Lamongan

On the 9th of July we visited Lamongan on the north coast of Java about 3 hours drive from us in Surabaya. It is a sort of theme park and centre for seafood. Nearby there are some interesting caves and a small zoo.


Here is Joe seemingly unconcerned about being eaten by a shark. We also tried to get Dhanu Dito and Indi to fear the beast but without any luck. Obviously they have never seen Jaws.

There are various rides there. The ones for the young children are inside a large warehouse type building and photography in the darkness there was hard. We see Linda and Indi on a train ride and Dito on the bumper cars. A rather fuzzy Dhanu and Dito on the helicopters and Indi running into the wall on the boat ride.






Outside there were boys toys. The go-karts, and the all terrain cycles. Koko gets ready to go Stephen and Yudha get instructions and Alex awaits his stead. Koko and Yudha seemed to find the scenery especially the trees and walls fascinating.

The Pool

After a long wait we finally got the pool tiled. Yesterday we began filing it with water. . .

Then I put an ornamental pond pump onto the pipe to try out the water feature. It works, but the little pump isn't man enough to give us a good waterfall effect.

Joe waits patiently for his turn in the pool! He didn't have long to wait.

Eventually Alex joined in too.

Hair

Summer holidays and everyone likes a change so Rose and Alex went to the salon to have a makeover. I might have joined in if only I had some hair to makeover.

West Surabaya

West Surabaya the Ciputra area is like Milton Keynes on acid, or something created by Disney's imagineers. There are a lot of new sweeping roads waiting for houses, golf courses, the water park and an increasing number of tower blocks and some eccentric architecture. A couple of snaps to give the feel.

The view from here !

Its not often that we get clear air in the middle of the day but this was the view from the road near our house in the early afternoon. The volcanoes to the south of the city are so close, but normally we are totally unaware of their existence.

Today 26th of July the view was even clearer and the whole range was visible.

Our Holiday in Lombok 2008

A very belated posting about our road trip to Lombok in 2008. We decided to drive from Surabaya east to catch a ferry to Bali, then across Bali to catch another ferry for the much longer trip to Lombok. We went in the Kia Carnival. Rose, Alex, our then maid Nia and sometime driver and general factotum Sus.

We arrived in Bali soon after dawn and went to Kuta beach to have a break and find breakfast.
Everyone raves about Kuta. It is OK at that time of day before the crowds arrive. At that time in the morning the cleaning squad were in action removing rubbish and any driftwood and flotsam from the sand. This is the classic view along the sands. The beach is backed by a road the other side of which are the hotels MacDonalds, the Hard Rock Cafe and similar. For me it is all too commercial. For a lot of foreign tourists I think it has a familiarity and security because of that. For Indonesians it appears sophisticated and western.


















After that we drove across Bali to catch the ferry to Lombok.












The ferry took about six hours to get to Lombok. Our first sight of the island came towards late evening just before sunset.



We drove across Lombok and started looking for a hotel. We eventually booked into the Hotel Senggigi. Here you see the Carnival in the car park. The rooms all face the car park forming a sort of courtyard on two sides. Opposite the long side are trees and a bamboo plantation.

From right to left. Rose Nia and Sus enjoy a snack outside our hotel room.

Here we are watching TV in the room, and gratuitous shots of Stephen and Alex sleeping.

























The next morning driving north along the coast road this view caught our eye. Lombok has miles of coastline like this. It is a truly beautiful island.















So the next task was to find the sand for ourselves. We drove along and found a spot where we could drive right up to the beach. We left the Carnival among the palms and walked out onto the sand.






While the girls sat in the shade Alex and I went for a walk along the beach to find a good spot to go swimming. In the shallows there were some sharp volcanic rocks where we first waded in.







Eventually we perusaded Rose to join us.



Looking north the beach is so crowded. . .



After the swimming food. A picnic by the beach.


That evening we ate in warung close to our hotel on the same coast road.