Gili Air, Lombok – 18^th to 20^th September

Sally and Jeremy brought Astra over to Gili Air from the mainland the morning of the 18^th.  The night before, Oliver and Charlie slept in the bar by the anchorage after a heavy night drinking while Liam and Jennifer spent the evening over on Gili Trawangan.  When everyone met up early afternoon, the entire day and evening was spent drinking in the bar which turned into our second home on the island for the next couple of days.  The people who owned the bar were extremely happy that we chose their place as our base camp for our time on the island. 

Saturday the 19^th was a very chilled out day aboard Astra.  Liam and Jennifer spent a few hours exploring the island whilst the rest of us watched a couple of films.  Sally and Jeremy then went for a walk on the island to get some groceries whilst Charlie cooked dinner and played cards with the others.  That evening we had an excellent steak dinner which was followed by a film whilst Oliver and Liam went over to Layaleeta.

The activities of the morning of the 20^th started off pretty much the same as those of the previous day.  We played cards and relaxed onboard.  After lunch we went ashore back to our friendly bar to socialise with Layaleeta.  We spent the entire afternoon by the bar playing beach games  on this rainy day.  Later on we moved around the corner to Zipp Bar and sat in a beach hut whilst enjoying squid and pizza for dinner.  Around 10pm we headed back to Astra to prepare ourselves for the early morning sail across the Bali.  Oliver and Liam went off with Damo from Layaleeta to watch the cricket in a bar along the beach and returned back to Astra a couple of hours before we set off.  We left our anchorage on Gili Air at 4am in the dark and headed the 55 miles south west to Bali.