After checking into a "homestay" (that seems to be the popular word here, but whatever you call it, hotel, guest house, losmen, whatever, they all seem to be the same thing), I thought I'd go for a swim. The ocean was tantalizingly close; I could see a little piece of it just at the end of the little dirt lane that the homestay was on. And it really was that close...but there was no one swimming when I got down there. There was a tiny area between anchored boats, but that was the rockiest area and didn't look like the best spot. Well, maybe down the beach a ways...
I walked around the beach, curving around almost to the end of the small island, but along the beach there were now the homes and fishing equipment of the locals. A few were out collecting a particular kind of seaweed that washed up, storing it in big woven baskets. The sand here is rough--it's still got a lot of shells and bits of coral and all that haven't yet been worn down into grains. It was a beautiful sunny day and a nice walk on the beach, but nowhere that seemed like a swimming area. I finally turned back. Almost back to my little lane, I ran into a friendly local sitting in the shade and chatting with the few passersby, and he said that I could swim there; it was safe and there weren't any rules against it, but it seemed a bit weird to swim among the locals' boats, and no one else was around, so I just went back to the hotel. The lady there told me that the swimming areas were on the opposite shore of the island, and really too far to walk--I'd need to rent a scooter to get over there.
I was tired and hot by this point, and it was getting later in the day, so I didn't want to go too much trouble. I enjoyed my walk on the beach (other than sweating in the hot afternoon sun), but decided to stick with the hotel pool for that afternoon. And it was lovely.
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