Sella Cabin Tours

As I already mentioned in an earlier blogpost (Wanderlust), I went to Italy for three weeks in February/March for the Sella cabin tours. My boyfriend's dad has been organizing these tours for about 6 years now, every year expanding a little bit (more tours, more customers). He has started this little business out of enthusiasm for the beautiful Dolomites (which probably are, I must confess, the most stunning mountains I've seen so far, so completely different from the Alps for example!), and the conviction he could organize a better and prettier tour than the already existing ones. The name 'Sella' comes from the Sella group, a plateau shaped massif in the Dolomites. It's quite a remarkable group of mountains! The route of the cabin tour makes a complete circle around this massif (which means that on a lot of spots in the tour you're able to see the Sella group).

The tour starts in Rifugio Fermeda, on about 2000 meters high. In Italy the cabins are called Rifugios (you can recognize a bit of the English word 'refuge' in it). The ones used in the cabin tour have room for about 20 to 70 guests (imagine bedrooms for 4 to 12 people). There's most often a bar (with lots of grappa, a kind of Italian liquor that is available in many flavours) and a dining room. Nothing very luxurious, but a lot of wood, checkered curtains, framed pictures, dead animal heads on the wall (which I secretly like a lot, shoot me for it!) and other curiosa. Shortly said: coziness at it's best :)

At night a three course meal is served in the rifugios, and you just can't imagine what delicious things people can cook in such remote cabins. You have to realize that most rifugios lie on or next to skiing slopes. After five in the afternoon those area's become quickly desolated, because the skilifts are turned off and most tourists return back to their homes and hotels in the valley. In winter, the only way to reach those rifugio's is by ski (downhill, of course), with the skilift or on the snowscooter. This makes the incredible taste of the served pizza's, pasta's and meat dishes extra amazing, doesn't it?

After some drinking, chatting and card game playing it's time for a good rest. This might recquire earplugs, especially when you sleep in a room with some big men. I've heard the most harmonious choires of snoring in those weeks, heheh (and believe me, women can snore tóó!)! You can imagine a lack of privacy in these weeks, but for most guests this isn't a problem, and it's only for a week of course (every tour lasts one week). I was a bit lucky though, in a lot of huts there's a smaller (2 person) room for the tour guides, and most times my boyfriend's dad let Mark and me have that room (thank you Gerrit!). I appreciated that a lot, it meant a bit more rest after all, and I had to keep u for more than 1 week!

Every morning we habe breakfast at 8 o'clock. After some bread, eggs and strong Italian coffee it's time to say goodbye to the cabin staff, fasten the backpacks and hit the slopes, on to the next rifugio. If you're fast enough, you can be the first one on the slope, making a brand new track in the freshly prepared (or even better, freshly fallen!) snow...nothing can beat that feeling! Oh and about those backpacks: many customers worry a lot about them beforehand, but that's absolutely needless. You get used to skiing with one very quickly, and you surely won't need more in one week than what you can fit into it: underwear, pyjama's, toilet acessories and maybe a book (or balls of yarn to knit, like me :)). Only in the lifts they can be a bit impractical, but that doesnt't weigh down the feeling of adventure and self-sufficiency they will probide. And don't forget the freedom that living out a backpack will give you...at least that's how I experience it :)

On the way to the next rifugio we stop about 2 times: late in the morning for a fresh supply of coffee, and early afternoon for lunch (read: pasta!). During the years Gerrit figured out the best routes, where the lifts are the least crowded, the slopes are most challenging and the sceneries are most breathtaking. For example we go through Serai de Sottogudda, a beautiful fissure with many frozen waterfalls, where ice-climbers try to ascend. We ski down the Marmolada (3342 m), the so-called 'Queen of the Dolomites'. We go to Cortina d'Ampezzo, an area of decayed glory, where the Olympic Wintergames took place in 1956. A lot of facilities in this region still hail from that time! The last day we sleep on mount Lagazuoi, where soldiers have fought in World War I. There are still mines remaining from this time, which you can actually go in to. On this same day we take the so called horse-taxi: a sledge with two horses that can drag about 20 people, hanging on two long ropes behind the sledge. The path is too flat here to ski downhill, so the horses bring you to the next skilift!

So... I took the tour three times (while there were six in total this year, I participated in the last three ones). When I arrived in the Dolomites it was, of course, beyond delightful to finally see Mark and be together again, I díd miss him in the three weeks before (forgive me if I sound cheesy now ;)). I was a bit nervous though...last year I took the tour for the first time (actually, it's where Mark and I met :P), all alone. It was a wonderful, but also very intense week. Now I would be doing thréé weeks, also being a bit of a 'helping guide'. How would I keep up, physically, but also emotionally? Looking back now, I can say it went wonderfully well. I'm actually a little bit proud of myself! Physically it was no problem at all (also thanks to the good nights of rest), I noticed coming into the new 'flow' (snowboarding, eating, relaxing and sleeping) quite soon. Somehow your body adapts to the new situation, although you might suffer from the heights a bit in the beginning (less oxygen).

Emotionally it was different from last year as well... I did not try to get the most out of one week, regarding my involvement with the guests. I related on a certain level, having fun together and chitchat, but not going too deeply. Mark helps me with this (although he probably doesn't realize it), he's a good example in how to set boundaries. He has to, how else would you be able to survive six of such weeks?! Speaking for myself, I'm not that good with boundaries regarding relationships, often getting involved too much...resulting in exhaustion. So these three weeks were a good opportunity for me to practice! Some days went better than others, but overall I can say I might have grown a bit. I tried to take a bit of time for myself every now and then (I might be used to being alone a bit more than the average person), like reading (Game of Thrones book 1!) in my bedroom, proceeding on my knitted socks, playing with the rifugio pets, or just sitting alongside the others, enjoying my 'birra piccola' (small beer) and listening to their conversations. This way I was able the next day to hit the slopes like a crazy girl, play in the snow, have fun with the guests and help where I could, as the 'guide-in-training' :)

And oh my, did we have fun! The most special days for me were in the second week, when a lot of fresh snow fell. I've never snowboarded in such deep 'tiefschnee', it's a feeling that can't be compared with anything else! Almost like you're on a sailing boat, sailing over big waves with your board, while the soft, loose snow sprays high behind you. I fell often (and believe me, trying to get up with both feet attached in hip-high snow is nót easy, sometimes Mark literally had to drag me out :P), sometimes even somersaulting. I had snow éverywhere, even in my underpants. But I enjoyed it so freaking much...once you have experienced this kind of snowboarding, you don't want anything else anymore! I must learn how to do proper off-piste boarding (including the necessary safety rules and equipment of course, I know the mountains are dangerous, and real off-piste skiing/snowboarding is not the same as making fresh tracks beside or near the normal slopes), maybe take a course, some lessons or a good guide one day? It's added to the bucket list!

At one moment the snowfall became so heavy, it was impossible to reach the next hut. So the cabin-owner had to pick us up with his snow-mobile, only able to transport half of the group. The other half of the group (where I was in as well) went down the abandoned slopes under the supervision of the 'Polizia', to a small bar lower on the mountain, for some hot jagertee. Later we were picked up as well by the snow-mobile (suitable for 6 persons at the most, but 11 people fit as well :P). The 2 Polizia guys, still on their ski's, hang onto the vehicle to be taxied up the slope for a couple of hundred meters. Even though nobody could see more than five meters ahead, we all had so much fun, it was crazy! Though I must say...those Italian jagertees are a bit dangerous...

When the weather was a bit better, Mark and I decided to go down the Sass Pordoi. This is a mountaintop in the Sella group that can be reached by by a skilift, but where no slopes go down (the lift is mostly meant for tourists who want to go up the Sella group and enjoy the view). There are some possible routes down though, and since we heard it was do-able, we wanted to give it a shot. 4 More men (including Mark's dad, bravo!) decided to come with us. Stepping out of the lift cabin, there were some doubts...but finally we took off. In the beginning there were some super high bumps and cliffs that scared me a bit, further down things became better. What an amazing descent! I actually found an online video clip that was taken during an almost similar descent (only the last part of the route seems different): http://vimeo.com/11655843. It was a shame that there was no fresh snow that week, resulting in hard, bumpy and crumbling snow. I'd love to do this route again in tiefschnee! (But, like I already mentioned...I'd do any route in fresh tiefschnee if I had the chance ;)).

Every week there were about 20 participants. Sometimes people come alone, often there are some couples or family-members. Groups of friends are also possible, and in the last week we even had a group of 9 sisters (partly in law)! Man, those ladies were something. You cannot believe what kept coming out of their small backpacks: candles, cheese, wigs(!), bottles of Amaretto...seriously! They stood on the table already their first evening (leaving the other guests a bit flabbergasted). I love how all customers are so completely differently, yet come with one goal: to have a week of great fun. We had an architect, a police officer, a brewer, a lawyer, nurses, a music therapist, construction workers, etc. All with a shared love for the mountains and skiing! By the way, when talking about nice and friendly people...I should not forget the cabin crews. All the rifugio employees are incredibly kind and welcoming, I was recognized (and remembered by name) after just one week! Of course, it's business for them...but still they go that extra mile for you, to make your stay as pleasant as possible. They deserve big hugs!

Well... here's some information for who's interested (Dutch and Belgian people): www.huttentocht.com, and on Facebook.
The rest of the photoseries used in this post can be found on my own Facebook.

You can already sign up for next year, if you like! I think a cabin tour is a good way to see more of the area, instead of staying at one place for the whole week. The Dolomites are definitely worth visiting, it has countless breathtaking views to offer, and well...the mountains are always a good idea :) I hope to go there in summer one day, I'm curious to find out how different the surroundings will look without snow! Did you know that the Dolomites are called after the rock they consist of? Yup, 'dolomite', a name that is on it's turn derived from Déodat de Dolomieu (a French geologist), who described the Dolomite rocks. A phenomenon for which the Dolomites are known worldwide is the alpine glow, also called 'enrosadira'. This glow begins at dusk, when the red gleams of the setting sun are reflected. During dusk and dawn, the colors of the mountains change literally from minute to minute, it's almost too much beauty to take in at once! I feel small, humble and só blessed during these sunsets....

The making of a 'thick & thin cowl'

Hi folks! This week I've been working on a new little project: a little girl's cowl knitted with homespun thick & thin yarn. I am really smitten with how it turned out!

So... I thought it might be nice to share with you how I exactly made this cowl, because it's really easy. I think even beginning knitters (like myself!) can do it!

Okay, we'll start at the very beginning. I chose to spin the needed thick & thin yarn myself, because I like spinning and because it gives me such a satisfying feeling to create a product from the very basis (actually... I'd love to own my own sheep or alpaca, shave them myself, and....well, you get the idea!). But I realize a lot of knitters cannot spin (while on the other hand, most spinners can knit), so I'll start with showing you where to get this kind of thick & thin yarn, spun by other artists and al ready for you to use! The easiest way is to go to Etsy, and search for 'thick and thin yarn'. I did it for you here! There are a lot of different thick and thin yarns, one important thing to keep in mind is the thickness of the slobs (the thicker parts). In my yarn, I made them about 2 cm thick (they contain a lot of air). Obviously there are also a lot yarns available with thinner slobs, which will give your final product a different look. I really wanted to go for a rough structure in this cowl, if you want the same: the bigger the slobs the better!

If you áre able to spin, and you'd like to do so, I will explain a bit about that in the next paragraphs (italic font). If you decided to buy the needed yarn instead (as described above), you can skip those parts and go straight ahead to the knitting paragraph :)

Spinning part
Okay, here's a bit for you fellow spinners! I went to Turtlepurl on Etsy for my superwash merino roving. I wanted a color scheme suitable for little girls, so her so-called 'swirly' roving jumped right out of the page to me! I also wanted the colors to be not too contrasting and differing, they had to flow into each other easily. Just various tones of two or three close colors, you get what I mean? Here and here are some other beautiful examples of what  I'm trying to explain. But this is purely personal, just go for whatever you like! Important is the amount of roving you need. I used a full 4 ounce for my cowl, and it's definitely not suitable for grown ups... If you want to make a cowl for yourself or a friend, you might need 5 or 6 oz! I think Merino is quite suitable for thick and thin yarn, it has a nice soft structure and drafts and spins easily. Superwash merino is even better :)

When you have your roving ready, it's time for pre-drafting. I think pre-drafting is not always necessary when spinning, but it ís when spinning thick and thin yarn. I chose to split the roving one time, but this depends a bit on the thickness of your roving. 

After splitting it in half, I carefully pre-drafted it to make it airy and easy to spin. Be careful though, don't make your roving thinner than you want the biggest slobs to be!

When you're done pre-drafting, you're ready to spin! Never spun thick and thin yarn before? I found Susie's (from Woolwench) youtube video especially helpful to get me started, you should definitely check it out if you're new to this kind of spinning. Take note of her explanation how to get a lot of 'air' in the slobs, I found this part quite important for the final look of the cowl!

Don't worry when most of the twist goes into the thinner parts of your yarn, that's normal and inevitable. Above you see the yarn on my bobbin, the slobs don't seem to be very big here, but that's because the yarn's still under tension... Once off the bobbin, you can really see the results! (Sorry for the bad quality of the next two pictures by the way...it was late at night, but I just hád to finish spinning my yarn ;))

Here I was just playing around, heheh. You can almost say it's not even necessary to knit the yarn, you can wear it as a cowl straight off the bobbin!

Anyway, last thing I did that evening was rolling my yarn into a ball, because that's just easier to knit from. Also, leaving it like that overnight might set the twist a little bit!

Knitting part

Now we get to the part where the non-spinners among us can join along! Next day (after spinning my thick and thin yarn) I proceeded on my project, and started knitting the cowl. For this I used the biggest knitting needles I had at home, which were 12 mm. Actually I would have used bigger ones if I had them, because the bigger the needles, the less air will be pressed out of the bigger slobs. When you knit with big needles, you allow these slobs to stay puffy, resulting in even more structure in your finished product!

I casted on 42 stitches, but this depends a bit on the thickness of your yarn of course. After casting on, the only thing I did was knit. No purls or other special stitches, only knits! How easy can it be? I told you, everyone can make this!

I just kept on knitting until I had almost no yarn left over. I fastened off my work, and with the little piece of yarn I had left I joined the two ends of my work together, to produce a circular cowl. I did not use any special stitch for this (I was counting stitches a moment ago, and almost couldn't find the seam back...the rough structure allows you to do whatever you like!), just kind off sewed the two short sides together. 

Well, that's it! It's a very forgiving piece of work, in that way it's perfect for beginners. It might feel strange though to knit with those huge needles, and with a yarn that differs so much in thickness. But then again: it's forgiving, little mistakes disappear in the bobbly structure. What I found a challenge, was not 'fuzzing' my work too much while knitting it. This happens easily, while I really wanted a more 'clean' look for my cowl, avoiding too much flocks. Al I can say is: try not to distress your cowl too much while working on it. But it's almost impossible to avoid this completely, so if anyone has any advice regarding this, please comment!

When my cowl was finished, I went to my moms house, who looks after a lot of kids (it's her daytime job actually). Lianne, a little lady of 3, volunteered as my photo model. I think the cowl looks adorable on her, so girly and sweet, yet also trendy because of the rough structure of it!

The cowl is still available in my shop for now, but now you also know how to make one yourself!

Wanderlust

Today I finally found the time to practice a bit with my remote Canon shutter. I made some wanderlust-themed pictures of myself and my worldmap, which is hanging on my living room wall.

What do you think of it? I expected the pics to come out sharper/more focused, I don't know if I should blame this on shooting with a remote, or if the light was just not good enough (it's quite rainy here today...). Any advice is welcome!

By the way...my next destination will be the Dolomites, Italy! 3 Weeks of snowboarding with my boyfriend, his father and the groups they guide (check out their Facebook to find more information about their skitours, from cabin to cabin). I'm counting the days, 19 to go!

Indonesia: day 8 & 9

Day 8 - To Lombok

A new day, a new week. After spending the weekend at the Gili's, it was time to cross the water to Lombok. The Gili's lay pretty close to Lombok, so it would be a short trip with the boat - not a fancy fast one this time. That didn't matter though, we had to leave early, and it was actually quite nice to start the day with an easy trip on the waves of the Bali sea, heading to the north-west coast of our next destination.

Everyone on the boat was quiet, probably still a bit hung over. Leaving the Gili's behind us, I mused about these unique islands. We had a good time there, but there was definitely something remarkable about them. Almost no 'normal living' takes place there, maybe the islands should actually be considered as refuges from 'normal life'. Three small communities, fully separated from the main land, with their economy (as far as you can speak of it) completely based on tourism. In fact, I wonder if there's even a simple school on one of the islands! I have no idea how the ratio is between tourists and island residents, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's about 3:1... Travelers go to the Gili's to pause their trips for some days, to stop moving and only relax and party. There's nowhere to go, and no motorized vehicle to take you anywhere. Countless of travelers that come and go every couple of days, the whole year through...while no one will stay for much longer than a week...that's a bit sad, in a way! Well maybe sad isn't the right word, because the islands are beautiful and happy places where we enjoyed ourselves perfectly well, but still I felt a bit melancholic seeing them disappear in the waves behind us.

Enough pondering about the Gili's, on to Lombok! Our arrival on this new island actually woke me out of my contemplation quite roughly. We had not even reached the shore yet, or a whole bunch of Lombok men ran into the water to take our backpacks. They weren't exactly being gentle either! As soon as one of them took hold of a backpack, they carried it to their own horse-drawn carts, so you'd be more or less forced to step in as well and let them take you (paid, of course) to whatever your destination was. Mark and I managed to get out of the boat with our own bags (quite an achievement in that situation), but had to give in as well not much later. It was such a chaos, with men pulling and yelling at us from all sides, promising to 'know' our transport company and to be the cheapest and fastest one to get us to their pick-up station...what could we do?! And no, it was definitely not possible to get there by foot. Transport to Sengigi (one of the bigger cities at Lombok) was included in our transition, and clearly we would not be picked up at the 'harbour', so...we stepped inside a cart, and off we went. Mark had to literally fold himself on the small bench, being way taller than the average Indonesian man. Once on the way, our 'driver' turned out to be more friendly than he actually seemed to be back in the chaos. Maybe they háve to be like that, to get enough customers and provide their families of money and food? They probably lie about the distance for the same reason (or they just can't count), 'cause it couldn't have been more than a couple of hundred meters to the pick-up station. We could have made that crawling!

We settled down under a small sunroof, relying on our cart driver who said that a van would pick us up here and take us to Sengigi. Minutes passed by, a funny Lombok man took his chance and kept showing me his goods until I gave up my resistance and bought a small bracelet. Still no sign of our van...hoping we were on the right spot, we waited a little longer. It felt silly to be back in motorized traffic, but comparing the size of Lombok to that of the Gili's, everyone would agree that having cars and scooters can be pretty convenient as well.

Unlike Bali, most residents of Lombok are Muslim, just like on the Gili's. This means that the smell that is so typical for Bali is absent on Lombok. Neither will you see a temple or altar on every corner of the street, nor women making small offerings in colorful clothes. Instead the Islamic prayer calls can be heard five times a day from the mosques. It's bizarre, how much influence the main religion has on the streetview of the Indonesian islands, and how much they differ from each other!

Finally a van that appeared to belong to our transport company arrived on our spot. We hopped on and settled for a one hour drive to Sengigi. It wasn't until this drive before I realized at what a stunningly beautiful island we arrived. Lombok is definitely different from Bali as well! It's way less touristic, but I think it's less populous anyway. To me, it was a bit of a relief to be in such a calm and not-so crowded place after Bali and the Gili's. It's less of a tourism-based economy, with more normal working and school-going people. We passed farmers, fishermen and busy housewives surrounded by little children barely wearing any clothes. Lombok also seemed to be greener: more forest, more hills, more nature. So much stimulation to al of your senses, wow!

Our plan was to climb Gunung Rinjani on Lombok (a big volcano). But before that, we wanted to see a bit of the rest of the island, so Mark came up with the idea to rent scooters for the next two days. We asked our driver to drop us at a rental place in Sengigi. The guy of the little rental office was a bit weird and véry pushy. He wanted us to book our (guided) Rinjani trip with him as well, but we only wanted two scooters! Finally he let us go, yelling after us that we had to come back to book the tour later...'yeah right' :P

We only had to cross the street to find a good place to stay for the next days: the Central Inn. It looked a bit like a tropical motel, and we discovered it had júst opened. The remote control and our bed-end were still covered in plastic, can you imagine?! Because the inn was still starting up, the prices of the rooms were low, while very comfortable (including airconditioning, free wifi and a hot shower!). Lucky us! We took a shower, arranged breakfast for the next day and relaxed for a little bit, browsing through the Lonely Planet chapters on Lombok. Time to explore this new island!

We took off on our scooters, this time I rented one myself as well (the Lombok traffic seemed to be a bit less hectic than on Bali...so I figured I might be able to actually stay alive :P). After heading slightly inland, we turned north towards the monkey forest near Pusuk. This road goes over a sort of 'pass' (over a small mountain), so the first hour we only rode uphill on the winding roads. Traffic goes slow uphill, so it gave me the chance to get a bit used to the scooter (driving on the left!)...even though Mark still managed to overtake every road user that went slower than neccessary (leaving me anxious to keep up with him...oh my!).

I enjoyed the Lombok scenery, so different from Bali in it's architecture, like I mentioned before. No more temples, but a lot of small huts, some mosques, land for sale (cheap!) and some old buildings here and there hailing from old colonial times. In between, all shades of green you can imagine and even more! Once on top of the 'pass', we stopped for a little break and to play with the monkeys. Man they are perky! Hanging out at the side of the road (literally, they just sit on the guardrails), they got used to being close to people and steal their potential food (or other interesting things). If you do something they don't like, they let you know clearly. They might touch you (while grabbing food), but you won't touch them. I was a bit scared of the big ones (seriously, has anyone ever been attacked by a monkey?), Mark was laughing at me of course. Luckily there were a lot of cute little monkey babies as well, I tried to photograph all of them until Mark dragged me away to pursue our trip downhill, convincing me it was nót possible to take one home with us. Such a shame.

Anyway, downhill we went, back towards Bangsal (where we arrived that morning). Once in Bangsal, we turned south again, now driving along the shore instead of through the forest. Another view, but still as beautiful...and hot! Missing the shade of the woods, the sun was now burning on our bare shoulders, arms and legs. With the sea constantly luring on our right side, it wasn't long untill we found some off-road route towards the beach. Nothing beats a refreshing dive in the ocean when it's hot! We had the beach almost to ourselves, only some Lombok kids were paddling a bit further along the beach. We draw some attention from them, I must say... Obviously the touristic season had not begun yet at Lombok, the kids yelled at us 'hi tourists!' and giggled out loud. Sweet :)

When we were in the water, suddenly an Indonesian boy started waving and shouting at us from the shore. We thought something was wrong, so we hurried out of the water towards him. The boy smiled at us though, shook our hands, introduced himself and welcomed us on his beach. Uuhm..okay? He was very friendly though and chattered a bit with us. He came sitting next to us on our towels, and showed his favourite music on his smartphone (the poor boy had a terrible music taste, my goodness). Mark and I weren't sure what he was doing or if he wanted anything from us, so we just babbled along. After a little while the boy asked us if we wanted some fresh coconutmilk. Well...why not, we thought? So off he went. It took quite long before he came back, later we realized he actually picked them off a tree right then! You won't get them any fresher ;) When the boy finally came back, he had two chopped off coconuts in his hand with a little straw sticking out of them. He also cut off some of the 'flesh' of the coconut, apparently this can be eaten as well. I must say, honestly...I didn't really like the taste (milk nor flesh), but that boy was só enthusiastic that I couldn't disappoint him. Of course in the end he wanted money for it, Mark and I already expected so, we're still 'the rich tourists' for him. So we gave him some coins, and he finally left us alone on 'his beach'. Silly boy :)

Late afternoon we continued our way south towards Sengigi again. We refreshed ourselves for a bit in our room (I took a nap and dreamt about being a horse, according to Mark who watched me stamping in my sleep...oh well), and took off to the city's centre for our evening meal. There are plenty of little restaurants along the main road of Sengigi, so it didn't take long before we settled down with a Bintang in one hand and the menu in the other. I believe I went mostly for European-like food these days, I wasn't making my belly very happy with the Indonesian dishes. So: fries, salad and a piece of meat for me please! Not very cultural, but my body said thank you :)

Day 9 - Waterfalls and a scooter accident


Waking up the next day, we enjoyed breakfast (pancakes, again!) on the porch of our room. Every morning we step into a thick blanket of hotness as soon as we opened the door of our air conditioned rooms, and it was still early in summer! I liked the temperature though, after the little shock of getting out of our cool room, it was lovely to feel the morning sunrays burn on my skin and lift up my head, eyes closed, to enjoy the warmth and light.

For this day, we decided to visit a waterfall, quite a few kilometres inland. But first, we had to book our Rinjani tour for the next day, so after breakfast we hopped on our scooters and rode along some different booking agents (anxiously avoiding our scooter rental place, we we're só not booking our tour with that pushy guy!). There are plenty of guided tour agencies in Sengigi, so in the end we just ventured into one of the offices and asked for the prices and possibilities. We wanted to do the three day tour, and définitely go to the summit (what's the point of it otherwise?!). There were three package possible: a basic package (1 cm mattresses, simple food and water), a special packages (thicker mattresses, a bit more diverse food, and I believe some lavatory supplies), and last: the deluxe package. This last package is seriously insane, it has even thicker mattresses, Bintangs, a lot of special lavatory supplies, and chairs. Chairs! Come on people, choose if you want to climb a vulcano or stay in a 5 star hotel, but don't try to combine both! You have to realize, all supplies are carried by special carriers: some Indonesian guys that climb with you with all the bagage (including tents, water and food) on their backs. It's unbelievable how much weight they have to haul up onto the vulcano, how can people ask them to take chairs on top of that and walk beside them with no shame?! Sigh...

I will get back to those chairs later, but for now we had our tour booked. We would be picked up about 5 a.m. the next morning, at our hotel. It would be wise to go to bed a bit early this evening... But first: the waterfall! They were actually two waterfalls: Benang Stokel and Benang Kelambu. It was quite a trip to get there, first we had to head a bit southward to Mataram, the main city of Lombok (from Sengigi that's at least an hour on the scooter). The closer we got, the busier the traffic became, you can imagine. Mataram isn't a nice place (at least what I saw of it, it might very well be prettier once you get off the main roads), but once we passed it, everything became nice, green and quiet again. From Mataram it's about 27 kilometers east to the waterfalls, probably another 1,5-2 hours. We were getting more and more inland now, which meant more rice fields: such a typical scenery for Indonesia. We paused for a moment beside one, drinking a bit water (away from the shore it became even warmer) and eating some cookies. Every now and then you have to stop to get new petrol, which is sold in transparent bottles alongside the road, mostly by women with little stalls. They look a bit like bottles with urin, actually (is this a silly thought?). You just pour them into your tank under the saddle, and on you go!

The last bit of the road the pavement got worse and eventually disappeared. We came through tiny villages, where the kids looked at us like they'd not seen white people in ages, laughed and waved at us. Even though Mark is an excellent map reader, we had to start asking the way to people, 'cause those small sandy roads could not be found on our maps anymore. Funny thing we noticed was how a lot of villages, no matter how small (even the ones with no paved roads in them!), had big shiny mosques. A lot of them were still under construction. Obviously a lot of money goes into these religious buildings, which I find a bit debatable. On the other hand, they provide quite some opportunities for employment, some of them were crowded with construction workers. Others seemed totally abandoned though, like the construction had discontinued halfway, because no more money was left to proceed. A strange situation, if you ask me.

Finally, after quite a rough last part of the road (imagine an uphill unpaved road where you have to find your way between huge holes you don't want your wheel to slip into), we reached the waterfalls. Well, not the waterfalls themselves, but some kind of a starting point, with a parking space for our scooters. Obviously we had to proceed by foot. Some men were chilling out under a roof, we asked them how to get to the falls. One of them (named Iskandar) offered to be our guide. He stated that it was still quite a walk to the first waterfall, which we could've found on our own though. Nevertheless, to get to the second waterfall, we had to be guided, otherwise we would definitely get lost in the woods. He seemed nice, and even though he had to be paid for his service, he said we could decide for ourselves how much we wanted to give him, afterwards. So we agreed, and the three of us went off for the first waterfall.

A beautiful walk and about 15 minutes later, we reached Benang Stokel. In the middle of the woods, there was some kind of small open valley, with a tall cliff on the opposite side. Here the waterfall (Benang in Indonesian) could be found, pouring down for about 20 meters into a little shallow pool. Local people believe this water has healing powers, so a lot of them come to bathe in it. Indeed there were some Indonesian families, with adorable (seriously!) little kids, spraying and playing naked in the water. It was a very peaceful place, with (luckily) few tourists. We later heard this is completely different in the main season, there even are food stalls in the valley by then! Even more amazing is the fact that the valley is completely filled with water in the rain season, right there on the place were we stood! We took a few pics, and jumped off another, smaller waterfall nearby. Iskandar said the water was deep enough for a jump, so of course we couldn't let the chance pass by. It was worth the long and slippery detour we had to take to get back on track (only once though ;)).

Now it was time to get to the second waterfall: Benang Kelambu. Iskandar had not lied when he said we might get lost without a guide on our way towards it, we passed a lot of side roads and junctions that were leading into the forest to who knows where. But with our cheerfully chatting guide, we found our second waterfall in about half an hour, where we were completely on our own. Though Benang Stokel was nice, this waterfall left me breathless for a moment. We old stairs lead down to it, another small valley completely surrounded by forest. On one side, water is pouring down like a big net being spread out, for 35-40 meters down. Kelambu actually means something like a mosquito net! The rocks the water is pouring down from are almost completely covered by plants and bushes, which gives it an even more unique look. On the foot of the fall there are rocks, small and big, scattered around. We climbed them, getting completely soaked by the haze of the fall, passing under the falling water into little caves behind it. Iskandar laughed and relaxed for a bit, already used to this beautiful view. He took my camera and made lots of pictures of us... I might sound a bit sentimental right now, but I will néver forget this dreamy place. 

On our way back to the scooters, Iskandar told a bit about himself, his wife and little girl. He asked us if we had a facebook account, and suddenly we were added as his online friends, right there, in the middle of nowhere, on his smartphone. How weird is that? The world is becoming so small, now I receive updates from Iskandar on my facebook timeline, with pictures of him posing in front of the Benangs, together with tourists just like Mark and myself. Mark and I agreed on what we would give to Iskandar for his services (of course his stories about his wife and little daughter made us a bit more generous). After saying goodbye to him, we started our long way back towards Sengigi.

Now I've come to the saddest moment of this holiday (I tried to postpone it as long as possible, hence my superlong story above :P) ... I had a little scooter accident. Actually that was not all that bad, I can handle a fall and some bruises. Worse was the fact that my Iphone got stolen during the little chaos that arose during my fall! I had it in some kind of front pocket on my scooter, so I could easily take it out during our drive (I stopped regularly for a moment, to take some pictures of the scenery). The fall was just a stupid accident, no one's fault. I slipped with my back wheel on the sandy road, not even going fast. It was a busy place, close to the centre of Mataram. Luckily I was smart enough to fall next to a gas station with a shop, where they sold betadine and plasters :) I bled on my elbow, knee and foot, but finding out my Iphone was gone made me so angry that I totally forgot about the pain. If looks could kill, all the Indonesian guys on the little square in front of the shop would have been dead. They must have seen who took my phone (or maybe even did it themselves), but refused to say anything. Grrrrrr..... We had no choice but to follow our way to Sengigi, leaving my unfound phone in Mataram. Even a quick visit to one of the few Hindu temples on Lombok on our way back (on the most stunning location you can imagine) didn't really calm me down, but at the same time I felt ashamed for it.

I felt hurt for my lost photos, I had already taken so many during this holiday! Of course I mostly used my DSLR camera, but a lot of funny quick shots and some memorable short videos were taken with my Iphone. A smartphone is replaceable, but not those visual memories. Also, I worried about my parents. I knew they worried about their daughter, so far away in a strange country. I knew they were often anxiously waiting for a sign of life from me, an assurance that everything was okay. From now on that would be only possible by email, for which I had to go to an Internet cafe. I hated the fact that they would probably worry even more now, even though it was not at all necessary (try to convince parents of that, especially when you're an only daughter). Anyway, there was nothing I could do about it, nothing that would bring my phone back. I had to accept the fact, take the necessary arrangements and just go on, if I did not want to let it spoil my vacation. So once back in Sengigi, I blocked my number in an Internet cafe, changed some passwords and send an email to my parents, Marks mom (who knows a lot about insurances) and my own insurance company. After that we searched for the police station in Sengigi, because I would need a declaration of theft for my insurance company. The police office was a joke, it finally made me smile again. My goodness, what a bunch of silly, bored and lazy men. It took ages before they found the right papers, all the agents were interfering. I wouldn't be surprised if I was the first visitor of the office that day. The mood was indulgent though, and over all the men were friendly. They all bent down over my declaration, admiring my handwriting. Well, uuhm..thanks!

That night we went to bed early. Of course I was still a bit upset, but I really tried to come to peace with what happened, and to stay positive. Right now I was even more a real traveler, away from home, with another 'chord' cut through. Maybe I could take this opportunity to grow even more independent, and enjoy the moment and place I found myself in more. Maybe that was actually a good start of our climb of Gunung Rinjani!