We finished out our trip last summer with four days in Bali, Indonesia. First stop there was Mu Bali Resort, which Nate (Kathleen's brother) found for us. A long drive out of Denpasar to the south (not by distance, but traffic in Bali is among the worst I've experienced -- just too many visitors and other people for the invariably narrow, two lane roads), we arrived to this small driveway into the resort, which seemed to be in the middle of nowhere special:
It did not overwhelm us at first approach, but then we went inside, to really see our rooms. I'll let the pictures tell the story.
We could have spent a week here and never left our "room!" It was truly amazing. The kids enjoyed the pool from moment one, they brought breakfast to us in our own dining room every morning, and we lazed and lounged to our heart's content in what was truly spectacular space.
There were frogs in the pool, but whether that is a bad thing or not really depends upon your perspective.
That wasn't all there was to this place, however, as nice as all that was. We headed out our door, and past a couple of gates:
To find this:
Which overlooks this:
and has all these amazing huts around, where you can just lounge about listening to the waves break on the reefs below.
The one on the left here is where they do massages. You know we indulged. There is nothing quite like a Balinese massage listening to the sound of the surf breaking, at a perfect temperature, with the lightest of breezes wafting across your body. Bali High indeed! I mean just look at these people below -- are they not happy and relaxed as can be? OH YEAH. Kari, Kathleen's sister, and her daughter Erin were with us, as was Nate, Kathleen's brother (on the right), and his wife Amy. Nate and Amy found this place for us, and do we ever owe them (in more ways than one) for an incredible experience.
There were great tide pools in the reefs down below the resort. We went down one evening, and here is a sampling of what we found:
I mean, where else can you find blue sea stars? Plus little teeny eels and a crazy kaleidoscope of colors, not to mention the most camouflaged crab in the history of the planet. The kids had a blast!
The next morning, we prevailed upon the resort to set us up (well, some of us under, say, the age of 55) with surf lessons, which they did at the Belangan Wave Surf School at Belangan Beach. Here is how it started:
And then the really hard parts began.
It took a bit, but Alden finally caught on pretty well.
Kate had a little tougher time, though she had done this before. It is just not as easy as everyone makes it look.
Kathleen even got up a couple of times!
She also got down . . . .
In the end, it was a pretty great time. The surf school did a really nice job of trying to help everyone have a positive experience.
We returned to the hotel to lounge and enjoy some massages in this island paradise. Unfortunately, no paradise is without its snake, and as we were doing yoga and massage in the compound, disaster struck, courtesy of this spot:
Boys being boys, Alden, Keegan and Jonah, Nate and Amy's youngest, decided this place was perfect for a game of king of the hill. Of course it was not, and the result was poor Jonah flying backward to have his head impact the corner of the pool, resulting in a huge and very bloody gash on the back of his beautiful redheaded head.
Alden may have been the one that unintentionally caused it -- I found him crying about it later in his bedroom. Given how severe the accident was, I would have completely understood an emotional and angry reaction from Nate and Amy. But they were unbelievably kind to my son, Amy even telling him it was an accident and things happen sometimes, so he should not blame himself. That one brought a tear to my eye -- I will never forget that superhuman kindness. You learn a lot about people in moments like those, and both Nate and Amy are just amazing and wonderful people. How lucky I am to call them family.
Speaking of lucky, it turns out that so many Australians get hurt surfing in Bali, they have funded a very nice hospital, with great care, which Nate and Amy were able to find. Jonah got excellent medical attention, and we learned that he is one tough little hombre -- he was up and about the next day, no signs of concussion, just a bunch of stitches.
It was a horrifying 24 hours, and cost him and Nate and Amy the opportunity to travel with us to Ubud (they wanted to keep Jonah under observation near the hospital), but all in all we are so grateful for the way things turned out.
Ubud was ok, but for the distance the drive there took incredibly long. Narrow two lane roads and tons of traffic will do that to you. After visiting Jonah in the hospital, we stopped for pizza along the way.
We arrived late at night, to a house Nate had reserved for us clear on the northern outskirts of the town. It was quite rustic. You could only reach it by walking narrow, muddy paths between rice paddies (luckily they had sure-footed porters to carry the luggage, or I am sure I would have ended up as a muddy mess). When we woke up the next morning, here is what we saw:
A great deal more rustic than MuBali Resort, for sure, and quite open to a fully natural space, for better or worse (luckily, we didn't actually see anything seriously malicious wander in). What I will never forget about this place, though, is the sound of the frogs. At night, it is a symphony like no other, with so many different calls and croaks that they practically harmonize. Really amazing.
As it was Ubud, we began our days at 7:00 am with Yoga instruction on a deck in the home, with frogs still croaking all around. Here was our very knowledgeable yoga instructor:
On our first day there we hired a driver (this fine gentleman below, who was kind, patient and excellent, with great english--wish I could remember his name), who picked us up after Yoga and began leading us through the various temples and sites of Ubud.
It turns out Ubud is very touristy - by far the most touristy place we visited. Narrow streets, filled with shop after shop catering to foreigners -- it has been transformed by the travel industry into anything but the quaint and unique place I am sure it used to be. Still, there were things that reminded you it was not just your same old tourist trap, like the time we were driving by building after building, only to see a large pyre of fire in the yard next to one of them with many, many people standing around. When I asked our driver what it was, he said, "Oh, it is a cremation. Do you want to stop?" That was a "NO," both because it felt disrespectful and because well, smoke and fumes.
Quirky things like that aside, there are many things to enjoy there, and we took Savannah and Avery (Nate and Amy's daughters) with us and tried our best to have a great time. Our first stop was the Gunung Kawi Sebatu, more commonly known as the Water Temple, dedicated to one of the three Hindu gods, Vishnu, who rules over water. It was a beautiful and peaceful place.
From there, we grabbed a quick lunch, then headed to the Goa Gajah elephant cave, and associated temple. Here are a few pics:
As you can see, the surrounding gardens were beautiful. Following that excursion, we headed for our last place of the day, and my personal favorite place in Ubud, the Ubud Monkey Forest.
It does not take long to realize that we are not in Kansas any more, Dorothy -- only in southeast Asia would you see fountains and statutes like this . . .
Despite the touristy nature of this place, you can't help but feel like you have stepped into an Indiana Jones movie -- you are in a whole temple complex, overtaken by the most amazing forest, where even without the monkeys, you feel like you have stepped back in time to some really ancient and hidden world.
But then there are the monkeys -- everywhere-- that you can't help but stop and watch and smile.
The grey long-tailed macaques can be quite aggressive with your bag, and violent with each other, but also pretty cute, as the little one above certainly attests.
After that very busy day, we headed back to the house, to eat some food and pack up, as we would head out to the airport for our very long transit back to Singapore, and then a day later, back to the states. On the way out of town, though, we headed down to see our last site in Ubud, the Tegenungan Waterfall. Here are our last photos from our entire Southeast Asia trip:
It was a nice waterfall, at the end of a short hike. That said, I don't know if we saw the best in Ubud, but I am not dying to go back. Perhaps other parts of the island would be interesting, but for now, we have had our fill, as there are a lot of islands in the ocean!
