Sanur, Bali, and the countdown begins

Reaching Bali has always been the last major part of our trip.   One item that we did not fully realize is that while we started in northern Asia during the prime, dry & cool season, we were now in Bali, south of the equator, during their non-prime, wet & hot season.  But, with our feet in the warm Bali sand, the last two weeks of our trip are ticking away.  There is no time to waste! 

Bali is easy!  Everyone speaks English, except for some of the Aussies, but even in the off season it seems very hectic to us.  The roads are extremely narrow and were never meant for this type of traffic.  When we mention this to locals they shrug and say that “this isn’t bad.”

We booked a scuba trip to a sunken ship off the northeast coast of Bali.  Being that Terri and I haven’t done much diving lately (5 years?) the “live” boat dives were out of the question.  We were relegated to two shore dives on the ship USS Liberty, torpedoed by the Japaneese in 1942.  We were also looking forward to the 2 hour drive up the coast just for some sightseeing along the countryside.  

The ship was in shallow water up to about 110′ feet deep with corals and sponges growing all around and through it. After walking over large rocks, carrying our tanks and weight belts, the beauty and ease of the dive was remarkable. The visibility was good by our standards, maybe 60-80 feet and the animal life was abundant.  We saw turtles, eels, a barracuda, nudibranches and many beautiful fish.  I learned after the first dive that Terri was somewhat apprehensive but was soon at ease with all of the visual distractions.   We both used up our tanks about equally fast which is unusual.  The second dive was shallower, less than 50′ max, and I was able to take my camera for some “action” shots. Unfortunately, we didn’t see the the meadow of garden eels on the second dive.  

Back in Sanur, I had found a local dude that rented SUPs (Stand Up Paddleboards) and tried to talk Terri into a SUP surf lesson in the waves.  She has flat-water paddled before and enjoyed it so this seemed like the perfect idea to me.  Instead, she booked a day of “pampering” at a local spa and I booked the SUP for the morning to try out the Bali waves.  Neither of us were disappointed, Terri returned refreshed and happy, I returned exhausted and happy.  SUPing can be tiring especially when you have to paddle for 20 minutes just to get to the waves on the outer reef.  I thought I was doing good in looking for the spot where I left the the beach: got it-look for the 5 blue beach umbrellas. 

I had reached the outer reef and SUPed a couple of fun waves when this sea snake pops up a few feet away from me…yikes!  He’s mellow, hangs out for only a short time and then dives back down.  It was a little unnerving as sea snakes, although not aggressive, are very venemous.  It was soon after the sea snake encounter that I lost my sunglasses in the surf, my first thought was to dive down and look for them, my second thought was that I was an idiot for having the first thought knowing that there are sea snakes out here!  Alas, I donated yet another pair of sunglasses to King Neptune.

I SUPed in the waves for about 90 minutes and had worked my way down the reef when I decided to head back to the beach….hmmm where are those beach umbrellas?  When I left there were only the 5 umbrellas, now with midday approaching, the beach was lined with them! Crap!

Tired, hot and thirsty after SUPing for over 2 hours in the Bali heat and sun, I took my best guess and headed to the nearest point.  I only missed my landing spot by a few hundred yards, great-just great.

I finally made it back to where Terri was being pampered and since her pampering included our driver I had to slum-it by the spa pool until she was done.

SUP specs:  (for my 2 friends that would care) Jimmy Lewis Kwad 9’11″x32″ quad fin 175 liters swallow tail