Half Way Around Bali

Woke up from a deep sleep to lukewarm coffee and a fresh squid drying on deck.  As the sun came up, we had a beautiful view of Bali.  In the morning hours, while we were off the north coast, we had a clear view of the islands most sacred volcano mountain and the sunrise.  It was a morning of natural beauty after the night’s company of surreal glowing dolphins.  Carol and I fried up homemade doughnuts for breakfast and we watched numerous outrigger sailing canoes motor close by to say hello on their way to the local fishing grounds.  All of this to the beautiful back drop of the Bali mountains, quite an amazing way to start a day!

We sailed around the North coast of Bali, full of beautiful mountains.  We then turned south down along the east coast.  Again, the land was very green, but flatter.  We saw lots of fires and smoke billowing up to the sky.  A massive storm system was building behind us; it seemed to be growing with each puff of smoke, which looked like demons being cast out of Bali.  As we neared our anchor sight in Sanur, the storm finally caught up with us.  We pulled into a gorgeous bay surrounded by white sand beaches, children playing soccer, and one high rise.  We anchored during sunset and as the storm was clearing.  With our rations of rum, we enjoyed the final glow of the day behind the lush island, caught glimpses of dolphins leaving the bay, and saw a possible dugong.  We saw a large animal breach the surface of the water three times along a line out of the bay, all near the boat.  The first was the closest, and right in front of us.  It appeared to have a face, very fleshy body, and no dorsal fin.  We are going with Dugong!  We spent a short, hot night off of the beautiful coast, protected from the sea by the bay, rotating through brief night watches.

At 4 AM we had a wake up call, loaded up on coffee, then raised the anchor…which really gets your heart pumping early in the morning!  We began sailing towards Benoa in the dark, eagerly awaiting the rising sun to light our way into the narrow straight to the harbor.  We discovered that the sand in the harbor shifts rather easily; the first clue was the dredger that sat just outside the docks, the green triangle markers sitting above the water just outside the dredger, and finally the sand bar we slid into on our first approach.  After expert orchestrating, the entire crew running back and forth across the deck trying to rock an 80 ton steel ship, we were clear for a second approach.  We got to the dock and found our agent.  Cleared into Bali by noon, very simple compared to Jakarta!!