Feeding the Fish

A full night's sleep for both, a good breakfast, and ready on time to meet our snorkeling guy. What could go wrong?

More than one thing, it turns out. Expecting the guy to load our things into a car sitting in the parking place, he instead took off walking up the street, then across the street. Montana and LuRue were half-running to catch up. When we were almost to the area where we had eaten the night before, he suddenly turned into a pathway toward the ocean. Without much explanation, we stood around until we figured out that he and another guy were pulling up a long open boat with catamaran-like poles on either side...onto the beach. He motioned for us to get in. The bow of the boat had a cover over it and was almost shoulder-high. We were supposed to crawl up onto that??? LuRue went first and it took both men pushing her from behind to get her onto the prow, lying there like a beached whale. Montana did much better & before we had a chance to look around to make sure we had everything...we were off! We had a few pretty good rollers to get through before we were in open water, but then we were zipping along across the surface heading for a nearby rock outcropping, known as "the island", which was surrounded by a couple of other smaller "islands". A few other boats were in the vicinity. From a short distance away, they looked like daddy long-legs perched on the water.

In his limited English, the boatman was explaining the parameters of where we should snorkel, since the current was stronger past a certain point. We jumped in and got our first look at what the area had to offer. Not much, as it turned out. We were in depths of about 20-25 feet of water, which was murky. We swam toward the island where the bottom came up to meet us, but a glance back at the boat showed the boatman motioning us away. There were some waves crashing pretty spectacularly up onto the island in places, so we swam parallel to the shoreline, such as it was. We were able to finally begin to see some tropical fish.

LuRue was very disappointed, but thought that the second place we were going, "Blue Lagoon", might be better. About then, Montana and LuRue met up and Montana said, "I don't think we should go to the Blue Lagoon. I've already thrown up twice." Having said that, she fed the fishes some more. We swam straight back to the boat and climbed up the ladder that the boatman put out for us. We finally made him understand that we needed to go back.

He landed the boat on a sandy spot and helped offload our gear. For LuRue, getting off was a lot easier than getting on, but then we had to get our stuff up some huge boulders to the pier level. The whole time the boatman was talking to us and we weren't understanding what he was saying...finally understanding that it amounted to "You pay me." We explained multiple times that the hotel would pay him, and that we would pay the hotel. He finally understood & went back to his boat, while we walked the pier and sat for awhile at some hotel's beach table set-up with an umbrella. Finally, Montana's stomach had quit turning somersaults, so we went back to our hotel. So much for the Dramamine she had taken earlier!

The women at the hotel were surprised to see us back so soon. One of the women, Putu, has "adopted" us, helping us in all sorts of ways. She commiserated with Montana, saying that she also gets seasick. Then she told us about a place that she goes with her family where you can just walk in the water and snorkel from there. If we understood correctly, she's going to arrange for us to go along sometime with them. In any case, we are not going back to "The Island". The one positive thing that came out of the experience was that LuRue tried out her new Tribord snorkel mask and loved it!

The women took our snorkel things away and said they would dry everything, then return them to our room. Which they did. There is a note in our hotel information that says, "Please do not hang laundry on your verandah. Apart from spoiling for other Watergarden guests, it is offensive to the Balinese culture, as personal items must not be hung near the room temple. If the drying rack is not sufficient to dry your laundry, please ask a staff member for assistance who will take necessary action with our laundry department to hang your laundry at our drying area."

We went through the pictures on our cameras. Almost all of LuRue's showed nothing but blue-gray bottom. Montana managed to get some fairly decent photos as she can dive down to the fish, or is very good at zooming. Great! we thought. Now we can do some real identification! No more trying to just remember shapes, colorations, and other distinguishing features. But as we paged through the book of Pacific Fish, we managed to label only three. Some of the fish were top views, so it was impossible to tell their body shapes. Others were likely juveniles, such as in the parrotfish family. Montana got the idea of doing a 'reverse search' on Google Images for one of the better pictures. When the page finally opened, it came with the message: Best guess for this image is "fish". This is going to be harder than we thought!!!

As we were still in our swimming suits, we rinsed off & went into the pool for an hour or so. Montana was completely recovered by then, so we just enjoyed being in the water in such lush and beautiful surroundings.

Lunchtime had passed, so we decided by then to spend the rest of the afternoon cruising the shopping area, such as it is. We changed some money at the hotel desk, paid for our aborted snorkeling trip, and got some advice on where to look for skirts, as LuRue also wanted one after seeing Montana get hers yesterday. Putu said that she was just on her way to exchange some shoes (too small) for her 2-year-old, and that she'd take us to the store she goes to. It was very close by and LuRue found two skirts. It must have been the Macy's store of Candidasa as she got a brown paper bag with the name of the store on it and Montana had only gotten a plastic sack. LuRue's skirts also cost twice and three times as much as Montana's...another sign that she was in the elite shopping spot. We then said thank you and goodbye to Putu.

After the requisite stop at the gelato place where we had to eat fast before all the gelato turned into liquid, we headed back to The Lucky Shop, where Montana bought a couple of souvenirs she had seen before. It is right across the street from The Happy Shop, where she got her skirt, or did she get that at The No Problem Shop...she can't quite remember.

Except for the extreme humidity, which keeps LuRue in a state of "sauna" sweating, Candidasa is a very pleasant place to be. People in every shop and business, up and down the street, constantly try to lure you in to see their wares, but take "No" for an answer when you smile and indicate you are not interested.

For dinner, we went in search of a beachfront restaurant...Montana remembered one labeled that way somewhere between our hotel and the shopping area. We finally found it and had a lovely table in the ocean breeze with the sunset reds coloring the sky. Montana had Ayum Rika Rika, a chicken dish with a sweet red sauce; LuRue got adventurous and ordered a "fish kabob" with garlic sauce, but can't remember the name--Sate something. The kabobs came with their own little grill. When the check came, LuRue discovered that she hadn't brought her waist wallet with her money, but fortunately Montana had enough to pay the bill. LuRue paid her back as soon as they got back to the room.

Tomorrow is Christmas Day--with big plans for sightseeing. A little hard to think about this being Christmas Eve! Around the premises, the hotel has scattered a few Christmas trees with wrapped gifts underneath. All people employed here seem to be Hindus; from what we hear, the hotel is owned by a Brit.