A dozen people squashed in a taxi
Lewis the Lion was awoken abruptly at 4 o’clock in the morning. They had arrived in Makassar and it was time to get off the bus. Taxi drivers in the bus station swarmed around the bus like bees to a honey pot wanting to take the passengers onto their next destinations. Lewis the Lion felt a little bit intimitated and pressured as if they were invading his space. Helen in particular was not happy to have been woken to discover that when she put her rucksack on her back it was soaking wet. The rain water must have leaked into the bus and consequently her back was now dripping wet too. Not a good start to the morning.
However, as luck would have it they met a kindly gentleman who spoke a bit of English who helped them on their way across this vast city of Makassar. They had to catch two separate bemo buses: one to take them to Teremosi and then another to take them to the Malengkeri bus station. However, it didn’t appear to be much of a bus station but rather just a couple of private cars parked by the side of the road. At first Lewis the Lion was a bit suspicious: was this kindly gentleman just trying to do a favour for one of his friends? Although it appeared not afteer all: there didn’t seem to be any organised transport to Tanjung Bira, only private hire cars, like the one that Lewis the Lion had caught from Pare-Pare to Tana Toraja.
It was therefore negotiation time again and Lewis the Lion was grateful to be with his friend Marion who was unflappable when it came to negotiating the best price. Even though they were not local people which was usually a guarantee that they’d pay more for any given service, she somehow got the taxi driver to agree that they were to pay 50,000 rupiahs all the way to the seaside resort which was approximately 5 hours away. (Lewis the Lion will tell you more about the Indonesian currency in his next blog post).
What a squeeze!
When they paid their money and loaded their big backpacks into the boot, the friends were surprised to find that there were already ten people squeezed into the car, waiting for them. Transport in Asia was certainly never boring!
The taxi rushes past bustling markets with fresh produce
Although it was very cramped indeed, Lewis the Lion enjoyed looking out of the window as the car beeped and raced past colourful and vibrant market stalls, each selling fresh produce. Gradually, different passengers were dropped off at their destinations along the way and Lewis felt like he could spread out and breath again!
Many rice fields can be seen on the drive to Pantai Bira
As the car left the bustling city of Makassar, it came across many more rice fields where people wore broad-rimmed hats and seemed to be working in knee-deep water.
Some traditional South-East Sulawesi houses with the crossing eaves
He loved to see the traditional wooden houses built on stilts, with slopping eaves that crossed at the front.
Mosques are found at frequent intervals up the road
Mosques peppered the roadside along the way and eventually the taxi passed through the town of Bulukumba, near to their final destination: Pantai Bira.
Lewis the Lion stands at the gateway to this Indonesian tourist resort
The first thing that made Lewis the Lion smile while Marion used her negotiation skills again to secure a good price on their accommodation was all the goats that were wandering freely around the town as if they owned the place! You could hear them coming at any rate as they had bells around their necks that rang out.
Goats roam freely along the Pantai Bira streets
Unfortunately the guest house they were hoping to stay at was busy for that night but they were able to stay there the following night instead. For now, they stayed in their own wooden chalet through a garden but the following day they would move to the charming guest house, Salassa owned by Shanty and Eriq.
Lewis the Lion is delighted to stay at the welcoming Salassa guesthouse on Christmas Day
Wow! The next morning, Lewis the Lion couldn’t quite believe that it was Christmas Day and what a different type of Christmas it was. The sun was shining brightly and Helen’s phone starting to beep with Christmas text greetings. Lewis the Lion lifted a lazy eye to the bottom of the bed. What was that? Something red was sparkling away. Santa Claus must have found him, even here in Sulawesi. How incredible! He’d left him some Christmas chocolate. What a delightful treat!
Helen wanted to find a church to wish Jesus a Happy Birthday and if they could the friends wanted to find the Internet or a wireless connection so that they could phone home but first they had to move their belongings to the Salassa Guest House along the road. So after breakfast where surprisingly they heard some Christmas carols on a children’s television programme, they headed along to Shanty and Eriq’s place.
Here they hoped to hire some mopeds for the day but Helen wasn’t very confident and so Marion took charge of one and Lewis the Lion and Helen grabbed on behind her.
Mopeds are the order of the day!
The friends rode for over an hour and half along the main road looking for a church and wifi connection to no avail. There were no churches at all and they were then told that the nearest one would be in the capital city, Makassar which was another four hours’ away. Neither too did they have any success in locating an internet cafe or wireless connection. In the end, the friends decided that they would return home only things didn’t go smoothly with that either as all of a sudden, they discovered that they had a puncture in the front tyre as they bobbled along the road! What were they going to do now they were stranded more than an hour’s walking distance from home?
Thankfully, Lewis the Lion realised that there were a lot of good people in the world as a car with a group of boys came by to help out. One of them helped Marion to load the moped into a passing bemo, whilst the others gave Lewis the Lion and Helen a lift back into the holiday resort of Pantai Bira. Even though they were in a different country for Christmas Day, Lewis the Lion felt that Christmas cheer and good will was still in the air. What a lucky lion he was indeed!
He was even more lucky when he, Marion and Helen headed down to the beach just a little while later. When he’d planned his worldwide journey all that time ago, he really didn’t have any idea of where he would be on Christmas Day but here he was on the beautiful Pantai Bira beach.
A beach day Christmas!
Lewis the Lion and his friends were clearly a novelty for the locals who shouted out at them “Mister, Photo? Photo, Mister?”
Lewis the Lion notices that many people here swim with their clothes on
They must have stood out like a sore thumb as Lewis the Lion realised that most people here did not wear swimming costumes to go for a dip in the sea but went in fully clothed. Helen and Marion felt very self-conscious being the only people on the beach wearing swimming costumes so they took it in turns to have a quick swim and then get dressed quickly afterwards, throwing on a sarong.
Lewis is happy to see children playing with tyres in the waves
Lewis the Lion smiled a slow smile as he happily watched the local children playing in the crashing waves. They had some old tyres and they were trying to stand up on them before the next wave approached.
Will the boys be able to stand up on the tyres?
They were clearly having a lot of fun and Lewis the Lion thought it was wonderful to see such joy from something so simple.
Lewis the Lion and Helen spend some time on the beach on Christmas Day!
It was wonderful to be on the sunny beach with the sand between his paws and the blue sky above his head. What a marvellous Christmas Day it was indeed!
Lewis happily watches the sun start to sink in the sky
He once more felt like the luckiest lion that had ever lived as he watched the sun set over the waves once more. Nature surely did paint the best pictures ever as you can see in his photos.
The sun starts to set on Christmas Day in Pantai Bira
Lewis the Lion is happy to celebrate Christmas with his friends Helen and Marion
His Christmas Dinner wasn’t the usual British turkey affair with all the trimmmings but this time being by the sea, he tucked into a delicious sea-food Nasi Goreng for lunch with a special savoury sauce and at teatime, he indulged in a freshly caught fish.
A Christmas Day Sulawesi dinner: seafood Nasi Goreng
After all the mishaps of Christmas Day, Lewist he Lion was rather excited about the treat that lay in store for the friends on Boxing Day.
Lewis the Lion wakes up on Boxing Day above the Salassa restaurant
After a beautiful breakfast at Salassa’s, the friends headed down towards the beach and stopped off at the diving shop: they were going to go scuba-diving!
Lewis has come to the right place to go diving!
The island of Sulawesi has a worldwide reputation for having fantastic diving sites and Lewis the Lion wondered what new adventures lay in store for them today beneath the waves?
Lewis the Lion can’t believe his luck: you can Scuba Dive here too!
Even though he was still a novice diver after his first scuba-dive on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, he felt reassured by his new dive-master, Chris who promised Lewis that he would be well looked after and that he need not worry.
Lewis the Lion meets Chris, the dive master
At nine o’clock sharp, the friends hopped onto the back of a flat-back lorry along with another dive instructor and three new Hungarian friends who had also come to Pantai Bira to go diving and snorkelling.
Helen and Lewis the Lion prepare for a Boxing Day diving treat!
As they approached the harbour where the dive boat was moored up, Lewis the Lion could see the equipment being loaded aboard.
The dive-boat is prepared to set sail
However, on the mainland, it looked like a storm was brewing in the distance. Oh no! Lewis the Lion prayed that it would bypass them. Not that it made much difference when they were in the water as they would be wet anyway but it could mean that the visibility in the water wouldn’t be so good.
Oh no! It looks like there’s a storm about to sweep in!
Helen and Marion prepare to sink beneath the Ocean’s waves
Lewis the Lion checks that the air cylinders are ready for their dive
His prayers must have been answered as there was certainly no rain when it came to their dives. As he peered over the edge of the boat, nothing could have prepared him for the wonders that lay beneath the ocean’s waves.
Lewis the Lion looks out over the edge of the dive boat
On his first dive at The Gap which lastest for 58 minutes he saw two baby white-tip sharks, a blue seastar, a painted spiny lobster, a giant clam, a peacock mantris shrimp, four lionfish, a tube worm, a Christmas Tree Worm (which he thought was rather appropriate for the time of year!), a sea squirt, a trumpet fish, fusiliers, a redtooth triggerfish, a squirrelfish, a spotted boxfish and a longfin bannerfish. What an incredible array of underwater life!
However his next dive after his lunch (which they all ate with their hands and he ate with his paws!) there were further delights at The Cape as he saw a clown triggerfish, a blue-spotted stingray, a great barracuda, a nudibranch, a warty and pineapple sea-cucumbers, a spinnate spadefish, a threadfin butterflyfish, an anenome fish, a scorpionfish, a red-lip parrotfish, blue starfish, table corals, a red-fire goby and more longfin bannerfish.
Lewis the Lion couldn’t have even begun to have dreamed of a more exciting Christmas and Boxing Day spent with some special friends. He felt so fortunate to have had such a wonderful opportunity and the fun wasn’t quite over yet as he will tell you in one of his next blogs when he discovers about boat building in Pantai Bira.
Lewis the Lion had a very different sort of Christmas Day and Boxing Day this year.
What did you do this Christmas and Boxing Day? What made these days special for you?
Or perhaps there is another day in the year that is special for you? If so, what is it and what makes it so special?
