Blogs from Flores, Indonesia, Asia - page 18

with money burning a whole in my pocket and the the boredom of producing endless bottles of lucozade day and night for months i booked a one-way ticket to indonesia with a rule in mind, that any return journey must be overland and flying for any reason was out of the question. accompanied by lottie for one month, we had a basic 5 island route, bali to lombok, lombok to sumbawa, sumbawa to flores, flores to komodo and then back to bali. in between shopping for souvenirs, finding restaurants where we could get 3 square meals a day for less than $2, we saw the sights, everything from hindu temples to waterfalls, cramming everything in, and all around daily visits to the beach. after some tough persuasion i managed to talk lottie into a 3 day ... read more

Wong again Everywhere we turn, everyone we ask gives us conflicting information. On purpose? Flores has no Dragons. Spirits were low. Lambanbajo, a one-road dump of a village, whose only beach we renamed Syringe Beach, was dragging us down. Jack had been served a rotten tenderloin steak and although he'd noticed and stopped eating half-way through was caught by a 24hour, gut-wrenching case of food poisoning, meaning he spent most of the night pebble-dashing the porcelain squat toilet. We shared a twin room. The toilet door didn't close never mind lock. I was woken constantly by his groans and the stench burning in my nostrils; an imaginary green fog enveloping the dim room. It wasn't pleasant. Doctor down. ..... The next day, after much bargining with Indo-Jack, our hotel worker-cum-travel-agent, we managed to get a pretty ... read more

Think it's a Sunday, but it's hard to tell, days just haven't meant anything to me for so many months. After my travels in Ubud and Kintamani I got the bus and ferry over to Gilli Trawangan (165,000 3hours). It was a long and hasslefull travel where the standard tourists tricks were played on us laden-down and exhausted travellers: busses would stop for no apparent reason at ports and terminals where you'd be shepparded into restaurants and cafes, given menus and expected to eat, eat, eat while tens of street vendors attempted to emotionally blackmail you to buy, buy, buy their tat, tat, tat or they'd drop you somewhere you thought was your final destination - the place you'd paid all inclusive to get to, then expect you to pay their mates to take you 400yards ... read more

We have just spent a couple of days in a tiny village called Moni at the base of Kelimutu volcano. It has no internet, one phone and about 30 houses in total. It was a beautiful place to spend a couple of days. We chilled out in a fancy bungalow with a view over some mountains. To make the most of Kelimutu we went up it on the back of scooters at 4am to see the sunrise. It was truly spectacular (again, photos still to come sorry). We could see for miles out over other volcanoes rising out of the sea. Kelimutu has three crater lakes, all different colours because of the chemicals in the rock. One was turquoise, one black and a third one was meant to be white. Unfortunately when we were there it ... read more

During my days in Ende I got to know a bit more about the religious conflict between the islamic majority and other religious groups. About 88% of the Indonesian people are muslims. About 8% are christian and 3% are buddhist or hindu. The center of the islamic society is Java where most of the Indonesian people live. Flores in contrast is 95% catholic with only a small islamic minority. In Ende I visited the local church during a christening procedure for 69! children. Afterwards I had the opportunity to talk to a local journalist. He said that the christian community was very affraid of a bomb attack on the upcoming christmas, the church full of people being an easy target. There had not been any problems with the local islamic minority but for several years already ... read more