Gili Air, a Trip to Paradise

I just returned from the most wonderful island, a place I only dreamed existed. Gili Air is the nearest of the three Gili's to Lombok, which is the large island to the East of Bali.  Gili Air, means “little island of water” in Indonesian. The people who live here make their living as boatmen, fishing and farming coconuts. A lot of the crafts people who peddle their wares or work at the cafes, restaurants and bars travel in from Lombok each day.

It will be impossible for me to put into words what the past week has been like, at least in one sitting, so I will do a bit now and when time permits, try to give a peek into how moved I have been by the beauty and peace of this tiny bit of Heaven on Earth...

To reach Gili Air we traveled by fast boat to Gili Trawangan, then took a smaller boat over to Gili Air.  When you step off the boat, any boat, anywhere, you are greeted by locals selling all sorts of things from jewelry to sarongs, all wearing big happy smiles.  We made our way to the only form of travel on the island, besides bikes and our feet, cidomo's or the horse carts.  The carts move easily along the stone paths that run through the interior of the island, but the outer trail becomes soft in places,  making it difficult for the carts to move easily, so much of the way has to be done on foot. 

Our first few days were spent in Sandy Cottage, a small place with salt water showers, surrounded by flowers.  There was a beautiful red hibiscus bush right outside the front door, and a big colorful gecko on the ceiling of the front porch to greet us. Every once in a while a very deep MOOOOO would bellow out from the cow who lived a few feet away.  It was really cool.

We dropped off our bags and made our way to Gili Air Suntay for the most delicious iced cappucinos & iced lemongrass tea to die for!! (We do a lot of eating on the adventure of a lifetime in case anyone has noticed)  No sense in describing all the meals we ate for the blog would be longer than War and Peace.  Let's just say the vegetables taste like sunshine, the spices explode in your mouth and fill your nose with  smells that conjure up images of far away places.  Fish tales to follow, so stay tuned....

Snooky and I decided to take a walk around the outside path that went completely around the island. It was pretty easy going at first, not too hot, the things to see were neat.  Beautiful water, some cows, chickens, some more chickens, and then it got hotter.....how long did they say this path was? The island is round right?  We have to find our way back eventually.  We stopped and went in the turqouise blue water for a quick swim and got back on the trail again. More chickens....ah, civilization!  Legends Bar!  We ask where our hut might be, and they point us in the direction we are headed...so we weren't lost afterall!  We pass a lovely pool where friends of Joel are staying and decide we will be really smart and ask to jump in there and get unsalted from the beach since all the showers are salt water.  Of course we won't tell anyone how hot and sweaty the walk had been!! Snicker snicker :)  SURPRISE!!!  Salt water pool!

We must have eaten again somewhere, right now it escapes me, the eating adventures tend to blur from one day to the next, terrible. Everyone decided to go back to the huts to hit the sack, but Anne and I wanted to hang with the locals for a bit, so we ended up gabbing with Sometimes, Banana and Georges. Now Sometimes might also be known as Always depending on the day, and Banana's real name is Rio.  Georges has a banana tree farm and works at the Gili Gita Bar with the other guys as a side job. Another one of their buddies, Mango, I kept calling Guava....well, I was close.....the time flew by, we talked about their island, a project that concerns coral restoration, and we finally left for the hut.

We seemed to walk forever, passing small groups of locals sitting enjoying the night air, everyone smiling and wishing us a good night. We ended up passed Legend's Bar when I said to Anne, oopsie, I think we might be lost.  So I asked the guy at the bar if he knew where Sandy Cottage was....he looked at me and said, "hey, are you still lost?"  Smartass....well yes, but I was coming from another direction!  We walked back the other way, and stopped to ask a group of locals sitting out on a BALE chatting, we had just passed them a few minutes ago actually,  if they could help us locate Sandy Cottage. They laughed and said, "yes, here!"  End of day one!