Gili Air, however, has by far the best anchorage. Two arms of reef reach out from either side encircling the harbor area, protecting the moorings from all directions but due south. Although the prevailing winds at this time of year are from the southeast, the fact is the bulk of Lombok island knocks down their effect and so moored boats sit nice and steady....but for the occasional wakes of the twice daily Bali ferry traffic. At the other two islets, the strong currents that swirl between the islands are more of an issue. Although we have seen a few boats over at Trawangan, most eventually end up here at Gili Air.
We were past ready to leave Medana Bay. The last day or two a NW swell had sprung up setting all the boats to obnoxious rocking and rolling. Yes, even, a big catamaran like Quantum Leap was uncomfortable; God knows how the monohulls tolerated it. Even more unnerving was the effect it had on the floating dinghy dock. In the dark after dinner it was like a e-ride in a horror show! They say the swell comes up for a couple of weeks each year about this time. Let's hope it is over before the fleet arrives for the Sail Indonesia festivities.
So, with coffee barely down, we joined the stream of boats departing the bay, all bound for Gili Air. Amazingly, there were enough moorings to accommodate us all, (But to those following us, be alert to scattered reefs in the anchorage itself.) There was no sign of the swell.
Don and I hit the ground running, so to speak. Our first act was to get some exercise by circumnavigating the island, something the guidebook said could be done in about 90 minutes. That, of course, is assuming you don't check every menu, chat at every dive shop, or actually stop for a cool drink or an expresso! About two-thirds of Gili Air's shoreline is developed with a dense cluster of charming bungalows, cafes, restaurants, and dive shops.
The dive shops --really they are dive schools -- have semi-in-ground pools for teaching, and there must be a dozen of them or more catering to a steady flow of 20-30-something mostly-European tourists. Each compound is just that, a compound of pool, dive shop, bungalows, their own associated cafe or restaurant, all perched amid riotous bougainvillea and palms on the edge of the beach where the outrigger dive boats bob. They've made themselves places you want to hang out.
The restaurants in between are simple yet idyllic. Each has its own cluster of berugas, thatched 8'x'8' platforms on which you sit and lean back on plump pillows to take in the cool sea breezes while sipping fresh fruit juices or a cool Bitang beer or consuming inexpensive meals of Indonesian, Sasak (Lombok local tribal people), Thai or global continental (pasta, pizza or burger) origins. Prices are absurdly reasonable. A simple veggie curry is 25,000 rupiah or about $2.50 (although really is is closer to $3.00 since the dollar to rupiah exchange rate has slipped to $1=8500R) But even a full dinner at the nicest place comes to less than $20 for two.
And the best part of the whole place is that there are no motor vehicles! Transport if not by your own two feet is by pony cart! The carts are simple wooden carts with bench seats and a canopy and with two large, fat-tired wheels to cope with sand, and the ponies are healthy, sturdy creatures about the size of a Welsh Pony and come in every color of the equine rainbow. Perhaps the best part is that they wear bells that jingle as they trot to warn pedestrians of their approach. This is about the happiest background sound I can conceive!
We signed up to dive that first afternoon with Manta Dive, a school about halfway down the beach. There were several operations closer to the harbor, and its hard to say exactly why we picked Manta. They had a good reputation, we liked the owners frank conversation with us, and it didn't hurt that he offered us a professional discount.
Because Manta Dive is primarily a school, staff is not a problem since plenty of the student stay long enough to progress up the certification ladder. They send out each boatload of up to 21 divers with a divemaster (often European) for each group of 4-5 divers, plus a local captain and the usual retinue of hardy local helpers. For Gili Air diver operators these guys are particularly essential, because the outrigger boats are loaded and unloaded afloat in the shallows. Each diver boards carrying his/her own mask, snorkel, fins and weight belt, while the deck crew schlep aboard the tanks all previously set up with BCs and regs! When the tide is low, all this takes place a goodly walk down the beach, and on those occasions a pony cart is added to the mix. It's quite a load for the pony to have 10-12 tanks in one cart!
Also because Manta (and most of the others) positions itself as a dive school, you have quite an assortment of ability levels. They do their best to sort the groups on that criteria, but generally the boat is run just the way such a system needs to be run -- with lots of close supervision. Our divemaster (a cute young blonde European with too many tattoos...who is probably quite recently certified) strove to keep a tight rein on her group. The other reason they do this is to create the illusion that your group is the only one on the reef. This is an illusion only, as there were four groups from our boat alone! More than a little bit of traffic management is involved!
Unfortunately, the dives we saw just aren't worth it. Don't get me wrong; for the bulk of their clientele they are wonderful: easy conditions with always something to find...not unlike some of my diving had to be in the Virgin Islands. But after Komodo's top quality, what we saw here was pretty anticlimactic. After our second dive, Don surfaced and said, "I could get two massages for the cost of this."
And so we switched our focus from the water to the spa. There are several on Gili Air, but our choice was the small boutique Beach Spa near Scallywag's Restaurant. Owned by a German woman named Amadea (after Mozart's piece) who has been on the island six years, the spa's services are provided by a small platoon of attractive young women in black who speak little or no English, which makes for a very peaceful experience. No chit chat beyond hello and thank-you.
And one of the loveliest parts of the whole experience is the spa beruga. Larger and more finished than the beach berugas, the spa's beruga takes up a corner of the courtyard (which is, by the way, just the pumpkin color my New York living room was!) and offers big bold pillows to lean against (or a hammock) where the girls start you off with small cups of ginger tea...to which we have become addicted. With the waves gently sighing across the street, the babble of children and the jingle of the pony carts, it is all incredibly restive and reflective.
I'll spare you the play-by-play of each spa experience as we worked our way down the menu, but I will say that I have had the foot reflexology massage, the full body massage, a pedicure and a facial. Except for the pedicure, it has all been a new experience for me, and I am addicted. I'd like to bring one of the girls and the beruga itself home with me. I have gotten the recipe for the ginger tea.
We have lost count of the days we have been here. Last Wednesday, Tom and Bette Lee took the fast ferry to Bali for their inland travel there. Leaving us here was a far more pleasant option for us for yacht sitting than the original plan of the Bali Marina, which is said to be a bit of a pit. We haven't heard a word from our travelers, so we can only hope they are having as good a time as we are. While it has been an incredible treat to be traveling with Tom & Bette Lee, having the boat to ourselves as been equally a treat.
We haven't been totally alone. Another of the rally boats has come in: George and Melinda of Daedalus, a 60' power catamaran. They have joined us in our cycle of walks, spa treatments, and beachside meals, for just the right amount of socializing, two on two. With the end of Ramadan nearly here, many businesses will be cutting back their hours and/or closing as their workers go home to families on Lombok for the four day celebration -- i.e. no spa! Actually, we have cut back to one meal ashore a day, sometimes breakfast with all its gorgeously cut fresh fruit and veggie-packed omelets, sometime a leisurely late lunch of Sasak curries or Thai noodles, while tonight we will try a new dinner place with another new catamaran acquaintance, John of the Privilege cat Ile du Grace. The way it's been going, we have a new favorite restaurant every time we try a new one.
Being a tourist island, restaurant enterprise cannot close down completely come Monday, but we went out today foraging for fresh fruit and veg to replenish our stock for the duration, just in case! Every night, a smattering of fireworks goes off from this restaurant or that one in anticipation of the end of the month of fasting. Budgets are low. You have to be quick; sometime a pop and sizzle is all you get. And only when everything gets quiet do you hear the chanting from the mosque which is buried somewhere in the island's center.
Really, truly, this could go on indefinitely!
Gwen Hamlin
Cafe Getaway
Sent from my iPad
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