Final four nights in Bali in laid back Uluwatu

Crossing the island of Bali is no easy trip. The roads are narrow, there is a tall mountain range straddling the island, lots of traffic, illegal (at least it would be in the US) parking abounds, detours galore due to the countless Balinese ceremonies that block roads, scooters darting about everywhere, and generally crazy driving (and for a bonus, it's all on the left side of the road).

As the crow flies, the distance is a short 61 miles. On an interstate highway, topping the speed limit by a few hash marks, that's just under an hour of driving. In Bali, it was an exhausting, six hour expedition following the sunny northern coast, winding up to the volcano's mist covered rim (the drive along the rim was spectacular - crater lakes on one side, and jungle diving into clouds on the other), descending hair pin turns down the other side where the sun broke out again.

The driver, of whom I had a funny feeling about from the beginning, mentioned that we should stop at a restaurant he knew of with a nice view. Alarms went off in my head. Having been in the tour industry, I know a setup when I see one. I advised the family against stopping, but all of us had skipped breakfast that morning, so we agreed. Taking a right, down a road off our weathered path, we wound up at a mediocre restaurant with a view of rice paddies. Not that spectacular. It was a buffet lunch, and we picked at what we though looked edible and/or appetizing. The quality was such that my instincts told me I could get sick off of this food. I ate it anyway, had some soft drinks, and when I asked for the bill, it was a whopping $66! The buffet was $10 a piece, which should have been half that price. As we left, looking for our driver, he was with the rest of his driver buddies, enjoying his free lunch and whatever kickback he received.

A few hours through the small villages and paddy fields, we hit the traffic of the big center of Denpasar.

The largest city and commercial center of Bali, Denpasar is constantly besieged with traffic. Slow, snarled, congested, with the advantage going to scooters, which can swerve in, out and between larger autos. Once we made it through the choke point that is the airport (the runway effectively cuts the lower peninsula of Bali with the rest of the north), we passed the Jimbaran area south of the airport, and headed up into the hills that form the celebrated cliffs high above the Indian Ocean on this part of the island.

Uluwatu was our destination. A surfer's paradise, it's one of only a few spots in Bali where waves break at just the right place and height to attract the international surfing set. Traffic was sparse in this area, a much more back country feel to the area. Scooters were ridden more by westerners than by locals. Moreover, many of the scooters had this strange protrusion sticking out. Only later did I realize that it was the way these riders carried their surfboards.

Our hotel in Uluwatu, called the Anantara, is located above a place called Impossible Beach, named for rocky reefs stretching deep and broadly across the water during high tide. Any wrong moves by a surfer too close to shore would be painful. However, our driver had no idea where it was. I had the address in my email, but that could only be accessed by Wi-Fi, which I didn't have while driving. I decided to turn my phone over from airplane mode (I didn't want to incur international roaming and call charges - I used Google Talk instead from my computer for a fraction of the cost), in order to look up the address to the hotel. Well of course, all the emails from the past five weeks and their attachments download. Using maps, I tracked our position all the way to the hotel (my reward? AT&T sent me an email the next day warning me that I had incurred over $100 in data charges...just from a few minutes of limited usage).

Once we arrived - exhausted and sore - we were so disappointed in the lobby drive up area. There was no personnel to meet us, and it wasn't clear where the lobby was located. All that we met was a long set of wide stairs (visualize the Potemkin steps) leading up to a large and even taller white washed concrete building, and with a marble monolith blocking whatever is hiding behind.

Adding this to the frustration I had with the driver (I'm a pussy though - I still tipped him what I had originally planned to give him), was this ugly first impression.

After hauling ourselves up past the marble monolith, the lobby was revealed, it's height allowing the fresh trade winds to flow through the lobby which opened to distant views of the ocean, and a more understandable flow of villas and structures.  The desk clerks were extremely charming, and made a sincere effort to welcome us to the Anantara. The GM came over to greet us by name, and let us know that we were upgraded to an ocean facing two bedroom villa.

Our Villa

We were starting to calm down by this point. The sun was shining, and villa they showed us to was spectacular! Three separate rooms - master bedroom, second bedroom and living area - connected by outdoor space, including a garden foyer and beautiful pool, deck and sunset views. After seven hotels, and seven  times unpacking and packing our eight suitcases, we had enough room to just open them and dig through what we needed. There was no rhyme or reason to what clothes were where, which were clean or dirty - it was what should have been the anticipated state of our luggage organization after so many moves, but at that point, we didn't care how we could have strategized how to have better packed. All we knew is that we only had to pack one more time.

View of pool and patio (master bedroom on the left, main living area on the right)

View from villa with wedding chapel in the distance

Private dining area. Leslie got so pissed one night when the couple dining glued to their cell phones all night

View of Indian Ocean from our villa

The resort, built on a narrow, steep hill, with the lowest part of the resort meeting a cliff side with a 100 foot plunge. This meant lots of stairs to go anywhere. Good exercise, but annoying. The pool area was nice. A couple of pools, both shallow (Liam and I prefer deeper pools were we can really go at fake fighting underwater), and enough nice lounge chairs and umbrellas to enjoy the views of the sea reaching to its horizon.

Sunbathing

View of lower pools on the cliffside

Leslie with the various villas in the background built up the hill

Umbrella in poolside restaurant

Looking south to Padang Padang beach (just follow the jutting cliff to the left, and you end up in the cove where Padang Padang is)

Beautiful Bali Sunset over the Indian Ocean

Breakfast was included in the rate, and we headed up the steps to the lobby, then an elevator to the sixth floor of that concrete structure we found so ugly upon arrival. However, the view is incredible. The sea, the adjacent cliffs, nearby beaches (including one we would visit).

We had no activities planned for a few days. The weather was spectacular, and we spent our time during the day sunbathing and reading yet another book on my kindle, enjoying the special mojito of the day (lychee one day, kiwi the next day, and strawberry on the third). Liam and I invented a new game. We both had diving masks, and though they typically fall to the bottom of the pool when thrown in, if balanced perfectly they can float. We would see whose floated the longest. Amazing at what creative game ideas come from a nine year old.

Leaving the kids to room service, Leslie and I took a taxi to a Thai restaurant called Kat's Kitchen. Recommend by the hotel's concierge, it was a great find. The taxi driver charged us 200,000 rupiah to take us there, wait while we ate, then take us back to the hotel. A great deal at $20. We had a bottle of local Balinese wine, most of which is absolute crap, but the one we enjoyed wasn't that bad - and a bargain at $22 for the bottle. After a number of tasteful curry and coconut based dishes, and some dessert, our bill came to $53. Probably the cheapest dinner meal of our entire trip. It was so good, that Liam, Leslie and returned a few night later (Lily stayed back at the hotel with a headache).

Though Leslie and Lily wanted to do some shopping, the only options were taxis to Kuta or Nusa Dua, Given traffic conditions, and the time it would take to get there, they decided to take their chances at airport shopping.

In the evenings, after dinner, and before falling asleep (often times while writing a post for this blog), I'd tune into HBO and watch whatever was showing. The room has a Bose surround sound system - a nice way to unwind in the evening. Finally, before falling asleep to music from my ipod, I'd read a few chapters in my latest novel (I think I went through 15 books on this trip) before falling asleep.

One morning, we made our way to Padang Padang beach. An erstwhile local's secret, it has exploded as a surfer's paradise and a beach for the twenty-something set to sunbath, preen and show off their lithe and buff bodies. It was straight from the movie The Beach, but without the unmatchable beauty of the Phi Phi islands in Thailand (where the real beach from the movie is overrun by middle aged Koreans). We didn't stay long. It was hot, the water was dirty with flotsam, and there wasn't much else to do except to watch the hotties (however, with the kids in tow, not a great option). It didn't surprise me that the beach was the site for the month's Full Moon Party.

Liam among the rocks lining Padang Padang beach

The fam returning from a quick dip to cool off

Leslie getting very hot and bored of the beach

Padang Padang Beach

On our final full day in Bali, the usual feelings flooded me. A heightened sense of appreciation for everything I was experiencing, a longing that the day would never end, and a sense of finality when the sun breached the horizon for one last sunset. For the next day, I move into travel mode.

However, we had one last sunset to experience at one of the most visited tour attractions in southern Bali. The temple at Uluwatu is celebrated for its sunset views, its winding paths along the cliffsides, and most of all, for its extremely aggressive monkeys. In fact, at the entrance there is a sign that warns visitors to remove sunglasses, and even earrings because the monkeys will take them. I kept on my sunglasses (since I couldn't see without them).  Almost immediately, a monkey snuck up and grabbed Leslie's water bottle from her hand and ran off. For some reason, this monkey's acquisition started a small war amongst a handful of the monkeys. Lots of monkey screams and fighting over the water bottle. We moved along quickly.

We made our way along the cliff just as the sun was setting.  The money shot is of the sun setting with the beautiful main temple on the highest point of the cliff in near silhouette. Yea, I got a few of those (of course, I had to elbow my way between Japanese and Korean tourists taking 'selfies' and hogging the prime shooting location). As the sun set, we worked our way up the cliff and encountered more monkeys. One big papa monkey jumped at Liam's foot and stole away his flip flop. A few moments later, another monkey - likely learning from example - ran off with his other flip flop. It was at that point that Leslie remarked that she had seen lots of visitors with only one flip-flop/sandal - it all became clear.

Leslie at Uluwatu Temple

Leslie with the temple in the background

My last - and quite spectacular - sunset in Bali

Uluwatu Temple

 

Liam and Leslie with the cliffs of Uluwatu

B&W - Cropped

Leslie admiring the view

Monkeys have big ass fangs!

This monkey has one of Liam's flip-flops

Cute, and surprisingly gentle, baby monkey

Wanting to be the hero, I tried to go after the monkeys, but was met with a hissing face full of long fangs. I stopped that tactic. One of the guides used fruit to distract the monkey to give me enough time to recover one of the flip-flops (not sure if it was the flip or the flop). Eventually, the big monkey grew tired of his acquisition, but what was recovered was unusable. The monkey completely tore away the bits that keep the flip-flop on the foot.  Darkness had fallen, and when trying to grab a taxi for our second dinner at Kat's Kitchen, Leslie found a new pair of flip-flops from a street vendor for $2. Problem solved!

That last night in Bali, while the kids and Leslie slept, I was posting to my blog, and got sucked into a movie on HBO. I walked outside, the sky swept with stars even as the full moon cast a strong shadow from it's perch high in the tropical sky. Knowing that I would be returning home the following day, I just sat out there, closed my eyes, and listened to the sounds of Bali. The chirping frogs, the buzzing mosquitos, the surf intermittently striking the beach beyond the cliffs in the distance.

It was a fantastic trip, but it was time to go home after six weeks on the road.

• Five nights in Dubai
• Three nights in Singapore
• Eight nights in Thailand
• 24 days in Bali
• One short night in a transit hotel in Dubai for a few hours sleep during a nine hour layover
• Two overnights on planes traversing the world

The next morning, we awoke at 7am on the 24th in Bali, and arrived in Seattle at 1pm on the 25th - 45 hours and three flights later. More on that in my next post.