[East/Central Indonesia] Day 02 / 28th May 2006 - Flores, here we come!

Before he turned in the previous night, MD discussed with us about a trip to the beach the next morning.

After the exhaustion from yesterday's activities plus last night's walk, Naga and I decided to give it a miss - I woke up at around 9am on Day 02 to find that MD, Pelé and the rest were already preparing to set off. I wished them an enjoyable day at the beach and proceeded back to my bed...

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Re-awakened at around 10am; the clothes washed yesterday were still not dry yet. Naga woke up soon after, and we proceeded to pack up our stuff, ready to move off anytime everyone is ready.

The rest came back at around 1030am. Final washing-up and we were almost ready to set off for our next leg of the journey.

The same cab drivers who drove us to the motel last night were already waiting for us downstairs. We hopped on and proceeded back to the airport. We checked in and went for lunch at the café outside the airport.

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After lunch, it was another wait, albeit not as long, for the flight. When it was time for boarding, we were ushered in to board some buses which took us to another part of the airport.

The sight of the plane shook us quite a fair bit.


Our plane - with propellers

First time on a propeller plane. For a while, I didn't know what to expect. Thankfully, I got the window seat (not that the plane was very big).

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Having a window seat, and being close to the wings, gave me a chance to see the wheels operate during take-off...


Going up soon... (Propeller is spinning in the shadows...)


Time to let the wheels in...

Of course, the window seat also offers some nice aerial views of Bali:


Busy roads in Bali


Look at those waves!

And of course, clouds!


Fluffy pieces of cotton wool...

We also flew passed the Komodo island, as well as several others - there ain't much on some of these islands, only elevations and earth, little vegetation and signs of humans...

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After more than 2 hours of flying (from an original estimate of 1 hour; probably because it's a propeller plane), we touched down at Maumere, located on the northern end of Flores island.


2 days of flying; pink for Day 01 and green for Day 02

We came straight down onto the runway, and we just whipped out our cameras and started snapping away at the marvellous sights - the various mountains that covered the background, no high-rises, no concrete:







We slowly made our way into the building - and waited for our check-in luggage to appear. My bag came in quite late, and I was stunned into silence, then anguish...

(1) The personnel did not allow me to claim my bag until I had showed him something which caught me off-guard. I showed him my ticket but I still wasn't allowed to claim my bag.

(2) One of the handles used for hand-carrying was almost torn off from the bag; it seemed like something had sheared part of the handle to the extent that it was almost falling off.

Looking back, I think I looked pretty crossed at that time. I almost wanted to rush up and confront the personnel, to demand an explanation and perhaps compensation - if not for the language barrier. Furthermore, at that point of time, everyone else had seemed to have gotten their belongings, and as I inspected the other parts of the bag, nothing else seemed to be damaged.

My mind flashed back to the night before I had left SG - Sis had specifically told me to take care of the bag because it did not belong to her. Now, the promise had been broken, though I wasn't the direct cause of the damage. I had to let her know when I call back...

Up till now, I'm still figuring out what could have caused such devastating damage to the handle...

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The reality took quite awhile to sink in, but everything else moved on....

And thus I came to experience my first experience on "ojeks" - taxis on motorbikes.

*In Maumere, it costs Rp2000 to get you to anywhere within the town - less than 50 cents. Naga and I shall get to experience the difference in prices for ojeks on our road trip.*

Each one of us took a bike and headed for the harbour. MD took the opportunity to snap a few shots of us on the bikes. I was real tempted to do the same, but without seatbelt, helmet, and with a potential for anything bad to strike me anytime, anywhere, any place, I hestitated.

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We came to the harbour, where a row of small motorised boats were "parking" - one of them had to be our boat.

Naga and I boarded the boat, while MD went to buy some stuff for the much aniticipated swimming expedition on Palu'e as well as some other stuff for the people in the village. He came back with a pair of swimming googles and two sets of swimming masks, though the green colour of the masks masked (no pun intended) the real potential of their effectiveness, as we would learn later on.

It wasn't till sunset that we got moving, so it was idling on the boat...


Shot - Ugly

We also paid a visit to the restaurant near the harbour - Naga and I swear that it was one of the best that we visited for our trip. We had Nasi Ayam Goreng, and i ordered this additional Lalapan thingy, which turned out to be some weird veggies that i hardly touched except for the cucumber. But the tempe was super nice! Freshly fried and piping hot! Plus marvellous fried rice! (Wah, now i'm recalling that moment in the restaurant already...)

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The skies were already dark at 1900hrs, and the boat slowly made its way out of the harbour.

Some of the Palu'e people were cooking dinner behind the boat, and one of them offered to lit up the area that we were in with a kerosene lamp.

MD went up to the upper deck, and the two of us soon followed suit. The skies greeted us with a sight that we have never been able to catch in SG... countless stars - the Southern Cross, The Great Dipper (no Orion though), and a sight that just held us in awe...



Ok, not so detailed of course, but somewhere in the clusters, there was this area where its literally star dust - signifying a high concentration of stars, and the existence of some galaxy - viewable with the naked eye! I didn't have the chance to see such spectecular night-view even when I was with the Astronomy Club back in Secondary School - though I gotten to see Saturn with its ring(s) via the telescope, the rest of the time in Astronomy Club was spent attending camps and socialising; vaguely remembered a crush on someone, but I remember nothing else already...

Ever-knowledgable MD pointed out to us how to naviagate and find the South with the aid of the Southern Cross, and the North as well. Went on to talk about how various cultures inevitably came up with similar descriptions and uses for these constellations. We spent some more time basking and bathing under stars before moving down to sleep...

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The next time I woke up, I tried to stay awake, but a combination of the rough movements and Indonesian songs meant that the only way to avoid further sea-sickness is to go back to dreamland...

We finally hit shore after midnight, after a near-six hour boat ride from Maumere. The plan was to go up to the village only in the morning, as it was too dark to attempt the ascent.

We would be extremely grateful for that decision...

To be continued...