Indonesia: Bali & Flores

The first day in South East Asia is always sweet. It starts when you step out of the airplane into warm humidity. It got more exciting with our 1:00 a.m. taxi ride into Phuket town because our driver was busy text messaging at 120 kph. The pineapples and papaya are delicious. We both got haircuts on our first day; a real event with a team of Thai girls shampooing, massaging, cutting and setting our hairdo's with the frenzy of a Formula 1 pit team. Tasty curries and ice coffees all make the day fun. We rediscovered that there is no such thing as a "little spicy" in Thailand. And all those smiles; we figure they were giggling from Glenn's renewed attempt at the language.

Further south in Georgetown, Penang (Malaysia), Little India oozed with atmosphere. The Diwali lights were still up, music shops blared the latest from Bollywood and the tandoori kebabs at "The Kapitan" were better than we remembered. Breakfasts were as varied as the cultures in that corner of the world. They ranged from an eye popping Thai fish curry, fried rice, masala dosa to Chinese noodle soup over our first four days.

Further south in Malaysia, we visited Tony (Nepal 1984) in his new home in Seremban. Ilse tipped us off, and to our delight, Tracy (France 1998) & Eric (South Africa 2002) had moved to Kuala Lumpur (KL) earlier in the year. Both visits involved a wide variety of mouth watering food including, of all things, Mexican burritos and margaritas.

Air Asia delivered us to Bali, Indonesia. Air Asia is a terrific low cost carrier; a giant notch better than Ryanair. Air Asia has newer aircraft, tasteful cabins, smart uniforms and they serve nasi lemak onboard but no inflight bingo scratch cards. Kuta, Bali is awful, unconstrained, shameless beach culture. The beach is scruffy, the hawkers are persistent, the water is polluted but the waves are consistent and it attracts droves of fun-loving tourists from around the world. Naturally, like moths attracted to light, we were entranced and stayed on for a few days. With a 8 USD hotel room (incl breakfast) with garden, large pool, a large beer for a buck and a half and decent food for nothing - it's cheap as chips - we couldn't resist. Everyone is your friend in Kuta and everything is for sale at a good price, cheap, morning price or sunset price. If none of those appeal to you, then there is more cheaper price. The only certainty is that you gotta haggle!

Ubud is a safe distance from the coast and is the (Hindu) cultural centre of Bali. It has gone from a village when we first visited it in 1985 to a present-day small city. The vendors ("cheap price") and taxi drivers ("transport?") are less persistent than their Kuta counterparts. The tourist rupiah helps fuel the culture - traditional dancing shows, temples, museums and the continuous temple offerings. Women carry towering trays of food, flowers, water and insense on their heads. In one day, we had three different offerings laid out on the porch of our bungalow. The Hindu trinity and Ubud ancestors are well looked after! The whole idea is to get lost in the rice paddies around Ubud. We got so lost that we did not know what continent we were in. We found wood carvers making signs destined for the bars of Hawaii, authentic Maori carvings, hand carved totem poles and genuine digidiroos.

Bedugal is higher up the slopes of Gunung Catur and is known for its lake, beautiful temple (it adorns the 50,000 rupiah note), temperate produce and enchanting botanical gardens. However, the real attraction is the novelty of the 1,100 metre a.s.l. temperatures. A hot water shower and two blankets on the bed were essential. A one night blast of cold was enough winter conditions for us. The far NW of Bali was an excellent snorkeling destination (Pulau Menjangan) - friend Steven thought it was better than his snorkeling experience on the Great Barrier Reef. It was also our first encounter with the boat mafia: too many boats, too few customers but a boat roster and fixed prices smelled like a functioning OPEC and did not favour the travelling tourist. The NW is where we met Steven and Julia; later we became six (with Frank and Margot, also from the Netherlands) and we travelled together to and through distant Flores. Later, at least for the purposes of this missive, we were known as the Flores Force.

We all traveled east by Pelni ship from Benoa, Bali to Ende, Flores, a journey of two days and two nights, but it felt like two weeks. The Lonely Planet Guide to Indonesia describes the Pelni fleet as "modern, all air-con passenger ships" and "First class is luxury-plus". Our experience on the MV Awu did not match the guide book description. When our ship arrived (well late), hundreds of passengers swarmed the decaying rust box and loaded it with mountains of boxes, TV's and even washing machines. Our fellow passengers were largely workers returning to Sumba and Flores bearing presents for their families from the tourism driven economy of Bali. When the Flores Force boarded the ship, we figured there were fewer cockroaches in the first class cabins than in the sorry looking second class. The voyage was like a cross between a Hitchcock and a Cronenberg movie. When Sheila emerged from her cabin after a 24 hour bout with food poisoning, we speculated that she had been transformed into the Queen of Cockroaches.

The landing at Ende, Flores was as eventful as our departure because the whole city seemed to have shown up to greet the ship. The Flores Force chartered a Toyota "Kijang" and driver ("Nissan") for a six day tour across mountainous Flores. We visited the major Flores sights: we strolled to witness the sunrise atop Kelimutu and its multi-hued lakes, savored local cuisine at "La Bamboo" (destined to wallow in obscurity), snorkeled the pretty 17 Islands National Park, met the famous self-obsessed hotel manager in Riung, visited traditional villages and regional markets. However, the real story is that we all got along for 11 consecutive days and the others did not throw us off the Kijang. Frank got us to stop for kopi break at villages along the way ("kopi?"). We also fancied ourselves as good negotiators when we chose a hotel or dealt with the local boat mafia (who we were kidding?).

Lovely Labuanbajo, if you ignore the human settlement, was the end of the road. The Force chartered a boat for an overnight snorkel trip to the superb underwater world of Komodo Island. When the other four of the Force continued west on their respective journeys, we shifted gears to diving.

The nutrient-rich cool waters and incredibly strong currents keep the coral and fish populations vibrant. It was exciting, exhilarating diving with amazing encounters with dozens of manta rays, sometimes almost within touching distance. Sitting in an underwater eddy in a strong current (actually, barely hanging on) while graceful mantas glided just above our heads is an unforgettable experience, a highlight of a trip anywhere.

The Komodo dragons (monitor lizards on steroids) didn't measure up to soaring manta rays but it was sweet nontheless. Our noisy (Perama) boat journey along the north coast of Komodo and Sumbawa to Lombok gave us a couple of snorkel opportunities including a chance swim with devil rays.

We pressed on to Gili Trawamgan, a small island off the NW coast of Lombok. Oddly, many other tourists were thinking that a white sand beach island might be a nice place for Christmas. Consequently, hotel and bungalow prices double during the high season and we had to pay an astronomical 12 USD for a sea view room (with breakfast) on the north shore. On Christmas, we snorkeled off our beach with views of the Bali (Agung) and Lombok (Rinjani) volcanos. We had pizza from a wood fired oven on the beach for lunch, lounging on pillows in a shady pondok. We wandered into town for dinner where our Bali Hilton trained cook looked after our appetites. There are no motorized vehicles on the islands, so the bells of horse carts could almost pass off as sleigh bells, well, not really.

For New Year, we boated to nearby Gili Air. We had stayed there back in 1985, so we approached it with trepidation. However, Gili Air, though more developed (electricity and running water most of the time), still retains a lovely, laid back charm. While it is mellow, The Legend Bar pounded progressive trance music and kept New Year revelers dancing on the beach till after 10:00 a.m. the following morning.

Back to Bali, we haggled over tens of thousands of rupiah (OK, a couple of dollars) with every transfer on East coast transport. The Liberty wreck at Tulamben is a fishy place; we dawdled amongst a school of over a thousand trevally while 250 divers a day keep the local economy buzzing. Jemeluk (Amed) also has a black sand beach and is another small village where tourists and pigs are well provided for. The tiny pontooned fishing boats go out twice a day and bring back modest quantities of mackerel to supply the region with its protein. Padangbai surprised us with the beautiful Blue Lagoon Beach and fine snorkeling but mostly we were chuffed because our hotel room had a mini bar.

We returned to Kuta to hop on a flight to KL and then right back to Indonesia (a visa run) - Northern Sulawesi was next.

FOR THE RECORD

2008 tent nights: no change at 185.

Indonesia Banana Index: 20 for 1USD, but varies immensely