A beautiful little island- Nusa Lembongan

I arrived in Nusa Lembongan, a small island off Bali, the next day after a really choppy boat crossing- where the boat would seem to fly up in the air at each wave! Nusa Lembongan was the least touristy place I'd been to so far. 

           Nusa Lembongan

It is a beautiful little island surrounded by clear blue waters. After checking into a room, I hired a bicycle to go around the island. I soon discovered that I could not get very far as in addition to really bad roads with lots of pot holes, there were many steep hills. I would have still struggled had the temperate been considerably lower, but with the heat it was impossible! 

      The bad roads around the island

The island was very undeveloped in places, and some areas were quite bare. I booked onto a snorkelling trip for the next day, and had some time to relax by the beach. 

        Relaxing on the beach

I woke up early for the snorkelling trip, and after checking out of my cockroach infested room (it was grim- and a lizard fell on my head as I went to leave!) I sat on a bench, looking out to sea.

In the morning, watching the boats

Something about this sleepy little island was just mesmerising. It was so relaxing to just sit and watch the fisherman starting working, as the sun rose higher in the sky.

            The boats 

The snorkelling trip was awesome- as well as all kinds of multi-coloured fish, I saw some manta rays.

     Where I saw the manta rays 

A view of the island from the boat

I wanted to see more of the island, so not feeling too confident with riding a scooter, I hired a guy to take me around. You can cross a bridge to get to Nusa Ceningan, which is the 2nd of the Nusa Islands. 

The view from the top of Nusa Ceningan

This island seemed at first to have no inhabitants at all, and there were definitely no tourists! The guide was able to show me different parts of the island, including a blue lagoon and a hidden surf beach, where a couple of brave surfers were trying their luck with the waves.

           The blue lagoon

The guy who took me round was in a band playing at a local bar. When I got back to the hotel, I got chatting to the new Australian owners- who were the pleased to hear any suggestions- and 2 other Australians. We all went to the bar to hear the band- who turned out to be awful but it was a good laugh!