The snorkeling was pretty great off Palau Mejangan. My only regret was the dive master/boat captian not taking us to other spots around the island. I was out there with two French couples who were diving while I was left on my own to snorkel about. No turtles, or anything I hadn’t seen before, but there seemed to be more coral diversity. We were at a classic wall, though I obviously stayed on the upper half. The rain started earlier that day and soaked us, but when already in the water it didn’t matter much. All eyes were cast down anyway.

Later in the day I had conversations with both the French guys at various times. Jerome and his girlfirned worked for NGO and did relief work all over Africa and more recently Haiti, though he claimed it was more triage than cultural exploration. Apparently one sacks out exhauusted at the end of each day and there is lttle time for anything else. But he’d also lived briefly in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and we talked a bit over beers poolside about the difference between life in France and the USA. The other guy, whose name I never got, had a company in Mongolia for three years, and since that is a country I think about teaching in at times, I picked his brain after dinner.

Some other teachers who might have come over to do the hike with me couldn’t make it, and the weather was forbidding. Plus the cost, as you have to hire a guide to hike in the National Park, so I took a pass. But a waitress told me about a small temple in the hills behind Pemuteran, so the next morning I went up there before riding back down to Denpasar. I haven’t edited in the jump tower footage I mention yet…maybe later.

Trying to decide if I should return the way I’d come, or along the southwestern road which I knew would be clogged with trucks from Java, I comprimised and came back partly what I’d done, but a new route through the mountains, passing lots of great rice fields, and hooked up with part of the SW road, which the trucks do indeed make suck. But back in my room, I realized I’d left my mp3 player and headphones at the hotel. I called and they have them for me, but I’ll need to return, most likely next week after classes are done but before I leave for AU. Damn it, I thought about them briefly pulling out of town but was distracted by some other thought before I checked while still in the area. It’s be about a 5 hour return trip, or maybe I’ll make another overnight of it. Oh well, I love motorbiking around in the mountains anyway.

The hotel where I’m staying turned out to have free computer use, so I’ll take advantage of this time during the afternoon downpour to update on the trip so far. I had three more vacation days left to use and had scheduled for this time. And it turns out Monday is Chinese New Year, so I have a six day weekend on my hands…

I drove back up to Munduk to drop off my finished copy of Germs Guns and Steel with Mr. Budi, as it came up during our previous conversation. He was out, but stopped by my room (stayed again at Guru Ratna and the staff was most gracious in welcoming me back) later and invited me for breakfast the next morning – at his main place from the video, not Golden Valley. I was in town by noon, having driven again through Bedugal, Candi Kuning and the usual spots on the way up, so I went down the hill to the hot springs at Banjar for the afternoon. They were cool, but my awesome spot on Flores was better. It was the first of twice I felt spoiled, by chance having had a superior experience in a field already, when I sense the current one would have seemed fine without having seen the other before. There was a Hindu festival (isn’t there always?) in town and gamelon and hours of chanting ran throughout the town. I’d gotten myself a small bottle of vodka in Serit and enjoyed evening cocktails. Also stopped in to see Bayu, who is about 11, son of a woman who owns a small shop across the road from the hotel. I’d given him some improv English lessons on my previous trip, so we had another, just checking some pronunciation as he read from his flimsy text. I’m sure his local teacher can only judge pronunciation to a certain point. His mom of course loved this and loaded me up with some fruit left over from festival offerings. Women are seen all over the island carrying ornate palm wrappings and fruit baskets on their heads to the local temple during festival time, everyone dressed in their kebayas and traditional clothes.

The rain has held to a nicely predictable pattern thus far: sunny until about 2-3, then a heavy afternoon showering. Today’s seems to be lingering…but I haven’t had to ride in it. The next morning after Kopi Luwak and pisang goreng (fried bananas) with Budi I was riding down the hill to Lovina. My map (brought a borrowed book this time) shows a logical route, but does not reveal the condition of the road, which got a bit sketchy: down to two lane track with grass middle through some steep areas and eventually to rubble I thought would pop my tire. But stopping to ask a local, he assured me it did eventually lead to Lovina. The road got better in time, and I made it, tires in tact.
I stayed at a place where I’d had lunch before, and headed down the coast a few km to where there was supposed to be good snorkeling. Unfortunately I had to pay a guy a little money to take me out in a boat to get to it. The conditions were decent, but again, I’ve been spoiled in the Gilis and Amed where you just swim in at no cost, no boat. And here of course weren’t all the turtles like around Gili Meno. But I was back in my room before the afternoon rain.
The main joy of Lovina was competitive beer pricing, and I had several in a warung before heading back for my even audio book session.

Then I rode on to Pemuteran. My room is a bit more here (still only $22) but very nice and dinner and breakfast are included, plus a pool and the computer action. Tomorrow I’ll pay for another boat out to Palau Mejangan for a day of snorkeling. Maybe hiking the next day.

Here are the precarious aqueduct near Senaru and baby turtles on Gili Meno. I’m not sure if they all start off black when small or those are another breed…

My Flickr account is currently in need of an upgrade, the picks I took weren’t super spectacular, and I couldn’t get the underwater turtle shots I wanted anyway, so I’ll try and paint this post with words.

For actual Christmas day I was here on Bali. While there are some lights and things around, it didn’t feel like Christmas at all: 82 degrees and raining. I went to an overpriced Xmas dinner at Alley Cats, Skyped my family in the States and turned in. The next morning I was packed and up, heading to Padang Bai by 9 AM. I was able to board the ferry quickly but we had to wait about an hour to depart. During that time, an Australian traveller, Michelle, showed up and introduced herself. The conversation made the four hour journey go more quickly and hopefully she’ll set me up with some tips when I get down there next month. She works for an NGO on Lombok building water tanks for small rural villages.

There was a light drizzle when we arrived at Lembar, so I did up my raincoat, fueled up and headed for the mountains. I turned East more quickly than I’d intended and was soon on the road to Praya, far south of where I wanted to be, so I cut North toward Mt. Rinjani which I could get glimpses of now and again through the clouds. As the road gradually climed, I was in beautiful rice field country, Lombok’s grain belt as it were. My “map” was a photocopy out of a Lonely Planet which lost ink in the creases and was slightly dampened each time I pulled it out. The town I was heading for, south of the mountain, was in the shadowed crease of the book anyway, negative space on a photocopy. But after stopping to ask a few times, I pulled into Tetebatu just before dusk, the rain having ceased and the sunset shooting some color into the think clouds.

Tetebatu was sleepy. I actually couldn’t buy beer in any of the stores and had to pay too much from the restaurants. Intending to save some money on dinner, I ate in a family’s home behind a small store. When I asked if they had Nasi Campur, they said yes, asked me in, rolled out a mat on the floor and I was left with the basic English of the teenage son while they fired up the stove to make a dinner for one. It was in retrospect a store, not a restaurant, but the enterprising owner saw a chance to make a profit and improvised. In the end it was too much, but under the circumstances I didn’t bitch. They also had cable Tv, which they turned to an English channel and I saw a bit of a Canadian production of Patrick Stewart in some sort of smallpox movie. Back at the room I had a few beers and listened to Selected Shorts.

Now, I am used to the pre-dawn call to prayer. On Bali, I live close to a Muslim neighborhood, and there is a large Hindu temple as well. So depending on the day, I might get morning serenades of both variaties. I’ve learned to sleep through, or to only be minorly anoyed by the sounds, then drift back off. At times I’ve actually found it soothing. But tiny Tetebatu seemed to have six mosques, all with amazing sound systems, and blasted the town not only with competeing calls to prayer echoing off the mountain, but also angry sounding speeches that went on and on. I eventually got back to sleep and woke up around 8. After breakfast and strong kopi Lombok, I headed out.

Michelle had warned me about getting over the mountain pass to the North side on my automatic bike, claiming I’d need a manual, as I definitely did on Flores. Rinjani is among the ten highest mountains in Indonesia. But locals I asked seemed to think my Vario would be OK. Just to watch out, as it was the rainy season. I’d intended to try, also to see some cool valley towns on the way, but with my pathetic map and poor signage, I soon realized I could see the sea and decided to just zip around on the coastal road. I’d loose some time, burn some more cheap fuel, but it would certainly be easy on the bike. Halfway around, I passed a few guesthouses Michelle had mentioned and considered staying, the plan being to hire a boat that would take me to some small mangrove islands on the East coast which are fish hatcheries. But it wasn’t even yet noon and I kept going. I ate some lunch and turned south a bit later. Now the raod was steeply climbing, I knew I was close to Sanaru. But I wasn’t. Seeing a buleh on the side of the road, I stopped to ask where I was and he confessed he didn’t know, as he’d been hiking in the Rinjani wilderness. But he assured me he we weren’t in Sanaru, because he was just about to get a ride there. A local looked at my pathetic, deteriorating photocopy and I realized I’d turned left too soon and was now on the mountain pass road I’d missed before, only now heading south. So I just followed Canadian Tad and his driver Mr. Morris back the way I’d come, a bit more on the coastal road, then turned onto the proper road south to Sanaru. They’d got ahead of me when I refueled, and it was raining again as I pulled into town, so I stopped at one of the first few places I saw and got a room.
It turned out to not be the best choice. But after a nap I felt OK. I headed out to explore the “town” really one long road up to the mountain, eventually ending in an area that became hiking only.

Later I found Tad again and we drank beer and fooled around on his computer at the one place in town that had wifi. I ended up moving in there the next day as it was a better room at a lower price. The next morning, I went to see a local waterfall before the afternoon rain started. There is a common scam in all of these places where locals will try and convince you a guide is needed to see the better waterfall. I turned down their offer, content to just walk the easy route to the first for only the small entrance fee. I could see from photos on the displays that the second really did seem to be better. A bunch of teenagers showed up, possibly a school outing, the girls in headscarves shooting photos of one another on their handphones, which were most likely instantly uploaded to facebook. I don’t know why it seemed weird: Muslims are not Omish. But somehow the conservatism links them in my mind. They were for the most part happy, chaste, goofy kids much like any in the west, only wearing headscarves, much as a Christian kid might wear a cross. Not a big deal.

I could see where a trail ran off, obviously to the second waterfall. I didn’t intend to go the entire way, but headed down for a bit. Soon I came to a very steep concrete stairway that rose up to an aquaduct crossing the narrow valley. I climbed up and saw where the water went into the side of the mountain, and across the way it had come. A small stream crossing a narrow concrete span, the water visible through partitions in the structure thicker than railroad ties but occuring with the same frequency. This was the way forward. I wasn’t worried about the width of the walkway, every other step having to balance to the next thick area, or the height of the drop off to the right to the valley floor. But I wondered about the strength of the entire thing. It seemed a bit like those impossible stone spans in Mordor ever disintigrating as the monsters close in. So I only went out part way and turned back. I did shoot some video perhaps I’ll post later to see if my description does justice. Back at the main path I posed for some photos with still more teenagers (this is common here, “Have your photo taken with the Buleh you will never see again…”) then followed the waterway a bit in the other direction. It cut back into the mountain side again, with hollows dug out every 3 meters or so I assumed to be able to get in and clear obstructions when they clogged the flow. I saw some monkeys while heading back to the entrance. Macaws seem to be in any mountainous region of Indonesia, though it feels more like forest than jungle to me. Back at the start, I described the aquaduct to the gate guy and he sheepishly told me I was only about 5 minutes from the second waterfall. But I didn’t feel like turning back, it was getting hot and might rain any minute, though by chance it held off most of that day. So I guess the 100k guide fee was just for a local to stand there and say “be careful” as you make the perilous crossing. Or maybe he’ll go get help to haul your broken ass out if you fall…

I chilled out reading until Tad showed up again and we had the same routine, he Skyping folks back home, me checking a bit of mail, until it was timne to begin with the drink. I’d found some cheaper beers down the hill in “town” and we ended up splitting a bottle of rice wine as well. He told tales of Canadian tree planting in Alberta and his current job for a tour company working as a guide in Thailand. As a lone wolf, it’s not the way I’d choose to travel, but it seems like a hell of a job.

The next morning I was ready to head out for Bangsal and catch the boat to first Gili Air to pick up weed, then Gili Meno where I would stay. But I saw Mr. Morris who was going to give Tad a ride, so I waited a bit and rode with them, stressed I would miss the early boat out. But there turned out to be several. Tad and I parted ways there, he heading for Gili T (the party island) to meet friends and I on my own mission. On G. Air I turned down one offer, to seek out the guy I’d scored from before. I was pleased to learn his son had been born healthily since last I’d seen him six weeks ago. He was sick and I gave him some cold medicine. But he still wanted a bit more for what turned out to be around the same amount of weed as before. Well it’s hard to tell without a scale, so many stems and seeds. I was cleaning it in the restaurant, behind the counter, nervous as hell already, when he came over to quickly through a bunch of stems away when some older guys approached. They didn’t have uniforms exactly but matching shirts. I turned out they were the tax men, and he just laughed as I nervously shoved it all into baggies and got the fuck out of there. “It’s Ok brother, no worries”, as they all say there. But of course, this would be one of the last things you hear before getting thrown into the hellhole of an Indonesian prison, where the death penalty for such offenses is definitely on the table. I managed to roll a pinner despite the absurd wind and sucked it down while waiting on the boat over to Gili Meno. I listend to some Sasak music I got off a guy back in Sanaru.

So the next four days were bliss on Gili Meno. I pondered how I might lure Michelle, who has never been out to the Gili’s, out for New Years eve. But how charming can I be via SMS? I went snorkelling several times each day and blazed epic joints. Luckily I wasn’t as overwhelmed as I had been before and enjoyed myself more than stressed. It got to the point I would spot a turtle within ten minutes of getting in the water and would follow him around a while. They are so utterly gracefully, slowly glidding through the water, much like birds. I was tempted to reach down and hold the shell for a ride, but they usually stayed just out of reach, turning slightly with the potential of a bite, or shooting beyond reach when I did make contact. It’s not good to touch them anyway, I think for bacterial reasons, more harmful to them than you, but locals do it. I didn’t see lion fish this time, but another of the evil yellow eels and another black and white striped one. I heart stoned snorkeling. Unfortunately the strap on my mask broke and I had to get another over-priced one, but I’ve had the thing for 9 years so I can’t bitch. The only issue was not having more money for drinks, which were expensive, and lead to mostly going to bed by 9 each night, including NYE, though I did have a tasty fix-priced feast and watched some fireworks over Gili T early.

I made it back without incident, though the ferry seemed much longer without anyone to talk to, and a singer and keyboardist set up in what would have been the comfortable interior area to belt out four hours of Indonesian pop and Dangdut hits. It always feels good to get back to Bali. The “urbanization” which bugged me when I left feels like “convenience” upon return. As much as I didn’t give myself over completely to this place upon arrival, I’m getting quite sad to realize I’ll soon be gone.