After yesterday’s early morning exertions we decided to take it easy for the afternoon, so headed over to Telok Datai, aka Sandy Skulls beach. Stunning. Even more lovely than the main beach we’ve been going to – bijou, you might call it, tucked into a secluded little cove about 20 minutes ride from our hotel. Just a few hundred metres of silky white sand, with trees to the rear and warm, gently lapping waves offshore. And no jellyfish.
What it does have is lots of wee beasties, hard at work building weird, Dali-esque mounds…
…as well as hundreds of tiny little crabs, scurrying about the place at implausible speeds on their tiny little legs, dodging into holes when anyone comes close, and creating strange, Aboriginal artworks out of little balls of sand they roll up using their front legs. When I say ‘little’, I mean perhaps the size of match heads – certainly no larger.
One slightly odd thing about the beach – the people there, more or less evenly divided between locals and westerners, but never the twain shall meet.
Not that there’s anything even hinting at friction or unease – far from it. In both camps, there’s convivial conversation among groups of adults, swimmers out doing their thing, kids playing joyfully in the surf. But the locals stay up one end of the beach – relatively close-packed – while westerners spread themselves thinly across what’s left.
I suppose it would be unrealistic to expect anything else: we wouldn’t dream of invading their space, and they’re just hanging out with their friends and families, obviously. But to me at least it does feel like there’s something just a tad apartheid about it all.
I’m doubtless overthinking things. Everyone’s having a lovely time on a lovely beach, so what the hell am I kvetching about.
After our exhausting morning at the beach we decided to take some time out for a siesta, then, when the day had got past total ferocity (ie, the temperature was down to about 35 degrees) we took another ride on the scooter to the local waterfall. Which proved to be quite lovely. Very well presented by the powers that be, with little huts for shelter, complete with barbecue pits, and rock stairs up to the main attraction, flanked at one point by lush red flower bushes, which were attracting the attention of big, beautiful butterflies, which seemed to be after the nectar, bee-stylie.
Then up to the falls, where we enjoyed watching a young family having fun in the rock pool, before one of us was a brave bunny, and launched into the torrent.
Then back on the bike for the return journey, immediately running into a large troop of monkeys, just hanging about on the road. We slowed to admire, and potentially photograph, some mums & babies, but were immediately approached by what was clearly the pack leader, a fair-sized male (‘Not half as big as the one that attacked me’ – V), who – fair play to him – was, despite being not that big, and certainly a helluva lot smaller than the pair of us on a scooter, clearly set on keeping us away from the young’uns. Discretion, valour, all that – we revved up and came back for bikkies on the verandah.