We’d booked fast ferry tickets to the Gilis due to the shortness of our stay. The much cheaper slow ferry takes 12 hours which essentially loses you a whole day, and means you arrive late on – a death knell on your hopes of finding accommodation during the current high season. Again we’d organised things [...]

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Courtesy of the nice folk at MBA Travel (what seems to be the largest tour company based in Kuta), we booked a 3/4-day trip around the island. The trip we opted for was their Bedugul “Green” Tour at $30 per person. They offer two timeslots – pickup at 8am or 11:00 with the latter offering [...]

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I did finally get to go diving today, but not as much as I’d hoped and later than planned. Two of our divers decided to have a lie in so we left Kuta at 9:30 instead of 7am which pushed the rest of the day back and meant it was my turn to be late [...]

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Not exactly five star… Right now I’m in Bali again, and last night decided just to sleep at the Ngurah Rai Airport International Departures area. It’s a little loud (the tanoy announcements are disjointed bits of separately recorded phrases and some are yelled out), but the hassle of getting into Kuta and finding somewhere only [...]

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Silke, one of the folk I dived with towards the end of my Divemaster course in Bali, has very kindly sent me a few photos. They’re pretty good, and as my camera died towards the end of the course I’m going to make full use of them. Incidentally, the camera is repaired and “awaiting despatch” [...]

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I got back to the bungalows around 1:30am. Not long after I redid all my packing, Valerie came home as she was too hot in the nearby nightclubs. Sweetheart that she is, she offered me the spare bed in her room so I could get some sleep before I was due to leave. Much more [...]

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My final full day in Bali wasn’t to be a very busy one. After crashing at around 6:30am, I woke around 10:00 as I just couldn’t sleep any longer. I shook off the alcoholy cobwebs, showered and packed. I had to vacate my room by midday. Even though my flight wasn’t until 6am the next [...]

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My first lie in for the better part of two weeks and I still ended up getting out of bed at 9:30 as I just couldn’t sleep any longer. I had some plans so that wasn’t a bad thing. First up, I finished the book I was reading and went to the nearby bookshop to [...]

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I was back at Nusa Penida / Nusa Lembongan today, racking up dives 58, 59 and 60. My companions were the same group from yesterday minus the token snorkeler who opted to stay home. For the first and last dives, I was buddied with Peter who’s still progressing on from his Open Water. Both dives [...]

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Another new site today. I was picked up early by Peter and driven to join Kadek and a small group for a couple of divers up at Tulamben. After they’d had breakfast, we journeyed back in the rough direction of Kuta to Amed. It’s a similar site to Tulamben, with a rocky beach and two [...]

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