We arrived into Denpasar Airport in Bali quite late so we were forced to spend the night in the nearby area of Kuta. Because we were arriving late, we had decided have a hotel booked ahead in advance but when we arrived we were annoyed to find that our room wasn't ready even by 11pm! The hotel worker showed us the room and found that it hadn't been cleaned so he phoned his boss but 10 minutes later he changed his mind and told us that it was ready! Too tired to care, we decided to just spend the night in this relatively dirty room. Thankfully, in the morning we were able to get some money off the price and find a nicer and cheaper hotel with a lovely swimming pool. We went down to look at the beach and spent the rest of the day lounging by the pool while Nina tried to recover from the sickness that she had picked up in Manila. Just as Nina was starting to feel better, Hannah came down with a bug that made her feel terrible and kept her bed bound! Thankfully it seemed to be a 24 hour thing so by the next day she was strong enough to travel and we made our way up to Ubud.
Once in Ubud, we found a good value hotel with a swimming pool where we would spend the next 4 nights. We were really surprised by Ubud as we were expecting a backpacker heavan but it has obviously changed a lot in recent years and gone quite upmarket. There were a lot of boutiques and expensive restaurants so we found it a little difficult to find decent cheap places for dinner. Saying that, we could also see the attraction of Ubud and why so many people go there. It has a really nice chilled out vibe compared to the party-centric Kuta and there are lots of lovely temples and palaces to visit as well as the famous Monkey Forest. We went to visit the main temples and the old palace complex which gave us our first taste of Balinese architecture. Although Indonesia is the largest Muslim country in the world, Bali itself is home to most of the Hindu minority of the country. This means that the culture is very unique and the buildings take influences from both religions. We also decided to go to the Museum of Art in order to see some traditional Balinese paintings, which the Ubud area is famous for.
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| Our little bungalow |
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| The Water Palace |
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| Balinese art |
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| Balinese art |
On one of our days in Ubud we decided to go on a long walk out of town to catch a glimpse of the famous paddy fields that surround the town. Our first stop was the famous Monkey Forest which, as you can probably guess, is a forest full of monkeys! The monkeys are extremely tame due to the large amounts of people who come to visit, and at the first sign of anything that resembles food they will pounce! Hannah was carrying a big bottle of water whilst we were walking around and before she knew it, a sneaky monkey had jumped from a tree onto her head and had taken a big chunk out of the bottle! You had to be pretty careful! We then exited the forest and walked an 8km circuit back around to the top of Ubud. We walked past lots of local art galleries and through paddy fields before heading back to town to get some belated lunch. By the time we arrived back in town, we were very tired and starving. There is a famous 'Warung' in Ubud that serves its very famous Spit-Roasted Pig. We all ordered the 'special' which came with a bit of everything! This included pork, crackling, offal and blood sausage served with rice and vegetables. It was a great experience but definitely not the type of meal you could eat everyday!
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| The monkey attacks Hannah |
On our final day in Ubud we spent some time looking around the market where Hannah got a new dress and Nina and I purchased another mask to go with the ones we already have from Korea and Sri Lanka. We also bought some small pictures that had been hand painted in the traditional Balinese style. After some pretty dodgy Nasi Goreng (fried rice) for lunch we headed back to chill out and play cards outside our room. During our time staying there, we had gotten talking a few times to our next door neighbour who was a somewhat flamboyant middle-aged German man. While we were playing cards he came out to hang out his washing and started chatting to us again. After about 5 minutes he stepped out from behind his washing and it became clear he was only wearing a t shirt and his briefs! Nina and Hannah had to look away immediately for fear of laughing in his face and we continued to have another 5 minutes of very awkward conversation! In the evening we went to a traditional Legong dance which was fantastic! It was a story told by a Balinese choir of about 100 men. As they chanted and sang, dancers came out onto the stage to enact the story. Traditionally Legong performances are romantic stories that also stress the heroic actions of a Princely figure. To top it all off, a man came out at the end on a fake horse and started 'riding' through burning coconuts. We didn't really understand this part but we all decided that it was one of the best things we saw in Bali!
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| The chanting choir |
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| The crazy finale! |
After leaving Ubud we made our way down to the coastal town of Padang Bai to spend a day on the beach before going to the Gili Islands. Padang Bai had a nice little lagoon but the current was waaaaay too strong to go swimming. We saw quite a few people struggling to get back to the beach so it was pretty dangerous. We spent a lot of time debating amongst ourselves whether or not we would take the fast boat or the slow boat to the Gili Islands. The fast boat takes about 2 hours compared to the slow boat which takes 8 but the price difference is huge. After a long discussion, we decided that one bad day on a slow boat would be worth it if we had more cash to spend on the Gilis so the next morning we set off on the slow ferry. The trip was to encompass a 5 hour ferry, a 2 hour bus and a 1 hour boat!
This did not go to plan!!! The ferry was very delayed so when we got in the bus we were informed that it would be impossible to catch the last boat to the Gilis. We ended up staying the night in the town of Senggigi which we'd intended to visit anyway so it wasn't all bad. We had a lovely drink right on the beach and watched the sunset. Thankfully the next morning, things went a lot better and we got the morning boat to Gili Trawangan. Although Gili T has a reputation for being the most 'party' of the three islands, it certainly wasn't anything like Kuta! We found that it had a really fun vibe and good atmosphere without being too touristy. We found a cheap place to stay that was run by a crazy guy called Norman and his 'island brother'. They were the most laid back people in the world and if you wanted the free breakfast you had to order it around an hour and a half before you wanted to eat!
The island was extremely beautiful and there were no cars or motorbikes. We spent one day walking around the entire island and had some time on a deserted beach before watching sunset. We also ate some great food on Gili T! There is a daily night market with loads of street food stalls and we also treated ourselves to a nice dinner at a great restaurant called 'Scallywags'. This included a BBQ and all-you-can-eat salad bar! It was absolutely great to have some really chilled out beach time
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