Tulamben

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Polly:

We arrived back in Kuala Lumpur on 24th March and checked in to the Tune Hotel at the airport. Tune is one of AirAsia's products, and whilst fairly cheap, is really only comfortable if you are the size of a hobbit. After checking in, Ross caught a bus into town to collect our wedding outfits which had been kindly looked after by George at Alex's Homestay. On the way back Ross paid a visit to the Colonel for some chicken drumsticks and spicy fries, and although they were finger lickin' good, his fingers needed more than licking afterwards. Even after a thorough scrub with soap and water they were tingling, swollen and inflamed. This continued for a few days until the skin started to peel off. I don't know what they put in their spice mix but if it can do that to fingers, god knows what it does to your insides.

The next day we had many hours to kill as our flight to Denpasar, Bali wasn't until the evening, so we bummed around, read our books and ate lots of food!

On the flight we were reading the in-flight magazine and were both drawn to a feature on Bali. We learned that we were arriving on the eve of Nyepi, Balinese New Year aka 'Silent Day'. The following day the whole island was to shut down; no planes, no taxis, no noise - you wouldn't even be allowed out of your hotel! We just kept our fingers crossed that our tentative and unconfirmed hotel reservation still stood as we didn't fancy our chances roaming the streets of a ghost town at 11:30pm.

When we touched down we got off the plane quickly and managed to get pretty near the front of the immigration queue. It was only then that we realised we had to buy a visa! We started our round the world trip as slightly apprehensive and over-cautious travellers, gradually evolving into streetwise, savvy backpackers who know the ropes but, after nearly ten months, I think we've become a bit too laid back and careless. We didn't have any dollars or rupiah on us with which to buy visas so went to enquire about a cash machine. An official looking man took us past immigration to where the cash machines were but these had already been turned off in preparation for Silent Day. Luckily we managed to scramble together various currencies we had left over and changed these outside the airport. The official took us back through customs and baggage reclaim, then sat us in a strange little holding room. He was really helpful and didn't want us to have to queue again so he sorted out our visas (for a small bribe) whilst we sat on a sofa and watched some dodgy Indonesian TV. All very strange! Once sorted, we went back the way we'd just been, got our luggage and went to see if our requested hotel pick-up was there. No one was waiting to collect us so we decided to give them a call. Unfortunately my phone had stopped working at this point so we thought we'd wing it and get a cab to the hotel anyway. We were just about to jump in a taxi when Ross said “Have you got my suit bag?”. I hadn't seen it in ages so Ross made the now familiar route back through the airport, retracing his steps, and found it on top of the x-ray machine. When he walked through customs for the fifth time that hour I was close to hysterics as it was quite possibly the funniest airport experience we have had so far.

When we did eventually get a taxi we had no further hitches, and were really happy when we arrived at our hotel, Sayang Maha Mertha in Legian, and they honoured our booking. It turned out that their internet didn't work so the web booking we'd made hadn't reach them, although they did still have a spare room for us.

At $15, the hotel was pretty decent, and had a nice little pool. The only downside was that we only had a fan and that our bathroom smelt like really pungent garlic poo. The staff were all lovely and put on a special New Year's buffet for the guests. At 6pm the bar shut, all lights were turned off, and we had to keep our voices to a whisper. The Balinese believe that on this sacred night the demons fly over Bali and if they can't see or hear anyone they will pass on and leave the island be. Some of the Aussies and a particularly annoying, loudmouth Texan jock (who believed it was his right to be served more beer) threatened to draw the demons' attention, but thankfully they shut up eventually. We didn't stick around to find out however - we took our candle back to the room, watched Quantum of Solace on the laptop, and had an early night

The following morning we had a stroll around Legian, before returning to our hotel to check out and wait for our transfer up to Tulamben. Julia and Simon, who we had dived with in Sipadan had learned to dive in Tulamben and highly recommended it, so we thought we'd go and spend some time swimming with the fishies. We booked a package online with Tulamben Wreck Divers which included transport to and from Tulamben, two nights accommodation, six dives, and breakfast, all for $230 each. When we got there we were allocated the penthouse suite, which normally costs about $50 a night, so were more than happy with the deal. The place was amazing, and the room was massive with a gorgeous balcony overlooking the pool. It's definitely the poshest place we've stayed in nine months. It even had tea and coffee making facilities, a safe, and an umbrella!

Tulamben itself is a sleepy little village on the northeast coast of Bali. It is set in the most beautiful location with Mount Agung towering behind it and a deserted, black sand and stony beach below. Apart from a small grocery shop and a couple of cafes, there were no tourist shops or activities, and nobody trying to sell you anything or hassle you. There's no ATM, no TV signal, no broadband, and only a dodgy phone line. It's absolutely tranquil. We ate a few meals at Wayan's Restaurant, where they serve great fresh fish, local dishes and some international food.

On our second day we got up really early for a 7am dive. This is one of the best times to dive as the water is calm, the fish are all busy starting their day, and none of the day trippers have arrived from Kuta. We put on our wetsuits, booties and weight belts and walked a couple of minutes down to the beach. The staff carry your tanks and equipment down for you, often on their heads. At the waters edge we got ready and did our buddy checks, much to the amusement of our “divemaster” Nyoman. He thought this was a very unnecessary and time consuming process, but at 30m I'd prefer to know the exact location of my BCD dump valves and be confident that my gauges are accurate. We waddled to the water, donned our masks and fins, then submerged. As we descended we swam about 20m away from the shore until we reached the edge of the USAT Liberty Wreck. The giant vessel used to be a passenger ferry, but was sunk during the Second World War, and did so very conveniently at an accessible diving depth of 5 to 30m. The boat is about 120m long and you can swim all the way round it and through it. Although you are never completely covered by a solid structure there are many beams and struts overhead and around you, all covered in fantastic coral growth and fish. The wreck is home to so many species, all with their little individual habitats, some just using a little room for protection. At 33m we saw four of the recently discovered pygmy seahorses on a sea fan which was really cool. We then looked up to sea a huge school of jacks circling above, shining and reflected the sun's rays. Everywhere you looked there was something interesting; strange coral, giant groupers, blue spotted rays, batfish, triggerfish, thousands of angelfish and butterfly fish. Nyoman pointed to what looked like a small, delicate, transparent leaf then all of a sudden the leaf produced two small fins and swam off. Crazy underwater world...

After our first dive we sat down to the best breakfast ever. We had fruit juice, fruit salad, toast with vegemite, eggs, bacon, sausage, tomato, cornflakes and coffee. Unfortunately, before we'd had time to shovel the last of it into our hungry mouths, Nyoman (aka Mr Impatient) was hurrying us up in order to do our second dive. He told us it was 9.30am already and we had to go, but when we checked our watches it was only 8.45am! He had a slight problem with telling the truth in general.

The next dive was at a site called 'The Drop Off', a wall that stretched down beyond our reach. Again it had loads of weird coral and lots of fish. Nyoman was starting to get on my wick by now though. My mask was really tight and sucking my face out, so he swam up, didn't bother trying to find out the problem, and just yanked it even tighter. He also kept swimming off fast, never bothering to check where we were and at times we lost him completely. He kept banging his tank then motioning for us to hurry up, but we never quite understood what the rush was. When he wasn't banging his tank with his metal stick and looking angry he was prodding various fish, nudibranches and coral. On one particular occasion, he prodded a pygmy seahorse which was sitting on a sea fan and I watched it float lifelessly to the bottom. After the dive he told us that we should hire a camera because he found it boring when guests didn't have a camera, and that the time went really slowly for him. That might explain why he kept surfacing when we still had loads of air left. Ross and I decided to take our time about things, continue with our buddy checks, and pretty much ignore him when he had his underwater strops. We later found out that he wasn't actually a divemaster, which might explain a few things. Anyway, enough of my rant about annoying Nyoman - Tulamben is a fab place and we didn't let him ruin our experience.

We spent the rest of the day chilling by the pool and in the presidential suite before a night dive back at the wreck. Night diving is kind of scary because it's feeding time for the big fish and you can get totally disorientated, but it's quite a cool thing to do. When you cover your flashlight and move your hand through the water you can see the phosphorescent plankton sparkling in front of you. At the end of the dive we got caught in a really strong current, and despite kicking hard I didn't seem to go anywhere, so Ross helped to drag me back to shore.

The next day we decided to have a leisurely morning and breakfast and do our first dive at 9.30am. We took a car up to the next village, Kubu, about ten minutes drive away. It was a lovely dive site and the visibility was about 50m. You can go deep here, but there is a long stretch of reef at about 15m with loads to see. It was a really relaxing dive and I learned to swim like a dolphin.

After lunch we went to 'Coral Garden' where I took my camera and stayed at it's depth limit of 10m. Again the visibility was perfect and because we stayed so shallow, we were down for well over an hour. They've got some artificial structures down there which they run electricity through to speed up and enhance coral growth. They looked a bit funny, but the fish seemed to like them. At the end of the dive a curious little black-tip reef shark came to check us out which was cool. Thankfully Nyoman didn't choose to give him a prod.

We'd had a nice morning, but didn't fancy rushing so we negotiated with the boss to stay an extra night for $20 and do our sixth dive the following morning. We had to move rooms, but our new room was still very nice. We toasted our new room with a Bintang and relaxed for the afternoon.

Our final dive was back at the wreck, and we started at 6.30am. The sun had just come up, and the water was glassy. Within seconds a few giant groupers swam by, and then the fish just kept coming. A group of ten, turquoise-green bumphead parrotfish, each about a metre long, swam past in a row which was awesome. It was a great end to our little diving holiday.

On the way back to the south of Bali we paid a bit extra to see some of the nearby sights. We asked to see Mount Batur, an active volcano to the west of Mount Agung, and some rice paddies, but somehow we ended up at a temple!? We've been dead cultural lately but I do feel totally temple'd out and had no intention of going to another one, but as we were already there we thought we should go in. We had to pay to enter, and then we were told that we had to wear sarongs. I wrapped my sarong around me and Ross used my beach towel, but they wouldn't allow it and tried to make him buy one for 150,000 Rp. Eventually, after much bartering, one of the stall holders rented him one for 5,000 Rp (about 30p). All skirted up, we walked to the entrance of Besakih temple, only to be refused entry unless we hired a guide. Again more bargaining! The temple was very beautiful, and full of decorations to mark the Hindu religious festival of Panca Wali Krama. However, I started getting twitchy after an hour and, as if answering my prayers, the heavens opened and gave us an excuse to leave.

We then drove to a viewpoint where we could see the volcano, Mount Batur, and the clouds parted just at the right moment so we could get a photo. Our driver then said we would go for lunch and took us to a stupidly expensive buffet restaurant. We decided to go with it, and just make sure we ate enough so that we wouldn't need dinner. Ross asked the driver if he was eating, he said he was, and joined us at our table. When the bill came the waiter said we had to pay for our driver's meal too. He wouldn't pay, and we thought it was all a bit out of order so just gave them enough for our two meals and left - you live and learn!

After an hour drive back down through Ubud, we got dropped off in Kuta and went in search of a room...

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