Garnerbiker's Journey on planet Earth

This blog started as a trip journal for the summer of 2011 Europe trip of 69 days. My wife Katherine, and I decided to use the entire summer break that teachers get, and go crazy. Everything was new to us. I was surprised at the blog's following. It has now become a tradition to travel on our breaks and blog about it. I write mostly as a journal for myself and students, but also give travel ideas to others that might want to travel like us, or go to the places we have seen. Take a look at what's on here. The experiences that I have had through travel are continuously shaping my life. I recommend you get out there and do it!

Translate

Monday, July 9, 2018

Nusa Lembongan Day 1



     After a great night's sleep, we headed out for our pre-dive breakfast.  The resort has a large communal table to serve food to all the guests and dive masters.  At 7 am, the breakfast crew is ready to take orders.  Of course Indonesian food is on the menu like mie goreng (fried noodles), and Australian favorites like jaffles (toasted sandwiches), and powdered coffee.  I just had scrambled eggs and bacon.

Katherine with her jaffle.

This is the front view of the resort, complete with hammock.   After breakfast, we met for the morning dive briefing.  We watched a short video on how to approach and dive with mola molas and mantas.  I found it informative and quite necessary to keep these animals stress free and safe. 


Above, you can see the offering put out in the mornings.  I mean, many, every day.  Ladies make these and head out in the early morning to put them in different places.  Sometimes, they are in front of shrines, temples, or just in front of businesses.  All around town, you can smell the incense, which really is nice. 

Looking our front from the dive resort.  I think the 5yr old is driving his fam to work.

Michael, Katherine, and I walked down the street to the boat for diving, and Tommy stayed back to take a yoga class and rent a moped.  While diving is awesome, I am sure he will get a great tour of the island.  When we get back, we will trade stories. 


The above photo is Manta Point.  We only saw one manta from a distance on the dive but were lucky during our surface interval and swam with several more.  The mola mola season kicks up in a few more weeks, with the best chances to see them being from July to October.  We were just a bit early, and unfortunately did not spot any.  The rock in the back right is a feeding area for mantas.  Our boat slowly headed over toward the rock and we jumped in with only our masks.  After swimming around for a bit, I had one right under me!  No camera, jut me and the manta.  It was unreal! 

That's me checking out an anemone and it's friendly anemone fish.

This shot was taken on the way back from our dives.  On the way out, waves were crashing through the hole pretty hard.  It was a beautiful sight!

Clown Trigger Fish

Pillow sea star

Anemone fish and anemone

Shot taken from Tommy's adventure of the day


     
After our 2 morning dives, we reunited for Tommy for lunch.  He had a nice morning yoga session and then saw most of the little island on his moped.  The moped cost about $30 to rent for 4 days!  After lunch Tommy decided to go to the afternoon yoga session while the rest of us lounged by the pool.  For dinner, we decided to join the local dive community for a pub quiz.  They needed teams of 4, so we had it made.  We surprisingly came in 3rd out of 8.  Yay!  The quiz was hosted by the Marine Megafauna Foundation.  


Chillin' at the restaurant for the pub quiz.  Good times!



No comments:

Post a Comment