Karaoke, Euchre, and a Bonfire on the Beach ~Pelabuhan Ratu Part 3

01 - 03 March, Pelabuhan Ratu, Indonesia

     For dinner that night, we decided to actually ask for the menu. Before we had just been reading the Western menu that was posted when you walked into the restaurant. I ordered some Indonesian food and it was tasty and cheap compared to the Western food. We sat around having good conversations and listening to my iPod on the speakers that the bar had. 

     Karaoke was next. We didn't even make it into the room. We sat outside listening to the terrible singing and started to play Euchre. We had to reteach Eduardo how to play. It takes awhile to learn again after you haven't played for a long time. He got the hang of it after while, which was good. He was my partner, and I wanted to win. Haha! We actually ended up losing by 2 points! 

     After one long game of Euchre, it was getting late. We decided we had better head up to our rooms if we wanted to get up early and enjoy the half-day that we had left at the beach. As we were getting up to leave, a local Indonesian started talking to us. He invited us to their bonfire on the beach. Of course we accepted the invite. It was really nice of them to invite us. I had never been to a bonfire on the beach before. 

     It was a big group of people that had actually rode their motorcycles from Jakarta to Pelabuhan Ratu for the weekend. We met one guy named Dani along with many others. Dani is the one that invited us. They were all very friendly and were happy to practise their English with us. They wanted soooo many pictures though! They always do when they meet new people....or Americans. 

 

     They were actually cooking fish and octopus on the fire. I didn't try any, but Danna tried a bit. I just stood around and talked to all of them. It was getting late so Danna and I decided to head back to our rooms to get some sleep before the next day. It was already midnight. 

     The next morning, I got up very early. I was woken up by my hotel-mates. They went back to sleep and I stayed up. I read my book, before getting some french toast for breakfast. I decided I should probably take advantage of the little time I had left to relax, so I grabbed my book and headed for the cabana by the pool. The group of guys that we had met the night before were leaving, so a few of them came over to say goodbye to us. They were going to be making their long motorcycle trip back to Jakarta. 

     We actually ended up leaving a couple of hours after them. I did not want to go back to the city of Jakarta where the air is not fresh and the beach is not clean for miles. I loved where we were and we all decided that we should have just called in sick on Monday. We wish! As we were leaving, I checked out the map that they had hanging in the lobby. I actually figured out where we were after the whole weekend was over. We were so confused as to what the town was called that we were in, oh well, we just knew we didn't want to leave. 

     After paying and chatting with the owner for awhile, we all piled in the car and got ready for the long trip back to the big city. We made one stop, and the trip took us about 5 hours again. I thought maybe it was going to be worse because of the traffic, but it really wasn't all that bad. I was sick of being in the car though, so I was not looking forward to the taksi ride back to Mitra Bahari. 

     I finally made it home around 6:30 pm or so. Back to reality....I had to get some work done for school after unpacking and starting some laundry. Monday was coming already, but I had a great, relaxing weekend.