Wednesday, 24 March 2010
Ship hunting
It's Wednesday now and one common thread amongst all the here say about the ferry was Friday and Larantuka so after an easy mornings drive to Ende when the harbour master told us that it sailed from Larantuka at 0700 the following morning and that Larantuka was at least 9 hours away we weren't immediately over the moon. After much deliberation and confirmation the time was 1530, nobody wanted to do an overnight drive especially Adam and Nicky whose head light lens didn't have a diffuser so only lit a small spot ahead of them, but we really had no alternative if we didn't want to be on Flores another week let alone the visa problems it would cause. Also it would mean missing out on one of the highlights of Indonesia, the three coloured crater lakes of Kelimutu. Scientists still aren't sure why but all three lakes are different colours even though they all sit in the same crater, not only this but periodically they all change colour! Bugger.
As we're packing up the car to hit the road for a not so pleasant drive the harbour master comes back. He's just had a phone call to say that tomorrows sailing has been cancelled due to the weather and it was now sailing Friday. Now whether this was genuinely fate helping us out or some old duffer getting his days muddled up and being too embarrassed to admit we will probably never know but bloody hell it was good news. Kelimutu was indeed awesome again photo's do it more justice. Two of the lakes were similar in colour but hey they were still bright and we had the place completely to ourselves. In fact with the exception of the mad Irish, surfers and a handful of tourists for Komodo we haven't really seen many foreigners at all since Lombok. A leisurely drive to Larantuka took the rest of the day but again the scenery made us glad we didn't have to do it over night. On arrival we drove straight into the port and confirmed that indeed the boat was leaving tomorrow at midday!? Inquiries as to whether it was supposed to sail today were met with a blank. Inquiries as to the length of the voyage brought between 12-18hrs, it was 22.
There were no seats only two levels of racking for sleeping on. We commandeered one whole section that was right on the edge of the open sides of the boat and would hopefully let a breeze through. No sooner had the boat left dock than the Indo rock ballad favourites came booming through the speakers. 10 o'clock at night we were told it would be turned off. We'd spotted two other foreigners on the boat a pair of young lads and after a local guy had tried to persuade us to fit more people on our platform we persuaded them to join us. James and Simon more Brits! Not only that but Simon was from Bridgewater only 7 miles from our home town of Taunton. Yet again small world. All was going well, too well. The music had ceased but the effects of the local hooch on four young guys adjacent to us clearly was only just kicking in. The rest of the passengers did the usual Indonesian thing and resolutely pretended it wasn't happening, not Kym. We asked them to turn down their radio, we asked them not to shout then we asked again over and over for the next 45 mins until Adams eyes turned white, his clothes started splitting at the seams and he changed colour. He leapt from our platform told them all to SHUT THE FLIP UP pulled ones hair then took their remaining bottle of arak and threw it overboard! Not content he then took their ciggarettes and told them "these are bad for you if you're good you can have them back in the morning". Regaining his natural colour he climbed back onto the platform to an eerily silent boat. Unfortunately morning in Indo starts at 0430 and being on a boat makes no exception, rock ballads in a different language pre-sun up anyone?
The lack of sleep made the decision to stay in backpackers for the night an easy one so we agreed we'd head on into Kupang to a place we'd read about in the LP. Sometime later when Adam and Nicky still hadn't arrived we called them to find they were still at the docks and the starter motor had gone on the bike. Picked them up and checked them in then went hunting for parts/repairs. Adam hopped on the back of a scooter with a local and I changed brake pads on the truck. The starter repair man couldn't do anything till monday (saturday now) so Kym and I said we were heading off in the morning for the two day drive to East Timor and we'd keep in touch.
Pretty uneventful drive really, pleasant enough country side and great road the best bit though was the local houses. Thatching is still predominant as are woven bamboo/wooden walls. Also these great little beehive houses that look like cousin "it" from "The Adams Family". Good little camp site for the night in a kind of recreation area on a beach near the border but a little bit shocked when they wanted $3.00 for letting us stay there, we got them down to $1. By 0830 we were at the border to our first new country since October! Of course nothing was open.
As we're packing up the car to hit the road for a not so pleasant drive the harbour master comes back. He's just had a phone call to say that tomorrows sailing has been cancelled due to the weather and it was now sailing Friday. Now whether this was genuinely fate helping us out or some old duffer getting his days muddled up and being too embarrassed to admit we will probably never know but bloody hell it was good news. Kelimutu was indeed awesome again photo's do it more justice. Two of the lakes were similar in colour but hey they were still bright and we had the place completely to ourselves. In fact with the exception of the mad Irish, surfers and a handful of tourists for Komodo we haven't really seen many foreigners at all since Lombok. A leisurely drive to Larantuka took the rest of the day but again the scenery made us glad we didn't have to do it over night. On arrival we drove straight into the port and confirmed that indeed the boat was leaving tomorrow at midday!? Inquiries as to whether it was supposed to sail today were met with a blank. Inquiries as to the length of the voyage brought between 12-18hrs, it was 22.
There were no seats only two levels of racking for sleeping on. We commandeered one whole section that was right on the edge of the open sides of the boat and would hopefully let a breeze through. No sooner had the boat left dock than the Indo rock ballad favourites came booming through the speakers. 10 o'clock at night we were told it would be turned off. We'd spotted two other foreigners on the boat a pair of young lads and after a local guy had tried to persuade us to fit more people on our platform we persuaded them to join us. James and Simon more Brits! Not only that but Simon was from Bridgewater only 7 miles from our home town of Taunton. Yet again small world. All was going well, too well. The music had ceased but the effects of the local hooch on four young guys adjacent to us clearly was only just kicking in. The rest of the passengers did the usual Indonesian thing and resolutely pretended it wasn't happening, not Kym. We asked them to turn down their radio, we asked them not to shout then we asked again over and over for the next 45 mins until Adams eyes turned white, his clothes started splitting at the seams and he changed colour. He leapt from our platform told them all to SHUT THE FLIP UP pulled ones hair then took their remaining bottle of arak and threw it overboard! Not content he then took their ciggarettes and told them "these are bad for you if you're good you can have them back in the morning". Regaining his natural colour he climbed back onto the platform to an eerily silent boat. Unfortunately morning in Indo starts at 0430 and being on a boat makes no exception, rock ballads in a different language pre-sun up anyone?
The lack of sleep made the decision to stay in backpackers for the night an easy one so we agreed we'd head on into Kupang to a place we'd read about in the LP. Sometime later when Adam and Nicky still hadn't arrived we called them to find they were still at the docks and the starter motor had gone on the bike. Picked them up and checked them in then went hunting for parts/repairs. Adam hopped on the back of a scooter with a local and I changed brake pads on the truck. The starter repair man couldn't do anything till monday (saturday now) so Kym and I said we were heading off in the morning for the two day drive to East Timor and we'd keep in touch.
Pretty uneventful drive really, pleasant enough country side and great road the best bit though was the local houses. Thatching is still predominant as are woven bamboo/wooden walls. Also these great little beehive houses that look like cousin "it" from "The Adams Family". Good little camp site for the night in a kind of recreation area on a beach near the border but a little bit shocked when they wanted $3.00 for letting us stay there, we got them down to $1. By 0830 we were at the border to our first new country since October! Of course nothing was open.
Tuesday, 23 March 2010
Flores
What a road! Amazing in the fact that it's perfectly surfaced and smooth and even more amazing that it clings to the sides of volcanoes, precipices, snakes through jungle, climbs to cooler heights and skirts the beach all in 10 mile stretches. Not so amazing is that the fastest you can hope to go is about 15mph. It was infinitely more suited to a nimble bike that a hulking 4x4. At lunchtime we caught up with the bikers in a small losmen on top of a plateau and joined them for a quick tea. Whilst sat in a little room quietly discussing the road and how beautiful Flores was there was a sudden burst of activity and a random Irish bloke came bursting in exclaiming "feck, where's have you's come from, I tought I'd come along way" bearing in mind this is in the middle of nowhere on a much less visited Indonesian island. Then his wife came in "feck, it's hot, oim fecking soaked". I think our collective response was to look at each other with our mouths open. They continued to question us over the top of each other without pausing for response for about another minute before it seemed they'd exhausted them selves. After picking out random questions that we could remember and establishing what and how both of us had arrived here (when I refer to us in this context I mean both couples) and then managed to get their story. Originally from Cork they now live on their yacht in Biscay and charter for the summer season. Halfway through what we're lead to belive has been a bit of chilly winter in Europe (irresistible, sorry) they decided to "fly da feck outta der". Bali was a little busy for them so they hired a moped and had done the same route as we had and were now on their return to Bali... on a moped! We thought they'd seen the vehicles but no it turns out that on the outward journey they'd mapped mentally all the places that sold beer and we just happened to be in one! We set off after handshakes (no introductions!!) feeling slightly shell shocked, just another random happening.
We made it back down to the coast just before dark and camped next to the beach by a big concrete pier in the middle of no where but close to Aimeree. Peaceful night just a few curious locals who explained that the jetty was for the ferries. We surmised from this and the complete lack of infrastructure any where nearby, that it must be a work in project only to find out a few days later that this was indeed Aimeree's dock! There wasn't even a hut! Next days drive over more ridiculous vistas that literally could only leave you shaking your head trying to think of words that don't exists to describe them, and lunchtime ish we got to Bajawa. This is home to the Ngada people whose bent on Christianity would leave most missionaries wondering where they'd gone wrong. We often ponder how on earth those guys managed to convince races of people who have been ingrained with their own beliefs of variously ancestor worship, animism, totemic and idol reverence etc to give that up and worship some tall white guy with long hair and beard. Let's face it their first meetings with westerners didn't really bode well what with us lot turning up with alsorts of horrible diseases let alone alcohol and guns. They had they work cut out for sure but all the statues of the afore mention hippy we keep seeing (not always great ones I have to say, the cross eyed Charles Manson look alike one example) are testament to the fact the they had some success. Bajawa is a relatively modern town and it took an excursion into the jungles to find the traditional Ngada villages. Bena has since 1975 been protected and with the exception of piped water has changed little for hundreds and hundreds of years and it really feels it. And it doesn't feel in the slightest way contrived. Important people are buried in front of their family homes in the common ground that the huts surround. Amongst the graves are stone.. monuments I guess you'd call them, kind of like mini Stonehenge's but with pointy rocks. These, guessing again really as there are no nice little plaques with descriptions, seem to have stopped being built and simple wooden crosses now mark the more recent graves. Every night candles are lit on every grave. For an inhabited village it seemed really quiet until we discovered it was food time and everybody was outside one hut all get stuck into a communal dinner. The only obvious concession to tourism was a visitors book and a donation book. Well worth a look if you happen to be at a loose end on Flores sometime.
Hot springs where two streams, one hot, one cold converged were close enough to tempt us so after passing backwards and forwards past it a few times then being escorted down through jungle to the confluence by a smiley local, we jumped in. The hot was hot, way too hot straight out the volcano hot but the cold was cold enough that if you positioned yourself in just the right place where the currents converged it was perfect. All to soon with darkness coming we had to get back and hopefully find a place we'd seen earlier to camp. Adam and Nicky were staying in Bajawa so we waved them off and then set off ourselves. About 20 mins later we saw them again, they'd run out of petrol. A 45 min round trip to Bajawa and they were on their way again. We just made it to our camp spot in time for it to get dark, cold and start raining. Early to bed then.
We made it back down to the coast just before dark and camped next to the beach by a big concrete pier in the middle of no where but close to Aimeree. Peaceful night just a few curious locals who explained that the jetty was for the ferries. We surmised from this and the complete lack of infrastructure any where nearby, that it must be a work in project only to find out a few days later that this was indeed Aimeree's dock! There wasn't even a hut! Next days drive over more ridiculous vistas that literally could only leave you shaking your head trying to think of words that don't exists to describe them, and lunchtime ish we got to Bajawa. This is home to the Ngada people whose bent on Christianity would leave most missionaries wondering where they'd gone wrong. We often ponder how on earth those guys managed to convince races of people who have been ingrained with their own beliefs of variously ancestor worship, animism, totemic and idol reverence etc to give that up and worship some tall white guy with long hair and beard. Let's face it their first meetings with westerners didn't really bode well what with us lot turning up with alsorts of horrible diseases let alone alcohol and guns. They had they work cut out for sure but all the statues of the afore mention hippy we keep seeing (not always great ones I have to say, the cross eyed Charles Manson look alike one example) are testament to the fact the they had some success. Bajawa is a relatively modern town and it took an excursion into the jungles to find the traditional Ngada villages. Bena has since 1975 been protected and with the exception of piped water has changed little for hundreds and hundreds of years and it really feels it. And it doesn't feel in the slightest way contrived. Important people are buried in front of their family homes in the common ground that the huts surround. Amongst the graves are stone.. monuments I guess you'd call them, kind of like mini Stonehenge's but with pointy rocks. These, guessing again really as there are no nice little plaques with descriptions, seem to have stopped being built and simple wooden crosses now mark the more recent graves. Every night candles are lit on every grave. For an inhabited village it seemed really quiet until we discovered it was food time and everybody was outside one hut all get stuck into a communal dinner. The only obvious concession to tourism was a visitors book and a donation book. Well worth a look if you happen to be at a loose end on Flores sometime.
Hot springs where two streams, one hot, one cold converged were close enough to tempt us so after passing backwards and forwards past it a few times then being escorted down through jungle to the confluence by a smiley local, we jumped in. The hot was hot, way too hot straight out the volcano hot but the cold was cold enough that if you positioned yourself in just the right place where the currents converged it was perfect. All to soon with darkness coming we had to get back and hopefully find a place we'd seen earlier to camp. Adam and Nicky were staying in Bajawa so we waved them off and then set off ourselves. About 20 mins later we saw them again, they'd run out of petrol. A 45 min round trip to Bajawa and they were on their way again. We just made it to our camp spot in time for it to get dark, cold and start raining. Early to bed then.
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