Lembongan Island to Benoa Harbour Bali

Gaviota
Wed 7 Sep 2016 09:47
008:44.88S 115:12.65E

We were surprised on getting to the entrance of Benoa Harbour to find it full of watersports boats, paragliders, inflatable bananas and flying airbeds soared and roared all around us.  It did seemed slightly odd allowing this in the entrance to a major shipping port but of course this is Indonesia!
 
We found Bali Marina tucked away up a creek and Syd did an amazing manoeuvre with Gaviota to get her into the only remaining space which was for a boat half her size.  But we were in and immediately went to plug into shore power to try and save the freezer contents.  First problem our plug did not fit.  So first job was for Syd to ‘adapt’ a plug that would work – and it did, so the freezer re-froze and first problem was sorted.  We looked around at Bali Marina with it’s broken jetties and floating rubbish everywhere – not a good first sight for visiting international yachts to the area!  The facilities resembled an Indonesian prison and the whole place was very run down but as always the staff were wonderful and we knew we had no option but to get on and sort our repairs as quickly as possible.
 
First call was to a wonderful Italian guy who used to work as an engineer on Superyachts – without his help we would have been struggling!  He quickly organized an electrician to confirm Syd’s suspicions that the electrical part of the generator needed a full re-wind.  This meant the generator had to be dismantled – again! 
 
Syd needed a break before he tackled this job again so I dragged him off horse-riding.  We were picked up from the Marina (which was in the arse end of nowhere) and had a very interesting ride through the tourist area of Kuta and over to the Kuda P Stables which were close to the surfing beach of Pererenan.  I was immediately impressed with the standard of the stables and the horses we were given were lovely, well fed, well groomed and very well behaved.  We set off and rode through the rice fields down to the coast where the rollers crashed in on a lovely black sand beach.  Our guide Deni took lots of photos, then let us canter and gallop along the beach.  Syd had the best horse he has ridden so far and really enjoyed experiencing a good horse at speed.  The ride back took us past lots of beautiful traditional Hindhu houses each with their own elaborate temple in the garden, very beautiful.  When we arrived back our host’s wife bought us cold drinks and freshly cooked banana fritters.  It was a really good break from sailing.
 
Back to cell block Bali Marina and getting the generator out.  Syd managed to do this in half the time it had taken him before in Port Douglas and Alberto (our Italian helper) took the generator away.  As always timing was crap, it was Saturday and the following week there was a 3 day Hindhu festival so a lot of places would be closed.  To compound the problem the entire credit card system of Indonesia had decided to pack up and as you are only allowed to get 1.25 million Rupiah (£70) out of a cash machine in one go it was going to be a problem.  Luckily the repair place took American Dollars and we were suddenly free to go.  We arranged for the rewound generator to be delivered to Lovina Bay in the North of Bali (where the next Rally stop was and more importantly where we had to get our Visas extended!).  We packed the freezer with ice and escaped.
 

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