Travel Day - Pulisan to Bunaken Island

 We began our long drive from Pulisan.  We checked out about 6, and really enjoyed are time there. Kristin will especially miss the great hour massages for $3.50.

 Heading towards Manado, we passed alot of small houses.  This is a typical house. Most houses have unbelievable floral arrangements in the front yard.

 North Sulawesi is a very green place.  Villages look like small outposts that have been carved out of the rainforest.

 Sulawesi logistics 

 These are cloves drying in the sun.  We saw lots of clove and chocolate plants.

 A village corner store drying some cloves.  It seems like everyone has a hand in this game.  We saw a ton of these on the road from Pulisan to Manado.

 All of the kids here yell, "Hey Mister Mister" to white people, even women.  We were told it is because when white travelers first arrived in Sulawesi, it was only white men, and it stuck.

 

 This is an illegal gold mining operation.  We passed several of these and they operate in environmentally protected areas.

 Here is another campaign poster.  This lady is serious.

 We were old that if you want typhus, order from these portable snack machines.

 We finally made it to Manado, and were greeted with a hero's welcome.  Mister Mister.  They were taking pictures of us.

 Some sweet glasses at a Manado department store

 We found a food court while we were waiting for our boat from Bunaken Island.  I did not order the Passion Piss.

 The Manado Harbor area is not particularly beautiful.  

 This is a bemo van, which is the cheap way to get around Indonesia.  A driver just runs a route and picks people up along the way.  Usually, the vans are customized and a little flash.

 Our boat to Bunaken.  

 I met these kids, and they wanted me to take pictures of them jumping into the harbor.  They were pretty hilarious.

 This kid was kind of the leader 

 Flips 

 I see now that he is apparently flicking me off.

 I gave them each a dollar.  They seemed pretty fired up about it.

 Leaving Manado, bound for Bunaken, which has some of the best diving in the world.

 Pulling into our resort, Living Colours, we had to navigate through some Mangrove Forest before arriving at a sandy shore.

 A dog was waiting for us at our front door.  This was the mom for some puppies that were on the premises.

 These geckos were our insect repellent.  They make strange noises and crap on your stuff though.

 These are a frequent sighting and are abut the size of a fat 5 year old's fist.

 Common Gecko 

 Puppies 

 This one was sort of the leader and dominant one.

 Every night some locals would sing and have a little party.  These are their drums.  They are really really good.

 Another Bunaken dog 

 The view from our patio in the hills 

 Puppy Party 

Furmonster of the day is a tie between the 3 pups 

These next pictures are from our dives in back in Pulisan, but I did not yet know how to use my underwater camera properly. I have since learned and the underwater pictures that I will upload tomorrow are unbelievable. 

 Perhaps the strangest development of the trip is Kirstin's sudden love of diving.  Here are her and Ryan.

 This is sort of like a seahorse 

 Lionfish 

 Our very laid back dive guides 

 Everyone has foreign flags up for world cup.  We have seen only 1 US flag, but many for Netherlands, Italy (face), Spain, and Germany.

 Kristin diving 

 This is the sassiest fish I have ever encountered.  It sort of just sashays around.

 A very strange flounder