Day 356: Gili Meno - Senaru

Mar 25 - Get our laundry back and pack up. Take a hot walk down to the pier, where the round trip ride I paid for three days ago shows up right on the minute. Quick ride across to Bangsal, where we enter into the dumb game of who’s-really-supposed-to-give-us-a-ride. I see immediately that the speedboat owner wants to pressure us to use one of his guys to give us a ride across Lombok, going so far as to have one waiting, with his phone, trying to convince me that he is who we are looking for. However, the business I already paid for this ride kindly requested the driver to hold up a sign with my name, so is easy to spot and verify. Even when this is obvious and we’ve already loaded our bags in the car, the boat tout starts pretending to be upset that we are making a mistake. I guess this works enough times that they keep doing it. It is easy to see how tired tourists, confused and not understanding the game, could be caught up paying for something twice. What is more annoying is that after we drive off, they call our driver demanding that we return because I left without paying the boat ride. I sigh and agree to go back, since I do have a copy of the round trip receipt. More fighting when we are back at the same office I bought the boat ticket before, but my part of the argument is simple. I just hand the receipt to the same person I purchased the boat drive from and say ‘That’s it, I’m done. Thanks for the punctual ride.’ They carry on arguing with our driver for whatever reason, accusing him of poaching customers, but at that point there is no reason other than hoping I will step in and offer money to make everyone happy. Since I clearly have no interest in that and don’t care if we sit there for an hour, they give up and we are off.

View of Gili Air from the speedboat.

The old man driving us speaks very clear English and we spend most of the ride talking about electoral systems, both in the US and in Indonesia. I learn that Indonesia has two parliaments, one of which are regional governors. Lombok has one, as to many islands, though larger islands like Sumatra have more than one. Also, all regions are required to have at least 30% women candidates or they will not be allowed to hold elections.

We also get into the weeds on how the US electoral system works. I’ve had this conversation enough times on the trip to know that it is hopeless to explain in a way that makes sense. This isn’t because it is complicated, but because it just doesn’t make any sense why a popular vote can be overwhelmed by an electoral vote. The question I get every time is ‘why don’t you just have a popular vote and decide that way?’

Senaru is a steep uphill from the coast, probably 5-10 degrees cooler. Mt. Rinjani is lost in the clouds, as I suspect it will be most of the time we are here. Everything is deep green and humid.

Today’s route: Gili Meno, (A) port of Bangsal, (B) Senaru.

Senaru is just a village, strung out along the road. Uphill is the entrance for the national park area and trailhead for hikes to the crater. Hiking tours here offer 2D/1N or 3D/2N trips.

View from the patio outside our room.

It is still early enough to do something this afternoon. The homestay owner suggest we take a scooter tour of some rice paddies and go to Sunset Hill. Janet doesn’t want to drive one, so I take Odette on the back of my scooter and Janet rides with the guide.

We go down the steep road to the town of Bayan, then back up a ridge to the east to an area of many crop fields.

We stop here to look at the fields.

Young rice plants. They flood them no so much because the rice needs it, but because it impairs growth of weeds and keeps rodents out. Later, when the rice plants are tall and have blocked the light below them, they cease flooding them.

Very nice shades of green on the rice before it starts seeding out.

Standing on a path between two fields. There is a continuous growing cycle here, and they rotate rice, corn, beans, tomatoes, and other crops.

From here we go back downhill to a place near Bayan, a lumpy series of hills. They are fully vegetated but very irregularly weathered. The exposed rock indicates that they are thick sequences of ash, with plenty of pumice. We wait around here for the sunset, and because the owner is preparing us a dinner at his house in a nearby village.

No view of Rinjani (clouded up), but there is a good sunset.

The bright light is the mosque. As soon as the sun disappeared the Qur’anic verse readings began, reminding us that Ramadan is not ending anytime soon.

Dinner was on the floor at the house. Many small dishes were served, of fish and chicken, rice, and a leafy soup. A Lithuanian couple also at the homestay joined us.

I was not very enthused about driving the scooter all the way back up the mountain to Senaru in the dark, but fortunately traffic was light and Odette stayed still. And it didn’t rain.

The night would probably been very quiet, but with Ramadan there was plenty of reciting from the local mosques that stayed loud until about midnight.

Indonesia