Diving & Motorcycling

Diving

After a lazy relaxing day yesterday, we had to wake up bright and early.  Actually, to our surprise many so-called holiday-makers have breakfast as early as 0700.

The reason for our early rising today was because Kim had an 0700 departure for snorkelling and I have an 0730 report for diving.  Both at the same places namely Crystal Bay and Manta Point over in Nusa Penida.

After my report, we were led to the back of the shop for our equipment.  We walked down to Mushroom Bay with them on our backs, but thankfully without the BCDs and weights (unlike in some places).

First dive was at Crystal Bay, famous for the elusive mola-mola or sunfish.  The water visibility was very good as we backrolled in, so the dive-site lived up to its name.  After some time around the reef, the divemaster led us into the blue.  Sadly, he turned around fairly quickly giving us the gesture for strong current.  We spent the remainder of the dive close to the reef with many other divers, without any sighting of the mola-mola.

Surface interval comprised of a box lunch of local food.  Most welcome after all the food that had been tuned to western tastes so far.  Despite hardly any breakfast, I didn’t want to finish all my rice as I was afraid of getting too bloated.

Second dive at Manta Point felt a little cooler as we entered the water.  Visbility was poor at times and when mantas were pointed out to us, I could barely make out the shape.  However, close to the end of the dive we had a stunning show of four mantas rather close up.  Sadly, there was one thing that ruined the experience … an entire “wall” of divers producing an entire “wall” of bubbles.

I had never been diving with so many other people before and I’ll try like hell to never do it again.  Good experiences are meant to be shared, I know,  but there is a limit for me.  I’ll continue to seek out more untouched places where the human impact is less and the experience will be more “special”.

One notable part of the dive was the icy waters that hit us like a brick wall now and then.  It was 19 degC which explained the need for 5mm long wetsuits.

Motorcycle Explorations

We rented a motorbike from our hotel and began our exploration soon after I refreshed myself after my dive.  First up, we headed to the main settlement of Jungut Batu.  From on high, the beach there looked better than ours as it seemed to be a long stretch with fewer boats.  Once there, it didn’t seem as nice as ours; the boats were just as plentiful.

Places to eat along the waterfront weren’t aplenty.  We settled on the only one we found and had a good lunch before heading to south side of Nusa Lembongan where the yellow bridge took us to Nusa Ceningan.

We explored the area on Ceningan on either side of the bridge landing.  The area to the left wasn’t too scenic as the road was more inland.  The area to the right would have been very pretty looking back at Lembongan if the tide had been high.  But during our visit, it was all dry and craggy with lots of a seaweed.

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Kim had some trouble with the motorbike twice during the afternoon.  It didn’t like starting; perhaps the starter motor was playing up.  Locals were friendly and came up to help.  And they know what to do as bikes like these are part of their everyday life.

We didn’t want to end up riding in the evening light so headed back to the hotel where we pre-ordered dinner.  It was cheaper than eating on Mushroom Bay but that wasn’t the reason; we just wanted to patronise them as they had been lovely.

Sunset viewed from the far end of Mushroom Bay with a Bintang Radler was lovely.  We took a detour to the ATM for our third withdrawal of the day before finishing the day with dinner back at the hotel.

I asked at the hotel about the Hindu cemetery that I had seen on the ride.  I had understood that Balinese are normally cremated but was advised that nowadays some are buried.