walked around the locals would call us over and play guitar with them. bringing a guiutar was a good idea! made friends with some locals. got some free beers and celebrated this guys birthday. sang loads of songs except felt a bit out of place when we changed the words from i shot the sherrif to i shot the tourist.... hmm i can understand why they hate the tourtsts!
next day we did our first 2 dives. they were AMAZING! literally gobsmacking. such a wierd sensation yet it felt so natural. maybe i just feel at home in the water! haha went down to about 13m which isnt that deep but saw so much coral and eels and an octopus and parrott fish and crazy stuff. the coolest dive was the second one where we saw some devil rays literally gliding through the water in a pack. amazing sight! as we got back into the boat we were a bit diappointed we hadnt seen a manta ray until the captain started shouting. we dived back in with just our masks on and saw a manta ray just gliding around! we followed it for a while and then the boat went in front of it so it swam right at us! it started doing back flips and i was so close! literally amazing. so lucky especially as it was out 2nd dive!!!
next day we did out last 2 dives and saw loads of the same stuff. swam along next to a turtle! cuttle fish are WIERD. but was awesome. charlie couldnt do that last dive as his ears wouldnt pop and we had gone down to about twenty metres! so he had to go back to the boat and wait till the morning. in the morning i was ggoing to get up and go with him and do an extra dive but i was to tired. charlie ended up seeing 2 sharks and some kind of bass! oh well at least i saw a manta ray!!! after his dive we realaxed and walked arouindthe island a bit. so hot. the north of the island is so mcuyh more remote and beautiful; than the direty south!
day after we went home. took twelve hours but we were used to it! back in kuta now and just been surfing. out friend garritt is leaving tommorrow morning so he is sketchingout a bit. going to be wierd being a 2 again! havent decided what we are doing. we have about... 2 weeks left in bali so think we are going to go to some surf breaks and then head round the north of bali for a few days then back to kuta and on from there! who knows. i will keep you updated though! i thoroughly recommend the gilli islands though as there are bits to for everyone!
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