A long and bumpy night results in only a few hours of broken
sleep. We arrive at Aceh and take an Ojek to the ferry port (Ojek chain breaks
mid journey). After a short and uneventful voyage across the narrow sea we
finally arrive at the famed Pulau Weh.
Immediately, we're approached by a chirpy man called Ahmed,
he settles us a reasonable price to take us to Ibioh, the part of the island
where we'll stay. Walking past all the air conditioned mini buses, our faces
drop as we realise, once again, we're riding an ojek. It’s hard to describe the
feeling of pushing 60 through the jungle, wind in our hair, sun on our backs,
flies in our mouths, dodging goats and monkeys as they lie lazily in the road.
Our driver takes us to various homestays in the area, starting
with his friends places first, despite our requests. We settle on a more
expensive place, Olalla cottages, paying 110,000rp a night (£7.70). We have a
big shack, literally on top of the ocean, (you could jump from our balcony into
the sea), a hammock on our porch and a shower.
Pulau Wey is suggested the best snorkelling location in the
whole of the Indian Ocean, our first priority is hiring snorkels. We pay
300,000rp (£21) for a snorkel and flippers each for the week, expensive, but
entirely necessary.
The water is crystal clear. A sandy beach lines the island
dotted with coral skeletons, seemingly alive as hundreds of hermit craps go
about their business. I enjoy chasing these really speedy crabs around the
beach, they disappear into little borrows in the sand. By knee depth, small
corals dot the ocean floor. Soon we are snorkelling around watching parrot fish
chew at the corals, shoals of coral dwellers flock to the side of rock
formations. As we get more confident we head further out, we find a 'ledge', a
sheer drop saturated with life and activity. A 4ft barracuda appears from the
murky blue; we both lose our nerve and head back, a 2 minute swim to our hut.
Our guide book says it’s not uncommon to see turtles, manta rays, lion fish,
sharks and occasionally whale sharks. I'm excited for the next week!
As I'm writing this a family of monkeys land on our roof and start to feed on the branches in front of our shack. It turns ugly as the mums turn hostile towards us, we hide inside.
Our happy driver, Ahmed
Hermit crabs
View from our shack
Our shack on the beach
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