A Robinson Crusoe experience at Gili Meno

A ray of sun wakes me up. I walk slowly to the bathroom, take a cold shower and walk in a slow pace to the beach. This is only 50 meters. The staff says good morning and they ask in a friendly way what I would like for breakfast. This morning it is going to be a banana pancake with honey, just as most of the days, with a pot of tea.

I’m going to sit in one of the nice little huts on poles with a view over the ocean, where you can have breakfast, read or just sit. I decide to read a book and chat a little to our new friends Nathan and Rose from California. (They are brother and sister and come from the USA, we met them in Ubud, Bali and we decided to travel together to Gili Islands)
This is the story of paradise; this is the story of Gili Meno, Honeymoon Island.

Gili Meno is an Island, between Bali and Lombok. It is situated on the North West coast of Lombok. Together with Gili Air and Gili Trawangan, these Islands are really paradise Islands. Gili Meno is the quietest of the three, and it has the best beaches. The population consists of 300 people and that means that it is easy to feel like you’re on a deserted Island.

The pace of the day is really low, and after two days I thought that it was too slow, but I got used to the rhythm of the day. After two days we recognized most of the people. But we had an excellent time, because we were in good company. The second night there was a full moon party on Gili Trawangan. We decided in the end not to go. But this night the sky was so clear, the moon so bright and the reflection on the water was beyond imagination. It was a magical night. We stayed on the beach finally with Nathan, Alex and I. Nathan was playing the guitar and we were telling good and funny stories to each other. We stayed there for hours and took some pictures to capture the moment, but the moment was too beautiful to be caught in a picture.

The next day there was a new morning. Alex and I got out of bed, took a shower, had breakfast, took a dive in the ocean, and Alex did some serious snorkeling. He stayed in the water for at least a couple of hours in total. This was a special day, because there was a party in Tao Kombo. A place run by a Frenchman and as we had nothing special to do, because there is nothing to do on this Island, we decided to go there. A sign said that it would be a 100 meters walk to get to the restaurant. Indonesian people have serious issues with measures. If they say 100 meters, they mean…we have no clue but we have to say something to get the people in, so 100 meters can be the same as 1000 meters. This was a brilliant example. After walking down a dirty road and 600 meters we were there. We were the first guests…Rose and I didn’t feel very well, so we went home early and Alex and Nathan stayed….At three a clock in the morning I woke up, I heard Nathan and Alex hauling to the moon…and Alex was shouting that he wanted to swim. I went to the beach and there they were. Two guys so drunk…..they were so quite together. When Alex saw me, he wanted me to go with him in the water. So I did. I thought it was a bit frightening, because of the waves and current, but although it was late it was nice to take a dive in the water. Rose woke up as well. So there we were in the middle of the night, with two shouting guys, hauling to the moon and each other. It was a good thing that almost no other guests were in the other bungalows. They would have waked them up for sure.

So the days started to get in a same rhythm. The most active day was the day that we hired a boat to go snorkeling. This was excellent. We saw big turtles, and at a certain moment we al swim after a turtle, he looked so big and it looked like he had no problems with the current.
The last day we got up to see the sunrise, above the volcano Rinjani on Lombok. From our own beach we had an excellent view on the Rinjani and the sunrise. It was a perfect morning, no clouds, and full view. At 6:15 the sun was coming up, but at that moment we saw fins of/ 4/5 sharks in the water. So Alex wanted to go back to snorkel with them, I was looking at their fins and Nathan just said don’t miss the sunrise :). So we didn’t see much of the last part of the sunrise. Anyway, the first part was the best...

After one week with Nathan and Rose it was time to say goodbye for now. We decided to take a boat trip from Lombok via Sumbawa, Moyo, Satonda, Komodo, Rinca to Flores and they had other plans… but we will meet again for sure.

Our next trip will start this Sunday, when we set sail to Sulawesi.