We only spent one day
on Karimunjawa but it has the lure that tempts you to stay forever.
It is a group of 27 islands, of which only 5 are populated. The
entirety of the cluster is protected as a National Park and
rightfully so. It is post card beautiful.
We took the dinghy to
land a bit before noon to explore and hopefully find lunch. Lunch
proved more challenging than we expected because the whole of the
island only has power after 5:30 pm. As a result most of the shops
were closed or the owners were found leisurely napping behind their
counters, waiting for the midday’s heat to lift.
There was one beach
front “warung” open so we settled into a table in the shade were
we heard a familiar accent. At the table next to us we met two
American girls who had been on the island a few days and were
somewhat stranded. There is typically a fast boat that travels to
Semarang daily but due to rough seas had been delayed at least three
more days.
After lunch our new
friends, Kaitlin and Rhiannon took us a picturesque “secret”
beach, which ended up being a private beach at stunning resort. The
caretakers of the hotel were incredibly nice however and let us spend
the day, even giving us a tour of the hotel. We were incredibly
tempted to rent a bungalow for the night but at almost $70 USD in a
country where most rooms go for $10 a night we had to pass.
By nightfall when we
were heading back to the boat both Kaitlin and Rhiannon had decided
to join our crew. Kaitlin needing to get back to mainland to fly home
to Minnesota and Rhiannon to renew her visa and then continue on with
us possibly all the way to Singapore.
So now our crew of six
is sailing north on strong winds to Kumai, home of the eagerly
anticipated orangutans.
No comments:
Post a Comment