Welcome back devoted readers, adoring fans, disgruntled grammar police. It has been a couple of weeks of hardcore adventuring in the lesser-known island of Flores, so we’re a bit behind on the old blog. However, due to an unfortunate missed flight (oops, my bad) and then a cancelled ferry, we finally have a bit of time on our hands to catch up. The good news is you have some great blogs to look forward to! For now, back to Banyuwangi, the eastern region of big and beautiful Java.

Days 138, 139 & 140 – Red Island Beach

Red Island Beach was our first stop in Banyuwangi. To avoid confusion off the bat, this is a beach, not an island. There is an island off the beach, but it’s not so red to be the obvious reason for the name. It’s a remote spot, and whenever we told people in Bromo where we were heading next they had no idea where it was, in general. It’s a gorgeous golden beach on the South coast; wide, deep and fringed with palm trees. Stands dot the beach, selling fresh coconuts and instant noodles. The ocean is quite fierce here, the waves crashing down angrily throughout the day. It’s not a good place for swimming unless you like getting beaten up, but we’re not here to swim…

We’re here to surf! Or at least try to surf. We booked in a lesson with ‘Big Daddy’s Surf Camp’ and hit the waves. The beauty of Red Island Beach is that it’s a sandy bottom so you don’t have to paddle much and there’s not an awful lot of danger if a wave smacks you against the floor, which it didn’t anyway, thankfully. I took the surfing with some success, surfing a few waves and growing a bit more confident as the lesson progressed. Sadly, Billie didn’t take to it quite as well, and was flummoxed by the very last step in standing up. Bloody hell though did she persevere, and came so frustratingly close so many times. We didn’t think the teacher was all that, either. We had nearly two hours in the water, and that will take it out of you, no doubt about it.

The following day, I had another lesson, but with another chap. Billie sat this one out. This guy was a much better teacher and had me surfing with more success. I was really enjoying it and Billie told me after I actually looked like I was surfing. Pretty cool huh? I did, however, have quite a few rashes on my fingers, knees and forearms. Apparently quite normal for being new to surfing. It wasn’t too bad, but it put me out of contention for surfing again the following day. We spent the day on beach loungers drinking coconuts, reading books and watching the waves pound into the beach relentlessly. The sunsets here were quite the thing to behold.

Emboldened by my stories of the wonderful new teacher, Billie took to the board once again. I was on the lounger this time, watching from afar between chapters in my book. Within 10 minutes, Billie had stood up and surfed a wave! I cheered from a distance and ordered a coconut in celebration. Sadly the trend didn’t continue much as she literally did everything perfectly, from placing her feet to where they needed to be, but couldn’t go from crouch to stand. I truly believe that if she broke through this barrier, she’d be on her way to pro competitions but alas, we shall never know. She came out with significant rashes on her knees, palms and fingers. They were much bigger than mine were and, fairly enough, were the final nail in the coffin of Billie’s surfing career. We will never know what could have been…

‘Twas a lovely stop on our Java tour, and an interesting different flavour of what we’d visited in Indonesia so far. Surfing had mixed results, but was generally an invigorating experiment. There is more to come from me in future blogs…

Day 141 – Banyuwangi

We travelled on to Banyuwangi Town, a few hours away by car. This is where you can get the ferry across to West Bali, which was our plan, but we had an afternoon and then a full day to kill. We hired a scooter from our lovely homestay, with a plan to hit the beach and then find a nice restaurant in town.

We scooted off to the beach, which was fronted by a marina. We found it absolutely packed because… there was a motorbike festival. Thousands of motorbikers were there, walking around ALL dressed in black. There were lots of shiny bikes and there was a lot of revving occurring. We got more than a few puzzled looks as we arrived on our dishevelled 125cc scooter and parked up, determined to find our way to the beach.

Well… we failed. We walked for a while to try and get there, but came opposed to large crowds of men walking in the opposite direction, leaving some part of the festival. Finally deterred, we clambered back aboard our scooty for another beach café some twenty minutes away. It just so happened to be the time where hundreds of others were leaving the festival, so the journey was quite dramatic, and we were part of an enormous convoy of shiny motorbikes through the already fairly perilous journey through the city. Again, we couldn’t have looked more out of place, it was quite hilarious.

Long story short, we made it to a café for a lemonade, but the beach was almost non-existent there. We were able to catch up on some planning for the upcoming days, book some accommodation and plan our ferry trip. Slightly deflated by the day’s offerings, we still managed a lovely dinner in town.

Day 142 – Baluran National Park

We booked a day trip to Baluran National Park, oft dubbed ‘Little Africa’ due to it’s savannah environment. It was a wildlife spotting trip, and we were excited to get going. Our guides picked us up and told us that we would visit the Banyuwangi Market and a Chinese temple first, because the wildlife action didn’t get exciting till closer to sundown. We were happy to be directed and enjoyed him showing us around both sights.

Several hours later, we were driving through the forest, looking out for birds and bigger prizes. We stopped a couple of times when we thought we’d spotted something, though the guide jumped out and slammed the car door each time and whatever we’d seen generally flew / ran away. We did, however, spot the delightful ‘black monkey’ or Ebony Lutung or East Javan Langur. They’re not super easy to see, so it was another great find for us.

Eventually, we arrived into the savannah area. It was seriously beautiful with the sun setting over a distant volcano, romantically lighting a large herd of deer. We stopped and watched them for some time. Cute babies, sparring bucks and delicate does were all enjoying the cool of the afternoon.

We also saw some birds, including the Javan Hawk-Eagle, peacocks and some others. Sadly my pictures are not blog worthy as the light was getting really low at this point, but it was all lovely to see.

Billie, however, was starting to feel… not so good. Incredibly tired, couldn’t keep her eyes open. It was the end of the tour anyway, but she was not happy with how she felt. Bless her, she just made it through the journey home. We sat down for dinner at our homestay and after one mouthful had to run off to the room… she had fallen foul of the dreaded food poisoning. This was not welcome news.

Day 143 – Travel to Bali

I am very impressed with Billie that she made it to Bali. She was not feeling good at all, and it involved several different modes of transportation. She handled it with grace and dignity. We arrived at the most stunning eco-lodge in Bali and we felt that perhaps Billie was over the worst of it and we could enjoy the coming few days here. Unfortunately, ‘twas not to be. As night fell, I too felt a deep tiredness, and with mounting dread, so a fever developed along with untoward bowel movements.

And this is the perfect moment for a cliffhanger to end the blog. The tension is rising and the jeopardy is very much real, if a bit off-putting. Our next Bali Blog will mostly be a picture blog, as we were sick as dogs for much of it. But fear not, after that you’re in for a big underwater blog including an Ambient Travel Vid. Watch this space!