Bali & Lombok

---

(Dave writes...)

Well, we're in Singapore now. We arrived here yesterday from Denpasar in Bali. We spent a month split between Bali and neighbouring island Lombok, here's what we've been up to...

We left our hostel in Perth on Thursday 29 January and arrived at the airport only to find that our flight no longer existed. Qantas had shifted us on to a different flight on the Friday morning, unfortunately no-one had told us! They also made us fly via Singapore and we lost our veggie inflight meals... anyway, back we went to our hostel after having said goodbye to the people we'd met there, feeling very daft, and stayed another night. People told us Perth was a hard city to leave, but I didn't realise how literally they were talking. We got away on the second attempt. Although our 3 hour flight was now a full day of travelling, the flight we got to Singapore had on-demand films and we geeked out on movies.

On landing in Denpasar we were met by our friend Clare who is currently working in Bali teaching English. It was great to see Clare, I think she was also happy to see us! We stayed with her in Sanur, a town that is a bit quieter than the tourist town of Kuta. We met Adit, Clare's Balinese boyfriend who turned out to be very sweet and also a great chef - we ate at his Warung (food stall / cafe) quite a few times! Also in Bali was our friend Liane and her family - which meant we were all able to see each other for the first time in almost a year!

The second day we were there was of course New Year's Eve and after meeting up with Liane we spent it with Clare and Adit, first drinking on the street Balinese-style outside a bank, then heading into Kuta to see the fireworks on the beach at midnight. People were smoking cigarettes, using them to light fireworks that they held in their hands until they went off. It felt a little like the Blitz, we quickly retreated and debated the pros and cons of safety standards. Immediately afterwards the monsoon rain arrived and we trudged through the streets avoiding the motorbikes that were flying around roads and pavements alike.

What hit us almost immediately about the island was the strength of religious belief and practice in Bali. Everyone lays out offerings to various gods and demons each day - usually consisting of food and incense in a thatched palm leaf. Religious ceremonies are very frequent and dominate social life here, within the first few days we saw a cremation procession passing down the main road, bringing traffic to a halt before heading to the beach where the body is burnt and the ashes thrown into the sea.

Whilst we were in Sanur besides spending time with Clare, Adit and Liane, we visited Denpasar, the capital, which was my first taste of an Asian capital and completely chaotic. The traffic was really heavy, everyone drives on a deathwish in Indonesia. Most people ride motorbikes, weaving in and out of the cars and each other constantly (sometimes in torrential monsoon rain) and the traffic fumes are intense. We checked out a few markets there to do some shopping, which was an experience in itself. It was a little like doing the conga, as various hawkers followed us around the market as we went, selling us sarongs etc. We tried to have a walk around the city, but crossing the roads was an extreme sport - the crossings are completely ignored by the traffic and as the flow is so constant you literally have to step out in front of the next car and hope it stops or swerves round you.

We also went to Ulu Watu, a cliff-top temple on the south pennisuala of Bali. There we strolled round, protected our belongings from the cheeky grey and black monkeys that line its walls and then sat down at sunset to watch a traditional kecak dance. The Balinese culture, predominantly Hindu, is incredibly rich and dominates their lives. Balinese Hinduism is unique in the world and inherits a lot of animist beliefs from indigenous Balinese culture. We spent a lot of our time learning about the culture. The dance was great, with a gloomy sunset in the background and an ending to the story that required grass to be set alight on stage and kicked around by a White Monkey! (nb. not a real monkey)

Clare invited us to her swanky hotel, Four Season's, at Jimbaran near Kuta, to sit in on her English classes (she teaches the staff) as guest speakers. It was a lot of fun, the staff were very friendly and spoke great English in testament to the teacher! Very kindly we also had some extremely posh nibbles afterwards - as you can imagine, Gemma loved it! The grounds were huge and well designed, immaculately kept. Not quite in our budget yet though.

After Sanur we headed up to Danau Bratan, a lake in the centre of Bali. We saw the temple in the lake there and visited the botanical gardens. Then we headed up to Lovina, a beach resort on the north coast. We didn't find the beaches on Bali to be exceptional, we actually preferred Australia's beaches, but we did find we loved Lovina for it's restaurants and relaxed atmosphere. Whilst there, we did a diving trip to the North-West of Bali on Menjangan island, where there are huge coral walls. The company we went with were great and we soon got back into the swing of things with our scuba gear, probably our best dives yet.

Also from Lovina we dragged ourselves out of bed at 2am to climb Mount Batur, a volcano in the east of Bali. By 5am we were at the foot of the crater and watched the sun rise over a sea of cloud, with the other volcanoes of Bali in the distance. It was beautiful sight and we had a good walk afterwards around the craters with Chris (a crazy American guy we met) and a sweet guy from the travel company Peraman that we had been using to get around.

After Lovina we headed down to Ubud, Bali's cultural capital, and saw three more dance performances there including Jegog, bamboo gamelan. This was the standout performance of the lot, it was all quite stunning and fascinating. We also went to the other branch of four season's hotel that Clare works at near Ubud, to act as guest speakers again. The hotel was recently voted no. 1 hotel in the world (by travel and leisure magazine), and we sat in one of it's opulent bars afterwards, eating cake and fruit juice thanks to the kindness of the staff. When we left they also gave us presents!

We decided to attempt a walk in the sweltering Bali heat, and walked 8km around Ubud including a trip to the sacred monkey forest. It was actually pretty cool - we thought it would just be a tourist trap - but the monkeys are free to roam and very entertaining. The monkeys in Bali are generally cheeky and will often grab things from you in order to barter with them for the food or water you're carrying! Afterwards we walked through a panorama of rice paddies, which line some of Bali's most beautiful countryside.

After Ubud we returned to Sanur and went out for Gem's birthday with Adit and Clare to a very chilled place consisting of small pavillions set amongst rice paddies, where we all sat on the floor and drank cocktails Balinese style - by sharing one glass and taking it in turns to down a small measure.

On Gem's actual birthday (15 Jan) we went white-water rafting as a surprise for Gem. Adit sorted it out as his cousin works for the company, which is actually based in Bakas, Adit's home village. The rafting was great, I got quite addicted to it! Can't tell you what grade it was (Bali doesn't care much for safety measures or other formalities) but it had a few good-sized drops (see photo!).

Afterwards we visited Adit's family home, which like most traditional Balinese homes is in the style of a compound containing a family temple and smaller buildings. Then Adit and Clare drove us to Padangbai, the main port for ferries to Lombok. In the evening we sat in a beach bar and drank Bintang, the ubiquitous Indonesian beer. We stayed in Pandangbai for two nights (a small place that we grew to love, very relaxed atmosphere) then caught the ferry to Lombok.

After watching a few backpackers and locals throw up on the stomach-wrenching four hour journey to Lembar, we smugly thanked our sea sickness tablets and jumped on a tiny fishing boat to reach an island off South-West Lombok called Gili Nanggu. Most backpackers visit the famous Gili islands in the North, but we decided it was time we got off the beaten track and tried something different. Needless to say, it was a silly idea and the only accommodation on the tiny island (which is less than 100m across in one direction) was run-down and unwelcoming. So we quickly scarpered the following day and went up to Sengigi on the Lombok mainland. Which also sucked.

Giving Lombok one last throw of the dice, we chose Gili Air and headed out there in another tiny boat on gigantic waves reminding ourselves how precious life is. We quickly grew to love the island, where the only transport is horse-powered, and the atmosphere is more relaxed than is imaginable. Usually to eat in our favourite restaurant (Warung Munchies, the highlight of our stay!) we had to either wake up the chef from her hammock next to the sea, or ask someone to get on their bicycle to go and find a member of staff!

Unfortunately as we arrived Gem's first major stomach bug arrived and she spent most of her stay there in bed feeling terrible. When she finally recovered, we left Gili Air and returned to Padangbai on Bali by a day-long journey.

After leaving Padangbai we went back to Adit's house in his village to attend an important ceremony for one of his relatives. The ceremony is known as the 18-month cermony, where a child symbolically has their hair cut for the first time. The whole ceremony is a huge effort, with preparations on the day starting at 3am and costs a serious amount of money in Balinese terms. They had to slaughter (sacrifice) 3 pigs and 20 ducks as part of the ceremony, and the priest herself had a huge job to do - going through various rituals such as showering the child with holy water, brushing an egg on the child, having a duck peck rice off the child's head etc. There was also a gamelan performance and a puppet master hired for the ceremony. We were very privileged to attend and wore sarongs, waist ties and headscarfs (see photos!). I did a little magic for the kids, which went down well, but Gem stole the show by turning up with sweets!

After the ceremony we headed back to Sanur for a few more days, and visited Kuta again to do a whole lot of shopping, much of which is now in the Singapore post heading back to England.

All in all we had a really interesting time in Bali, spending time with Clare and Adit and learning about the culture were the obvious highlights. The atmosphere on both Bali and Lombok was quite subdued, due to the recent bombing last October, and this has really hurt the local population that is heavily reliant on the tourist industry, directly or indirectly. It definitely negatively impacted on our holiday as the street sellers, hawkers and conmen were much more aggressive in an attempt to compensate for the lack of tourists. Reassuringly, we met other travellers who had travelled through the rest of South-East Asia who were quite shocked at the situation in Bali so fingers crossed things will improve!

In terms of travelling, we found Bali to be the most difficult country we have travelled in yet. Using public transport wasn't really an option and the hygiene problems the countries suffer are quite severe - open landfills are dotted across the landscape, and rubbish is piled on the pavements. Our stomachs are still recovering, but we found locals also had problems.

We were very sad to leave Clare and Adit behind, they had been great hosts and we had a lot of fun with them, but as with each flight on the journey, we always have something new and exciting to look forward to. It was only a day before we left that we realised we were arriving in Singapore in time for the Chinese New Year! It promises to be very memorable.

---