More Gili & Bali September 29 2008

Heaven, I'm in heaven, da da da da da dahhh. Ah, show tunes, something for every occasion!! We have just left Lovina on the north coast of Bali which is truly cruisers' heaven. When Rose and I walked around I kept saying I'm never leaving!!! Boat boys for $1.50/day to take garbage, run errands and haul the dinghy in and out of the water, $1.50 LARGE beers, $3 Jack Daniels, full meals for 4 for $25--inc. cocktails; $6 massages. BUT, more on this later. We left you in Benoa on the South side of Bali just after Rose's arrival.Joe and Olivia returned from the wedding in Singapore and loved it there. They plan to depart the boat there and seek gainful employment. Why two basically broke people would pick one of the most expensive places in the world to live is beyond me, but it will be nice to have the boat back to myself and Rose. The good news is they were able to find such American necessities such as Velveeta cheese and A1 Sauce and brought some back--at my expense, of course. Have to admit Joey was thoughtful and generous enough to buy me a bottle of duty free JD.They arived back on the 5th of September but we didn't get out of there until the 11th waiting to clear a watermaker pump in from customs. I had received a box of mail and a bit of "stuff" from Lizzie through FedEx and it cost me about $35 to clear in a $50 declared value. Well the pump was $1,200 and I wasn't about to pay the same percentage ($700) on that. Indonesia, it seems, doesn't have a "yacht in transit" exclusion like the rest of the world. Fortunately, DHL called first, unlike FedEx, and didn't just automatically accept the customs duty. Anyway, what with the language barrier and island time here, it took 2 weeks to get the package out of customs and $100 more to a clearing agent. AND, guess what? Wrong pump!!! All is now well, however--knock on wood--as that was a spare anyway, and the company is sending the proper one to their Singapore agent for us with another watermaker part we do desperately need. I was able to get my new table top--solid teak. 3/4" thick for $90!!! Installed and finished it. Looks great, but between that and the stop gap in OZ, we've got about $1,000 into that new table. Okay, that's what solid teak would have cost me in Oz anyway.After clearing the pump, we're outta there to head back to )what we then believed was paradise, since we hadn't yet experienced Lovina) Gili Air (which I'm sure you all recall from our last letter!!??). Because of the huge, permanent southbound current, one of the guys told us the best way to go was to sail 12 miles to Lemborgan, a resort island off Benoa and leave there the next day on the ebb tide. This minimizes the current and it worked. We averaged about 7 knots on the trip north. We didn't go ashore at Lemborgan, but it was interesting watching the mini cruise ships pull in and attach to their private barges which were like a floating "Water World" complete with water slides and swimming pools.So, off we went to Gili Air with much anticipation, but we found it too crowded with other rally boats to anchor there. Oh, did we mention that the "Around the World Rally" pulled into Benoa as we were leaving? Saw a few more of them going down the channel. It's a big bucks 14 month deal and they really hold the peoples' hands. I guess you get what you pay for, as our rally certainly isn't so caring!!! Anyway, we scooted over the mile or two to Lombok where the official rally stuff was going on with the intention to sneak back over to Gili when boats started leaving. Couldn't find a place there either, but our friends on Scot Free II finally took pity and called to ask if we wanted to raft up to them for the night. Found a spot of our own the next day, but it was really nice of those guys to help us out. We did take a nice tour for $40 for all day with a guide and air conditioned car to the nearby town of Mataram, weaving and woodcarving places and a stop in the mountains to see and feed the almost tame monkeys. As with each stop, there was an official dinner, this time at the local country club. Should be good, right? Wrong!! Joe and Olivia wisely opted out of the 15 minute ride over for the dinner. Even keeping in mind that it was Ramadan, this was the worst. We had to get there about 4:30pm--about the peak of daily heat, and there was no shade. The venue was on the country club grounds but was just woven mats on the ground. We listened to speeches starting at 5, got a bit of water (no booze or even beer as it was Ramadan and a Moslem island), then "dinner" at 6:30 consisting of rice, fried bananas and some ground up something with chickpeas. Unanimously considered the worst event by far by everyone!!The next day, I think, we took off for Gili Air. It looked as though we were going to have to go elsewhere again but a guy, as we were driving around, tipped us off to a sunken mooring off the small wharf there. Luckily, we found it and spent the next few days there, getting massages, shopping and eating out. We've found in Indonesia, it is so cheap to go out, it makes no sense eating our expensive ships stores. Anyway, very meaningfully, the captain passed his tenth anniversary of living on the boat. Yes folks, hard to believe, but it was September 15, 1998 that Tammy and I flew to Capetown and spent our first night on Rendezvous Cay.Luckily, for some reason which escapes me now, we decided to leave Gili the next day for Lovina, about 70 miles away. Good thing we did as I was already nervous about the mooring so close to the concrete wharf and, apparently, the wind came up and several boats dragged their moorings and one even broke loose and went aground (fortunately it was on the rising tide and locals were able to pull him off) Yes, I'd rather be lucky than good!!! We took off with nice wind and were really moving along across the channel until we hit the north coast of Bali and lost our wind in the lee of the island. Nothing new, we've been motoring alot and expected to.We arrived in Lovina late afternoon, and it was a big anchorage with good holding in a sand bottom. There were probably 30 boats already there including many of the old faces. At the peak there must have been 80 boats. Anyway, as I said, everything was great about the place. Even laundry was cheap. The official dinner here was at a real restaurant, and, because Bali is 80% Hindu, we were able to get beer and wine and had a really nice sit-down dinner including suckling pig!!! Every night there has been some sort of traditional entertainment on the beach. Last night someone on the VHF announced that Robin Gibbs of the BeeGees was going to be playing at one of the bars. The old farts on Rendezvous decided to take a pass as the 9 pm start time was way to close to bed time. The younger crew,I don't think, even know who the BeeGees were!!?? Neither did they attend.Since we really didn't do any touring in Benoa, Rose and I decided to hire a car and driver--$35/day--to go to Ubud, the arts and crafts center of Bali, and on down to Serengan just north of Benoa where I needed to get some exhaust hose. Yes, Lovina wasn't quite heaven as the starboard side exhaust hose developed a leak. Now I just know you're dying to hear about this so I'm going to elaborate. This is big wire reinforced, fire proof 4 inch diameter hose through which goes exhaust gases and cooling water. Apparently when it curves like ours, the abrasive exhaust gases wear away the lining of the hose exposing the wires which rust, spring apart and poke holes in the hose. This is not good!!! So the only place on the island to get new hose is back down where we just were. The only problem is the guys couldn't find the stuff in Bali for less that $120/meter about double the US retail price. To make a long story short, he was going to try to source it in Jakarta so I left the hose to make sure we got the right thing. Well the guy on Java wanted him to take 40 meters of the stuff so we ended up paying the $120 plus a $20 handling charge plus a $20 delivery charge and the stuff was no good--wouldn't bend without kinking. So, with the advice of some friends we bypassed the water lock and used the hose remaining down there. We just have to keep an eye on it when the engine is off so water does not siphon back into the engine.So, Rose and I had a great time in Ubud. there's a shop 'til you drop crafts market as well as a million stores and we bought all sorts of junk from a cylinder with a spring on it that makes the sound of thunder to carved boxes to leather "shadow" puppets. We found a hotel for $40/night, got the best massage I've had in years if not the best ever (sorry Oleg) and had a great dinner out. We even found a Mojito happy hour place with the real thing for 2 for $5 until 7. The next day we had our included breakfast, and Rose was back at the market buying more stuff, then we piled into the car to check out the silver district and head down to Serengan (which I already covered although we did run into several more rally folks down there and had a nice chat). Koman, our driver, used to be a silversmith so Rose wanted him to show us the ropes. First we went to a high end place with amazing and expensive stuff. Hah, that's not us. Off we go down a bunch of back streets to a place that sells sterling by weight. Yeah, Rose bought a bunch. Really nice chain and some other gifty stuff. Next stop was to get some babi guling which is a local dish consisting of all parts of roast suckling pig. The pork part was okay, but the rest was pretty disgusting like blood sausage. Rose was enthused, the captain was not. A nice scenic drive got us back through the mountains to Lovina. One town on the way actually charged to go through it and at the public toilet, a little kid kept yelling "you pay me". Cost $.20 to take a leak. the area is quite well known for its scenery as well as its aggressive residents!!!Well, it's now 5:30 am on the 29th, and, as usual, I'm writing on the late watch. We're on our way to Kumai, but let me finish first with Lovina. Shopping there was also great, and we got a bunch of clothes--Hawaiian shirts for $7, etc. Found a place with JD for only $30 and local spirits could be had for $7 liter--not bad either. All is not perfect. Besides the exhaust hose, we have a leak in the dinghy somewhere and just can't find it. Unfortunately, this had dire consequences and my worst dinghy nightmares were realized. Joey and I had the thing hauled up hanging by the main halyard to soap it down to look for the leak. Bang, the shackle opened up, the side of the dinghy hit the back deck and there it was upside down in the water!! Shit. Fire drill to get it up. Hosed it down with fresh water and ran it for at least 45 minutes. Okay, maybe we got lucky. Nah. On the way in later that morning, it stopped running and wouldn't start; the boat boys couldn't find a mechanic; we're screwed. Nope. Scot Free once again saved the day and introduced us to one of the local fixers. I figured water got in the fuel and was right as captains must always be. Anyway, he found a guy who took off the carb, cleaned it, got new fuel, changed the plugs and fuel filters--all for $35. Joey insists it runs better now than in months!!!So right now we're almost to Bawean island about half way to the Kumai river on Borneo. We'll stop a day or two before completing this leg. At Kumai, we'll hire a small river boat and do an overnight trip African Queen style up the river to the orangutan conservation area. Looking forward to that and then we're off to the final Indonesian venue and check out at Belitung on the way to Singapore. Will report on all that next time.CheersTim, Rose, Joe & Olivia