Gili Air
Trip Start
Mar 19, 2008
1
24
31
Trip End
Jun 05, 2008
Where I stayed
Coconut Cottages
Gili Air, West Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia
Monday, May 19, 2008
When we hit shore, the only way to our hotel was by horse and cart. There's no cars allowed on Gili Air and precious little electricity. Gili Air is part of 3 little islands that poke out from Lombok. Each is fairly tiny (about a 3 hour walk around) and each has incredible beaches and coral - and each has no cars and little electricity. Horse and cart is a very bumpy ride.
Gili Air is the closest to Lombok and quiet - infact, after dark it's pretty hard to find much life at all. Apart from bats. Our hotel was a series of cottages set back from the beach in lovely coconut palms - really really georgous.
We spent our 3 days here reading, swimming, relaxing, taking walks and watching sunsets. It was no more complicated than that. The coral and fish life was amazing, so a daily snorkel was great fun (even if Paul nearly drowned himself in 2 feet of water - he blames the flippers, wouldn't let him stand up apparently). In the evenings we popped along to little bamboo bars on the beaches and relaxed, avoiding the magic mushroom pizzas that we'd been warned off.
Each sunset was a treat too. Each evening the sun would drop behind Bali and give incredible back lighting on the distant volcanos. This was all so wonderful, but with few bars, hand-crank internet and no shops, there's only so long you can stay - beach paradise or not. So we opted to hop over to the slightly more lively Gili Trawangan for a bit more excitement. There's plenty of beach there too so it's not exactly a risk to make the move.
