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Published: November 8th 2010
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Discovering Lumba-lumba Diving
Well as for travel blogs go this one isn’t a very adventurous one, as first I arrived here ill nd healing nd secondly because I am rather exhausted of a hard year off ill health and hard labour, so as my hosts are in charge, I have been allowed to do little but rest!
Which is not a complaint but well the opposite, Roel and Juud the Owners of Lumba-Lumba diving in Manado, have built this resort from scratch, each plant, bungalow, stone, electric cable or piece of wood has been deliberately placed to ensure that this place brings to their customers what they would like to receive where they to be guests at such a resort, which means that it is almost spotless in the running, looks and service provided. I am just amazed at how 2 people could out of a forest hill in Indonesia create something so special.
Obviously I am bious as they are friends of mine, but when I listen to the feed back of other guests I can hear how delighted people are! But that on the other hand is contradicting in itself as well, as they are my
friends and therefore stop me from going wild as I would normally do when I travel and are keeping me relaxing, doing nothing much and healing further…I should make a complaint…Hahaha
So for the first 3 days I did nothing but lay at the pool, soak up the ambience, look at the beautiful plants and sleep a lot, missing breakfast every day, not diving as Roel wants me to be in better lung function before he lets me go down, (I have been suffering of a bad cough for months) which finally happened today.
It is the rainy season, which means we’re having daily storms, some times short and heavy but today longer and heavier, the heavens broke down and the place showed the mastership of the builder (ROEL) again as the gutters where able to deal on such a steep hills with the vast amounts of water pouring down, the sea became brown with the mud coming down the hills.
After 3 days of doing nothing much, this afternoon after the downpour, I set of to discover the village next door, Makupa, nothing much interesting to note, other than it is the average Christian Indonesia village,
tiny but I counted 4 churches in the place! Mostly catholic I believe?
I walked up and down the wet roads, where friendly people said hi, nd as ever in this countries children asking your name and where you’re from, but in a good mannered way, I ended up finding a small road going into the forest and hills, next to a grave yard nd took a picture of a beautiful butterfly, the skies where covering the hill tops in mist and it just looked magical, I also found a bunch of men nervously looking at me whilst burning and chopping wood, which unnerved me a bit as it felt as they were doing something they were not meant to be doing, and the sliced pieces of logged wood where being taken away whilst no friendly greeting was exchanged, but as Roel later told me, this kind of logging is not the harmful type such as in Sumatra and Borneo…
I returned to the harbour built by Roel, where we chatted for a bit before he told me to get kitted out to go for a dive off the site, which I nervously did, as I haven't had
a dive in 2 years and after severe illnesses and blood problems I was weary of how my body would react to going back to the underwater world…I must say I hesitantly and quiet panicky just followed orders and got on with it as ever…within 5 minutes I was back in control and enjoying this fabulous pass-time/sport that is scuba diving.
Roel kept an eye on me at all times, I precariously followed, nd teased him underwater for picking up what I thought was something marine which turned out to be a paper of a chocolate bar, to which in underwater/Italian language told me…ma vai!!!! Nd showed me what it was, it made me giggle underwater.
I still remained with little cough, had 2 little bouts, whilst underwater and I didn’t panic, so all is good and I feel ready to confront the currents of this area tomorrow! Thank Juud and Roel, for making sure that I didn’t get into it too quickly and making sure I was safe at all times!
After the dive we put the gear away and we spoke as ever of saving the choral of this area, about awareness of diving and
its impact and ecologically maintaining a quality resort which these two people excel at!!!
Then I moved on to giving tips on the cooking, as ever with my professional/critical eye and trying to help, giving my feed back friendlily as to help improve, but indeed Roel explained the issues I raised making sense of them, for which I think I should abstain from commenting any further and letting them run the show as they have for 10 years very successfully, gaining momentum especially this year, which I am really happy to realise and have the chance to see before my travelling days are over, with the wish to be able to return regularly as they are lovely people and I am sure my friends back home would love to share this experience with me in the future…obviously as paying guests, as it is a small resort nd they need to earn a living as everyone else does…
Lumbalumba is a far better surprise than I expected, and am delighted to be here visiting an old friend and his wife whilst discovering the hard work he has put into creating their own livelihood!
Chapeaux mes amis!
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