Shopping in Seminyak

Finally - shopping! We walked to the next town North of us here in Kuta - Seminyak - which is known for being fancy and having loads of fabulous shops and restaurants, high-end hotels. It's a bit of a treacherous walk, there are not many sidewalks in Bali and there's a surplus of mopeds whipping about your ankles at any given time. But we haven't been hit yet...knock, knock.

Anomali Coffee

Silly us, we took directions from an Indonesian again and wound up far from our desired destination. However, we found some beautiful paved stone alley ways and even a few rice paddies!

After a few hours of shopping we break for coffee. We are very pleasantly surprised to stumble upon a Western style coffee shop (there are virtually no coffee shops in Indonesia because all the restaurants serve it), with magazines, air conditioning, ample seating and amazing coffee. Thank you Anomali! You can choose which Indonesian country you'd like your beans from, and then how you want it prepared: French press, drip, or something known as a wood neck. They roast beans on site, and offer Luwak coffee for your discerning palette.

Pretty rice paddy

More shopping, followed by dinner at a new restaurant: Locale. The Bali Hai beer was awful and flat, stick to Bintang. The food, however, was amazing. For $1.70 we caught a cab back to Legian and took a late night swim in the pool - not a bad day!

Surfin' Safari - I'm a real surfer now

Exciting day today - more surfing! Our buddies at R-Six hooked me up with a sweet fish board, I've been dying to test one of these out for awhile. A fish board is a retro style wide short board (popular in the 70's), usually with a swallow tail. This one is 6'2 with a quad fin. They're perfect for learning turns on smaller waves, which is exactly my plan. Chris is on sunbed rest from a bad cut on his foot, which he is trying to keep from infection.

I leap into the ocean and catch a few white wash waves for warm up. I can stand up with no issue, my balance is perfect. Yes! Every 20 minutes or so, there's a set with double-overhead so you have to keep an eye out (as always) so you don't get caught in the impact zone. These waves are breaking heavy, too, the big ones. I paddle out for a few of the smaller waves and catch only a few rides in 2 hours - my timing is off today. I am also having trouble with the duck dive, I can never get deep enough to avoid the wave completely. A set of big waves is coming in and I just make it over the first one. I get caught in the second. I can tell at the very last second that I will barely not make it, so I roll off my board and swim hard against the wave. I make it over the wave, but I get a hard jerk from my leggie and realize my board has gone over the falls. The board pulls me over the falls, and this is a heavy wave. I get spun through the washing machine twice, touching sand on my second time - and this is pretty deep water. I'm under for like 10 seconds (trust me, this is a long time) and come up gasping for air. Fortunately there's not another big wave in this set, so I immediately start swimming for shore to get outside the impact zone. This is when I realize I have only half my board. The wave has literally broken my board in two pieces. Pants. I make my way to shore, where an excited group of Indonesian children run over with my other half. I am pissed about the board, but strangely excited as well. I survived a wave that broke my board with no injuries. Lucky me.

Chris is not happy. We walk back to the surf shop to face certain punishment. Fortunately, we signed a contract with them and know the penalty for breaking the board: $100. At least fifteen people shout at us from the street on our way home - "Broken! Big wave?!" The guys at the shop are super nice about the board. Apparently this happened two weeks ago also. One of the guys tells me he's broken 15 boards in his life and shows me scars from his surf history. He asks about my wave and I show him my surf scar on my knee. I am a real surfer now.

Dinner is at The Balcony. Frozen margaritas for just 25,000rp! I haven't had a margarita since the States and boy do I need one after my wild day in the sea.

Surfing Safari - Legian

A light layer of cloud covered the sky above, and inland, dark and ominous rain clouds were gathering. A perfect morning for a surf.

After exploring the town the previous night and finding a few likely spots to rent surfboards (A few online searches turned up the sage advice, that renting surfboards from the beach was likely to earn you a cheap, damaged board, at half again the going rate.) we walked the short but harrowing block down the street from our hotel to pick up some good heavy-glassed mini-mals from R-Six Surf. A 7'0" for Krissy, and 7'5" for me. These boards being very similar of size and shape to the mini's that we rode in Byron for several months, the period of adjustment that is required on riding any board for the first time would be blessedly short, allowing us to start shredding all the quicker.

The 100,000 rp cost for the two boards' day-long rental proved to be a full third more expensive than renting in Kuta Lombok, however the quality of the boards more than made up for the difference.

Excitedly, we headed off for the beach a short five minute walk away. In as much time as it takes to blink an eye, we had in typical Balinese fashion, been offered transportation in taxis, on mopeds, and everything else in between. ("Yes, transport?!", "Yes, taxi?!") How any of them thought they would manage to take the both of us and our boards should we have accepted their offer, is far beyond us.

We arrived at Padma Beach, opposite the magnificent (and WAY out of our price-range for this trip) Legian Beach Hotel, and spent a few minutes watching the surf. A beach break - heavy, with small barrels. Overhead in the sets, shoulder-high in between. The bottom would prove to be soft and sandy with a decently steep beach, meaning plenty of water underneath at both high and low tide. The heavy swell would died a bit through the day, tapering to pleasant and easy rollers.

We paddled out and got to work. It wasn't more than twenty minutes before Krissy and I found ourselves making the drop together five-feet apart on a big fast set-wave. It felt great to be back in the surf!

Not too long after that, when paddling back out after another wave, I found a big one coming, and clearly preparing to break right on my head. Making the only sensible decision, and one I have made many dozens of times previously, I took a deep breath and dove forward into the wall of the wave, swimming through and up. A unique and generally exciting feeling often occurs at right this moment, when the monster crashes on the water that had until quite recently been occupied by me and my board. One of those "This is what it is to be alive!" moments. A shockwave slams down and through your body. This time however, it seemed to hit harder than it should have on my feet, my right one in particular. It felt as if it had peeled the skin off the inside of my right foot... strange. I pulled my board up to me, and swam out past the breakers, and evaluated. No pain - a good sign. Gingerly feeling my soggy foot, sadly it seemed that indeed, a rather large flap of skin had been peeled back from the inside, in what was probably not a good way. No blood, at least yet. I started to paddle in, flagging Krissy down in the process, and we both caught the same wave to the beach.

When we reached the sand and took a better look, there was a moment to examine it, and then it started gushing. This sadly would prove to be the end of my day surfing. Near to lunch time anyhow, we decided to head back to the hotel and clean it up (I have an almost unreasonable, yet in my mind fully justified, fear of infection in this warm, damp, tropical heat), then at least Krissy, and maybe I would go back out for another session after lunch.

After taking the necessary steps to make sure everything was clean and sterile, I applied one of the several bandages we carry from previous surf injuries, along with plenty of Neosporin. We grabbed lunch and the ukulele, and went back to the beach where Krissy enjoyed an afternoon session, and I enjoyed spending some time strumming and plucking on the beach.

All in all it was a great day. I'll likely be out of the surf for a few days, and taking extensive steps to make sure my foot heals up properly. Fortunately its not an inconvenience to walk on, so we will continue our adventures with hardly a hiccup.

Bingin

Stairs to our homestay

All we have to do to get to Bingin is take a small boat from Gili Meno - the nine o'clock - back to Gili
Trawagan, and from there we are shuffled onto the fast boat to Bali. We grab our bags and jump into a car that takes us to Kuta. From there, we split a cab with our new German friend Marion, and we arrive in Bingin just after 4pm. All the hotels seem to be booked, so we head to the beach at the bottom of a very step and inconsistent set of stairs to ask at the homestays. Our room is in an American equivalent of a barn. Large thatched roof with a restaurant downstairs and a row of rooms in the loft. Lest you carry yourself away with romantic notions about spending the night in a barn loft, let me present you with the facts:

Our porch

There is a hole in our floorboards through which we can see the restaurant, there is likewise a hole in the ceiling through which we will become soaked should it decide to rain, our room has walls but no ceiling - the same for our bathroom at the back - which I can tell you means your neighbors can hear everything from a cough to a tinkle, the toilet paper (there's toilet paper!) is held up by a piece of pvc pipe sticking out of the wall, and the toilet must be manually flushed using a large bucket of water next to it (don't ask), I can only be convinced the shower was previously utilized for scrubbing dirt off elephants, and the shelf below the bathroom window is decidedly crooked (except it's not, which means the window above it is very crooked indeed, and we are trying to ignore the fact that this probably means our barn is sliding off the very steep hill we are perched on). However, we can hear the ocean from our bed (which does have a rather romantic mosquito net around it), and have the most beautiful view of it, spying countless surfers catching perfect barrels in 2 feet of warm Indonesian water over a rocky and unforgiving reef.

I am awoken at two in the morning by a pair of young Spanish lovers in the next room, who are actually being quiet, but of course I can hear everything. La, la, la...This barn is one to remember.

Bingin Beach

The surfers here are some breed of crazy. They venture forth at dawn to surf a small but perfect barrel wave just outside our barn, walking in reef booties about 100 meters from shore. The wave rolls over a scant 2 feet of water and sharp, horrible reef. Half of them come out of the water with long jagged cuts from falling on the reef. No thank you.

We walk to Uluwatu one day to check out the temple, and a legendary surf wave. I wouldn't recommend walking there, it's about an hour and a half walk from Bingin. We were too timid to try renting motor bikes after what happened to our neighbor in Lombok. And too cheap to pay a driver. A little exercise is good for you, non? Sweaty and tired, we pause halfway there for some fresh pineapple juice. Yum. The temple is small, but extremely popular for some reason. I think it might be the monkeys - they are everywhere and pop up unexpectedly. Before you go into the temple you pay 20,000rp and wrap yourself in a sarong. Women on their periods are asked to kindly refrain from entering. You are also warned to stow eyeglasses, earrings and anything a monkey might grab.

Sunset view from our porch

The temple is nothing spectacular, but the views are amazing - soaring limestone cliffs and large waves rolling in on the turquoise ocean express to crash up against them. A Dutch couple warns us the monkeys bite (duh), and one of them stole his surfer wax! We look over and see the little guy eating the surf wax. "I guess he thought it smelled good," says the guy, as his girlfriend rubs her nibbled arm.

Dinner is amazing. And the cheapest we've had so far in Indonesia. We head down the stairs to the beach where a collection of tables with candles has been assembled on the sand for enjoyment of the sunset and an après surf Bintang. The sunset is unmatched. The tide is low and the reef sticks up in rocky majesty surrounded by still water that reflects the bright red glow of the sun as it goes down. I get the tuna, caught that day and grilled for me right there on the beach.

Sunset dinner on the beach

The next day we find ourselves kicked out of our homestay. For the best anyway because now we are dying to surf and plan on hitting Padma Beach for a safer, beach break session.

Gili Meno - "The Honeymooners Island"



Local woman prepares a coconut for my enjoyment

This is when we discover we are loosely following the Banana Pancake Trail. A recent term developed to describe the common trail taken by many backpackers in the last two decades through Southeast Asia. It's funny because we have already hit three of the trail benchmarks in Indo, and plan to visit many more of them. Also, due to the fact that all the free breakfasts we've had along the way have in fact been banana pancakes.

Meno is quiet. A vacation from our holiday, if you will try to understand. Not that I'm asking for sympathy, but backpacking can be trying on the soul. You live out of a bag (which will develop an odor at some point and never recover), travel through shoddy transportation systems often with nothing more than a handwritten ticket, trusting your life to people you hope understand what you need and where you want to go, spend 24/7 with just one person, eat some very weird food you hope will not come back to bite you, and spend many a day wandering the planet with no reservations (because nothing here is online) trying to find a bed for the night. It can be exhausting. Wonderful, but difficult as well. So, we are treating ourselves to two days in paradise.

Paradise is Gili Meno. Not the resort kind that I have experienced before (with room service, jet skis, planned activities and air conditioning), but a real paradise. Here, you live in simple grass bungalows like the locals, and there is literally nothing to occupy your time except sunning yourself on the beach, reading a good book, having a snorkel, and stuffing yourself with deliciously cheap local food. No guilt hanging over your head if all you do is swim. All day. Because there is no shopping, no sights, no town really even. Just a few grass bungalows a restaurant or two, and long stretches of white sandy beach with some fabulous reef right off shore. Bring a snorkel. So this is how we spend two days at the lovely Jepon bungalows. We do go see the turtle sanctuary, where 100 turtles are in giant saltwater baths on the beach, until they reach one year and they are released back into the wild. This greatly increases their chances of survival.


Gili Meno turtle sanctuary

It appears our bungalows are next door to a chicken farm, because at 4:45am they all start crowing. Apparently paradise comes with roosters.

Gili T "The Party Island"

Horse-drawn carts resemble a yellow and red Pere Noel tuk-tuk that jingles as it passes. The drivers honk a toy clown horn to let you know they're coming. A few are bumping Kanye. The street is an uneven half rock half dirt highway with foot passengers, happy bicyclists with baskets full of snorkeling gear, and horse carts alike. No sidewalk here, but that's part of the charm. When the horse-drawn tuk-tuks are empty of people they are full of Fanta crates.

Colorful Indonesian boats with names like "Why Not" and "The Rasta" - skinny wooden boats painted white with two long, thin pontoons reaching from either side for balance - pull up on the beach to offload basil, coca-cola, coconuts and other goods. They are reloaded with recycling, and empty water containers.



Our bungalow at Edy Homestay

Indonesian teenagers line the streets yelling "cheap room, cheap room" and holding brochures, just waiting for you to be too hot and exhausted to resist their pokes. After a 20-minute stroll up and down part of the main street, we are sweating from the weight of our three backpacks and one ukulele, and concede to view some of these "cheap rooms." For $20 a night we are staying at Edy Homestay, a coral pink backalley garden retreat, away from the noise of the main street. We get our own grass bungalow with a nice porch and a gorgeous beige stone outdoor bathroom with a hollow boulder for a sink. And, much to Chris' sheer enjoyment, air conditioning.

A cross-eyed, crooked-tailed grey tabby kitten we affectionately refer to as "Bintang" resides at our homestay. He snuggles in your lap and has a pair of very large ears.

There is a lovely Italian restaurant down a back alley off the main street - Trinycora(?). They have the best pizza in all of Indonesia, cooked in a traditional wood fired oven to near-Italian standards. The atmosphere is beautiful: big square wood tables and chairs in a neatly trimmed square grass lawn, under a black starry night. Oddly speckled with psychadelic Tiffany's style 6ft mushroom lamps. Later we had dessert at Cafe Gili Trawangan - perfect little spoonfuls of fresh coconut ice cream accompanied by petite chocolate cakes.

Gili T is the party island and we intend to participate - with cowbell. Our sights land on the Dark Moon party Wednesday night. Since the Full Moon parties only happen once a month, many locations have adopted a Dark Moon party to apease party-seeking backpackers. The party is at the Southern end of the island (the whole island can be walked in about an hour) at the Surf Bar. It kicks off with fireworks and a large bonfire is lit. There's a big grass hut for a bar, and another hut for the djs. There are laser lights and the whole effect is an outdoor nightclub on the beach - awesome. There must be a hundred people here all having a great time and while the dance floor is packed  - in true Indonesian form - the power goes out. It's back on 10 minutes later and a shirtless Indonesian teenager appears with flaming balls on the ends of two chains to execute some poi. He is amazing, I've never seen a fire performance like this. Then it's more dancing until the sun comes up. We head off to the night market before it closes to satiate our hunger. Chris has Mie Goreng and I order what I believe is a chocolate pancake. It turns out to be a full-on cake with about a million chocolate spinkles and tiny chopped peanuts melted on top, then folded in half and chopped into slices before being placxed in a dainty pink and white box for takeaway. I am more pleased than I care to express by this fortunate food order.

I had been itching for a good beach party since we landed in Australia months ago, and Gili T delivered.

Trouble in Paradise

Today it is my goal to summit the large hill East of our beach. We set forth in the hot morning sun with swimsuits, runners, and a water bottle. As we get to the base of the hill, there is a man selling coconuts. We ask him if it's possible to climb to the top and, in true Indonesian manner, he nods and says "yes." We continue all the way around the base before realizing he has misunderstood us, and replied "yes" so as not to appear stupid. Fortunately, on the other side of the hill is a beautiful, untouched lagoon with sparkling turquoise water. We happily decide to have a swim, for once unbothered by the pesky bracelet peddling children and the Muslims on holiday from Java who think we are movie stars (both of these are a daily occurance here). On our own private stretch of sand in Indonesia, we pause to admire the thousands of shells and bits of coral washed up on the shore. Chris finds a beautiful gray tortoise patterned shell with a large turret. As he's admiring it a tiny hermit crab pops out in protest. This is our day.

Later on we meet up with Dan and Emily to share our last dinner together. At the restaurant we are treated to a table in the sand, surrounded by twinkling red lights. We are soon discovered by Bob, John, Tom and Tina. You would think these are American businessmen or the like, they are in fact 10-year-old Indonesian children. Their vocabulary consists of words like "Jack Daniels", "happy hour", and "pussy." The children impart grand Lombok wisdom such as Daniel's long hair means he must have a "big banana" and that this leads to a "very happy girlfriend". They look over at Chris' short hair and sigh, "your wife is crying inside - you must buy her a bracelet to make her happy." Which of course is what they're peddling at our table. My freshly caught and grilled marlin is fantastic, covered by an assortment of veg and herbs that I can barely make out in the red light. I dig in zealously, knowing it will be delicious, not caring what the ingredients are. It turns out to be a fabulous concoction of green beans, caramelized onion, chili and lemongrass - to die for.

Mangrove forest, Kuta Beach

Upon arriving home, we gather on our front porch for some ukulele strumming followed by a game of hearts. We are thoroughly enjoying ourselves over a large Bintang each, when two motorbikes and three Indonesians come roaring into our courtyard. One drunken Indonesian teenager stumbles onto our porch and yells at us "My friend saw you today have three people on scooter..." then his friend smiles at us, grabs him by the shirt collar and drags him to the adjacent porch, where they all start yelling at three English people next door. They are our age and had rented a scooter from the homestay that morning. The Indonesian teenager is going on and on about how he had to save up money for three years to buy a scooter for 4 million rupiah. Apparently you're not supposed to have three people on the scooter (even though we have witnessed a family of five on just one scooter before), and he claims the rear shocks - or something - are ruined. He demands 500,000 rupiah as payment for this damage. The English guy explains that there were three people present when they rented the scooter and they must have known three people would be riding it. Otherwise they should have informed them of this rule, which they are now charging them for. The English guy is very calm all through this and asks that they come back in the morning when it's light outside.

Selang Belanak beach

We are all shocked at this turn of events and are trying to appear busy playing our ukulele and minding our own business. But it's extremely difficult to play such a tiny silly instrument when a brawl is about to happen next door. The Indonesian is quite angry now and yells at the Englishman "you think you are more clever than me because you speak English...I will kill you!" At this point the English guy has turned to go back into his room and the Indonesian guy picks up a sharp rock - we are all terrified he will hit the Englishman in the back of the head and beat him senseless. Fortunately one of the other Indonesians holds him back and speaks for his friend to resolve the issue. We are looking around to get the homestay people to help us at this point, and they are all terrified hiding inside their house peeking out the window. We don't know how to call the police, and we're worried they might be corrupt and just put the English people in jail. We feel so helpless. Finally the English agree to pay and the Indonesians go away. No one gets hurt. The homestay people come out of their house and apologize for the scene, they barely speak a word of English. Apparently they have a big problem here with gangs. Thank God we're checking out tomorrow. we decide to call a rain check on the Euro Cup game that night and tuck ourselves into our rooms, locking the doors. It's amazoing how the whole town knows where we are staying even though we are in a homestay with no name.

A word of advice to those traveling in Indonesia: the locals are unfailingly friendly, but be careful who you trust in relation both to renting scooters and booking boat passage. We've heard several horror stories about shoddy boats sinking on the crossing between Lombok - Gili Islands - Bali. And then there's the scooters. We don't want to be too judgmental, but there seems to be some sort of Indonesian mafia operating most of Lombok's tourism back rooms and it's best to avoid them.

Surfing Safari - Selang Belanak

Finally, the day of our first Indonesian surf trip had arrived! Emily and Daniel had stayed up late to watch Sweden in the Eurocup, so Krissy and I set our alarm for 6:30, and headed out early to pick up the surfboards and motorbikes, which we had secured the previous day. Having never ridden any sort of motorbike before, Krissy was full of nervous excitement for the short drive back to our homestay. After stopping to load up the surfboards, we had a small gravel hill to climb back to the road. Preparing for the steep but short hill, she gunned it. The back tire immediately began spinning, sliding, and spitting gravel. When she hit the road and the tire bit, she launched forward, but managed to maintain control and happily hit the road!

After a quick (but as always in Indonesia, free and banana pancake based) breakfast, the four of us set out. The morning was quite warm, and despite only being able to acquire two helmets, and renting our motorbikes without so much as giving the man our name, or filling any paperwork, we were optomistic about what a great deal we had bargained for on our rentals, and ready for fun! Previously we had heard stories about police shakedowns, and so decided to bring with us just 300,000 rp, or about $30. It was to be a 1 hour drive to the beach, and we were excited for fresh air, and the wind in our face.

As we started our journey, we quickly found that herds of cows and goats were commonplace along the main highway. Likewise, horse-drawn carriages were a common sight, and an interesting obstacle to dodge. We passed through two markets, where the entire street was crowded with people and animals. These were quite nerve-racking. Back onto the open roads and we were happy to be cruising, until it happened. We were flagged down at a police stop point. Uh oh.

In the backpacking community around Australia, horror stories abound about being shaken down for money by the often corrupt Indonesian police. They are apparently quite skilled at finding ways to squeeze some thousands of rupia out of unwary travelers. A driver we hired for a day on Bali had joked about the corruption money, letting us know that sometimes even he keeps 'corruption money' from his wife! Laughingly, he said sometimes he when he made 500,000 in a day, he might claim just 400,000 was made, so he could stash some away for car repairs and the like, preventing his wife from feeling the stress when those events came up. Not the worst thing that could be done with corruption money!

As Krissy and I, Emily and Daniel all sat on the side of the road, no fewer than five police officers of various rank and uniform surrounded us. The thought of our shady motorbike rentals quickly flashed into our heads, almost immediately followed by the realisation that not one of has had brought along any identification for the day-trip. This could turn out to be a bad day. Immediately the officers made requests for license and registration, in responce to which we meekly informed them that we could produce none of that. Meanwhile as one or two officers interrogated us, making sure to point out that we also seemed to be missing several helmets, the remaining officers were snapping photos with their cell phones! The officers questioning us rotated out periodically, while frightening at the time, in retrospect it seems they were taking turns posing for their pictures.

After several minutes of this they happily informed us that we could be along our merry way, without so much as a single rupia to encourage this outcome! How on earth that worked out, we couldn't figure. Having had such good luck and seemingly having built a good reporte, we decided to ask them for directions to our surf spot, making sure we were on the right path. They happily pointed us down the road in the direction we were headed, and off we went before someone changed their mind!

We cruised along with sun on our face, and wind in our hair, stopping once or twice to add a bit of petrol to the tanks (a unique experience!) and soon we realised two hours had passed, and we hadnt found our beach. We had stopped several times in the interim to confirm directions, and happily the local indonesians had pointed us along our way. Finally we stopped one last time, when we seemed to have reached the middle of nowhere, and asked directions and got fuel at a three-way stop. The people hanging around at our intersection contentedly pointed us along in three different ways. Great. We had heard before that rather than look like they dont know the answer to a question and loose face, an Indonesian would make up an answer, and it seems as if we had fallen pray to this mindset. With this discovery fresh in our minds, we decided to backtrack and try again.

With a bit of luck, and another hour and a half of travel, we managed at last to find our way to the surf beach! The tide was on its way out, but still some good swell to catch. A quick dip to cool off and clear the road grime, then some ground training for our un-surfed friends, and we hit the water. We managed to help them catch several waves, and get them comfortable with the balance on the board, the push of a wave, and the motions of standing up. Good progress for a first day! Krissy grabbed a few waves while I played coach, but sadly by the time I put a board under me, the tide had dropped to a point where on my first wave, I rode for maybe three feet before grinding to a stop in the sand. Oh well, it was beautiful, and we were having a nice adventure.

We hung out for a while more, trying for the first time one of the road-side indonesian specialties - corn grilled over a small fire! We ordered one with spicy sauce, and another with sweet (and still slightly spicy) sauce. YUMM! Now seeking refreshment, we walked down the beach a ways, and found Laut Biru - a cafe that was part of a resort consisting of five individual private villas. The place was small and very Indonesian looking with bamboo and grass, but well made and certainly of high quality. We ordered home-made chocolate icecream, that I believe to be the best icecream ever! Rich chocolate, from a coco bean rather than some pre-made concoction. The end result was smooth and chocolatey, but not super-sweet, just right. SOOOO GOOD! A bit of iced coffee to pick ourselves up after that, and we headed back for a last swim before our drive back home for the night.

Having finally figured out where the beach was, we saved a small amount of time for getting lost before dark set in, but just a small amount. It turned out that we were able to navigate the way home with no problem, and finally turned onto the last bit of highway before we arrived in Kuta. Emily had wanted to drive some, so we pulled over and she swapped with Daniel. Krissy was a bit concerned about driving with me and the surfboard, so decided to leave it to me to get us home. After having passed a patch with some water running across the road, we started down the last hill into town, when suddenly I felt our tail end sliding out from under us. We were uncontrolledly fishtailing down the hill! On a hill with wet tires, I thought I must have been a bit heavy on the throtel, so tried to let off it and coast. The back end continued to fishtail, but not so agressively, and I realised that we had a flat on our back tire!!

With just enough time before dark fell to get back into town, we quickly decided to have Daniel and Krissy head back and try to find us help with the man we rented from, while Emily and I stayed on the side of the road with the flat. In the 30 minutes or so we waited, we were happy to have had several friendly locals stop to ask if we needed assistance, in what english they could muster. While it seemed longer than it was, in short time and with darkness just starting to set in, Daniel arrived with two locals and a second motorbike. We moved the surfboard over to the new bike, and Daniel set off down the road with Emily, while I followed with one local on the fresh bike, and the other took the bike with a flat tire back and drove it into town.

We were all fairly sure they would blame us, and attempt to work a large amount of money out of us for repairs. Happily, in their great friendly way, they did no such thing, and when we got back sent us on our way with smiles and waves. Awesome! Home after some harrowing adventures, we got cleaned up, and headed out for some Bintang, food, and more surf movies. The only reasonable conclusion to a very exciting day in Lombok.

Ferry to Lombok

Early morning today, we pack our backpacks in preparation for the ferry to the
neighboring island of Lombok. Emily and Dan are coming with us, and We have promised to
teach them how to surf. Back in Perth, I sold my surf board to an old surfer dude from
California. He owns property on Lombok and told us about the great surf there, and how it
hadn't really been "discovered" yet. Arriving at the ferry terminal at 8:40am, we are

Padang Bai Harbor, from the ferry

ushered onto the boat, with barely a glance at our handwritten tickets. We head to the
second story where passengers belong and have a seat on the perimeter, where we can face
the ocean. A happy little green bird chirps away in its beautiful bamboo cage, nibbling
on bits of papaya every so often. Once the boat takes off the view of the harbor is
amazing, with Mount Agung rising up from the clouds. This is the "slow boat" and will
take about 4 hours to reach Lombok.

A Kiwi and a Brit are sitting next to us, they are executing a 3-day hike to the top of
the second highest peak in Indonesia while on Lombok. The Brit whips out his guitar and
starts playing. A group of Indonesian kids gathers around him to listen and he teaches
them "Big Bad Bullfrog" to which they sing along, clapping and laughing. Four hours later

Village huts in Kuta, Lombok

we arrive in the dirty harbor at Lombok, with barely a food stand and only a few goats
and mangy dogs wandering around. Most of the backpackers on the boat catch a transfer
shuttle to the Gili Islands. We must wait for ours, which is late, to take us South to
Kuta. I reluctantly visit the bathroom, preparing myself for the worst. Sure enough, the
lock on the door is a piece of green nylon string, and the toilet is a hole in the ground
with serrated plastic footholds on either side. The only other acrutrement to the room is
a large plastic tub filled with water and a small pail for pouring it...somewhere. Once

Local woman selling fish from a basket atop her head

outside I am pleasantly surprised when a nice SUV pulls up and we are able to ride in air
conditioning after a long hot boat trip.

The first thing we notice is the absence of seat belts. The second thing I notice is the
lack of identification or credentials of any kind. You have to tour Indonesia with a
strong sense of humor and trust in the locals. This man could well be taking us to the
middle of the jungle to be sold into sex slavery, but we are together and trusting that
we will arrive safely in Kuta. We drive at a pace between break-neck and break-
everything, passing motorbikes and large trucks full of produce on the narrow two-way
winding road. The scenery is unmatched: houses painted hot pink with bright green trim, a
village wedding procession (on motor bike of course), bamboo forests, and hundreds of
rice fields. A 40-minute drive later, we are in Kuta. I feel like I could well be in
Africa, the main street consists of two city blocks lined with simple grass mat huts
selling goods and cooking food.

It's definitely a surf town though, several shops rent out boards and offer trips to the
reef for surfing. We tell our driver we want to stay somewhere cheap and he takes us to
the end of the road and drops us at a compound with yellow gates and no signage, where
mothers and their children are playing on a raised bamboo platform in the dusty
courtyard. Dirty cats are meowing and running amuk. I think this might be his sister's
house. Nonetheless there appear to be several rooms that are numbered and labeled with
checkout times. There's a surf board or two outside some doors, so it can't be too bad.
The price is beyond cheap and the rooms are fairly clean with our own patio and free
breakfast. We drop our things and rush to the villager in search of food, we haven't eaten
since morning. I can't help feeling like I'm in an Endless Summer movie, where they visit
these remote places with huts and friendly natives in search of the perfect wave. We can
see the reef break in the bay, and it looks huge. We find lunch and enjoy delicious fruit
smoothies while we wait for our food. A group of Aussies are also here in search of surf,
and say there's a big swell coming in. Tomorrow, we will talk to the surf shops and score
some boards.

Chris playing ukulele on Kuta Beach, Lombok

After strolling through the rest of town to gain our bearings we head back to the
compound for a rest before tonight's Euro Cup match. Chris teaches Dan and Emily a few
songs on the Uke, then we all have a glorious nap before rising again at 11:30pm to catch
the match in town. We appear to be locked in for the night, a giant padlock is holding
the gate closed and we have to expertly hope the gate to get to town. We hit the Tropical
Beach Bar, which has a projector and a big screen set up for the game. All the local
teenage boys are already there watching the pre-game analysis, which is in Chinese for
some reason. The bar is amazing, with thatched huts, and adorable bamboo table and chair
sets all on the beach. Twinkle lights and tiki torches create a lovely atmosphere as we all cozy up on the sand for the game.

Welcome to Padang Bai

Beautiful Bloo Lagoon

Today began at 11am, with Ketut's yummy pancake and honey breakfast. We then go to Padang Bai Cafe in town where Nanon (our chef and friend since we've been in town) has promised us a good price on ferry crossing to Lombok. We give him 300,000 rupiah and he takes our names on a piece of paper. We are to return later in the afternoon for our tickets. This is how it works in Indonesia, so it's always a good idea to make friends with the locals and cultivate a relationship - they will help you out big time when you need something.

At the Bloo Lagoon, we spend hours of the day snorkeling. This is some of the best snorkeling we've seen, even better than the Great Barrier Reef. It's amazing because you can swim to it right from the beautiful sandy beach. The sand is so soft it feels like pancake batter between your toes. I see so many kinds of fish I can hardly begin to remember them all now. Fat blue puffer fish with yellow spots, long silver pike fish, a school of a hundred trout, and big bowls of lettuce green coral. We have lunch at the Bloo Lagoon Cafe. I try the Bali coffee, which is unfiltered grounds in typical Balinese fashion, but it tastes good. Just sip carefully to avoid the sludge. We have a leisurely stroll back through town toward Lemonhouse, where I leave Chris to head to the well-named White Sandy Beach. I am just not done swimming, and looking forward to some time alone - which is rare when traveling full-time with a companion in third world countries.



Cow path to White Sand Beach

I proceed past the ferry terminal and turn left at the two big cows and head up a steep gravelly hill, serenaded by chickens. Then it's down the other side of the gravelly hill until you turn a corner and "bam baby" - there's your first glimpse of White Sandy Beach. Moby's "Porcelain" is playing in my head and, rightly so, I feel like I've discovered my own private slice of Indian Ocean paradise. I trek through tropical bush and heaving coconut trees on a small dirt path to the beach. There are only 6 or so other people enjoying the sand and I luxuriate in a long swim in the warm ocean before settling on my sarong for a good read. A friendly local has plopped down next to me with his guitar. He's wearing nothing but a pinstriped speedo and a silver playboy necklace. Awesome. The Balinese people are unfailingly friendly, generous and helpful, so I decide to trust this silly man. He would like to practice his English, so I indulge him for a few minutes, how can I refuse such a genuine desire? I am rewarded with a personalized song. The guitar is lovely, and the singing seems to be a compilation of every sentence he knows in English. It goes something like this:

Welcome
to Padang Bai
How are you today?
You swim today in Padang Bai
Soon you leave
But come back
to Padang Bai
America love Bali
so beautiful
I hope you like Padang Bai



Discovering White Sand Beach

This is Indonesia...I smile away and enjoy the moment. Eventually, after a very long story in half English half Indonesian - something about Obama and Indonesian boats - I head home. The Indonesians love to talk about Obama because he went to school in Jakarta for a few years. I have just passed the cows at the bottom of the gravelly hill when I hear a voice behind me: "Kristin - I bring you to Lemonhouse!" Ketut happened to be cruising by on her motorbike. She pulls over on the side of the road and I excitedly hop on, hoping I won't later regret my helmetless state. We proceed down the tiny winding alley to Lemonhouse, dodging other motorbikes (how do they all fit?!), and I make it alive at the bottom of the steps to home. In all seriousness I've been dying to try out one of these things and I had so much fun riding along with Ketut.

After a cold shower, we head to town for dinner. We pass Nanon at the Cafe, and he has our ferry tickets for us. Yay! We pop in to Puri Rai for dinner tonight, and it is the best meal we've ever had. For only $3.30 USD I receive a grilled Mahi Mahi steak on a bed of wilted greens with a trio of homemade salsas, and a tower of rice shaped like a temple. Yes, I will be worshipping this meal. There's even a cute little sign in the restaurant: "Thank you fisherman for providing us with the best fresh seafood" - they pull it right out of the bay across the street. You can't get fish that's fresher, I beg you to try.

The Mother Temple

The next stop on our whirlwind tour of Bali was to see Pura Besakih, or "The Mother Temple".

Our guide warned us before we went to get our tickets that they would try to rip us off, charge exorbitant rates, force us to use a guide (which we would have to pay for) etc. He let us know that we shouldn't pay much more than 50,000 rp (Indonesian dollars - about $5 US.) for a guide, and another 35,000 for the tickets. Despite the warnings, we still managed to get ripped off. :-) That said, our 'Rip Off" was for a grand total of $15 or so, and we had a three hour guided tour of this HUGE temple complex. With construction starting around the year 800 AD, this Hindu temple is both the oldest, and the largest in Bali. Built on the south slope of Mount Agung, there are twenty-two individual temples. It extends over what seemed to be near a mile up the side of the mountain, with main temples on the East, West, North and South.

The carving of the entirely black volcanic stone is incredibly detailed, with representations of the Hindu gods, as well as dragons to protect the temples, and various other religiously significant depictions.




All in all the visit was well worth what we paid, even though our driver seemed almost upset at how much we paid in the end.

Catchup!

Just a quick note, we skipped over our entire road trip up the Australian coast, and our visit to Perth, due to a lack of internet during those adventures. We will be back-filling the blog with some posts, so go back in time a bit and see what we have been up to!

Much more to come about Bali, and our travels in Asia!

No Power, No Worries

Bintang during EuroCup at Topi, 2am

We have befriended a young Swedish couple and are talking of traveling together. Emily,
Dan, Chris and I took the cow path to white sandy beach today. It was a luxurious day of
sunbathing and swimming, watching the ferries putt into the harbor. There are just a few
bamboo huts with thatched roofs selling coconuts and simple food on the beach. We are all
tired from staying up all night to watch the Euro Cup at Topi, so we decide to watch a
movie. Twenty minutes later, the power has blown. All our neighbors seem to have power, but

Our American-Swedish game night, sans power

our house is black. As there's no one around to take care of this issue, we wander about
trying to find the breaker, unsuccessfully. Faced with the prospect of as long hot
fanless night, our only option is to raid the fridge of Bintang and play cards until we
no longer care. We take turns learning Swedish card games and teaching American ones.
Many are the same game by a different name. The beer is gone now so we opt to head to

town for a refill. When we walk out the door we notice the breaker just outside.
Unbelievable. We flip it and power is back! We are having so much fun with beer and games
that we proceed as planned and pretend the power hasn't returned.

The Day We Saw Everything

5am - Morning prayer sounds (like it's time for fourth period), followed by chanting for 15 minutes.

9am - Breakfast: banana pancake, fresh fruit, coffee. Boats honk arrival in the harbor.
Ali takes us to a traditional Balinese dance performance. The Sekehe Barong Sila Budaya, where we watch the Barong and Kris Dance. Something about the eternal fight between good and evil spirits represented by monsters with wonderfully elaborate costumes made from real flowers and hair. I am oddly reminded of Cousin It. Beautiful Balinese women with handmade frangipani headdresses dance with painted eyes wide open, unblinking. Emphasis on fluttering fingers and careful, measured foot placement. Busloads of Muslim children from Java literally wait in line to have their photo taken with us after the performance instead of with the widely fantastical dragon from the play.

Traditional Indonesian boat in Padang Bai harbor

11am - Walk the town of Ubud, great shopping. Local artisans have made the town quite popular (silver smiths, painters and wood carvers). Also here: Monkey Forest. I would not recommend feeding the monkeys bananas (which the locals sell at the entrance to Monkey Forest). They are mean, they hiss at you and have massive fangs. Neither will they hesitate to jump on you and take your watch, your credit card, and sunglasses and sell them at the nearest pawn shop, perhaps after a fancy lunch and shopping excursion. We indulge in a fried spring roll/taquito hybrid from a street vendor, who chops it into pieces with tiny scissors and then tops it off with many small green chilies, serving it to us in a brown paper square stapled into a pyramid. Delicious. And fried.

1pm - Lunch at a local restaurant per our request. Ali has eaten here many times before, they serve traditional Balinese pig, which is slow roasted over a spit and then displayed in a glass enclosure at the front of the restaurant. Tehbotl to drink (bottled sweetened iced tea). Our food arrives with many small bits and pieces, some roasted, some resemble jerky, and one bit looks like intestine. It's served on a bed of rice with a spicy green sauce unique to the restaurant. We bravely dig in and ask no questions. When we are down to three last questionable bits, we ask Ali about them. The pig lung is dried like jerky and quite tasty. The intestine we both leave on the plate.

At the coffee plantation - in the jungle, baby!

2pm - Coffee plantation. They grow everything here, from cinnamon bark to vanilla pods, to cocoa, Arabica beans, and limes. After touring the gardens and various flora we taste 5 varieties of coffee and several teas - including saffron, ginseng and lemongrass teas. The vanilla and coconut coffees are delicious and the ginseng coffee is amazing. Also on order, the special Luwak coffee - from the shit of the weasel-like Asian Palm Civit. It's alright, but not worth the extraordinary prices charged. It is one of the world's most expensive coffees. A warning to the coffee drinkers out there, the Balinese do not strain their coffee, but serve it with an unflattering sludge at the bottom of the cup - do not gulp every last sip of your coffee or you will have a mouthful of grounds!

3pm - Lake Batur. Unfortunately there's no swimming in this big, beautiful lake because of the volcano explosion in 1999. They are, however, farming fish in this lake today for food for the villagers. There's a startling blackened lava trail still visible on the south-western slope of Mount Batur from the 1968 explosion (which killed 1700 people!), nothing grows there. But tourists hike up this active volcano every day.

The Balinese leave these at the entrance to
their homes and temples as offerings
to the gods for protection, daily

3:30pm - The Mother Temple, or Pura Besakih. Chris did a whole post on this place, so I will summarize here: it's 1300 years old, and resides on the sunny side of Mount Agung. The entire site, consisting of 52 buildings, is constructed from lava stone, which gives the temple it's famous black facade. Each temple has 11 palm-thatched roofs (which get re-thatched every 20 years), and statues of the 4 Hindu gods. Construction is underway on one of the buildings and workers are balanced on bamboo (!) scaffolding high in the air.

4pm - Rice paddies. It must not be rice harvesting season, because there is no water in the paddies. They have the stepped, green resemblanjce to the photos I've seen in National Geographic, but are slightly disappointing without the water and sky reflection. There is, however, beautiful jungle and flowering frangipani trees surrounding.

Beautiful Bali

Balinese Chickens

We arrive glistening in Denpasar at 8:30 Saturday morning. We exit the back of the plane onto the tarmac and are welcomed by a heat wave. Finally, warm again. A bus takes us on a brief ride to the terminal entrance which, of course, is an ancient looking temple gate. After security we are greeted by our driver, Putu Ali, and his adorable 5-year-old son - who begged to go with him to the airport to avoid school. The children attend school 6 days a week here. The little cutie already knows English and greets us excitedly with a hand shake.

Alley to our B&B

The one-hour drive from Denpasar to Padang Bai, where we will be staying for our first few days, is dizzying from the flurry of cultural sights. Towering, colorful statues of Vishnu encompass several round-abouts. Motorbikes dodge in and out of traffic at an alarming pace. Some are laden with impossibly large loads of groceries, "cow food" or even families of five. Helmets and traffic signals are merely a suggestion. Women carry wide baskets of produce on their heads. Chickens line the streets, clucking with great commotion from under their upside-down grass baskets. They are kept this way to make them more aggressive for cock fights, which are illegal but take place nonetheless.

View from Lemonhouse

Despite all these cultural differences, there are similarities too. Ali's baby boy loves SpongeBob and watches it religiously before school each day.

Ali takes us up 68 narrow, steep stairs to Lemonhouse. The hotel is more of a big house with just three double rooms and one four bed dorm, perched atop a hill overlooking the village and the Indian Ocean. Our room is the most beautiful we've stayed in since we left home 9 months ago, and the bed and breakfast atmosphere is a welcome respite from the crowded, noisy hostels we've become accustomed to. At $24 a night, we're looking forward to a month or two of leisure and sightseeing in Bali. Ben and Clare, our happy hosts, are more than helpful getting us settled in town.

Blue Lagoon

Upon check in we make a German friend and he shows us town - a small fishing village. We head to lunch at Topi Inn. Delicious chicken satay for just $5 USD - one of the pricier items on the menu. Then we climb a hill and descend a few stairs into the turquoise majesty of the Blue Lagoon. A small bay with excellent snorkeling and water so clear you're not sure its there. Vendors approach us on the beach offering everything from hand made wood necklaces to massages.

Dinner again at the Topi Inn, we're wary of getting sick from the local water and on our first few days we're exercising caution as we choose our food. We set out with our friends from the hotel, including a salmon farmer from Tasmania and share our meal over international banter and a few large Bintang.

Topi Inn

Hindu is the primary religion here. Prayer is called out over the village microphone 3 times daily. I listen to the Basa Bali (local language) chanting while I brush my teeth and enjoy our beautiful balcony view. I accidentally use the sink water instead of our bottled water and spend the night hoping I don't get sick, which everyone tells us is inevitable. But I wake up and feel great. Phew.

Fishing the Great Barrier Reef

One of the activities that I have been most excited about doing while we are in Australia, is fishing the Great Barrier Reef!

It's the type of thing that you really just can't experience anywhere else, and something that I felt was a must-do. Since we had already snorkeled on the south end of the great barrier reef in the Whitsunday Islands, when we got to the north I decided to go fishing, while Krissy and Paul went for another snorkeling adventure.

It was definitely the right call!

We took off early from Port Douglas, a beautiful little town in FNQ (Far North Queensland), and headed about an hour straight east onto the reef. Contrary to our assumption prior to travelling in Australia, the Great Barrier Reef sits roughly 10-15 miles off the coast - it's not something you just swim to from the beach.

The day was a bit overcast, but that wasn't a problem at all! We stopped at something like 7 or 8 different fishing holes along the reef, and I caught fish at almost all of them! My first catch came not 2 minutes after we arrived at our first stop, sadly it was less than an inch under-sized so it wasn't a keeper.

The highlight came about two hours into the day trip, when I caught a pretty little 8-10 inch parrotfish, and proudly proclaimed it to be bait! The boat operators were in complete agreement, and helped me put it back on the hook, alive!

I sent it back down and felt it swimming about on my line, but didn't get any bites at that stop. I pulled it in and threw it down at our next hole, still alive. With a live bait fish, the bigger fish will play with it a bit, sucking it into their mouth then pushing it back out. They key is to feel this on the line, but ignore it, and wait until the big fish swallows it whole and takes off! Then you set the hook, and reel it in! The results? This bad boy!

A lovely 10-12 lb. coral trout. This delicious fish sells for over $20/lb, and is VERY good eating fish. It would turn out to be not the biggest catch of the day, but the best eating fish! In the end I lost count of all my catches, bringing in at least 5 different species, but kept just the one, big pretty fish.

When I got back in from fishing, Paul and Krissy were waiting for me, and were quite excited that I had brought home dinner! We used the grill at the RV Park, and fried it up with some roasted red potatoes. YUMMMY