Day 146, Year 3: “You Won’t Believe This One.”
Date: Hari (Thursday), Bulan Oktober2, Pada Tahan 2008
Weather: Cloudy Day but Still Beautiful
Latitude: 05 degrees 47.770 minutes S
Longitude: 110 degrees 20.355 minutes E
Location: Pulau Menyawakan, Java, Indonesia

Some days are just better than others. This morning I got an email from our daughter Heather saying that she has finally bought the tickets to come visit us in Thailand in January. Hooray! Just as we are sharing part of our adventure with Justin and Jo now, we will share the Thailand adventure with Heather, Jed, and Sam.

Mark and Justin made trips to shore early this morning to buy water to top up Windbird’s water tanks. Later in the morning Shirena sailed into port and Mark and I visited them while Justin and Jo went to swim with the sharks. Mark and Justin had talked to other cruisers this morning that said that one of the floating fish houses had pens of sharks and that it was great fun to swim with them. Not my idea of fun, but Justin and Jo really enjoyed that little adventure. We then pulled up anchor and moved about 7 nautical miles north to Pulau Menyawakan. It is an uninhabited island except for the plush Kura Kura Resort. Anchoring was a bit tricky, but once we arrived Justin, Jo, and Mark went ashore. I stayed on Windbird to do laundry “watch.” I washed sheets today and I am not about to lose any more king size sheets to Neptune. The view from where we are anchored is off the island that is ringed with a sweeping white sand beach backed with palm trees, mangroves, and casuarinas. There is a reef between us and the island and the water inside the reef if that beautiful milky turquoise. It really is drop dead gorgeous. I can’t think of a better place to watch clothes dry! It was when Mark returned from the resort with Justin and Jo that his only words were, “You won’t believe this one.” Evidently the resort is just beautiful and the owner is a most generous and gracious host. His name is Lax and he took Mark, Justin, and Jo on a tour of the resort, set Justin up with an internet connection (something that doesn’t exist anywhere else out here), and offered a free bungalow to us for the night. Mark and I are going in to have dinner, but we are going to let Justin and Jo enjoy the night ashore. Marks says the bungalows are beautifully furnished with handmade furniture and Lax’s bungalow is a palace. In the Lonely Planet it says that there is a two night minimum to stay here and it costs $175US. Mark says the deluxe ones are more like $500US and include a private pool and much more. I’m anxious to go ashore and see this place. I must say that I think it is the most beautiful island we have ever anchored off.

We will stay here tomorrow and part of tomorrow night and then we head to Kumai. We start our river trip to see the orangutans on Tuesday and we have almost two hundred miles to travel to get there. So the adventure continues.

081002 Day 146 Java, Indonesia–Kura Kura Resort on Pulau Menyawakan