Bali in Summary

We foolishly believed that starting our trip with the Aoki's on the Big Island (basically heaven on Earth) had doomed us to 8 months of relative disappointment. But apparently there is no shortage of stunning countries in this world. Each new place seems more mind-blowing than the last.

Our latest stop was Bali, where we stayed at my friend Poliman's apartment in Ubud. The bright green rice fields, misty mountain peaks and lush jungles, complete with waterfalls and hot springs, almost made us want to go through the hassle of changing our tickets and staying longer. In the end our budget and curiosity about Thailand made up our mind for us, but Poliman played tour guide and made sure we packed as much into the 6 days we had there as possible. Here's a recap.

Thursday March 3: after a hellishly long bus transit between Phnom Penh and Bangkok, and a 3.5 hour plane trip, we landed in Denpasar and were picked up by my old friend Poliman. We stopped for milkshakes and donuts before stopping for satay rabbit before stopping for fruit (we were very hungry) before heading up a mountain to a cold pool and a hot spring. I'm not exactly sure where Poliman took us, but it was awesome. We went back to Poliman's and had dinner before going to sleep relatively early.

Gorgeous rice terraces

The beauty of Bali

The ice cold swimming pool

The heavenly hot spring, complete with waterfall

Such a happy place

Dinner courtesy of Poliman. Tastes much better than it looks.

Friday, March 4: We woke up early to catch the sunrise over a volcano. It didn't work out - it was too cloudy to see the sun. But we took a bunch of pictures anyway.

Driving to another spectacular overlook. We're obviously super excited.

Danielle had a death-grip on her pillow during the entire ordeal

Walking with the pillow

Posing with the pillow

Why are we out here again?

This is what happens when you make us pose before 8 a.m.

Fine. We'll smile for one.

We had to stock up on groceries because the next day was a day of silence for Nyepi. Everything shut down and no one was allowed outside. So after a random shopping spree in which we attempted to buy a healthy assortment of complimentary foods that a) would not spoil without a refrigerator and b) would not attract ants (we settled on noodles, canned veggies, dried sausages, bread and tea), we went out to see what the masses were up to.

I will never be satisfied by an American holiday again. This party had better pinatas than Cinco de Mayo, better fireworks than the Fourth of July, better costumes than Halloween, and better floats than the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Plus a lot of loud music, dancing, and a lightning storm!

Apparently the whole island produces hundreds of grotesque paper mache statues and burns them all to represent ridding the island of evil. We'll put up video as soon as possible.

Kids putting on their game faces

Giant paper mache monster with glowing red eyes

They're coming to eat your children!

Saturday, March 5: We watched movies for as long as we could, but our little, independent, American brains could not fathom a holiday in which neighborhood guards force you to remain indoors ALL DAY LONG. So we briefly snuck out and hid behind some trees off the street to see what we could see. It was predictably boring - no one was out except a few rebellious teens and a very angry dog that refused to let us pass.

Rice fields near Poliman's apartment in Ubud

Sunday, March 6: Rode Poliman's little honda to church more than an hour away. Riding motorcycles in Asia is terrifying, even in Bali where people tend to stay on one side of the road. In the end I got so nervous that he let me drive. When we got home we rented a scooter and went to the Monkey Forrest. The monkeys were all adorable, with their human-like expressions and rebellious faux-hawks.

Vendors sold bananas to tourists, and Poliman showed me how to hold one above my head to get them to climb up my body onto my shoulders. I found an adorable little baby monkey, let him see the banana, raised it above my head and......I was attacked from behind by a greedy fatso who wouldn't get off of me once he'd stolen the banana.

He just sat there using my head as his own personal table.

Trying to get the rabies-infested giant monkey off of my head without panicking

The gorgeous park where the monkeys live

After we ran out of bananas, we wandered around the park and looked at the sculptures and gorgeous trees. We found some vines and decided that it would be only appropriate to swing on them. Assisted by a Canadian Irishman with a death wish and very strong hands, we learned how to grab the vines and swing out over a small staircase and fish pond set 5 or 6 feet below the platform. One of the security guards saw what we were doing and ran towards us screaming, "Hey! Hey!" We all froze like kindergartners caught jumping off the swings at recess, but the security guard stopped about 20 feet away and simply shouted, "Be careful!" before turning away and leaving us to our swinging. We proceeded to swing more carefully.

Making friends

Monday, March 5: Poliman had work to do, and Danielle and I decided we needed a beach day, so we took the scooter and began an island-wide game of hot-and-cold. At each stoplight we would get the attention of another motorist, point in a direction and say, "Uluatu?" It took us a few hours, but eventually we found a STUNNING beach. Of course we had forgotten my camera, so here's a picture I stole from the Interweb.

Unfortunately, all exposed skin (most notably my arms and Danielle's legs and shoulders) had been burnt to a crisp during our extended ride to the beach, so we weren't in the mood for sunbathing. But we sat in the sand sewing (yes, we like to sew in the sand), listening to music, and relaxing. We tried to leave before dark so we could backtrack as much as possible before the streets became indistinguishable, but as the sun set we were still an hour and a half from Ubud and we could hear thunder in the distance.

Soon it was pouring. I put on my jacket, but Danielle had left hers in Ubud and was drenched in less than a minute. Our method of asking for directions at stoplights was more difficult with fewer scooters on the road, but we gimped along for another forty minutes or so until we met a cheerful Indonesian girl on a cute scooter, who said she was going to Ubud and we could follow her. My relief lasted until the light changed and she zipped off at 80 km an hour in standing water, weaving in and out of traffic like a lunatic on crack, occasionally feigning interest in her own well-being by slamming on her breaks before potholes, and in the process forcing me to swerve around her to avoid colliding. She would look back to see if we were still with her every few minutes, but after a while we became convinced that she was just checking to see if she'd finished us off yet, and we began to imagine that (assuming we survived her death-trap obstacle course on the road) she was leading us to some dark uninhabited valley to be murdered in a cult ritual. We saw a sign for Ubud and took it at the last second, hoping she wouldn't notice.

Things started to look familiar, and once again we thought the worst was over until we discovered a little-known fact: Ubud floods backwards. We headed up a hill on one of the main roads and turned left towards Poliman's apartment, and were almost knocked off the road by a flash flood. The higher we climbed, the deeper the water got, until the wheels of our poor little scooter were nearly submerged. We managed to ride the wake of a truck in front of us until we saw the sign for the alley leading to the apartment and got stuck in the gutter. Luckily Poliman was outside and helped us get the scooter into the alley to park. We got off the bike and started giggling. Then we changed into dry clothes, had warm tea, and fell asleep.

Us after the craziest ride of our lives

Tuesday, March 6: After the excitement of Monday, we decided to have a relaxing last day in Bali. After brunch we walked through town looking at shops. In the afternoon we went to the most beautiful spa I've ever seen to get Lomi Lomi massages (another recommendation from Poliman). Afterward we had dinner, played go-fish, and watched kittens run around on the roof until it was time to pack for our flight the next morning.

Our room was like this but more awesome

A statue in Ubud