Lombok - a mix of Java and Bali and a little aussie flair

Disclaimer - due to the regrettable and classic trap of 'falling behind' in blogging, I am only now getting caught up on the last couple weeks of July which I spent on the lovely island of Lombok and Gili (just west of Bali).

For my Lombok trip i joined another fantastic Intrepid tour for 8 days. It was sad to leave my first group as after 15 days together we got quite close! But the second group was a fun bunch as well! I had a hilarious and seasoned Australian tour guide who in many ways made the trip - with his strange sense of humour and deep knowledge of Indonesia and southeast Asia. My first guide was Indonesian, and that was fantastic, so naturally I was worried about a foreigner guide...but my worries were soon put to rest.

We circled around the island and visited the paradise-esq Gilis islands. Lombok is around the same size as Bali, and has a massive volcano at its centre. Once again, my stats are pulled from memory and may be horribly off, but it has a 6000m volcano at its centre (aka, that was the island), some 60 000 years ago. It exploded and blew apart the volcano, leaving a huge crator and a baby volcano inside at around 3000m. It was wild to look up and image it being double the size, as its massive today at ~3000m.

On the 4 hour ferry from Bali to Lombok
Lombok is much less densely populated and has a different culture and climate that Bali. The West side is very dry and overall it is much poorer than Bali or Java. I say it was a mix of Bali and Java because it was more conservative than Bali and more Islamic, similar to Java, but also had bits of Hinduism and traditional beliefs woven into their new religion...the old and the new mixed together in a potentially controversial way, yet it appeared to work for them!

We were lucky to arrive on a Sunday, wedding day. Apparently divorce is very common too, and there is an overall very young population, so there were no shortages of weddings! This made for a very slow drive to our first destination, but also incredibly interesting. Here are some shots from a few weddings we saw (and partook it!). The bits that we saw were a parade of people - the bride and women walking solemnly in front (sad because she is leaving her family home); and the groom and the men in the back dancing up a storm, going wild, with huge speakers mounted on a pickup truck and lady-boy dancers fo show.





This old man and woman had such a strange trancy dance going on...and all the while with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, Indonesians are so bad-ass!


Ah. We stayed overnight in a quiet Guest House outside of Tetebatu. From there we took in the beautiful and lush agricultural surroundings in the valleys and rice paddies. In the back you can see Mount Rinjani, and the outline of the carved out interior. I wish we got the chance to hike up it! I found out its a very difficult climb, and would take several days. Next time!

Vanilla!

Rice

Tobacco

Sketchy bamboo bridge

And we ended the day by visiting a lovely waterfall. We came prepared to swim, but the water was absolutely freezing! Thankfully we visit another waterfall that was swimmable...and amazing!

I just can't get enough of that lush green, green, lively jungle!
Stay tuned, ill try and wrap up the July bit of my blog before we hit October!!

Back in real time, I am still at RDI, Mark has arrived (yay!), and I am extending my trip until early December. That way travel to vietnam, thailand and laos, and cambodia, will be more spaced out, and i can properly finish up my work at RDI...as usual, I bit off more than I could chew in 2 months!

Lots of love