We spent 12 days in the marina hanging out with the awesome crew (Caz, Milla, Ziggy, and Hamish for just one night) of SV Cooeyanna, cleaning, and preparing to leave. Riki replaced our windlass with the new one.
One day we decided to walk around the island of Gili Gede — a “2 hour walk” per a marina employee. It turned it to be 7.5 miles long and took us 6 hours!
We spent a horrible, bumpy, and sleepless night in Amed, NE Bali. While we were there, the ketch next to us broke free from its mooring and ended up on the beach. We didn’t see anyone on board. We were supposed to pick up our friends for a day sail to Lovina, but the surf was too rough to beach the dinghy.
In Lovina, Bali we hired a driver and a car for the day. We visited waterfalls, saw monkeys (long-tailed macaques), and went inter-tubing down an irrigation ditch amongst the rice terraces. Our friends Sarene, Erik, Ari, and Chayla (plus Erik’s mom Mona and their driver Agus) joined us for the day! In our limited time in Bali, I found it way more touristy than anyplace else we have been in Indonesia including bad traffic, hawkers who wouldn’t leave us alone on the beach, and a woman who grossly overcharged us for the inter-tube rental.
We reunited with Igna and Kili in Lovina, and headed together with them to Bawean Island.
We had the most fabulous time in Bawean. Bawean doesn’t see that many tourists. It is a lush green island with mountains in the interior. Igna and Kili met a man who invited them to come visit his school (a specialized school for teenagers studying to work in the tourism industry) the next day. They invited us along. Turns out, we went on a full day tour of the island! Tomu, Jade, and Luz kept asking me what we were doing next, and I kept answering — I don’t know! I find often if you just give in to the fact that you are along for the ride, the most marvelous adventures will unfold.
They fed us the whole day — chips and watermelon at teacher Fara’s house while we waited for the scooters to arrive; pisang goreng (fried banana fritters) at the school, then a feast of grilled fish and chicken with rice and sambal mangga (a hot sauce of chilis, salt, and peppers smashed by hand) at the mountain lake. We had a whole entourage of students, teachers, and the head of school as guides. I rode on the back of teacher Mogi’s scooter. Riki navigated very steep mountain roads with Jade & Luz on his scooter. Tomu rode with Pak Jamal and his son. Mogi was really playful and kind. He swam in his jeans and played Monkey in the Middle with us in the lake. We ate a communal meal with our hands, off of paper spread over the floor of a wooden platform by the lake. The women ate with us, while the men squatted around a similar spread on the ground. I haven’t eaten like that since eating chebujen prepared by Fatu and Daba in Dakar, Senegal in 2004. Our hosts didn’t charge us anything for the whole day tour, and they insisted on buying even the gas for the scooters and our entrance tickets to the waterfall. Indonesian generosity is unparalleled.
The following day we had 17 people out to our two boats — we cycled them between White Wings 3 and evi, and all ended up on evi at the end. On evi we offered pancakes and juice, and they ate a fruit platter on White Wings 3. I wrote out the script for a quick tour in Bahasa Indonesia, and the kids took turns giving tours of our boat. Jade gifted bracelets, drew face paint, and brought out a puzzle to do together. I had lovely conversations in Bahasa Indonesia with Pak Jamal, the head of school, and with the Bahasa Indonesia teacher. Pak Jamal told us that when we come back next time we should stay the night at his house.
sv evi 
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