October Break!
The boys have a two week break from school and since this time off aligns with friends of ours who are teaching and living in Macau, we decided to spend a week together vacationing in The Gili Islands. The Gili Islands consist of three small islands, Gili Trawangan, Gili Meno and Gili Air, all offering a remote island experience. All motorized vehicles are prohibited on the island, so the preferred method of transportation is by foot, bicycle or a chidomo (horse drawn carriage). 'Gili' in Sasak means "small island" and diving and snorkelling is very popular due to the abundance of marine life and coral. We had a wonderful week enjoying the sand, sun and company!
We left Singapore Friday night, stayed over in Kuala Lumpur then caught the morning flight to Lombok with our friends Amanda, Les and Kaidyn.
From the airport, we travelled by car for 1 1/2 hrs then hopped into a boat to get to our destination.
This is the main road that circles the island, Trawangan. Our bungalow hotel was just off the main path but near to a wide selection of restaurants. We rented bikes for two days and leisurely biked our way around the island.
The water is clear, blue and very warm. The coral surrounds the island so we were able to snorkel from the beach to see a beautiful array of fish and even saw a sea turtle.
While walking along the beach, Kaidyn decided to help Mother Nature and started to pick up garbage that had floated up along the shoreline. Josh quickly followed suit and before long, the boys had nicely cleaned a strip of the beach.
We spent an afternoon on the north side of the island consuming the local beer, Bintang, and enjoying the scenery. Jason captured the view in a drawing.
Taking a ride back to our bungalow in a chimodo.
We rented a boat and snorkelled around all three islands. Les & I were lucky to see a sea turtle! It was truly amazing!
Amanda & I thoroughly enjoyed our
large Bintangs. At one point during the trip, we stopped for a pit stop at a beach restaurant/bar and Jake said to Amanda "Look, you can get your Large Bintang here!"
The Kiat's introduced us to Vacation Olympics - so fun! One afternoon was spent doing the aquatic events, the other doing beach track & field. Some highlights were Singles Synchronized Swimming, Coral Inukshuk building (which was judged by a nice couple from Kelowna who are living and teaching in Seoul), Javelin/Archery and Long Jump.
Jason was
very proud of his Gold in Synchronized swimming. His performance to "Crazy Train" was amazing!
Playing with army men in the sand.
Kaidyn celebrated his birthday while on our trip. For his 9th birthday, we went geo cacheing which took us up the only hill on the island. The view was beautiful!
Each evening we spent playing "Truth of Dare" with the boys. The kids looked forward to this every evening and many laughs were shared!
A great week!
And the best part, the boys & I are still off for one more week!
