Day 13 - Lombok islands

This morning we woke about 7:30, some of the group had gone to the fish market early on but I needed some sleep and didn’t fancy the same smell issue as the last market we attended!

We wandered a whole 10 metres onto the beach after breakfast and waited for our boat to arrive. This was our second boat of the day, as the first one had sunk whilst on its way to us! It was one of the traditional old fishing boats with wooden poles attached on either side for extra balance. It pulled up onto the beach, we all jumped in and we were off for our day of snorkelling.

We went to two snorkelling locations, both of which we saw some amazing coloured fish and coral waving in the sea current.

We stopped off on a sandbank for half an hour which only appears every so often so it was good timing. Right in the middle of nowhere it reminded me a lot of a similar sandbank in Tobago, surrounded by beautiful turquoise water.

Our next stop was another small island for lunch and to spend some time swimming around and sunbathing. I walked around the island which took about 20 minutes and just lolled about enjoying the weather and the scenery. Whilst snorkelling a few of us had been stung by very small jellyfish which just felt like a very quick sting. The area went red but within an hour or two it had disappeared thankfully.

After a picnic lunch of rice (surprise!), cooked chicken, dried salmon fillet and beans we got back on the boat and headed back to base camp. Upon dropping us all off on the beach by driving the boat onto the sand, the driver whilst trying to get over large waves to get the boat back out, blew the engine. There was a loud pop and a bit of smoke, he then dropped anchor to await rescue which we found out didn’t take long but none of us were particularly happy to leave the poor man drifting around!

We had a few hours to kill so most of us grabbed a beanbag, a book and a beer and sat in the garden in the shade for a while.

Dinner consisted of a fish bbq (prawns, red snapper, Octopus) which was cooked on the beach and eaten In the undercover eating area which was good considering that we had our first very light rain of the trip.