Our Xmas pressie to ourselves...
Trip Start
Oct 06, 2008
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Trip End
Jan 28, 2010
Pulau Weh, Aceh, Indonesia
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Located about four or five kilometers from Indonesia’s ‘kilometer zero’ off the north west tip of Sumatra is Gapang beach on the remote tropical island of Pulau Weh. Five days of sun and diving seemed like the perfect Christmas present for two weary travelers in need of a brief respite from all the, um, sun and diving...
A one hour ferry from Banda Aceh got us to Pulau Weh and a further one hour by mini van got us to Gapang beach and the Lumba Lumba dive resort. This place was crazy expensive for us humble backpackers but being seeing as how it was Christmas we figured the budget would just have to cope. A huge bungalow was our home for the next five days and we were almost instantly comfortable. The unusual addition of a fridge was soon put to good use, stocked full of mixers for our duty free booze. Two litres of spirits should be plenty to get us by in this super strict Muslim state...
Our first days diving started with a trip in an open topped long boat to a dive site called Batee Gla. The only reason we were on Pulau Weh was because the diving is pointed out as a highlight in the Lonely Planet and it was quickly evident why. The visibility was amazing and when we looked hard enough it was possible to faintly make out the western coast of Australia. Although that may be a mild exaggeration it was definitely the clearest we have had in our limited careers.
In total we had six dives during our stay, each with its own ‘special’ as the dive masters call them. “Did you see something special?” was the standard question once we resurfaced. There were an incredible amount of huge moray eels at all sites including a ‘special’ one called a honey comb moray which has honey comb shaped patterns in yellow, black and white. The shear number of them means they can often be seen swimming in the open instead of just with their head poking out of a hole as seems to be normal. Very cool.
We also saw a number of firsts for us which included an octopus which pulsated many different colours (probably a warning of some kind...), several very large puffer fish and a massive napoleon wrasse. A lot of the terrain was also a novelty as we swum through vast under water canyons and archways. Our PADI open water ticket means we are only supposed to go to 18m but the dive masters use their discretion and so our deepest dive of the six went to 28m. Another personal best was staying under for 72 minutes on a dive that went to 27m. Probably not a big deal to any of you long time divers but we were impressed all the same :)
Even though there was a Christmas shrubbery in the dive shop it really didn’t feel like Christmas day on the 25th. It had been a long time for both of us since having no family around on Santas big day and it all felt a bit odd really. Getting up at 5am for some failed Skype calls home using the islands flaky internet connection helped add to the feeling of being disconnected from home. Mind you, we don’t go diving on tropical islands on a normal Christmas day so I guess you have to take the good with the bad...
A dinner for Christmas night at a local restaurant which had been organised by the resort, turned out to be hugely over priced but also highly interesting. A large portion of the price was having to pay the extortionate local beer prices as our spirits had run out the day before. The interesting part came from everyone at our table seeming to be involved in some type of aid work in Sumatra, mainly to do with rebuilding Banda Aceh. Having already heard stories from the side of the survivors it really completed the picture talking to these guys and was a definite eye opener into international relief work...
All good things must come to an end as did our time on Pulau Weh and so back to mainland Sumatra we went. As fate would have it we ended up being in Banda Aceh, the worst hit town of the 2004 boxing day tsunami - on boxing day. (Several hours were spent back in Banda Aceh on boxing day visiting various sites but poetic license means those hours were written about in the previous blog - sneaky eh...)
Next stop Bukit Lawang...
