Escape to Gili Air

By Monday morning, I was well ready to go. As much as I loved the family and enjoyed spending time with them, thingswerent very comfortable with the other girls and I could just see my holiday in a wonderful new place getting wasted by the pool in a garden. So instead I moved on and met up with Jess K and not a single regret! Reza's dad insisted on us getting up at 5am to make the trip, I was heading to Senggigi to meet Jess then onto Gili Air (maybe Water Island, dont knwo if it has a translation), while Jess S and Amy, with Reza were heading to Gili Trawangan, another island a little bigger. Reza and his dad were great, helped me up this little laneway with my suitcase to jess' hotel lol then headed off up the coast to the ferry terminal. It was great to catch up with Jess K, shed been in Senggigi the last couple of days by herself and had a great (and cheap!) room. We had a walk along the beach and had pineapple pancakes for breakfast, with great Lombok coffee, then went down to the travel office in Senggigi. Although public boats go from Bangsal, further up the coast, its a notoriously bad port for cons and harrassment unless you have an indonesian accompanying you, so we decided to pay a little extra, get a direct boat to Gili Air, and avoid the hassle. It was quite funny- I didnt expect the boat to be pulled up on the beach and that id have to wade out in knee deep water to throw my suitcase into the boat! There were about ten other people, and all of us and our luggage fitted into this 10m boat, like a big canoe with a motor... There are three islands in a row, Gili Trawangan (the party island), Gili Meno (the quiet island) and Gili Air (somewhere in the middle), and we were recommended Air by a friend so decided to start there. We dropped everyone else off at Trawangan then continued to Air- if i was worried about there being lots of people in the boat to start with and it getting rocky, I shouldve been grateful! With only four of us going to Air, it was crazy! We were dripping wet by the time we pulled up on the beach and jumped out into the water... We got a cidomo (a horse drawn cart) to our hotel, the Sunrise Cottages. We took a lovely bungalow with a wondeful day bed, table and bathroom downstairs, and a balcony and mozzie-netted bed upstairs with views to the water, but as it was still being cleaned, we had no choice (sigh) but to sit in one fo the little huts by the beach to wait... lol and have a great fruit juice... mmm. Such a nice island! We went for a little walk, there were a string of hotels further up the coast and the whole beach was flanked by these huts where you could sit in the shade and enjoy the view or lunch. It was pretty quiet too, peaceful :) We had lunch and a rest then went snorkeling- I cant believe Ive never been snorkeling before! Its amazing- there were so many fish! Really relaxing, just swimming around watching them. My favourites were the electric blue ones, but there were quite a few beautiful rainbow ones... hundreds! It was strange, when a school of fish came along, I could hear them talking, it was like a high-pitched ticking filled the water til they passed, strange! One woman was feeding them, I put my hand out once and a fish almost touched me- and I almost had a heart attack! After a couple of hours the tide came in so we had to get out and just lie on the beach. Sigh... lol it was lovely.On Tuesday morning, we had breakfast in the huts again, a huge serving of pancakes, fruit salad and coffee- v generous for a free breakfast! We walked around the perimeter of the island, past all the hotels and to more deserted parts where people and fishermen lived. It only took about an hour lol, then we had a swim with some jellyfish and a relax. The boat back to Gili Trawangan in the afternoon was a bit more eventful... it was a charter, bigger boat by a few metres than the one wed come in and a bit less sturdy... we got v wet, v thrown around and the guy running it was bailing out water.. bit scary especially as the indo girl next to me was being all silly and overreacting, going on about throwing up and things. But we arrived, another jump into the water to disembark, and Jess went to check on our hotel while I looked after the bags and wrung out my sarong.