Indonesia - Bali - Gili Trawangan - Lombok

A trip to Indonesia, Bali – Gili - Lombok

So here I am, first time in Indonesia. It is actually so close to Bangkok or Manila and I still haven’t made it to Bali till now.

First thing u encounter is the usual rip of prices the airport taxis want to charge u to get into town. Normal price to midtown Kuta would be 30’000RP but the usual taxi starts wt a price of 150’000RP. Welcome to Bali…

I made my way down to Kuta beach and was a bit shocked… I thought I was in Phuket or Koh Samui, the beach was very crowded and especially full of drinking Ozzys at 11AM. It took me no more than a couple of minutes to understand the bombings in 2002, specially when I discovered Legian street where the memorial is located. All along this street is one bar and club after each other busting the music as loud as possible.

So all I did in Kuta, was waiting for my chanchita Caro and then move somewhere else. If ur looking for Bali u want find it in Kuta or Legian, but if u wanna party, that’s the place to go.

The next day we decided to get some tickets to Gili Trawangan to find a more peaceful island wt nice beaches and as I found out, there were some Swiss friends on the way to that island too, Andreas and Fabienne.

A very early wake up, a bus transfer to the harbor and a bumpy 2h boat ride later we found ourselves on Gili Trawangan, a scenic little island north west of Lombok. I f u rent a bike u can ride around the island in about 1hour. There are 3 islands here side by side and the best thing about all of them, there is no traffic, 0 motorized vehicles. The only way to get from from ur hotel to the beach or a restaurant is by foot, bicycle or horse carriage.

Plenty of dive schools offer courses and fun dives, the good thing is u don’t have to worry about prices, they are all the same in all schools. So u can actually choose ur school by the people and the service and not by cheapest price. My fun dive was good, I’ve seen some ginormous turtles, the tiniest little shrimp a whole lot of very colorful fishes.. too many to know or list their names here.  

We climbed the highest mountain on the island to enjoy the sunset… must have been at least 100m high ;-) The sun was shining when we walked up but never showed up for sunset…. But hey we had a good workout.

The restaurants on the island are pretty good but a bit more expensive then most other places. We spent dinner mostly together wt my Swiss friends and some good chats and laughs about our travels and journeys.

After a couple of days of laziness we decided to move on to Kuta Lombok, which is a famous surf destination. When we arrived in Kuta we figured out that there is actually no real good spot right here, the next best one is in Gerupuk, about 10minutes motorbike drive away. We headed straight there and found a nice little homestay for 10$/night. This was our base now for some days of surfing and exploring.

The first day of surfing was not so successful… haven’t been on one of those boards for a long time… more used to my small kiteboards. The second time I took a longer board and caught much more waves and had more fun after all. The wave (Don don) we surfed was just a 5minute boat ride outside of our homestay and it could have been named the Swiss wave… at least 80% of all people on this wave were Swiss… and I think the rest was French.

We made a country side trip wt our motor bikes, it’s amazing how many waves u can find in the area, every 15minutes u find a new beach and the further u go the more remote the spots. Time has gone fast and it was already time to say goodbye to Carolina, we had a good time and lots of fun in the sun. For me it was just two more days over here and some good waves later I took a plane back to Kuta. This is much faster and cheaper than taking a bus, boat, bus version.

Cheap flights

I headed straight for Sanur beach this time. I found a cheap place to stay right next to the local market... which I would visit various times for dinner within the next days. The food here is great, local and very cheap. I explored the beaches around here for a few days and tried to get some kiteboarding in… but the wind was not really wt me, as I don’t really like to kite wt a 14 or 16m kite. I would say it’s a very good spot for race boards.

I took my motorbike for a longer ride up to Ubud, which is in the middle of the island. Most of the local craftsmen live and work up in this area, on the way up there u can see countless shops for furniture, wood frames, sarongs, masks…

I took a  two hour walk along the rice paddies and small canals. It’s a very relaxed atmosphere up here, perfect to enjoy nature for a while. I made up plans to return the very next day as there was a big cremation ceremony goin on.

The ceremony was amazing, no sign of sadness and grieve. It is a happy, crazy ceremony where the body got transported through the streets inside a big black cow. The body and soul gets into a better life reunited wt the 5 elements water, wind, earth, fire and universe. It takes hundreds of helpers to carry the up to 15tonnes structures along the road. If u have the chance to see any of these ceremonies, it’s a must do.

From here on I went down to Uluwatu, which is one of the most famous surf spots in Bali. Thx to my friend and surfer Samia I found a very good stay. 20$/night. There is a big Brasilian community over her, and especially in my hotel. They all come over to surf for a couple of month usually. The swell was not very big, so perfect for me to rent a board and have some more fun out there. I surfed Padang-Padang for a day and went to check out the other spots as well, but due to the full moon the tide was only high enough in the morning... if u don’t like to get washed over the reef.

So this was pretty much it… a very nice trip wt loads of good people, a lot of fun and stunning nature and amazing beaches all around.

Back to Bangkok now and off to Japan before I will head back to Switzerland for a couple of weeks.