Saturday Sept 16

Boarding day - we spent our last morning in Bali doing a final beach walk followed by showers and a late lunch at Gado Gado. We had booked a car & driver for 2pm through our hotel which only showed up when the concierge flagged one from the depot next door. The 30-40 minute drive to the port where we were to board at 3pm took a bit longer as our driver got lost - Dieter saved the day with one of the trekking apps on his phone. Anyway we made it in plenty of time - we boarded, had a glass of bubbles (FC and cocktails seem to cost extra here) - we settled into our cabin and unpacked. Unfortunately I had developed a sore throat and was not 100% but in true trooper style I soldiered on.

We had a briefing and happy hour then dinner - all excellent. We started meeting some of the other guests who, to our great surprise, were nearly all South American (Chile, Peru, Brazil and Mexico) some of whom were on travel agent freebies. The exceptions were ourselves, a dutch couple, a German couple (with their 19 YO son) and a HK Chinese couple. Nearly all the South Americans spoke passable to excellent English.

Sunday Sept 17

Disaster - I hardly slept as I had a raging sore throat - at 5am Dieter decides to call the bridge at 6am and tell them I might have covid - they sent a couple of RAT tests and a thermometer. Good news - negative - bad news - I still felt very poorly. Nevertheless we had brekkie and did the first snorkel - which was excellent.

After lunch there was a land tour to village with a walk and swimming at a waterfall - I decided to give it a miss and spent the afternoon trying to rest. When Dieter returned (close to 5pm) he said I did not miss much and had made the right decision to stay back - it was very hot with a steep rough walk.

I made it to happy hour and dinner - then off to bed early. In fact dinner is at 7pm and by about 8:15 or 8:30pm - almost everyone retires to their cabin - no night clubbing here. Some of the South Americans are a group of 6 fairly young guys (say 30ish) - perhaps they stay up later - not sure when the bar closes.

Of course everyone wanted to get to bed early as the daily briefing had advised that swimming with the whale sharks would commence at 5:30am.

unday Sept 17

Disaster - I hardly slept as I had a raging sore throat - at 5am Dieter decides to call the bridge at 6am and tell them I might have covid - they sent a couple of RAT tests and a thermometer. Good news - negative - bad news - I still felt very poorly. Nevertheless we had brekkie and did the first snorkel - which was excellent.

After lunch there was a land tour to village with a walk and swimming at a waterfall - I decided to give it a miss and spent the afternoon trying to rest. When Dieter returned (close to 5pm) he said I did not miss much and had made the right decision to stay back - it was very hot with a steep rough walk.

I made it to happy hour and dinner - then off to bed early. In fact dinner is at 7pm and by about 8:15 or 8:30pm - almost everyone retires to their cabin - no night clubbing here. Some of the South Americans are a group of 6 fairly young guys (say 30ish) - perhaps they stay up later - not sure when the bar closes.

Of course everyone wanted to get to bed early as the daily briefing had advised that swimming with the whale sharks would commence at 5:30am.

Sunday Sept 17

Disaster - I hardly slept as I had a raging sore throat - at 5am Dieter decided to call the bridge at 6am and tell them I might have covid - they sent a couple of RAT tests and a thermometer. Good news - negative - bad news - I still felt very poorly. Nevertheless we had brekkie and did the first snorkel - which was excellent.

After lunch there was a land tour to a village with a walk and swimming at a waterfall - I decided to give it a miss and spent the afternoon trying to rest. When Dieter returned (close to 5pm), he said I did not miss much and had made the right decision to stay back - it was very hot with a steep rough walk.

I made it to happy hour and dinner - then off to bed early. In fact dinner is at 7pm and by about 8:15 or 8:30pm - almost everyone retires to their cabin - no night clubbing here. Some of the South Americans are a group of 6 fairly young guys (say 30ish) - perhaps they stay up later - not sure when the bar closes.

Of course everyone wanted to get to bed early as the daily briefing had advised that swimming with the whale sharks would commence at 5:30am.

Monday Sept 18

Another disaster - I was awake from 3am feeling really really sick - I had to give the whale sharking a miss. So Dieter went off at 5:30am while I tried to get a bit more rest - not easy with a raging sore throat and now a splitting head ache.

I started to very slowly improve - managed a bit of breakfast - a movie and a whale shark presentation then lunch. At 2pm we did a snorkelling trip - very good perhaps not as good visibility as the first day. The back to boat for a short break and finally kayaking in the late afternoon. The kayaking was in a volcanic crater lake - however it was not particularly scenic. We were in the second group - when we arrived at the lake the first group was just paddling in - as they arrived they all commented on how difficult it was !! and these were the “young guys” - ha ha we showed them, Dieter and I managed the paddle with no issues - all other members of our second group chickened out and spent the time wandering around the island - a local ranger kept an eye on them due the danger ??? of snakes.

Back on the boat it was a quick shower then happy hour before the daily briefing then dinner.

Dinner was again excellent - we sat with our Dutch friend (Anthony and Sylvia) and 2 ladies from Santiago, Chile (Veronica and Karen)

Tuesday Sept 19