Nusa Lembongan

I took the slow boat from Bali to Nusa Lembongen, an island just east of Bali. There might have been twenty-five of us on the boat along with lots of luggage, a large display case and two motor scooters. This is not a large boat, by the way, sort of a longish with wooden benches across it and no aisles. It reminded me of a spider because it had three legs on each side connected by a log that served the purpose of keeping the boat from rolling in that sometimes turbulent sea. On the back were four motorboat motors and we had to wade through the water to climb on. When we landed, six workers, make that six very wet workers, mostly women, carried the scooters over the surf to shore. The only surfers I saw were from this boat and not one of them made it through a wave. I was impressed anyway.

  

The harbor where we landed was nothing but beach, no docks. Once ashore we were accosted by so many people wanting to guide us to a room, a tour, a ride, anything to make a buck. The buildings were smaller here in the older part of town and more rickety than anywhere I'd been before. I managed to find a place with a couple computers down an alleyway, around a temple and to the left on a rough little road. From there I managed to connect with my friends who picked me and my luggage up on scooters and took me to the Dream Beach Resort where we had a cottage overlooking a pounding surf. At their restaurant, I tried a spaghetti made with coconut milk that was the best I've ever eaten. 

 

Libby and I took scooters into town to a beach where people were gathering seaweed. They set low nets between posts well out into the water, then pull the seaweed out and carry it in big baskets on their heads to wherever the next step in the process takes place. One young man working at our hotel said that its a pretty good living and many people on the island work harvesting seaweed, including his wife. He likes his job at the resort and says he appreciates the steady income but misses the high earnings in the months when the seaweed season is in high gear.

Those little dots out there are actually people taking seaweed from the nets.

 

 

 

I went on another snorkeling trip that took us to three different locations but I only went in twice. The coral was not as colorful as the Komodo trip but the shapes were more varied. There were big branch coral, brain coral and lots of colorful fish. I remember two kinds of angel fish in white-yellow-black combinations, a big irridescent blue fish and a gar that looked like a pale eel with a long thin nose. I had a good time chasing them.

 

Best of all was the pounding surf. There are lava cliffs that the waves crash against sending up huge sprays that run off in so many little waterfalls as the water recedes. On the morning we left we walked out to where the rock was terraced. I stood on a rock as close as I dared to the edge and watched the water patterns on the levels below me as each wave came in. One wave actually smashed  onto the terrace below me sending up a huge spray right in front of me. I didn't move, just spread my arms out and got drenched. I was still soaked when I got on the fastboat back to Bali.