Tag #35 to #37

Hello there,

After two eventful days, we are back with an update. On the 5th, we continued our journey to Kuta by scooter, which is said to be the most touristy place on Lombok, next to Senggigi. It is known for its good surfing spots. Well, to be honest, we were really disappointed with Kuta. The beaches, which were advertised as beautiful, were often littered and there were stray dogs everywhere (some even accompanied us as you can see in the pictures).

So we simply visited the beaches, and the landscape is really amazing. The highlight was the sunset point, where it seemed like all the tourists from Kuta came. After our stay in Tetebatu, we were really disappointed with how we were ripped off even at the few nice spots.... even during dinner, dozens of children (approximately 4-16 years old) came to our restaurant to sell bracelets. Especially the boys were annoying and persistent if you didn't buy anything. Overall, we were really disappointed because more could be done in the area. Especially, like everywhere in Lombok, the infrastructure is simply lacking, which makes traveling either very expensive or very difficult. Maybe we are just spoiled by Thailand.... at least the starry sky was beautiful.

We also noticed this when we continued our journey the next day because we simply didn't know what else to do in Kuta besides lying on the beach. Jacob had the (in hindsight, 'liquor-infused') idea of spending a night on a deserted island by a campfire on the beach. After some research, we found out that the Gilis in southwest Lombok seemed to be a good option. After a two-hour scooter ride, we reached a kind of harbor (which was also too undeveloped for tourism -> expensive), from there we went to Gili Gede, the largest of the islands. We had read that there is even a fishing village there, well, it was just a few huts by the sea ... we didn't find a supermarket as we had hoped. After consulting, we decided to go to Gili Layar, which was said to be particularly great.

Hmmm well, I'll skip a detailed description at this point, here are just a few points that we had definitely imagined differently:

- The island was huge with ('only') a kilometer in diameter (about 2 hours to walk around... so not a mini-dream island)

- The most beautiful beach and the best reef for snorkeling were right in front of the resort on the island (we thought that these were the only inhabitants here..)

- but: there were definitely more than 100 cows on the island, which along with hundreds of flies and ants made us feel like we weren't alone, even at night.

- and: there were also some natives living on the island with chickens, etc.

So definitely not a relaxed, small island all to ourselves.

Well, at least the reef was somewhat okay, even though it's nothing special here.

Anyway, we grilled a bit and today, after a sleepless night, we drove back to civilization - Lombok doesn't make it easy to have a relaxed vacation.

What annoys us especially now are all the school children, who appear out of nowhere, for example even on Gili Layar (Jacob thinks that the boatman told them that we are here...) and want to have an 'English practice'. Since we had already heard everything dozens of times from the kids in Senggigi (see previous entry), we simply don't feel like having meaningless and annoying conversations anymore. We started pretending to be French and not understanding English, so the local children would ignore us! - so far it's working quite well.

Certainly, a lot has gone wrong in the past two days, Kuta and Gili Layar were simply disappointing. We think that we are just spoiled by the amazing infrastructure of Thailand (supermarkets, buses, good roads, no annoying 'Hello miiiiister, how are you?' everywhere) and the easy and cheap ways to travel. Well, here in Senggigi, at least we have everything we need for daily life.

Jacob wants to try his island adventure alone again later, but this time on a really small and deserted island.

For now, we're taking a break.

Yours, Teri Yaki