Hi All,
The Gili Islands are three tiny islands off the coast of Lombok in Indonesia. Picture tropical paradise and you have the Gilis; beautiful islands fringed with white sand, surrounded by crystal clear waters. We chose to spend two days on each, starting on Gili Trawangan (the ‘party island’) before moving onto Gili Meno (the ‘honeymoon island’) and finishing on Gili Air, a perfect combination of the two.
Gili Trawangan
We disembarked from the boat and stepped straight onto a white sandy beach. Despite being dubbed the ‘party island’ it was incredibly peaceful when compared to Bali. The island which does not permit cars or motorbikes is instead served by horse and cart so it felt like we had stepped back in time. We found the ‘strip’ of restaurants and bars were not the crazy affair of Thailand but a more relaxed atmosphere and one that you could easily escape from when walking a couple of hundred metres to the perfect beach spot. There were some small waves on the southern tip of the island that Ross thought may be good for surfing but decided better of it after noticing the expanse of sharp coral in the shallow waters!
We had the most incredible afternoon snorkelling just off the northeastern shore at ‘turtle point’. We were lucky enough to see 3 or 4 huge green turtles each time we went in for a swim! Watching these wonderful animals swim to the surface to breathe air then dive back down to resume grazing along the bottom was truly spectacular.
Gili Meno
Our aim for our first day on this tiny island was to walk its entire circumference, a mere 5km. Needless to say, it was a beautiful walk along the beach and through the palm tree lined footpaths. It was much quieter than Gili T and had a more quiet feel. We noticed how the sand changed as we walked round, turning from powdery white at the southern tip to sharper coral pieces in the north. We took cue from this and broke up our walk with a spot of snorkelling over the coral reef. The most intriguing thing was seeing the art sculpture of 48 people that has been sunk to the floor of the ocean. Swimming towards it and seeing it loom into view was a somewhat eerie experience. It was pretty cool to swim through the sculpture and examine the faces underwater.
Our underwater photography continued the following day (the camera decided to play game - unlike yesterday!) as we put our scuba diving certification to use on two fun dives. It was amazing to be immersed so fully in the underwater world. On our first dive we were on the look out for reef sharks but unfortunately didn’t spot any. We did see an incredible array of coral and tropical fish with fantastic visibility of 20m. On the second dive we saw at least 10 green turtles! Actually swimming underneath them was truly magical. What we thought was a once in a lifetime experience when we first saw them in Sri Lanka has now become a monthly occurrence! The reef was shaped in a pinnacle so we circled the steep coral slope in awe of all the incredible marine life, passing an open mouthed moray eel on route. As we began to ascend for our safety stop, we even got a fleeting glimpse of an octopus.
Gili Air
Although Gili Meno was our favourite of the three islands, we were immediately taken with the quirky cafes and low key beach side bars on Gili Air. We stayed at a guest house right on the beach which was perfect for a lazy day doing nothing but reading. Ross of course could not sit still for long so set off in pursuit of finding a company to go spear fishing with. Having found he could hold his breath for a considerable amount of time when snorkelling, he wanted to see if he could master the tricky skill of loading a 6ft wooden spear gun under the water to ultimately catch some fish. He came up trumps, returning with four different fish! It was definitely the most physically challenging type of fishing but rewarding to have put in so much effort to produce the delicious BBQ we had that evening.
Our last day in the Gilis was spent back in the depths of the turquoise waters. We went out on two more dives. On the first we extremely excited to see three white tip reef sharks hiding in a small cave. Our sightings also included: a cuttlefish, leopard moray eel, mantis shrimp and a whole aquarium of fish! On our second we were lucky enough to see yet another pair of turtles, scorpion fish and puffer fish amongst many others! Learning to dive is for sure one of the best decisions we have made while travelling; after each dive we are eager to jump back in, literally!
We are now heading on a 4 day boat trip to the island of Flores. We are sleeping on deck with 20 others so don’t expect the luxury that we had on our last sleeper boat in Borneo but do hope to see some Komodo dragons on route!
Love R and D xxx
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