As is typical for Indonesia, we struggled somewhat to get our anchor to set in Telok Batu Montjo, on the northwest corner of Komodo Island. The night promised to be calm, though, so I didn't worry about it too much. After the sun had set and the moon was rising, Kyle and I both jumped into the perfectly clear water, trying to shed some of the afternoon's heat that our bodies seemed to hold so well. "Can you believe this?" Kyle asked, as we both treaded water. "What?" I said, not quite sure what he was referring to. "We're fucking cruising Indonesia!" he said, capturing the moment perfectly.
Before dawn the next day we were underway again, on a course of due west, with almost no wind. By late in the afternoon, we had entered Telok Bima and made our way south about eight miles to the large town/small city of Bima, where Corie and Kyle jumped ship for their surfing adventure. Although the holding was good in Bima, it was a little too exposed for Ruthie and me so we made our way back north in the channel and found a small bay that was almost filled with fishing boats. It was terribly deep and I didn't want to put out much scope but we did get the anchor to set albeit tenuously. As darkness fell, almost all of the fishing boats headed out, their small, single-cylinder diesel engines providing the power for their insanely bright lights they use to attract fish. The boats were still out at dawn the next morning when we started to weigh anchor but I could tell by the way our windlass was grunting that something was wrong. As our anchor broke the water's surface, it had brought with it the anchor of one of the few boats that hadn't gone out. An old man in a very small dugout canoe came over and helped me get us untangled but we left quickly before too many people could point at us and laugh.
We motored across the top of Sumbawa Island and nightfall was approaching as we made our way to the gap between the islands. No sooner had we finished showering when the wind filled in and the sea built. Instead of the widely-spaced rollers of the Indian Ocean, though, we were now sailing in a washing machine with tall chop coming from what seemed like every direction. The motion was awful and the only good thing about it was that we were making good time. It was nearly noon the next day when we pulled into Medana Bay on the northwest corner of Lombok Island and Rutea was once again covered with salt.
An enterprising Brit and his Indonesian wife were in the process of building a marina and resort. The bay was crowded with boats from Sail Indonesia and we reunited with many people that we hadn't seen in a while. The restaurant served pretty good food and kept what must have been an enormous amount of Bintang beer cold. We took one trip into the local village but there didn't seem to be an abundance of charm there so we made plans to get underway once more, this time to the island of Bali.
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At 9/25/2013 7:46 AM (utc) Rutea's position was 08°09.47'S 115°01.36'E
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