Jakarta2011
Harry Clemson
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Man write blog. Blog about Trip. Trip to Indonesia.
Going Bamboo 
January 12, 2011
Note: the pictures are posted backward again and I am too dumb to figure how to fix it.

Tell my boss I am not coming back. We have found the beach I was searching for all my life and I am thinking I can live off bananas, mangoes and Ikan rica rica. The hotel is really fantastic. Our cabana has a huge porch facing the ocean and pool. The bedroom has two double windows that open outward to allow us to feel the breeze and hear the waves. The floors are marble and the bathroom has an outdoor shower with a little garden area. The walls are high enough to keep the neighbors from complaining (-: We had an 8AM tour scheduled with a car and driver so we woke early and had breakfast on the beach. The food here is excellent and the breakfast no different. It was nice to sit in the sun with the ocean within a few steps.

Lombok is roughly the size of Rhode Island. So unlike Gilligan we cannot walk around it in an hour so we got a driver. Our driver was very good, we forgot to call Dewi’s friend but this guy was very friendly and very good (we have had one bad one so far). He took us south past Senggigi and Mataram to do some of the usual touristy things and we stopped first at a pottery place. Lina was seated at a spinning wheel and she was taught how to make her own clay cup. According to the driver Lombok has excellent clay for making pottery. After the lesson, Lina and I shopped for about an hour. She picked out a few things and I got two goblets. I have been eating like a Viking as my brother says so I figured a goblet was appropriate. The driver took us then to a weaving place where Lina picked out some nice tableclothes.

After this the day got more interesting to me. We went to the south coast which took almost 2 hours to reach. Kuta was the beach he brought us to and it is in two parts split by a large rock peninsula. The first part of the beach he stopped at was after taking a wild ride which should have been in a 4 wheel drive. The road to this part of Kuta is washed out in many places and muddy in others. We watched 2 trucks in front of us get stuck on a steep uphill grade but our guy managed it fine. I recognized this beach from an online real estate ad I saw at home. The beach is nearly deserted except for other couple, their driver and about a half dozen hawkers selling sarongs , beer and food. The beach is at the center of a large horseshoe cove with high cliffs on both sides. The beach was about a mile long and on the left hand side was the shack and five acres I had seen online with the fishing boats moored in front. The sand is very loose and you sink into it easily. It is steep too as it goes into the water. So when the waves crash into the beach the water rushes back out fast creating another huge wave. No lifeguards but I still waded in to take a few pictures. I remembered my adventure with the rip current in Huntington Beach so I did not swim, just waded up to my thighs. No need to have people reading ‘2nd honeymoon ends in tragedy’ in the Lombok Times.

We rode to the more eastern part of Kuta Beach and this we both loved. Anthony Bourdain (No Reservations) did an episode on Indonesia and said that while here he could totally understand how WWII soldiers from Britain and the US would ‘go bamboo’ and just leave it all behind and stay here. He was totally on board with dropping the show (maybe just for effect) and opening a restaurant in Bali. Today I had this same feeling. I could definitely see myself selling my return ticket and living here. We stopped at a restaurant on Kuta Beach called the Full Moon Cafe. It was miles from any major town but this restaurant right on the beach was in the heart of a small beachfront village. It was built from bamboo and a thatched roof as well as two attached private seating porches made the same way. There were about 10 people there in the restaurant (mostly Aussies and a party of some Eastern Europeans (language I could not ID). There were about 6 bamboo beach chairs facing the bay in between several palm trees. It was warm and humid but the breeze off the water made it nice. The beach is about 2 or more miles long and has thatched huts lining the beach only where the village near the restaurant is. The view from the beach is spectacular. On the right is a high cliff that is almost a mile out from the beach. There is a reef going from that cliff to another cliff on the left. The waves break there and despite the distance you can hear them. The left cliff has a portion of it that fell into the water creating an isle of its own. The restaurant had a definite surfing vibe to it and I really felt like we were in a place that very few knew about or would ever see. The music playing when we got there was the Sublime CD “40 Oz. to Freedom”. It was still playing when we left 2 hours later. It was like “Groundhog Day” stuck in 1996 LOL. For what is essentially a beach shack they had great food. I had Nasi Uduk and Lina some fish. We ate and had drinks and just hung out thinking of ways to drop out and stay here forever until we decided we had to finish the tour. We had to see the Benang Stokel waterfalls before the day ended. We took down the names of all of the hotels on this beach and plan to stay here next time. Sadly I learned later that with the planned new international airport being built this section of the island is going to be developed and the charm of the small surfing village will likely disappear. It will be sad if I am one of those who few will be saying “I remember when..” like they do about Bali now.

Our ride to Benang Stokel was interrupted by the start of a political demonstration on the road to the park. About 50,000 people (give or take 49,000) met at a mosque on our route and were all leaving to climb into trucks to ride to wherever they were going to protest. It was total gridlock man. We sat in the car while they all blocked our path and walked around us. Some traffic guard dude tried to order our driver to back up but that was retarded because there were more behind us we would have just squished. We just sat and waited. The ride through the rice paddies was nice and the view of Mt Rinjani was nice even though a haze covered it.

There was thunder and lightning behind us as we entered the park. It started to rain as we got out and paid to enter. It started pouring rain about half way there on the path. We walked the over 200 steps down to the base of the falls which luckily had a covered seating area for the driver and my backpack. Since we were already wet, Lina and I walked into the water under the falls. The rain was warm and so was the water from the falls. There are two falls side by side here which fall from a height of about 50 yards. I took pictures and video and got wet. The rain stopped while we were under the falls so the walk back was ok.The ride home to Senggigi however was a little moist.

It rained heavy for the rest of the night and is still raining at 11:11PM on 1/11/11 now. We had dinner at the hotel. The restaurant is an open air covered pavilion set up. The wind was blowing rain onto the first few tables. We got a great seat nearer the kitchen and were dry and happy. We watched the lightning over the ocean between Lombok and Bali. The waiter told us that we will have to replan our visit to the isle of Gili Trawangan since the boats do not run when the waves are high. The weather the past few days has idled the boats. No problem for us, we will relax at the hotel and maybe rent a motorcycle tomorrow. There are 3 Gilis and if we don’t do them this trip, they will be on the agenda for the next. Next time not being during the rainy season. (-:

Anyhoo, just wanted to tell Mom that I will be returning from Lombok – this time.
  • Falls 3  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Falls 3
  • It is Raining  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    It is Raining
  • Moisture  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Moisture
  • Can't seem to fix this picture to show correctly...  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Can't seem to fix this picture to show correctly...
  • Falls 2  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Falls 2
  • Falls 1  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Falls 1
  • Paddies on the way to Waterfalls  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Paddies on the way to Waterfalls
  • Young Coconut  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Young Coconut
  • Best Beach Cafe - Ever  Canon Powershot Sd780 Is 5.9 - 17.9 Mm
    Best Beach Cafe - Ever
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