Munene, the journey...

We began the day at 9am. I woke up not feeling well still. I was queasy and weak. After breakfast, getting my laundry, we left the Aryaduta hotel to Manado airport. We checked in our bags and flew to Jakarta, where we had a two-hour layover. At the airport We caught our connecting flight to Kualanamu Airport, Medan, where a bus was waiting for us. Our guides Dede and Danny showed us to the bus, which then took us to Bukit Lawang on a 5-hour ride. During the journey, it rained and water got into the bus, and dripped on me while I slept. For a moment, I thought it was a creature and was horrified. We got to Bukit Lawang at 11.30pm, where the rain continued to pound. We crossed the infamous bridge in the torrential rain, got our rooms assigned and we chit chatted for a bit. I am rooming with Russell. Went to bed at 1am amid the rain.

The day began at 9am after breakfast. We rode our boat back to Manado and back to the Aryaduts hotel where we had left the rest of the luggage. I was still feeling nauseous and a bit ill, but I took it in stride. At 1pm, we left for the Coral Triangle Initiative. The presentation was a bit dry, and when we left the 2-hour presentation, we were still confused about what CTI does. By this time, I was starving because I hadn't had lunch and I had not eaten most of my breakfast. We went to a local restaurant close to the hotel, which Zack recommended we try the grilled fish. It was a decent meal, and I left still confused about how big the fish was. It was almost snake-like, with muscle and a lot of flesh. Later, we returned to the hotel to prepare for the following day and catch up on my journal.

We began the day at 9 after breakfast. After the usual logistics, we took the boat to a snorkeling spot. The water was incredibly clear and beautiful. Unfortunately, due to a hangover from the previous night's drinking, I was feeling mildly nauseous and uncomfortable with the whole water and boating business. Once we got to the snorkeling area, Adriane and Daniela did diving, while the rest of the crew did snorkeling. I had my life vest on, and was excited to try out snorkeling. Once I jumped in the water, I knew I had made a mistake. I panicked, held my breath and was terribly scared of being in the open sea with nothing to hold on to. I have never been so terrified in my life. For some reason, my whole body refused to relax, even though I was not sinking, I could not breath. I flailed my arms around and screamed for help from those around. Andrea tried encouraging me to just relax, but I was in flight mode. One of the guides held me and motioned for the boat to come...

We took a boat from Manado to Bunaken Sea Garden Resort. Once we got there and had lunch, we were free to explore the area. We spent the rest of the afternoon at the beach, and pier. We had a couple of Bintang beers while at the pier. The calm beautiful sea beautiful macaw We also saw a couple of very beautiful and showy lovebirds and macaws. Later, we had dinner and we went around to explore the bar scene by night. We happened upon The Shack, where we drank some cheap local palm wine in copious amounts. In a bad mood, get some vitamin sea A local band was playing and we joined them in singing karaoke. They had a lyrics book from which we could suggest songs. We sang Hey Jude, Yellow, Fix You and other songs. We started with Coldplay's Fix You and moved progressively to Lemonade Tree, Hey Jude, Iris and many other songs. This was while we drank many many shots of the incredibly sweet, but terrible palm wine mix. It was made by mixing two palm ...

Woke up at 7am, and began preparing my bags to check out of the cottage. Once, I had breakfast, I joined the rest of the team to Bali Hot Springs. name says it all fried plantain and ice cream! awesome Mt Batur in the background, an infinity pool The journey there was beautiful as usual. But even more beautiful was Lake Batur from up close, with Mt. Batur in the background. It was amazingly beautiful. The spring pool was really cool. There were elephants spewing hot water. The pool was really warm and nice, and relaxing. Taryn, Andrea and I had 3hours of relaxing pool time, while Julie and Annisah had massages and spa treatments. Later, we bade Bali goodbye as we flew to Manado in North Sulawesi. We stayed at Aryaduts Hotel for the night, in preparation to leave for Bunaken the following day.