Helpful local information

Well we were really achy this morning. It was such a struggle to get up and out of bed, but we had no choice as we still had to find out times for the bus to Riung as we couldn’t face getting up for the 6am bus. The locals all told us different times:-
‘There is only 1 bus and it is at 6am’
‘Only 1 bus at 7am’
‘No buses in the afternoon’
‘Yes there are buses in the afternoon’
‘There are many buses’
‘The only bus in the afternoon is at 12pm’
‘The only bus in the afternoon is at 1pm’
And finally, ‘the only bus is at 2pm’.

grafitti

So with all of this reliable information, we decided to just get there and see what happens. We arrived at 12pm and we were lucky as just at that time one bemo arrived! I could see why the locals get confused as we had to wait over an hour for it to leave, and yes there was only one bus in the afternoon so we just had to wait until it decided to leave! We also were over-charged by the bus, and we knew the real price but arguing proved pointless as they knew they had won as it was the only way to leave Ende so we were so annoyed!

A nice road

It was such a bumpy and uncomfortable journey but it was nice travelling and chatting to the locals along the way. When we were half way we stopped for what we thought would be a quick break, but after waiting 1 ½ hours for the bemo driver to appear Chris and Rod went to find him discovering him sitting in a restaurant drinking Bintang! He was planning to stay there another hour, but the boys compromised with him, saying they would join him for a quick beer as long as they left straight afterwards, and luckily he agreed as we were sooooo bored!

When we arrived we found a nice place to stay infested with millipedes and woodworms, but apart from that, it was perfect, with clean crisp white sheets, something we haven’t seen in a long time!

written by

chrischarly on June 12, 2011 from Riung, Indonesia

from the travel blog: Chris and Charly's Passage through SE Asia

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