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After the mad rush of Java, we were ready to relax a little bit by the time we got to Bali. Our time there didn't start that well, as we hit the end of the holiday weekend with the lack of transport options and were forced to deal with a complete arsehole of a taxi driver while trying to get from Denpasar to Ubud. After protracted negotiations - during which he argued, slimed, lied, tried to use a doctored meter and even locked our bags in his car and wouldn't release them, trying to insist on a higher fare - we finally agreed on a price, and set off for Ubud. Half way there, sat in bad traffic in the early evening, he decided he couldn't be bothered to queue any longer and would just go home, and turned back around saying 'you can stay in Denpasar and get a bus tomorrow'. Apparently he still expected to receive a full fare for this, because when I told him that he wouldn't be getting any money from us if he just drove us back to the same spot, he turned very nasty, and ended up stopping on the side of the highway
and throwing us out in the middle of nowhere in the gathering gloom. All's well that ends well though, we managed to hitch a ride about two minutes later, and got safely to Ubud...
We were staying in a gorgeous little guesthouse in Ubud, a family-owned complex of traditional buildings set around their own little temple. It was quiet, relaxing and friendly, just what we needed - and the family's cute little sausage dog, who trotted around the complex greeting all the guests, helped the ambience as well. We had a bit of an itinerary planned for Ubud - go and see the monkey temple, do a couple of treks, rent motorbikes and cruise around the beautiful rice paddy sculpted hillsides - but our plans changed somewhat when Tania got hit in the face by a funeral pyre.
...yes, you did read that right. We were very lucky in the timing of our arrival, in that the King of Ubud had just died (not so lucky for him, obviously) and his cremation was the next morning. Balinese cremations are a grand and celebratory affair at the best of times, and the cremation of a king is a big
deal. The whole town was shut down, and the morning was filled with the sounds of gamelan orchestras and the scent of incense, as the body was cleansed and prepared, while the finishing touches were put to the huge funeral pyre - a ten metre or more high bamboo structure, intricately decorated and vibrantly painted. When the time came for the ceremony to begin, huge groups of volunteers gathered under the funeral pyre and the other ceremonial structures, ready to carry them through the town to the temple to be burnt. We stood on the side of the street with the crowds and watched as the volunteers would pick up the pyre and then, cheering and shouting, sprint as fast as they could for a few metres until the weight became too much and they would stop. The time came for them to sprint past us, and we saw with gathering alarm that they were losing control and that the entire huge structure was veering further and further onto the pavement and into the crowd. And that was the point when Tania acted as their emergency brake and stopped their passage with her face. We were pretty worried for a
while as a huge lump came up on her head, but fortunately with a couple of days of rest there was no long term harm done, other than the lump and a beauty of a black eye.
So Ubud was really just a recuperation stop in the end - although I am glad to report that after the mediocre food of Java, we finally had an Indonesian meal to write home about while there; babi guling, which is roast suckling pig, an Ubud speciality - whole suckling pigs are glazed with coconut milk and then roasted all night over a fire on a spit. Succulent meat, delicious crispy liver and intestines, and crackling that was absolutely to die for - a meal to live long in the memory, and definitely one to help ailing patients forget about their injuries...
After recovering there, we headed to Nusa Lembongan, a small island off Bali, to take some surfing lessons. After the first day, we'd both managed to catch a couple of waves (admittedly with the help of a little push from the instructor) and felt the exhilaration of cruising along towards shore, and we'd both also wiped out in numerous
and often amusing ways... By the end of day two we were both feeling pretty confident and having a lot of fun - although we were exhausted by this point; surfing is surprisingly hard work! On our final day, they took us out to some bigger waves and taught us to turn, and then it started to get a little more difficult... It took me half the lesson to work out that my dodgy technique, though it didn't affect me standing up on a smaller wave, was causing some spectacular wipeouts on the larger ones, as I would place my hands too far forwards while standing up, dip the nose of the board under the wave and then immediately launch into a triple front flip. Spectacular, but not quite what I was going for. Slightly bruised, we got there eventually, and by the end were feeling pretty great as we zoomed along the waves, adrenalin streaming. A lot of fun, and definitely something we'll be doing again.
From Nusa Lembongan we headed to Gili Air, off the coast of Lombok. A tropical paradise with no motorised vehicles and a very laid back vibe, we were there to relax, drink
beer in the swimming pool, snorkel, and scuba dive. The diving in Gili is famous for one thing - turtles. Unfortunately the coral is pretty decimated from years of dynamite fishing, but it doesn't seem to have affected the turtle populations; every dive we saw many of them, and on some we saw dozens. Totally unconcerned and very used to divers, we would just drift along in the gentle currents and watch them soar above, below and around us; amazing. We swam with sharks, saw beautiful lionfish, and even got the chance to perve on a cuttlefish orgy - eight of the randy little buggers clasping tentacles for all they were worth. Not something you see every day!
Great diving, but just the amuse bouche for what was to follow. After a very uncomfortable night in Lombok airport we flew to Labuan Bajo on Flores (where we found a second Indonesian meal that we could actually get enthusiastic about - ikan kuah assam, a whole barbecued fish in a spicy, garlicky, peppery tamarind broth, best served with freshly caught fish sat on the bay at a little seafood warung with a cold beer, watching the spectacular Flores sunset -
perfect). Labuan Bajo is the base for Komodo National Park, where you can find not only komodo dragons but also some of the best diving in the world. The next day we were setting off on a four day liveaboard dive safari, which would turn out to be one of the absolute highlights of our travels.
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