South East Asia Again – Day 2 🇮🇩

After arriving from Singapore yesterday, we got up early for the visit to Nusa Penida today. We booked a ride to Sanur Port using the Gojek app, and it cost IDR 141,500 to get there. We reached and located the Sanur Port building and were told that we had to go to the Semabu Hills Fast Boat counter to exchange the voucher for the ferry ticket. There was a long line at the counter. The looked at the reservation details from Klook and gave us each a badge with lanyard and also a voucher for the return trip. We walked back to the Sanur Port building and then proceeded to board our ferry to Nusa Penida.

The ride was not too long and the water wasn’t very choppy so over all it was fine; but the ferry was completely packed. After reaching Nusa Penida, we walked around to locate the office for Pelabuhan Nyuh from where we would start. They checked our voucher and had us to try on snorkelling fins for size and then asked us to change into our swimwear and wait. It took a while for the whole group to assemble and then we were lead to the boat. Even after the boat left we had to make another stop to pick up additional snorkelling masks and fins on the way. We cruised along the Nusa Penida coast passing by Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan to our first stop, Manta Bay.

We got into the water at Manta Bay and there were lots of people around. I didn’t manage to see a single Manta Ray in the water. When I got back up on the boat we saw a huge Manta Ray glide by us very quickly, it was like seeing large black carpet under the surface of the water. Given the speed at which they were swimming it would be been virtually impossible to see one while snorkelling unless you were really lucky and the Manta Ray swam up close to you.

From there we went to the next snorkelling spot which was called ‘The Wall’. I got rid of the fins because they made it very hard to climb back into the boat and jumped into the water. After snorkelling for some time I realized that our boat had gotten quite far away from where I was. I tried to swim towards but I wasn’t getting anywhere with the current. Knowing I wouldn’t possibly be able to swim to our boat on my own, I waved to the people in my boat to indicate where I was and then circled around another tourist boat and climbed on asking them for help to get to my boat. Once the people on my boat saw my climb aboard they quickly get there to pick me up. I was always confident about my swimming skills but this brought me down a peg or two!

We then headed back to the port and being in the sun and in the water was exhausting. We changed out of our swimwear and decided to walk around a find a place for lunch. We settled for The Garuda cafe to try local Indonesian cuisine, Gado Gado, Nasi goreng and Mei Goreng. This started a trend where we sampled Nasi goreng and Mei Goreng at almost all places we went to over the next few days.

We walked back to the port and went to exchange our voucher for ticket at the Semabu Hills Fast Boat counter. We walked around the beach while we waited for the ferry. We could see the faint outline of Mt. Agung on Bali across the water. The ferry ride back was uneventful. We walked to a nearby Dunkin donuts for afternoon coffee. From there we booked a ride back to our hotel using the Gojek app and it cost IDR 121,500.

It had been a tiring outdoor day and we relaxed at the hotel for a bit and then went to the close by Warung Kubu Segara Kuta for dinner. We ordered Nasi goreng and Mie Goreng and liked it here as well. We walked back to the hotel and called it a night.