Base 30 - Penestanan

Once there were cocks. Literal ones. And they woke us up every morning at 6. Then came the chickens. They joined in in a sometimes synchronized choir or sleeplessness. Then came the builders who built a small house next to us with a speed that put my game-building to shame.

There were two houses being built. This was the one farther away.

Our room was beautiful with a generous balcony, a small but useful kitchen, a big, confy bed and an open air bathroom. Our hosts knew almost no English at all but they were friendly. We dealt mostly with an older woman who was apparently the owner, her sister who carried our 25kg luggage on her head, and her two daughters. Although both daughters were in school age, they never seemed to go to school. They were busy cleaning up and working. That's probably how it works there but still I found it sad.

Ze bed.

Ze view

Ze kitchen

Ze open air bathroom

We stayed there for four weeks and after a short while they figured us out. We ate nasi goreng for breakfast and one day Diana asked for more vegetables. A few days after that, every time I got my breakfast it was "SPECIAL, VERY BIG BIG". I also had to laugh every time and thanked them.

Relax like Buddha

In the end it was a very nice stay, tainted by the noise for the first half of the day. The neighborhood outstanding, the coconut juice was flowing... ah, those were the greatest times. But we had to go back "home" to Australia and the looming danger of the volcano didn't help.

Penestanan

I am not 100% sure if Penestanan is part of Ubud or not and if they grew together. I am also too lazy to look it up. The last time we were in Ubud, we visited because there was a hotel and a yoga school there that were recommended to Diana when she was in Thailand. The girl there told her that Yoga Barn was too commercial and the other school is better. It turns out that the Yoga Barn is too commercial and Intuitive Flow is smaller, more personal, more consistant in the quality of its tutors and they take more more often to correct you if you do something wrong.

Intuitive Flow.

The rooms at Yoga Barn were very nice but the one in Intuitive Flow were outstanding. I took part in two Yoga Classes. One of them were the kind of exercises you would expect, focusing on stretching, breathing and balance. The other was one where you lie down and gradually learn to sleep without losing your awareness. I fell asleep losing my awareness in a matter of minutes. Diana was laughing at me for days.

Light is always a major part in good photos.

While living in Penestanan Diana spent a lot of time in the yoga studio and I spent a lot of time programming my game and looking for jobs in Australia. We also went to the gym and Diana introduced me to Squash. In the beginning she let me win and later I let her win. But don't tell her that. I was making too many points in a row once and she wanted to give up. We probably never played a real game the whole time we were there. And we played a lot.

It looks like something out of Tomb Raider.

Other than that we explored a bit more of the restaurants in every direction, tried some new delicious food and went to walk on a trail where most of the photos were taken. Because our hotel was further away from everything, we also had to learn driving around on a scooter, constantly defying death. We also went to a place that most people seem to think is reduntant in Bali: a sauna. But it was nice there. They had a pool to cool down and of course other people from Germany.

The most vertical trees.

Our room and neighborhood was an adventure in itself. We will go into that next.

Base 29 - Canggu

OK, this is probably going to be one of the most content-free posts I have ever written. My hazy memory tells me that I did have some things to write about this place but my memory also fails to deliver. Bad memory!

Bed.

As is tradition in Bali there is no sidewalk at the side of the road. What made this neighborhood more dangerous than anywhere else is that often at the sides of the road there were no shops or whatever, just a wall or a drop to a rice field or some kind of open drain so you couldn't step sideways even for a bit.

Terrace.

Although the room was not bad, Diana hated it there because we had no privacy. There were other people walking in front of the room to get to their own rooms and so she didn't have anywhere to meditate about life and the universe as we know it. As soon as our German friends left for Germany we left for Ubud.

I added a blurry photo of the yoga place close by to make the whole thing a bit less boring.

Sorry!

Canggu

Back to Bali. But this time in the city in order to perhaps have a beach we could go swimming. Only we couldn't because most of the time they had big waves and red flags, which says that swimming is forbidden. We were told repeatedly that Canggu is beautiful but we didn't see it, presumably because we weren't in the center of it. I still managed to do some good photos.

The greenest green ever.

This post and the next one are going to be really boring. What should I write? Let me see ...

The cloudiest clouds or something?

There was a yoga school/retreat/restaurant nearby but everything except the yoga thing were luxurious but prohibitively expensive there. I went once to do a Ying Yoga class and because the trainer spoke with a heavy Spanish accent, I had to constantly think about sex during the whole duration.

I don't even know. Let me be!

I also had birthday while we were living there. Diana told me she made a reservation for McDonalds and she was so serious about it that I believed her for a while. In the end, we went to a Greek restaurant called "Nostimo" which had shockingly authentic Greek food, although they told me that they never had a Greek working there. It was like in an alternate reality.

I have a rule of not making photos of my food but I made an exception.

After our friends from the Germanies left us, we left Canggu as well.

That's all folks!

Bali Day Tour

On week three in Ubud we were visited by the dynamic duo, also known as Elvira and Felix. And because they are not as lazy as us, they booked a taxi driver for a day by the time they arrived from the airport. Actually they had booked three days but we only joined them for the first one. This is how it went.

Entry of the temple.

Center of the Temple of All Things Templish.

The first stop was the Taman Ayun temple. Yes, a temple. Which was very templish. With unidentifyable temple things. They were existing all around even though I didn't understand their purpose. Behind the temple was a park but we didn't spend time there because I assumed (and I was right in my assumption) that our time will not suffice to visit everything that was in our plan.

OoOOh spread your wings and fly, butterfly!

Our second stop was at the Bali Butterfly Park. They also had other bugs and some spiders in boxes but their main attraction was butterflies. I loved them (no homo)! I thought that the very colorful depictions of butterflies were the stuff of fantasy because all I have ever seen live was the brownish ones but these here were wild, beautiful, big, sometimes colossal to the point of being scary. Not hairy-spider-scary but still scary.

I have to look up what this is before it kills me.

This is some kind of bug and NOT a leaf.

Also not leaves.

I hadn't thought that the butterfly park would be interesting for me but it was.

Third stop were the Jatiluwih Rice Terraces which were impressive in their own, very different way. Nothing I could say about them that isn't explained better with pictures.

Rice fields.

Sky mostly.

Our fourth stop was supposed to be a bath in hot springs but time was running out and we went straight to Danau Bratan. I think that is its name because Google Maps has an alternative spelling. It is a temple in the water. This was more exciting than the first one because of the surroundings being more interesting and varied and there being a playing field for children. We rode a kind or round swing for two when you sit opposite of each other. Wheeeee!

Temple in the water.

That was supposed to be our last stop. What we didn't know was that our guide had another stop planned for us (not pictured).

What I liked in Bali compared to Thailand was that people seemed less inclined to relentlessly try to sell you things at overinflated tourist prices. This is true at least apart from the taxi drivers in Ubud. Those keep each others back like a wall of scam you can't penetrate. Our taxi driver for the day offered a price that was a significant pay day for him but wasn't more expensive than taking a taxi in Australia. Which brings us to our last stop.

Also close to the water temple just to break up the text a little.

Our driver asked us if we wanted to try Luwak coffee. We didn't. He asked if we want to do a coffee break and the friend who sat on the front naively said yes. We were brought to the most obvious and most deliberately evil tourist trap where got a tour of how they make their own coffee and let us taste different sorts of coffee and tea. Then they took us to their shop where we paid prices four times higher than what we found later in normal shops. I knew they were scamming us but agreed to buy something anyway because the price for the ride was pretty low, he was a good guide otherwise and I accepted that he gets a percentage of the things sold there.

I got a package with vanilla coffee for myself and Diana drank all of it.

Monkey Forest

While in Ubud, do like Ubud which means do the Monkey Forest ... or something.

Ubud is known for its monkeys and its hippie yogis which are almost the same thing. OK, they are nothing like each other at all. But perhaps the yogis can use their devine powers to communicate with the monkeys? If so, I have some use for them.

Criminals!

After our friends from the Germanies arrived, one of the first things we did was visit the monkey forest. I personally got a taste of the monkeys even before we got through the gate. Since I didn't have anything to eat, I bought two pieces of banana bread. When we were close to the forest and I was still naive, unsuspecting and therefore unprepared, I unpacked my banana bread, had a bite and then out of nowhere a monkey materialises before me, jumps and climbs on me and snaps the banana bread out of my hand. We laughed! But I was also angry.

Statues of criminals

If I found a yogi that can talk to the monkeys, I want her to tell the monkey that he owes me a banana bread and I want the monkey to buy it at the Coco Market because they have my favorite one. After that I was still hungry but weary. Before going through the entrance, I checked my surroundings, took out the second piece, saw another monkey coming at me and put everything in my mouth. The woman at the entrance told me not to bring any food with me and I agreed with her even though I am not sure she understood me because I talked with a very very full mouth.

No criminals in sight. Not that I know of.

The forest was nice to look at, the monkeys climbed on you, if you bought any bananas from the banana-stands there and it was funny if you were intentionally carrying food to feed them.

It was nice.

Base 27 - Ubud

August is peak season for tourists in Bali. This means that because we decided to go there a week prior, the choice of rooms was severely cut down. The first priority was to find something close to the Yoga Barn, so it was more difficult. I booked a room close by with a view to a rice field for three days. The plan was to look for something better for a longer stay when we arrive there.

We didn’t find anything.

Either the rooms were too far from the Yoga Barn, or they were too expensive or we had to switch rooms every one or two days if we picked the hotel. We also looked for some rooms in Penestanan close to another yoga place but every room we’ve seen there had an intense smell of mold. I don’t know if you can even fight mold in a place like that but it was a shame. I hurt to have accesss to the most beautiful houses for good prices but not being able to stand the smell.

Da masta bedroom.

So now, our room for three weeks. It was actually three rooms. The first three days was in a small room with a double bed. It was too small. The second one was way more roomy, on the second floor and with two single beds which we had to push together. It only half helped. Diana fell in love with this room and wants to stay there forever even though it‘s a bit shabby. Hot water was sometimes missing. The bathroom didn‘t have a window and was damp most of the time. Some corners had a bit of mold. But the feeling there with the view was freeing. It felt like vacation.

The lobby and restaurant were also flawed but lovable. We went there every day at the last possible moment to order breakfast, because normally none of us eats breakfast. So I ate fried rice with vegetables and banana pancake for three weeks straight. Is that wrong?

It‘s all good.

Da masta restaurant.

We also had a third room for two nights because our favorite room was booked but it was horrible and we best forget about it.

Bali Ubud

After Diana came back from Thailand to Australia (did I mention, she was in Thailand?) she wasn't happy. Her stint in Thailand was more work than relaxation and she wanted to do more yoga and drink out of coconuts.

So, Bali. It is supposed to be something like an Australian colony because it is the cheapest vacation Australians can do outside of the country. At least that was the reasoning I wanted to use for including it in the blog. It's all a lie. We have heard more Germans than Australians here.

Where The Streets Have No Numbers

OK, it is not a lie, we are just on the wrong spot. The partying Australians are just in different parts of Bali. When we arrived here, I shamefully didn't know anything about Bali or Ubud. We came here because Diana was told it has the best yoga places. I just found out yesterday that the whole of the tourism here is rooted in the book/film Eat, Pray, Love. The core of it are women in their 30s looking for spirituality, fitness, cleansing, health, whatever. That's me basically.

First meal in Ubud.

I like and I don't like the center of Ubud. It has lots of good restaurants (and shops if you like that kind of thing). The people are good natured. It is cheaper than Australia. I like the traditional architecture. Also the rooms they do yoga in are stunning in their beauty and I don't even care for that kind of thing. What I don't like is the endless traffic and constant loudness and the taxi drivers asking for prices beyond what you would pay in Australia.

Working place in our hotel.

If you go a bit outside of the centre of the village, it is a completely different feeling. Traffic becomes much less and you see a mixture of beautiful nature, small, neglected shops and traditional courtyards that house multiple generations of families with their own mini-temple. Next time we come here, we will get a room a bit outside of town.

Then we will see more of this.