Indonesia, September 20 2010, Immigration.

As explained in a previous report, we entered Indonesia without a visa, but with a letter of intention from the Indonesian Consulate in Nouméa supposed to smother the case.

We went to see the Immigration office in Singaraya 15 minutes bus drive away from Lovina Beach. As I showed them my passport, they were already upsets not to find the visa.

I showed them the CAIT, to prove that I made my homework, and showed them the letter of intention from the consulate.

The officer read the letter and looked at me disgusted; telling me that the letter says the visa has been rejected. That it is more than one month that we are illegal in the country and that I should have reported earlier to a port of entry etc . . .

I was so choked, that I took my papers without a word, turned my back, and we left the place.

We went at the supermarket to do some provisioning and next day we left like thieves Lovina Beach and made our way to Singapore.

We had planed to stop in Kumai to visit the orangutans, but enough is enough.

Indonesia, September 19 2010, 2 days tour, second day, Ubud.

After the show we went back to Ubud and stopped on the way by a silversmith. They had a workshop and we could see how they were putting tiny little silver pearls on a cap. Then we got invited to have a look in sales shop of course and we saw some master pieces.

We found that a little bit too commercial, and swapped the wood carving.

We spent the rest of the day shopping in town, and had an interesting stop at the market. Not the fresh one, but craft’s one.

In the afternoon we made our way back to Lovina beach.

Indonesia, September 19 2010, 2 days tour, second day, Barong Dance.

Next morning after breakfast, we went all to see the Barong dance. It was close to first place we went the day before.

The Barong is a mystic creature representing the welfare and the forces existing on earth. The opposite of him is Rangda, queen of the witches and representing the evil.

The Balinese believe that these two powers coexist side by side.

The story tells about Prince Sadewa who will be scarified to Batari Durga goddess of the death.

The prime minister enters the scene followed by the queen, mother of prince Sadewa. The queen is upset to have to scarify her son. The witch worried that she changes her mind, touches the queen with the magic scepter. The queen gets instantly angry and orders the prime minister to bring the prince to the cemetery were the goddess of the death leaves.


But the prime minister loves the prince and refuses to obey the queen. The witch touches him too and he gets angry.

He brings the prince to the cemetery and ties him at the tree in front of the temple of death.

God Siwa dressed in priest sees the prince tied at the tree. Pitiful he makes the prince immortal.

Comes Batari Durga and wants the instant death of the prince, but he’s immortal. The witch realizes her defeat and asks Sadewa to kill her to redeem, what he does.


Kaleka principal priest of Batary Durga also wants to redeem, but Sadewa refuses. Kaleka uses her magic power and changes in a bear to attack Sadewa, unsuccessful to kill him; she changes in a big bird, still unsuccessful. Finally she changes herself in the powerful witch Rangda.

She is too powerful for Sadewa who changes himself in Barong. They fight together and nobody wins. The Barong call’s his disciple.

The Barong’s men appear with their magic dagger called “Kris” and attack Rangda. She bewitches them and the anger of the Barong’s men turns again themselves to plunge the Kris in their chest. The men get in trance and the Kris can’t kill nor hurt them.



The Barong gets the men out of the Ranga’s trance, the dance ends, and the priest blesses the men with sacred water to get them out of the trance.


Boas, the alder son of Martin was quite impressed by the dragon.

Indonesia, September 18 2010, 2 days tour, first day, in the evening.

We stopped in Ubud and our driver suggested us to stay at Ubud Abangan Bungalows, it’s just aside central Ubud and it’s easy for him to park the car.

We went for a walk to see if we can get something in town and came back to the start point. We took a bungalow at the end of the place close to a river and a waterfall.

Dingo had an accommodation close to the entrance, much easier with the kids. The entrance door of their room was a master piece of carving.


Ubud is known for his dances. In the street, as we were looking for accommodation, many people were offering dances. Our driver suggested us to go to the one outside town, about half an hour driving.

We went just the two of us to see the Kecak and Fire Dance.

The Kecak Dance is not accompanied by an orchestra, but a chorus of men. They form a circle around the actors of the dance. In the 1930’s the old Indian epic Ramayana was included in the dance.

The story runs as follows. Due to an evil trick, Prince Rama the legal heir of the throne of Ayodya was exiled from the realm of his father Dasarata. Accompanied by his wife Sita and his younger brother Laksamana, they went into a forest called Dandaka.

The demon King Rahwana accompanied by his Prime Minister Marica found them.

The King lusted after the beautiful Sita. Using his magic power, Marica transformed himself into a golden deer to distract the prince and his brother while Rahwana kidnapped Sita and look her to his palace in Alengka.


Prince Rama and brother Laksamana set out to rescue Sita from the claws of the demon King destroying Rahwana’s army under the command of his sun Megananda.

Finally Rama succeeded in getting his wife back sound and safe.

We liked very much the show and after  the performance we went back to town for a nice diner and made our way back to the bungalow.

Indonesia, September 18 2010, 2 days tour, first day.

Together with Dingo, we hired a car with driver for 2 days to visit Bali.

On the program we had Waterfall, temple, rice fields, and the city of Ubud well known for his wood carving, Silversmith, pottery,dances, and so on.

To see the Gitgit waterfall, we had first to climb up the mountain, luckily with the car.

After a 15 minutes walk thru the rice fields we arrived at the base of a 40m high waterfall we were the first.

It was early in the morning the air was fresh.


Boy Scouts joined us and were happy to be pictured.

The second stop was at Bratan Lake and we visited the Ulun Danu temple.

Since de bombing they take security very seriously.

As we entered the parking, a man was checking under the car with a mirror, and then we could park.

It’s an important Hindu Buddhist temple dedicated to Dewi Danu the goddess of the water.

It is built on small islands witch means it’s surrounded by the lake.

Pilgrimages and ceremonies are held to ensure water supply for the farmers all over Bali.

The roofs are made of thatch, and look very thick.

A team was working on site to maintain them.

The place is very relaxing. On site you also find a spa.

We left the place peace in mind and made our way to the rice fields of Jatiluwih.

We were rewarded with vistas that exhausted our ability to describe green. The locals were also rewarded with our green as there is a road toll to pay.

The place is stoning. Our guide told us that they grow rice twice a year. At the time we visited the place the rice was not yet mature.

We had a comfortable lunch with the overview of the entire valley. A little breeze was highly appreciated.



After lunch, we continued our journey to visit a second temple of Luhur Batukau.





Luhur Batukau was the state temple when Tabanan was an independent kingdom.

It is dedicated to Maha Dewa the mountain’s guardian spirit, as well as shrines for Bratan, Buyan and Tamblingan lakes.

It’s surrounded by forest and is often damp and misty.

You must wear a sarong that you have to rent and a donation is requested.

We decided that the rent of the sarong is the donation.

Not every body is allowed to enter the place!



We had a little bit enough visiting temples and made our way to Ubud.

Indonesia, September 11 2010, Lovina Beach.

It’s an open place with good sand bottom protected by reefs; the water is fairly clear, and holding is good in 5 meter of depth. Access to the beach is easy with the dingy and the kids don’t play with it, leaving it full of sand.

The place is quite touristy and you get approached by a lot of local for the local handicraft and diverse services.

They come to your boat to offer drinking water, fuel, laundry and more. You have to bargain your services. We bought local drinking water for 7’000 IDR the jar of 4 gallon, and 7’000 IDR the liter of diesel. (1€ = 10’000 IDR)

At the petrol station the fuel cost 4’500 IDR/l, but you must organize the dingy, the bus, and carry the jerrycans yourself. Martin did it, I was lazy and took a local who provided the jerrycans, brought them back full. He was even offering me to empty them in the main tank; I denied the offer, preferring to do the mess myself.


The place offers Internet services, restaurants, resorts, a market, and super market with frozen meat. If you take the bus to Singaraja there is a Carrefour Super Market.

The local buses have yellow plates and the ride cost 5’000 IDR. Sometime they ask you more it’s up to you if you want to pay more.


You can’t go strait from Lovina to the Carrefour; you must change bus, usually at the bus terminal, some time the driver stops on the way close to a bus that brings you the Carrefour.

On the way back you can hire the bus strait to Lovina, they will ask you 50’000 IDR, again bargaining is common.

From Lovina you can hire a car with driver for the day (around 40€ all included), and they can organize a tour for you, or you tell them where you want to go.

We did it a first time together with our friends from Dingo. No! We didn’t make it with the Vespa Sidecar.

They had to go to Denpasar to renew their passport. It took all day. It’s a 3 hour drive to there.



On site we went to Legian a famous surf beach for lunch. A very crowded place in full reconstruction.



On the way back stopped at the big Carrefour in Denpasar, very well furbished and reasonable prices. The one in Singaraja looks small compared to this one and is fairly well furbished too, but has less international products.

Next we stopped in a king of botanical garden where they procure and sell the famous Kopilok coffee, the most expensive one in the world.






In the movie the bucket list, it’s Jack Nicholson’s favorite drink that makes Morgan Freeman laugh to death (one of the wishes on the list).

The place also sells spices. We shared one cup of Kopilok coffee with Martin (4€ a small cup), I found it very smooth and loved it; very different from the usual one from Vanuatu witch I like (I’m not talking instant coffee powder).




We were back to Lovina after sunset, and happy to make our way back to the yacht. Car and driver were Ok!





 
 
 

Indonesia, September 3 2010, Rinja to Lombok.

We left Rinja and made our way North to Gili Lawa. It’s a famous diving spot. Heading North we experienced quite some strong currents.


From Calm water it changed in Ruff Sea in no time. These currents are very difficult to predict. We had to fight them.

On the way we came across local Charter boat, they are quite big.

We stopped for two days at Gilli Lawa. Very deep anchorage and one mooring was available.

It’s normally used by the local dive boats to avoid damaging the coral with their big anchor.

A sailing boat was on it, the big dive boat asked on VHF the sailing boat to move, he didn’t want so the big dive boat had to drop his huge anchor.

The next night a dive boat set his anchor to close to us, I let him finish his maneuver and ones ready he was close enough so I could ask if he is well insured in case he hits my yacht. He didn’t hesitate to move to another place.

We left this crowded place and made our way to Lombok. We past North of Sumbawa, and South of the Sangean volcano.

The island is habited. we could see villages around it. We hope the volcano is well asleep.

On the way we had to keep a careful watch, there are a lot of fish attracting devices floating on the water, and they are not lit at night.


It was no much wind around and we had to motor quite a lot.

For sure the heat produced by the engine was not cooling the inside of the boat.
We had temperatures up to 34°C.

We stopped at Teluknarat on the NW side of Lombok to decide were we are going next.

On Bali the port of entry is Benoa at the South end of the Island. There are strong currents up to 5 knots and the marina seems to be a quite crowded place. What you sail down, you have to sail up later to head to Singapore.

The other option is Lovina Beach on the Northern side of Bali. We went for the second option.