Currently anchored off Sea World resort in Maumere, North Flores Is.
We arrived here yesterday morning & anchored in 20ft of black volcanic sand just off the beach from the Sea World resort. It's a great place to use as a base to do some in land travel as there are always other yachts around to keep an eye on the boat and the area seems pretty safe. As soon as we arrived quite a few guys rowed out in their dugout canoes to sell vegetables, Diesel & water, they're happy to barter the price on all & just as happy to stop for a quick chat to practice their English. We took a 30 minute walk into the small nearby village to find an ATM and buy a few vegetables at the market, as always everyone along the way stopped to wave & say hello...fascinated to see us pass by! Jimmy took both his air tanks into the dive shop at the resort to have them filled for roughly US$7 but found one of them had a pin hole leak & will have to be thrown away...that's going to be tough to replace!
Today however was a breath of fresh air (quite literally) as we left Blue Moon sitting peacefully at anchor and headed up into the mountains! We hired a car and driver for the day, along with Joern and Eli, through the resort costing 630 rupiah (US$70) and at 5am we met at reception with coffee in hand to start the three and half hour drive up to Mount Kelimutu. It's not the highest mountain on the island but it's famous for the three coloured lakes that are found at the top. No one can explain the exact reason for the different colours other than minerals in the rock but if you take out a bottle of the water it's as clear as any drinking water. We were lucky that there were no clouds today so we had a clear view of the bright lime green of one, brown of another and black of the third. During different times of the year they can change to pale blue, red and light brown. The locals have a belief that when someone dies their spirit enters one of these lakes; Green for the young, brown for the old and black for people who are bad. The scenery was fantastic with beautiful views over the surrounding mountains and a nice cool breeze to make the hiking a little easier...all this sailing and our legs have turned to jelly!!
On the drive back down the scenery got better and better with hillsides covered in shimmering rice paddy's and villages full of hanging Ikat weavings. We visited a traditional village and were invited to take a look inside the chiefs very elaborate wooden house. A local lady explained to us the ceremonies that take place there every year (all of which consist of slaughtering some kind of animal). The most interestingly seemed to be how the next chief of the village is decided. This pretty much consists of the present chiefs first born son being left in the rafters as a baby and if he cries in the first five minutes then he's worthy to eventually take over! If not then he is given to the shaman who takes him away and knocks his head against a banana tree, if he cries on the first try then he's worthy but if not until the third then he is considered stupid, the second son is then automatically pronounced chief without a question and the first son will have to leave the village...tough crowd huh!!
We had a great day and our driver was a lot of fun, we still can't belive he stayed awake the whole day but are very glad he did as some of those roads were a bit dodgy to say the least! Tomorrow we will be upping anchor again trying to stay ahead of the Sail Indonesia crowd with a short hop 30 miles west in hope of finding some clear water to snorkel and dive in.
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