Beautiful Bali - Paradise on Earth

When:               5-12-2008 / 17-12-2008
Where:              Sun Island Boutique Villas at Seminyak
Temperature:    +/- 31 degrees non stop :P

After a 24 hour trip by plain and transfers we arrived Bali. It's hot, 31 degrees, but that's one of the reasons why we're here. We booked a villa at Seminyak with our own small swimming pool, never had such a luxe room during our last holidays and it was perfect. A very nice bed, huge flatscreen with dvd-player and a big bathroom, even an outdoor kitchen to prepare our own dinner. But of course we didn't went to Bali just to sit inside and swim in the pool.

At 7 we had an appointment with a guide we already contacted in NL. She lived in NL for a while and speaks very well dutch, we've got the same age and the same humor. The next week she will show us Bali. We first took a look by ourselves the next day and explored the beach and Indonesian food which was splendid, the restaurants at the beach are great. After a long walk on the beach and some hours at the restaurant we shopped a bit in Seminyak. Our villa is situated in the centre of Seminyak, nearby the shops and restaurants and the Bingtang supermarket. But after 9 o'clock it's quiet and there is no noise at all which was perfect to sleep in. After such a hot day and a jetlag we wanted to sleep very well. The only noise at night are the birds and toke's. :)

Today we're going to the north. After leaving the coast we were driving very quick through jungle and rice-fields. The people here are very gentle and they all wanted to be photographed. :) In 3 hours and a coffee-stop we arrived Banjar where we will visit the Brahma Arama Vihara, It's a Thai-Boedhistic temple. Our guide, Mini, have never been here but I wanted to see this place so it's for both of us the first time to visit this place. It's a beautyful and very peaceful place. That's why there are many people and monks meditating up here. It's not allowed to speak hard to keep complete silence. The temple is a small copy of the one in Java, this one is already a beauty so the one on Java must be really great. Maybe I will go there some time, Mini will go very soon with her husband after seeing this place.

After visiting the temple we lunched at Lovina beach, it was raining and a bit sober so we didn't stayed long and drove to the Git-Git waterfalls. A wonderfull place, the water is falling down that hard that there is constantly a wind blowing through the plants and tourists. But it was also raining here so we went further to the Pura Ulun Danu Bratan. This temple is dedicated to Dewi Danu, the godess of the lake this temple is situated in. Once the temple was surrounded by the lake but because of the environment which is changing the temple are dry very often. We're here in the rainingseason so we have seen them completely surrounded by the lake.
End of the day we visited a lokal market, it reminds us of the markets in Cambodia and we felt home almost immediately. :)

A new day, today we're going to see the Barong dance. Mini showed us how the dancers are preparing themselves which was great to see. The females are beautyful with all the colors and flowers in their hair! The show was also great and it's nice to see a piece of their culture.
After this dance we visited some villages and treid to buy a Ganesha statue but they only wanted to sell it for a huge amount, 300 euro's. So no deal for us. Can't have everything and maybe we will buy one if we will ever go to India. Must have dreams. :)
We went to the Monkey forest in Ubud. Mini knows the apes are tired eating big bananas all the time so she bought small ones on the market. The apes seems to like these very much as the never get these. And indeed, as soon as they saw us with the small bananas they left the tourists with the big ones and climbed on us.

I like these little creatures, very naugty apes. :) They are wild but are living in this forests and in the temples. There are two groups here and they are the protectors of the temples as the local people says.
It's already lunchtime so we lunched at the lotus restaurant and visited the palace and market in Ubud. It was raining again but actually that's ok. It was only a pity when it raining when we went to the Tanah Lot temple at sea. It was storming and there was no beautyful sundown so we went back to our hotel. Maybe we will visit this temple next week again when it's sunny.

A day to rest, on the beach it's a mess after the storm of last nice. Complete palmtrees have brought by the sea to the beach and there a fish everywhere!

Time to discover the east side of Bali.

Today we saw some old villages and took a look at the way people are living nowadays outside the touristic areas. It's nice to see and to realise (again) how lucky we have to be with everything we belong. After these visits we saw a palace and the Pura Besakih. This is one of the biggest and most important temples on Bali. Normally the huge vulcano is shown behind the temple but of course when we were there the whole vulcano was hide by the clouds. But still the temple is beautiful and we even met family of Mini there who were having a ceremony at that time.
After a bomby ride in the mountains, the road was a road last time Mini went there but now the road was gone by the rain, we lunched at Candidasa. We ended the day by visiting the Pura Goa Lawah, a temple in a cave with thousands of bats. A beauty again.

Of course I also had to shop. So the next days are shopping and relax days.

Some days later Mini took us to the Pura Luhur Uluwatu in the south of Bali. This temple is situated on a cliff and is protected by many groups of wild apes. These apes are agressive and try to steal stuff from people. Like glasses, hats, photocameras and earrings. They bring it to people who 'trained' them by giving them food for every stuff the apes give them and than they sell it against a huge amount back to the people.
After walking on the cliffs we saw the Kecak dance, the apes-dance, which was so impressive. While the sun sets we watched the show and enjoyed our holiday. :) This eve was the last one with Mini so it was a bit of a emotional goodbey.

We laughed a lot this week and talked about all kind of interest and non-interesting things and of course about shoes as she adores them as well. :) We hope to meet again someday.

Some relax days again, swimming in our little pool, eating on the beach, shop and watch the sun set with the local people on sunday.

The sun is shining! We arranged a cap and went to Tanah Lot again. This time we were able to make some beautiful pictures and I wanted to hold a huge snake. :) Hey, I'm allowed to act like a tourist these days so I did and made the owners happy with some cash. :) The next day we were already leaving so this day was a perfect one to end our holiday. We had a short but beautiful time on beautiful Bali. This trip was one of the trips never to forget, a piece of this paradise on earth is stored in my memories for ever. :)