We had planned to leave on the ferry on December 30th and be back in Jakarta for New Years Eve with our friends. Mother Nature had other plans! A big storm came in on the 29th and the ferry was cancelled on the 30th. It doesn't run on Saturdays and it was also cancelled for the holiday on January 1st, so suddenly, we were staying until January 2nd! We did consider hiring a boat or chartering a plane because people were also stuck in Padang trying to get to Aloita as well, but the weather really cancelled every option. We chose to make the best of it and enjoy our 3 bonus days!
The first day was pretty nasty. Storms blew around most of the day, but the intrepid surfers didn't stop from going out...in fact, they actually went to a more remote break in search of bigger waves! The boys and I chose to have fun indoors until the rain quit. After that, we enjoyed all of our extra time, especially when the sun came back out!
New Years Eve was really fun together! We voted to celebrate at 10pm instead of midnight (thanks everyone!) and thankfully still had a few clean things to wear to the party.
Once again, the staff had made a wonderful dinner for us and transformed the dining room into something really special. The front desk staff even joined us for dinner!
Then we took things out to the beach, where they had a bonfire and sparklers. They had planned to have lanterns as well...but they were on the ferry....arriving January 2nd!
Happy New Year! We had a champagne toast at midnight 10pm and wished a fond farewell to 2022.
The whole gang! Our family, the British family, American honeymooners, a German couple, the Swiss/Chinese family, the Italian manager, the Swedish yoga instructor and the Slovenian surf instructors. We spent all 10 days together with no one else coming or going and it turned out to be pretty amazing. When the ferry finally did arrive with two dozen new people, I wasn't quite as sad to leave because our little bubble was broken.
Welcome to 2023! Since we weren't expecting to see the sunrise from Mentawai on January 1st, it seems like this might be a year of being flexible. Looking forward to every day of it!
No comments:
Post a Comment