Behind the mountains, with the 7 dwarfs, there lies Amed!

People! I've decided not to apologize anymore if I haven't written anything for 100 weeks :D.
In the last few days I've been thinking again and again about the arguments I'll use to justify why I can't bring myself to regularly post a new post online, but: no. I'll start right now with my trip to Amed ;).

Amed is located at the easternmost point of Bali (check the map above). Anka, Charley and I (oh dear, by the way, that's Anka's last trip with us! Then we're going back to Germany) packed our backpacks for one night, saddled the scooters, programmed Google Maps and off we went on the wild ride.

At this point I would like to mention again what a great invention scooters are. I can't say it often enough, I think these means of transport are so great. When you ride a scooter you perceive your surroundings in a completely different way, much more genuinely. The wind blows through your hair, you feel the temperature differences and see colors much more clearly. In fact, we have taken a taxi halfway to Amed three times to get from Padangbai (also in East Bali) by ship to the Gili Islands, but I have never felt the way as much as I did that day. In the car you chatter, look at your mobile phone far too often and get annoyed that the air conditioning is set far too cold. Often you just put your head against the window pane and close your eyes because you feel a little tired.

On the scooter you can neither chat nor look at your cell phone and certainly not close your eyes because of a feeling of tiredness, which is actually only made up anyway. Instead, we often stopped at the side of the road to admire nature. And there it was again, the goosebumps at 30 degrees in the shade.

Amed is right on the sea, but quite hidden behind several mountains. Among other things, also behind Mount Agung, the highest volcano on the island at 3142 meters. On the way there we turned left, drove inland and on the way back along the coast. It's pretty quiet in Amed. Many divers are drawn here because of the beautiful coral and since none of us dive, we borrowed a couple of snorkels on the first day. I really have to summarize the snorkeling story quickly, then you will have something to laugh about :). Since there were three of us, someone always had to stay with our things on the beach. Anka and I went into the water first. Anka then immediately slashed her back and I slashed my foot on a coral. Well, swum on. In fact, there were very nice things to see. Of course we didn't want to deprive Charley of that! So Anka got out of the water and Charley came over. Unfortunately, suddenly everything wasn't so nice anymore because the sun was gone and everything just looked gloomy. And then suddenly an Englishwoman, who was a bit further away, frantically called to us that we should be careful where we are and again and again she called "ihh, ihh, ihh" and swam towards the beach at breakneck speed. Well, and when we then looked around confused, we realized that we were swimming IN THE MIDDLE, really IN THE MIDDLE of about 5 square meters of soaked... well... shit. Oh god we swam like a shark was chasing us. And folks, each of us has gotten some water in our mouth while snorkeling, right? Yes, me too... at least five times. I waited the rest of the day for the onset of a gastrointestinal infection, but thank goodness nothing came.

After we later saw a beautiful sunset in the mountains, we went to a small fish restaurant. It was an evening that I think I will think back to very often. The tables were right on the beach and each table had a small lamp. A tourist couple was sitting at the next table with two Balinese people who made music and sang and when we were done eating we sat down with them. Later an Australian came along and also the owner of the restaurant when all the other guests had left. We drank beer, talked, sang. And even though we wanted to get up at 5 a.m. to see the sunrise and were dead tired, I didn't want to get up from that chair ever again. So we sat there for a few more hours. Among other things, the two boys sang the Indonesian song " Ya Sudalah ", maybe you would like to listen to it, it always reminds me of that evening :).

Of course, despite the long evening, we went down to the beach the next morning to see the sunrise. You shouldn't miss it in Amed. And it was really nice. In such moments I ask myself why I always sleep so long and miss such great moments far too often. Afterwards we borrowed boards and went stand-up paddling for the first time because the sea is so calm here.