When we were doing our last dives, the dive master and skipper started telling us what else we should see in the area. One of the things they mentioned, was a visit to some caves filled with bats. After lot of explanations of how we should go about getting to the bat caves, the skipper told us that he could take us after the dive. Of course a group of us said yes to this!
Excited – new adventure on the way!
Houses on Bastimentos Island
The bat caves were on the other side of Isla Bastimentos and we followed the shore line to get to a river. After that, we followed the river into the jungle for quite some time. The river was so quiet with so many twists and turns, and some really low hanging branches. At one point we even passed some local boys out in a canoe. Finally we came to a tiny dock next to some houses, and that is where we stopped.
Such a calm trip through the jungle
Local kids in a canoe
Once on land, our guide decided that my sandals were not good enough for our hike through the jungle and the water in the caves, so he found some rubber boots for me – for which I was so thankful later on. We stopped at a small bar where we each got ourselves a beer for the road. We then headed into the jungle in search ofhef cave. As we went along the guide pointed out different things – a spiked tree, – red frogs, and more. He also told stories from his own life. It turns out that he worked for NCL for several years so from then on, we obviously had a long ship life conversation.
The muddy entrance to the jungle
Ready for the hike – check out the boots
Once we got to the cave we all switched on our lights and headed in. At the entrance there was a big cave with tons of bats and relatively dry ground to stand on. While we all thought this was the cave, our guide decided to take us further into the cave system – a hike which lasted an hour and a half. Here the water was ankle deep in the shallowest part and in some parts we had to swim. Some of the caves were wide and some were super narrow, some had stalagmites we almost had to swim under and some ceilings were super high with sleeping bats. Oh, and the only light we had was what our head lamps provided. There were also tons of rocks we had to climb over, and at one point we came to a small waterfall and a massive rock we got to jump off into the water.
Stalactites in the bat caves
A small waterfall and stalactites
As we left the caves the sun was already starting to set, and the mosquitos came out in full force. It was a mad dash through jungle and mud to get away from them. We then got back into the boat as it started to get dark which created this awesome atmosphere where we were sailing. On the way into the jungle we asked the guide about his life and he told us that he lived on a small farm with dogs and goats. As a special treat he brought us to his farm so that we got to cuddle baby goats for a while, which was definitely a perfect ending to a perfect day
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