Finally in Sumatra

I took a night flight from Maldives to Kuala Lumpur, changed to the low cost terminal with a local bus and jumped to the next plane towards Sumara. Finally. I planned to come here already last year but as usually, changed my plans in the last minute and went somewhere else. But now I'm finally here. 

My first destination was Pulau Weh in the northest tip of Indonesia. Green, beautiful small(ish) island with excellent diving & cheap accommodation. What do you need more? Oh yea, cheap beer. Well, not existent in the strictest islam area of Indonesia. There were a few questhouses with beer but if you pay as much for 2 cans as for your accommodation, you don't really feel too thirsty. But priorities, priorities, and this time that was diving anyways.

My 6 e / night bungalow, the first one on the left of the big house by the water.  Loved it!

That's a view I'd like to have in Hakaniemi...

I had done the AOWD in Maldives so I didn't need to worry about which dives I can and cannot do. Not that it would have mattered in Pulau Weh anyways. I did 7 dives with Rubiah Tirta Divers at Iboih Beach. Some were really good, some a bit boring with bad visibility. Canyon was great, cool rock & coral formations, loads of fish etc. In total I saw 2 sharks, loads of lion fishes, a few stone fishes, an octopus and morays were basically everywhere. And also did my deepest dive so far, 47,7 meters. Nothing to see there. And can't complain about the price, I ended up paying 16 e per dive :)

On one day I drove around with a scooter with a dude who was also diving, we tried to find a volcano in the land and one under water. Didn't happen. Nice day nevertheless. All the other days were all about diving and one of the mornings got wasted with a small hang over. Yes, finnish ppl buy tax free vodka when they know alcohol isn't widely available. And when there's a german and a mexican around there's also soon an empty bottle.

After one week I felt like it's time to move on. The scooter dude was heading to the same direction so it looks like I don't have to sit in a bus alone. Not that that would happen anyways as the locals are quite nosy. But first a few days in a surf spot near Banda Aceh and the next plan probably on Monday is to head towards Ketambe. Or maybe Bukit Lawang. I'll see... Plans are made to be changed.

...And everybody still remembers Martti Ahtisaari here. Looks like he did a good job at the peace negotiations almost 10 years ago.

Maldives - Beach, diving & air-con

Huh who are you???

In Maldives this air-con hater turned quickly into an air-con lover. Sometimes you just have to escape from the sun & heat & humidity and spend some time inside. Especially if you work during the travels... So, air-con, I think we are friends now. Until the next time u make me sick.

In Maldives I stayed with friends at Vilimale/Villingili a short ferry ride away from Male. Lovely small local island where you hardly see any tourists and if, they are on a day trip. A few expats live there but otherwise it's a place for the locals to live in. I had an important job to do at my friends neighbours (who were on holiday) apartment: feed the cat. Cuddle with the cat. And clean up the cat litter... As a return I got my own apartment just next to a beach & fantastic snorkeling reef. No complains here!

The plan for Maldives was to dive, dive, dive. Martin was about to do the Advanced open water -course so I decided to join him. I still think that certificate is just a money rip off but well, at least then I don't have to argue with dive shops anymore about going for deeper dives. There's a small local dive shop in Vilimale which we used. Nice people, some chaotic moments with all the dive master students but good dives & good fun.

We did the learning stuff as buoyancy conrol and navigation in a lagoon reef nearby Vilimale. And found a HUGE sting ray under a small wreck. Never seen such a big one. I couln't even see it first , it was just too big and hiding too well. Finally after spotting the eye I even realised what I was looking at. Otherwise not much to see in that lagoon but it was sunny & shallow so good for the learning stuff. 

For the deep dive we went to Banana reef which is one of the first & oldest dive sites in Maldives. No wonder why. Great small caves, huge overhangs, many schools of fish. Probably the best place in North Male atoll. 

The next day I went for a wreck dive near hulhule, the airport island. There lies since over 30 years the 110 metres long MV Victory  at a depth of 35 meters on a sandy bottom. The current was really stong that day but we still managed to search the cargo holds and visited the bridge. Amazing place. A ghost ship.

Later I also did a night dive. A frustrating one. It was more like a drift dive, we flew next to the reef so no time really to see anything. Oh well. I don't think that'd be my new favourite anyways. Too much work to find something interesting. But it was kind of cool to be in a pitch dark ocean. So: been there, done that.

Home beach at Vilimale.

After finishing the aowd I took a day off, just snorkeling, hanging out with Annett & Amalia and managed to do also some work. For the next day I booked two more dives with a different dive shop as my “home shop” didn't have a trip for the day. It was quite a long trip to Hulhumale from Vilimale early in the morning but for sure worth it.

Lion fish traffic jam.

First dive of the day was to Faydhoo, a deep reef next to a small island. We found lot's of small stuff, some turtles, I hung out with trigger fishes and just had fun under water. And I saw a moray eel swimming for the first time!

For the second dive we went to Banana reef again, this time with the current was quite strong. We saw much more fun stuff than on the first time there: turtles, eagle ray, crabs and one of the group also spotted a reef shark. I was too busy trying to stay in no deco limits (yea didn't work) so I missed that one. But the best part of the dive shop was the dive master, who was leading the group. (all us stupid tourists had dive masters as buddies too... quite weird). I haven't seen anything that gorgeous for quite a while. Body like a (thin) greek god, wide white smile, half long hair and fantastic attitude. Why didn't I find this dive shop earlier? :( Oh well, time to move on. Today is my last day on this atoll paradise, moving on to Sumatra via KL this evening.

"Finally she's leaving!"

P.S. There's absolutely no alcohol on this island. Getting a beer worth 10 dollars would have meant I have to make my way to a resort. Couln't be bothered, there was enough party in Sri Lanka and there will hopefully be some more in Sumatra. Good to behave for a while. Drinking non-alc beer on a roof top can also be nice.

Lazy in Sri Lanka

Home beach at Dalawella.

Sri Lanka. Another place which caught me by surprise. I did expect that the island will be beautiful, people nice and all the other clishees, but I ended up really fancying it. Shit. One more place I really wanna go back to. The list is getting longer.

The plan was to meet up with the lovely couple Sudda&CJ who I had met in Borneo last year and hang out with them for a few days before I'll go to the hill country to see some öh... hills. But as I only had a week, loved Galle&Dalawella area, I ended up staying there the whole week. I had a lovely room at my host's house who also rent it out via Air B&B (check it out here) just next to a beach & a expat hang out bar. 

But I wasn't lazy all the time, I finally made it to surfing! Kind of. Standing isn't the biggest problem, it's getting up on the board. I tried it for 2 hours and managed to stand 4 times. Not quite breaking records here. Bruised knies and some battle wounds but it was good fun! Have to try it again somewhere, someday. Maybe even on this trip as Sumatra is supposed to be excellent for surfing. 

We had a massive party on Saturday, one expat girl had a birthday and the beach bar was full of people. Good fun until early hours. And followed by a nice hang over thinking “never again”. Well yea. Even I don't believe myself anymore.

After a recovery day I finally made it to diving. I had heard some good stuff about a huge wreck about 30 min boat ride from Unawatuna so that was the next destination. The SS Rangoon is a 60 m long steamer/sailing built in the year 1863. Now it lies in a sand bank in about 30 meters and is filled up with huge clouds of fish, rays, morays etc. Beautiful! 

The second dive of the day was a pinnacle under water called Aluth Gala. It was all about fish. Lots of fish. Small ones, big ones. Fish everywhere. Made me hungry!

We came back to land in thunder & rain. The huge waves almost made me puke and I have enough of boat rides now for a while. So no whale watching on this trip I'm afraid, even though the sightings have been quite good in the last days. 

Instead I took out CJ's scooter in the next days and went to explore Galle & the surroundings. I drove to the fort a few times, to a buddhist temple, to the beach, to the next beach, to nowhere, to everywhere. 

Tuk-tuk polo on a beach.

Some house at Galle fort.

In total Sri Lanka is a laid back lovely place, people are nice and not too interested in what you are doing & where u r going. Meaning not annoying, but helpful with a smile. Food is great, especially the seafood. Wow. After a week it was sadly already time to move on. But I'll be back! Next stop: Maldives.