Joe comes to visit

Pagi pagi again Boatbloggers®

We’re sorry for the long radio silence, but with one thing and another we have been pretty busy in the last few weeks – more about that in a future edition. We’re actually in Singapore as we write this, which means we’ve put in quite a few sea miles since we last met.

Lombok was one of our favourite places in Indonesia – mainly because Joe came to visit.

Joe has just passed his Advanced PADI diving certificate, so we did a lot of diving while he was here. But it wasn’t all the usual, let’s-go-down-and-see-some-pretty-fishes type of diving – though we did do some of that. 

We helped to rebuild the reef.

You start off by going down and collecting some of the broken coral. Not the pieces that have actually died,  the ones that have just broken off but are still showing signs of life. You bring them up to the surface, and then you concrete them into these weird looking pots that some unsuspecting tourists have been persuaded to make as part of a traditional Indonesian Pottery Class.

Then you take them back down.

And plant them in a sort of underwater fairy grotto.

And in about ten years time this will – hopefully – have turned into a proper coral reef.

The bigger pieces get cable tied on to metal frames called spiders

..and in just a few years time they start looking like this.

Even the turtles can’t tell the difference between the real reef and the artificial one.

But we didn’t spend the whole time underwater. 

We went round the famous backpacker paradise of Gili Aire in a traditional horse and cart.

Which is about the only way to get around. Cars are banned, and the potholes are worse than Brentford.

We met some of the locals.

Yes – before you say anything – we’ve already done the jokes about that’s Ju on the left. Ho ho.

And at the Lombok Wildlife Sanctuary they have some pretty big birds.

The elephant wasn’t camera shy.

How Ju got talked into this he doesn’t know.

But back to the boat.

It’s always good when we have crew come to join us, to help with the sailing and all the boat jobs.

The local village arranged a picnic for us which was nice.

But all too soon, we had to have a farewell toast with Joe as he made his way back to Thailand where he’s now living.

This is called “fun drink.” It’s condensed milk which sinks to the bottom topped with a delicious cherry aid type thing on the top, so it’s definitely fun. And I guess technically it’s drink. Hmmm. I can see why it’s not gone global.

But sadly we had to bid sampa jumpa to Lombok as we headed north to catch up with the rest of the Indonesian rally fleet.

Is that it? No sunsets – Ed)

Ok – one quick sunset.

Cheers

Ju & Lyn