Bali - First Night and Day 1

Stephen writes.....
Bali is a must see place if you are in this part of the world...it's beautiful, the people are friendly, and it's pretty economical for a trip. On this trip there (because we're sure we'll be back) we went with our new Guam friends Ben, Meghan and Dave, and Meghan's friend from home Bonnie.

We got in to Bali in the evening and had our driver meet us at the airport. Once we cleared customs and got visas and exchanged cash, we met up with him outside the airport in a sea of chaotic taxi drivers looking for fares.

The ride to Ubud from Densapar was eventful. We felt like our heads were on swivels...partly because of curiosity for our new surroundings, but mostly because we felt like we were going to run over somebody on a moped. Bali's main source of transportation is the Vespa, or some other similar scooters. They are everywhere, sometimes with 2 adults and a couple children per scooter. They drive absolutely crazily. They weave in and out of traffic and you can barely see them at night. The roads are fairly well maintained, although I don't think I saw a yellow line anywhere. Occasionally you'd see a dotted white line down the middle. It didn't matter, though. The scooters ran down either side of you, down wrong way streets and were like those little summertime knats flying around you. Quite literally, it is chaos.

We arrive to our bungalow. Our driver, who also manages the bungalows, tells us to get some rest and we can check-in the next morning sometime. Our bungalow is sweet, as Katrina will soon describe. We are promptly brought a message from our friends we are to meet. They are down a block or two, enjoying some local evening refreshments. We still giggle at the name of the local brewery name.....Bintang. After relaxing from our flight and (now amusing) drive, we are all enjoying our little slice of Bali. By the way, the pizza is bad there. The Bintang is good, although Katrina didn't much care for it. Everybody else did. I guess it evened out the night.

Katrina writes...
We stayed at the Ubud Bungalows on Monkey Forest Road - in a double superior room, which means it had AC. It was awesome, a separate little bungalow for us, with a huge bathroom and shower, a porch and a vaulted ceiling. The door and window coverings - which I forgot to photograph but you can see similar ones on the temple photos, were intricate carvings with all the details painted. It included some of the best breakfast I've had in a long time and only cost $40 US a day.

Stephen went out for a morning run, and explored the local surroundings before anybody got up. After breakfast on the first day, we explored the reason for the name of our road - the Sacred Monkey Forest. A small fee and purchase of some bananas and you're in. It is an area filled with monkeys, all wanting those bananas you purchased, and being a little aggressive about it. The guides just say - give them the bananas and when you don't have any more they'll leave you alone. Unless you're Ben and the guide has you sit down and hold your arms out with bananas. There was a little tail in mouth action there. The monkeys (once you're out of bananas) are a little curious about you, but go on with the daily activities of grooming, chasing each other and harassing Meghan. We went into the temple there and checked out the amazing carvings on everything, as well as the monkey's licking the walls - we think for the moss but we're not sure. On the way out we just watched the other tourist who'd just entered with their bananas and laughed. It's sort of funny when they monkeys aren't climbing up your body.

From the Monkey Forest, we headed up MFRoad and had lunch on our way to the large market. The market is one deal after another - Stephen is the master of offering a price and pretty much walking away to get it. In many ways it is sad because people are almost begging, but they are also asking for multiple times what they are selling is worth. So is the begging an act? They will also use the "for good luck" phrase to make a price sound good, and Stephen will still walk away to get his price.

Stephen writes:
Dinner was fantastic, as this would be a recurring theme throughout our stay. Great local foods, and a whole lotta local beverages of many sorts. I actually nearly had the entire beverage menu by the time we left. I fell a couple short, but was happy to have passed on them the next morning. I didn't go jogging the next day. Everything is so affordable there, despite steaks and appetizers and drinks, the dinner bills averaged $15 per person, most of that tab being liquid. The steak dinners themselves were only $5 or so. After dinner, it was back to the familiar watering hole from the previous night before hitting the bed.