KennethT

They may not, but I can! Especially while it's still cold outside but I imagine this stuff to be pretty temperature tolerant, bacteria-wise.

I thought you'd get it....

@ShelbyThis is the place I've passed by a million times but never tried. That will have to change soon!

Don't forget the beef fat!!! You should be frying your eggs with tallow, and then drizzle melted butter on top.

The next day was our last day before flying home - so this means no diving as you really shouldn't dive 24 hours before flying. This is where the last of bad luck happened. Originally, our flight from Labuan Bajo to Bali was supposed to leave around 1:30 in the afternoon, but that flight was changed to leave around 3:30 which would cause us to miss our connection in Bali to Singapore. So instead, we had to rebook the flight to one that left at 9:50AM. If we had been able to take the original flight, the plan would have been to dive in the morning since we'd be on the surface long before the 24 hours cutoff. One of the reasons we came to Komodo was to see manta rays - they are huge - 10 feet across and gracefully glide through the water and are practically everywhere in Komodo this time of year as it's on their migration path. There are some dive sites where you'd see 10-20 of them lazily circling around.... So, of course, the hotel was able to get permission to go back to the same place we dove the day before that morning, but this time, it was early enough to do 2 dives at slightly different sites in the same area - and, of course, they saw a few manta rays!!!!! Anyway, we didn't hear about this until the boat got back in time for lunch, so in the meantime, we had breakfast: Jasmine tea - finally! I hadn't had any since we were in Labuan Bajo as I like to stay as hydrated as possible when diving so I stay away from caffeine. pineapple and I think this cake was chocolate flavored, but I'm not 100% sure.... The last of the pancakes The last of the poached eggs After breakfast, we decided to take a short hike to the top of the island - the hotel put in a "panoramic viewpoint" which is really a 1 square meter slab of concrete.... View from the panorama After getting back and changing out of our now sweaty clothes, it was time for lunch: Soto ayam for me... Last nasi goreng for a while.... I just asked for the fruit platter but without the watermelon (I'm not a huge fan): Must have lime with dragonfruit!!! My wife's fruit platter:

After lunch, they were able to take us to a dive site close by, but not the house reef. It was a nice dive, but I didn't film anything too different from what I've shown already, so I won't bother posting any video. If anyone wants to see some, let me know and I'll put a few up for kicks.... Just before dinner, a nice sunset: We both got the prawn spring rolls We also both got the beef rendang... I found it interesting the lack of vegetables served, so I asked if we could get a side of stir fried vegetables - like the bok choy they had in the soup for lunch, or some water spinach (how I missed you!) or some cassava leaves (more common in that area) and they brought: Oh well.... better than nothing.... Dessert: No dragonfruit that night

After lunch, we didn't have much to do, so we basically just lay around... I don't think that agreed with me because my stomach started feeling not so great as dinner time rolled around... I think eating all those desserts and not getting much activity was getting to me... who knows... Anyway, that was NYE and of course, they'd have a special menu... After seeing the fish in the local market, we decided that the sushi platter was not a great idea. Yes, I know, chances are that it would have been fine and they weren't getting their fish from the local market, but we really didn't want to take any chances, plus I wasn't feeling 100% and my wife didn't really want to eat that much either... I also didn't think my stomach was up for the Chicken Kiev so I asked for some ginger tea and some plain grilled chicken.... Ginger tea - interestingly, they added some lime juice to it Plain grilled chicken with some vegetables Chicken Kiev We decided to not get dessert either, but they wouldn't let us leave before getting the special fruit platter: Snake fruit, bananas and mandarins. Mandarins are a NY tradition for Chinese (usually lunar new year) and Russian NY, evidently. The snake fruit (salak) is similar in Indonesia. I'll stand by what I said years ago, I still haven't found a snake fruit that I enjoyed. The next morning, I woke up feeling better - not 100%, but at least 90. So, breakfast... pineapple and a pandan chiffon cake - I think the green was food coloring - there was no pandan flavor evident More ginger tea Slightly eaten pancakes... my wife's poached eggs not pictured.... After breakfast, and more ginger tea, I was feeling quite a bit better, so we decided to do another house reef snorkel right after breakfast, when the current was going in the other direction, so we'd see the other side of the house reef. As you'll see, the current was a bit strong that morning - as you see things going by, we were just floating - not kicking at all.... Soft corals waving in the current Lots of fish under the dock..... Afterwards, lunch.... More ginger tea... just in case.... I had the chicken burger - it seemed to be the same chicken cutlets that they served me for dinner the night before More nasi goreng I had the creme brulee - but only had about 1/3 of it

Wow! That is really windy!!! Do you have some kind of tractor that you can use to try to pull the deer stand back upright?

I somehow neglected to take photos of breakfast the next morning - my wife had 2 poached eggs and I think I had pancakes with (gasp) maple syrup!! Really, they couldn't make some palm sugar syrup!?! How much did it cost to bring maple syrup over there!?! We got the ok to be able to dive the house reef that morning. There isn't a lot to see there, but I looked at it as a chance to practice my buoyancy, and they were using the opportunity to get us to help them do some reef cleaning - aka picking up trash that finds its way in there... Reef with puffer fish Colorful reef shot More reef aquarium..... Lunch after the dive: This was the wonton noodle soup... I think they said that it was from Shanghai or something... dishes on the side had soy sauce and sesame oil. Do I have to say what this was? For context, here's some shots from the beach.... Most of these surrounding islands are uninhabited or barely habited.

Looking at the whole plant and pot, I wonder if it has gotten root bound, in which case, it will always be a little wilty because there can't be enough root mass to support the plant. I really like fabric pots since it's impossible for it to get root bound - instead, the fabric air prunes the roots, which encourages more branching - you wind up with a giant super dense ball of roots. I always cut my basil flowers - they're so pretty, but I always thought that if I didn't, the plant wouldn't do as well.

Ha! Yeah, we thought that was hilarious - but definitely not the first time we've seen something like that. I don't know how she could sleep with that smell though... I guess you can get used to anything. Yeah, it's funny how certain things are so common in one place, and then in another so close by, it's like they've never even heard of it. Lime juice (it's really a limeaid, but called lime juice) is so common in Singapore and Malaysia. The fact that it's so rare in most of Indonesia is interesting. I guess it's kind of like sweet tea or grits being a big thing in the south US, but no one has ever heard of it (except on TV or in books) in NY.

I think I've walked past a place in NYC that makes it, but I've never tried it. Next time I'm in Chinatown, I'll try to take one for the team... for research purposes only, of course.... Funny - I never noticed it when I was there, but looking at the photos now, it seems like all the trees in the pots are dead... I can't imagine them being dormant, like we get in winter - how would the trees know when winter was? It's always hot, the amount of sunshine varies by like +/- 20 minutes all year since it's so close to the equator... maybe they go dormant during the rainy season? I've never heard of trees that did that but who knows... Everywhere else was so green.... I think it had sweet soy sauce in it - that would be common in Indonesia, but since the hotel catered to mostly Europeans, who knows, it could have been balsamic vinegar!!! Ha! But we didn't try it, so I don't know for sure.... Ha, more like 3 planes! For those outside of NYC, LA, SF or Seattle, probably 4 at least!!

After lunch, we were told that they'd be able to take us on a dive of the house reef around 3PM.... Spotted stingray.... Batfish This looked like a hawksbill turtle For dinner a few hours later: We both got the prawn spring roll.... Nasi campur - next to the rice ball are two corn fritters, on the stick are two chicken sate lillet (really dry) and two pieces of chicken with some fried tempe with sweet soy sauce and some tempeh chips This was kinda like a Thai red curry with chicken Ice cream - it was a little icy, like it had melted a bit and then refroze - not surprising as it had to survive going from the store to the car to the boat then a 30+ minute boat ride, then to the pier and then finally to the kitchen all in 85-90degF.... Fruit platter - pineapple, watermelon, dragonfruit

Breakfast the next morning - at this point, we were hopeful we'd be able to go out for some dives - there was a plan to leave at 7:45 for a 2 tank dive (1 dive at 8, the next after a 1 hour surface interval on the boat after we surfaced, so probably around 10-10:30). Good pineapple and dragon fruit Mie goreng (fried noodles) with chicken sate covered in a sweet-ish peanut sauce. I forgot to take a photo of my wife's poached eggs. Unfortunately, the morning dives were cancelled as they were not given permission to move the boats by the harbormaster... Instead, they offered us the ability to snorkel the house reef, which was really nice. Due to the constant currants, you shouldn't just jump in the water to snorkel as you'd drift far away and then it's a lot of swimming up the current to get back. So they took us in a zodiac a ways away and dropped us off so we could just have a nice drift snorkel back to the pier. This shows some of the coral garden and a puffer fish More coral and a green turtle - when the camera breaks the surface, you can see the turtle's head pop up to take a breath I had thought this was some kind of grouper, but was later told that it was a lipstick fish I was so impressed by the coral gardens in this area. So many different types of hard and soft corals - most with only minimal bleaching if any at all. After the snorkel, it was basically time for lunch. View from our table This is the beef wrap. The menu said that it was beef with "capsicum" which I assumed to mean chillies, but no, just bell pepper slices. Another nasi goreng.... More tiramisu... And a creme brulee....

The rest of the afternoon was spent unpacking, getting our dive equipment set up, etc. As we were seated for dinner, we had a few wild guests join us... I got the tuna tatake for an appetizer - only realizing midway through that most fish in the area is not kept on ice in the market so probably not the best idea, but I never got sick, so whew! Prawn spring rolls I was hoping that the hotel would have a lot of traditionally grilled fish, but no.... Fried squid, a single prawn (I think it was fried also) and more grilled tuna. Served with a tomato/shallot/chilli mixture and a sambal goreng (normal fried sambal). The beef rendang, which was probably closer to gulai than rendang but it was pretty good - definitely not like a true Padang rendang though. On the side is a very small piece of eggplant covered in sambal - that's about as much vegetable as we get here!!! We forgot to take photos of dessert.