Beautiful Bali

Last week we were basking in the beauty of Bali, feeling like the luckiest people on earth.

When I posted to facebook that we were in the plane, heading to a week in Bali-paradise I had an impressive array of responses, many of people saying they've always wanted to go to Bali.  I don't know how much of it stems from 'Eat, Pray, Love' and Julia Roberts, but I've also wanted to go for a long time.

I was surprised when talking with several different people here in HK, when Bali seemed to come up short in their opinions.  It's a common destination to go to from here, being less than a four hour flight away.  Unfavourable descriptions like 'dirty', 'sub-par-beaches', and 'not-worth-the-hype' were used to describe this oasis I saw in my mind.

Sketchy money exchange business

I think it was because of these nay-sayers, and our subsequently lowered expectations, that we loved Bali so much.

Again, as always, I will allow the pictures to tell most of the story with a few extra anecdotes along the way.

Beach Peddler

First, Indonesia is a developing country, and has some of the realities typical to developing countries.  The sewers stunk under the sidewalks a little, there was some trash on the streets, and there were poor people trying to sell you stuff at every turn.  See the above photo of a money exchange business set-up in a sketchy vacant 3-walled structure... doesn't scream confidence.  The currency has an exchange rate of over 9500 rupiah to 1 USD, so Bali is wonderfully cheap.  We had delicious dinners with several drinks for under $40 Cdn.  Mike also got a 45 minute foot massage for under $5.  Everyone is trying to get a piece of the tourists money so we did find we were 'sold to' a lot.  There were many peddlers on the beach trying to sell you anything and everything from sunglasses, hats, sarongs, to surf lessons and kites.

Taking out over 1,000,000 from ATM.

Bali really is a surfers destination, with huge waves.  The waves were so crazy that we couldn't actually swim in the ocean... you'd just get knocked over by the waves, tossed in the surf, and then try to right yourself in time for the next wave.  Kids on boogie boards had a grand time as did surfers.  Also, because of the aggressive break in the waves, the sand was constantly turned up and throughout the water.  No joke, we were home for over a week and I was still getting sand out of my ears.  Sand gets everywhere when you swim in the ocean.  Other than that I really couldn't see anything else wrong with the otherwise stunning, clean and breezy beaches.

Beautiful beach walk, note the coolest kite ever, the 3D pirate ship

Views of the mountains near Ubud, Bali.

Our highlight was the day we spent going inland, to the mountains near Ubud.  We booked a day of adventures from mountain biking in through villages and rice fields (hello Julia Roberts), to riding an elephant in an Elephant Safari park then white water rafting down the Ayung river.  Mountain biking introduced us to some local life and industry including production of Kopi Luwak.  If that sounds familiar to you, it's the coffee that Jack Nicholson drinks in the movie The Bucket List, and it's made from coffee beans that are eaten by the 'Asian Palm Civet', then pooped out, cleaned and roasted.  It's the world's most expensive coffee.  I didn't try it... couldn't get over the pooping factor since we just watched the animal eating the beans with poopy piles below it's cage.  Ekk.  Riding the elephant was lovely, knowing that they are treated well and cared for in this conservation safari park.  They also had an elephant show with many strange elephant tricks like playing basket ball and playing the harmonica.  But of all three activities, white water rafting was our favourite.  Unfortunately, it's also the one with fewest photos since I couldn't bring my camera on the raft.  If I were able to, you'd see photos of beautiful waterfalls, high green cliffs on either side of the river and monkeys playing the trees beside us.  It was truly extraordinary.

Foley biking through a small village

biking farm back roads

Local spider on the side of the trail... not dangerous, just scary looking

Asian Palm Civet, eating a coffee bean to poop later for a delicious (?) cup of joe.

joy... or excellent training?

Sitting pretty... looks uncomfortable

Old Elephant playing the harmonica

Our other favourite part of Bali was the zen-like lifestyle of indoor/outdoor living.  In our villa (one of the most beautiful places I've ever stayed) the only part enclosed in walls and a ceiling was our bedroom.  Aside from that, the bathroom, kitchen and living room were all outside.  We also had our own pool and trickling waterfall which was heavenly when those crashing waves of the ocean waves were too much to face.  Absolute paradise.  We spent a couple of lovely evenings after a nice dinner in some local restaurant sitting on our outdoor couch, watching the Olympics.  The evenings were a perfectly cool temperature... [contrasted to the night after we arrived home to Hong Kong. I checked the weather at 2am, it was 95 degrees F with the humidex... That's just wrong.]  Bali was so lovely weather wise.

Overall Bali was wonderful and we loved it.  Now we're already starting to look forward to our next trip in October... possibly to Japan.  I love living in Asia.

Fancy dinner out for our anniversary

Foley consulting the map before his scooter ride

'I can get 90 miles to the gallon on this hog... got room for one more if you're going to Aspen.'

Thought I may never see him again... Foley rented this for $5Cdn for the day.  Kuality with a K.

'It's a boy... and WHAT a boy!'