Orangs, Angin, Arus dan Ombak

Orangs = People. Plenty of them. In fact, after a week and a half I suspect we have now heard "Hello Mister" from several hundred thousand children and received looks of awe and surprise from hundreds of their fathers and brothers as they busily overfish the fertile waters of Bali's north shore. Our every movement is absorbed by an audience, eager to find out more about these crazy Australians. Breakfast can be ogled by an army of fishermen - never before has a bowl of muesli been so interesting!

The forces of nature have also become primary concerns to us o ver the last few days. Angin = Wind. Three days ago we turned a corner around Bali's northern most point and, like flicking a switch, the wind decided to turn on us. The following morning at 11:00am sharp the pressure valves were released and all the wind the atmosphere could dump on us thundered headlong into us. We were stopped in our tracks, contemplating how to deal with the next element in nature's arsenal.

Ombak = Waves. We turned to shore in a desperate effort to find a suitable spot to land and despite the glorious backdrop of overhanging coconuts, jagged volcanic skylines and the tempting smell of roasting chicken from the local village, our escape route was blocked by a wall of surging waves crashing onto a beach of black boulders. The wind was too much, and as whitecaps broke and whipped our nervous faces we battled into shore through the maelstrom.

The villages are beautiful. This is the Indonesia that is not written into the Lonely Planet guidebook (although we don't own a copy - in fact we barely have a map!) and is lighthearted, raw and abundant with smiles and laughter. By the time we can walk from the beach to the main road to find a meal the owner of the rumah makan (= restaurant) already knows who we are and how we arrived - the bush telegraph seems to be operating on broadband here.

As we continue southeast the last of the ocean's weapons has also been unleashed upon us, Arus = Current. Like the wind, every point we round seems to concentrate the forces of the water and the air. The waves chop up, breaking over the bow and, wind or otherwise, our progress is dampened to a crawl by the pressure of the surging water rushing northwest along Bali's shore.

Ever since our debilitating crossing from Java to Bali a week ago we have both been nervously seeking information from every fisherman (and his seven children) about the conditions we might expect crossing from Bali to Lombok, a distance nearly double that that shattered us recently. The intelligence is unanimous - don't do it. Whatever hint of Angin, Arus and Ombak that we might have experienced up to this point is child's play compared to the strait.

Mixed into this cauldron is the fact that to avoid the worst of the wind we would have to start paddling at about 10pm, just after the moon sets, to have any chance of arriving before the beastly Easterly wind slams into us at dawn. Our early morning stealth paddles in Bali have been OK, but out there in really deep water with no way out, we are not so sure.

And so it was with great relief (and no doubt some comfort to our parents) that today in Tulamben we managed to procure the services of a boat to transport us and our kayaks to Lombok. Tomorrow we'll test this new method of transport and who knows, we just might like it.

Photo: Lain attempting to chow down breakfast with a full Indonesian audience.