Ubud, Bali (Indonesia), 6 -11 August 2008
Offerings to the Hindu Gods are placed out on the streets early morning
Having spoken to Kelly & Mark about their adventures in Indonesia we decided to catch a cheap Air Asia flight from KK to Bali. Bali, the name conjured up images of endless white pristine sandy beaches flanked by rolling surf.... or at least it did for us. Getting in late we were glad to see our hotel rep waiting for us in "arrivals", wonders will never cease. We were staying near Kuta Beach and so after a good nights sleep we went out to see what all the fuss was about. First impressions were not good. All street vendors were going for the hard sell "Come in, Come in", "Good price for you"..... What really annoyed Claire was when they would physically grab her arm and try to lead her into their shop. Even the beach offered no escape. "Surfboards, surf lessons" and so on. It felt very tacky for us. Yarg, get me out of here. We decided to leave the following morning. At first we considered moving to one of the Gili Islands but transport was an issue (for the fast boat) and then we met people who told us they were swamped with drug-taking, lager drinking backpackers. Lousy backpackers. So we decided to backpack our way inland to Ubud instead. With our remaining hours in Kuta we escaped into the familiarity of a Starbucks before venturing into one of the many stores to purchase the obligatory copied DVD's. This purchase helped to psychologically justify our time at Kuta Beach.
We arrived in Ubud early afternoon and were met with a number of touts. We went with one of them and incredibly he brought us to a beautiful second storey en-suite room with a very private balcony in a modern building (family run). The price 8.50 Euro with breakfast served to you on your balcony. Maybe Indonesia wasn't so bad after all. Next we stumbled upon Kafe - serving all the stuff Claire loves.... "organic-wholewheat this", "freshly squeezed that". Things were definitely starting to look up.
The following day we hired a driver to take us to all the local sights, the first thing we noticed was just how sprawling the town of Ubud was. We thought we had seen most of it the previous day when in fact we hadn't even seen the main street! Ubud is the art capital of Bali and has a bohemian character with quirky art galleries, wood carving stores, jewellery makers and colourful clothing boutiques. We passed the day stopping at lush green rice terraces, ancient Hindu temples, foreboding volcanoes and yes we even managed to squeeze in a little shopping when we passed a vendor that looked like they had something a little bit different. We also spent time at a coffee plantation. Our interest was peaked by their LUWAK coffee. Luwak coffee is produced from beans that have been eaten off the coffee bush by cheeky mongoose type animals. Because they can only digest the outer fleshy parts surrounding the bean they excrete the remainder. This "remainder" is then found by the workers when harvesting in the coffee plantation. These beans are then processed as normal to produce a coffee with a distinctive caramel taste. It was pricey but we couldn't resist buying a jar. We passed a few more pleasant days in Ubud (with Claire clocking up 3 massages in 6 days) before calling it quits with Indonesia and jumping on a flight to Kuala Lumpur back to peninsular Malaysia.
Rice Fields
Offerings at the Temple
Batur Volcano
Wooden Artefacts making their way from Bali for Dara, Megan, Ellie, Katie, Eilidh & Orla
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