Bali Part One

We arrived in Bali on 25th April after a two and a half hour flight and headed to our first destination, Kuta. Having been to Bali in 2006, Kuta wasn’t our top choice of places to go, but all attempts at finding accommodation elsewhere had failed. We checked in to our homestay which was fairly ropey, but at 60,000 rupiah (about £4) a night, we weren’t too fussed.

We then set out to explore the delights of Kuta, the ‘raucous’ party centre of Bali (lots of football shirts, sunburn and dodgy dvd’s). We had a few beers and a chat with an amusing Dutch expat before heading back to our room. We didn’t manage to get too much sleep that night due to both our proximity to the road (mopeds screaming around all night) and a rather excitable couple in the room above us (I think she must have had a very good book on the go).

The next day, after a quick walk around the market stalls in Kuta, we decided to head to Seminyak, only about 10 minutes drive away, but a rather different kettle of fish. We wondered around in the searing heat for about forty minutes looking for somewhere to stay, and eventually found what appeared to have been a big hotel about twenty-five years ago, but had since been abandoned - very odd.

The next day we got up reasonably early, and headed down to the beach to bodyboard for a bit, which was great fun. We then headed back to our hotely-thing to grab our bags before heading onto Uluwatu, about an hour’s drive away. Then we had a shocker…

After getting back into Kuta, where the bus to Uluwatu supposedly left from, we made our way, with our backpacks on, to the bus stop. It must have been about 35 degrees, and after about 15 minutes walking to the bus stop, it became apparent that muggins here had misread the map. We turned around and walked for about 30 minutes in the other direction and, dripping with sweat, waited for a bemo (local bus) to turn up. After about another 40 minutes, it became apparent that no bemos were heading to Uluwatu that day! Upon gathering this information, getting slightly dispirited and bickery, we staggered back into Kuta again to negotiate some transport of our own. We eventually got this sorted, and for about 90,000 rupiah, headed on our way at about 2.30 in the afternoon.

After about an hour we got to Uluwatu, where our driver dropped us off. The village was split into two parts - one part about 25 minutes walk from the beach, and the other part down about 200 steep steps by the sea. We decided to bite the bullet and head down to the beach part of town, and staggered down the steps with our bags trying to ignore the extremely persistent Balinese women who couldn’t understand that I didn’t want to buy a t-shirt.

We got to the beach dripping and much in need of something to eat and an ice-cold drink. We found somewhere reasonably easily and had a decent meal, so we now felt strong enough to go and find some accommodation after a quick stop at the cash point. Ah. I asked the lady in the place we’d eaten where the nearest cash point was, hoping that at worst it was in the other half of the village at the top of the 200 steps somewhere. No such luck. The nearest cash point was in Kuta, where we’d just come from! This was a very bitter pill to swallow indeed. Nearing the ends of tethers, we headed back up the 200 steps, with our bags, to the other part of town to try and sort something out.

The t-shirt women were highly amused to see us emerging again at the top of the steps covered in sweat. We walked past them with stiff upper lips, pretending to look as if our day was going exactly according to the plan, so as not to lose face! Another twenty minutes wondering around, we located a taxi office and decided that enough was enough. We got in a taxi and headed straight to our next destination, Sanur, via Kuta to get some cash. About an hour and twenty minutes and 180,000 rupiah later, we arrived at about 6 p.m. Luckily, the rest of the day went well. We found a nice place to stay, and treated ourselves to a slap-up meal to round off our worst day so far!

After a couple of days relaxing in the garden of our homestay and on the beach in Sanur, we headed on to Ubud. We had a great few days in Ubud, visiting the monkey forest, haggling in the local markets and eating in the local warungs for about 80p a meal!

Next on the list was Padangbai, a small port and fishing village on the east coast of Bali, which we visited back in 2006. As well as planning to stay here for a few days, this was where the ferry to Lombok, our next destination, departed. The bus from Ubud to Padangbai took about an hour and a half, and we managed to find a decent room fairly quickly and went for a wander.

The village was quite a lot busier in terms of buildings than last time, but it was still really nice. We headed for a great beach we had found last time we’d been here (still great, but a big hotel is in the process of being built just above it), before heading back into town and getting a delicious meal - the seafood in Padangbai is excellent!

After our meal, we headed to the local reggae bar, where we had a fantastic night listening to an Indonesian reggae band trying their best!

The next morning, we were delighted to find out that breakfast was brought straight to our veranda,

but were less delighted to find out that the only cash point in the village was broken (and had been broken for about two years!). The nearest cash point was about an hours round trip away, and I managed to persuade a local chap to take me there on the back of his moped for a small fee. Tearing around Bali on the back of a moped driven by a crazy man was pretty nerve racking, but very entertaining! That afternoon, we went snorkelling and saw our second shark of the trip, and even managed to follow it for a bit much to Lauren’s delight.

After a couple of brilliant days in Padangbai, we were on our way to Lombok on a rather uncomfortable car ferry that took four hours!

The rest of the plan for Indonesia is to head straight from Lombok to the Gillis (a group of three Islands off the coast of Lombok), head back after a few days there and travel around Lombok, before heading back to Bali to see the north and west coasts before heading over to Java to see what goes on there!