30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 25 & 26

I am sorry for the delay but day 26 and upcoming day 27 were busy :).

Guess what I’ve done on day 25? Nothing! Except going for lunch and enjoying the day, pool and some movies I’ve literally done nothing and it felt great! 🙂

Yesterday though I’ve used to visit the stone temple Gunung Kawi. My old school friend told me about it so I decided to go for it. The scooter I´ve rented came with an empty tank and I didn’t want to give it back with a full one, so I’ve jumped on my scooter and took it for a ride :). The temple is located a bit further east of the Tegalalang rice terraces so I more or less knew the way. Still, I am using the GPS to avoid the big traffic infested roads but now that my stay comes to an end I know the streets around Ubud and how to get to places.

Taking the smaller roads that led through villages, little forests of palm trees with still wild animals give you a much better view on what Bali is like and simply safes you from the mayhem of traffic.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 24

I am slowly but surely realizing that my vacation comes to an end. I have only 5 days left and I hope I can make the best of it. I am not yet sure what I will do tomorrow but I think I will head again towards the sun. I haven’t been yet on the southern tip of Bali and I think I will do that. I don´t know where to yet but I am sure I´ll find something. In addition, an old friend and former schoolmate is on Bali with her family. Let´s see, maybe we meet for lunch or dinner?

As yesterdays stay at Hubud wasn’t too productive I´ve paid it today another visit to keep working on my pictures and on the Milkyway timelapse I´ve done in Amed. It took me longer as expected as I haven’t done a timelapse and its required editing for while. It worked out at the end and I am happy with the result. It still needs to find it´s spot in the final edit of my 30 days on Bali video but I am sure I´ll find one.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 23

Day 23! I know…yes…you still have 7 days! 🙂 Yes! But I already see it like “it´s only 7 days until I have to go back to Barcelona” OMG!

Why is sitting in a car so exhausting…even if you don’t drive? Two days at the beach, sun, good company and possibly 20 killed mosquitoes later I’m back in Ubud.

As I wasn´t able to say goodbye to Ricka I used Instagram to send her a message and as it happens Ratih and Ricka are close to Ubud…so we might meet tomorrow for lunch. If not then I will, of course, send as well a message to Ratih to say my goodbye and to thank her for her great hospitality.

Last night I was sitting at the beach bar guarding my camera doing a timelapse. I was down there alone but it gave me the option to have my music running, chatting aaaand huuum damn…what else did I do down there? Well, I went back to my room and eventually to bed at around midnight and slept till 8.30, or as long as the mosquitos let me. I used the morning to do my feedback on booking.com and tripadvisor.com as Ratih asked me to do, and after that treatment I gladly did it.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 22

Damn, I am soo on time with my blog today! It will even go online the same day :).

Tomorrow it´s time for me to head back to Ubud to my other hotel and I feel like trading one paradise with another. Amed is just beautiful and I just can recommend everyone coming here to do snorkelling, dive or just relax at the beach…I went for the last option as I am still a bad swimmer :(.

The hotel I´ve spent my two days here is a great place to relax your soul and if the management remains in the hotel then I can promise you that you have a great stay.

Ratih…if you ever read this…I had a great stay at “your” hotel and you made me feel like being a special guest. I certainly wasn´t and just have been another guest you had in your hotel, but you treated me like I´ve booked the presidential suite! If every hotel manager would treat their guests like you do, guests would have awesome times at their hotels. One question though, please provide some mosquito nets in the rooms for the beds. I think I´ve killed around 15 mosquitos in my room. But hey…I mean you have to pay a price for staying in paradise :). Ratih was, in the beginning, a hotel manager to me and her friend “just” another person I´ve met but I´ve the feeling that we would have a great time if we would meet again in a year or so.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 21

Change of location and hotel. I have to admit that this move does come with some danger as my new hotel is in the northeast of Bali only 21km from the volcano crater of the active volcano Mount Agung. The ride here I did again with Lovi, this time you could see that this trip was a bit different. He didn´t look that comfortable to drive as the road we took brought us 10km close to the crater. So understandably we had our eyes not only one time onto the crater to ensure we are “safe”.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 19 & 20

Day 19 & 20 I think I better combine :). Someone I´ve met here on Bali asked me when during my 30 days I will do some vacation if I am constantly visiting temples, waking up early in the mornings to see sunrises and edit my pictures in the co-working space etc…Well guess what :D!

Some days back I´ve been for sunset at the temple Pura Ulun Danu Beratan and met Brian, a US programmer and hobby photographer living abroad. He showed me a picture from a close by temple as well on a lake that is pretty picturesque during sunrise. So why not giving it another try to capture one and the drive was booked. I would love to do this with my scooter but I am not convinced yet about the scooter itself, not just because of the power of the scooter but about the light of it. I rode it today to do grocery and to go to have dinner and the light the lamp is providing is alarmingly low…well literally non-existing.

My driver was a bit late so we left around 4.15 in the morning and drove up into the mountains. Again I have provided the GPS location to where I want to go but my driver again brought me to the wrong location. As I already had some experience on that matter I corrected him, showed him the location and we arrived after another 15 minutes drive on rough and steep roads through a monkey forest. I was expecting a lake somewhere in the middle of nowhere without anyone, so with enough space to move around and to enjoy the quiet space and to enjoy the sunrise. Well…! Just by estimating I´d say I´ve seen around 100 tents and 500 young Balinese that camped up there and some as well to take pictures of the sunrise. Still, I was pretty surprised how loud they were, playing music and dancing. My driver though wasn´t so surprised. School´s out for 1.5 months so the kids are around at these places.

On our way back to Ubud I had another nice conversation with Lovi and he invited me over to his home to meet his family and to enjoy dinner with them. Once I am back on Bali and still am in touch with him I will gladly accept the invitation to get to know the local culture and people even more. The way back brought us through the mountains with a nice view on Mount Agung which is still active and erupting. Lovi and I agreed that there was still some smoke coming from it…So I actually saw an erupting Volcano…from very far away but it´s one thing I can scratch from my bucket list.

Back in the hotel I enjoyed a good breakfast omelet and used the time I´ve to fill out the customer feedback form for the Hotel. I really like the hotel but there are things that could and should be improved. The staff working here is awesome, super friendly and always smiley but there are still points that need improvement. To name just one: The security guy is watching TV till 3am and it´s pretty loud especially that my little house is kind of next to the TV.

I am still discovering different Warungs and had lunch in Warong Pojok, quite close to my hotel. The food was again just delicious and I really can get used to the Balinese vegetarian curries and by the way…Slowly but surely I can drive through the outskirts of Ubud with my phone connecting to different Wifi´s :).

I spent most of the days being on the road, visiting different temples, waterfalls etc…so I decided to stay in the hotel and relax on the pool reading my book. The sky though was a mix of dark and bright clouds with the sun here and there peaking through. The evening I spent relaxing and watching a movie and fell asleep when watching it…That happened to me maybe 1 or 2 times till now. I woke up in the middle of the night with my notebook next to me running the screensaver mode.

This morning on day 20 I was pretty surprised when I saw during breakfast that my feedback had been read and the breakfast adapted. Suddenly other types of marmalade were on the table, the staff parked their scooters not directly in front of my little house to avoid the noise. One of them has a scooter with an adapted exhaust pipe…this thing is just loud. Even now in the evening, the TV is off. Thank you for that!

Today was planned to go to the beach in the morning to really do some vacation stuff ;), relax on the beach and to enjoy the 30 degrees Pacific. As such a tour with a car and driver would be around 30€ I decided against it but to book a hotel directly at the beach at the foot of Mount Agung. 30€ for only 4-5 hours at the beach is too much I think so I rather spend 60-70€ for two days at the beach incl. driver and car.

I wouldn’t call it crazy and myself a maniac spending the night in a 13km proximity of an active volcano but I have to admit that it is not 100% safe. The photo opportunity for a sunrise picture with the island Lombok in the midground or a sunset picture with 2 volcanos in the midground and maybe even a Milkyway picture was too tempting. Furthermore…I can spend some time at the beach to relax. If the volcano blows, I would, in addition, get this picture as well. 🙂 I am always up for a good picture as you might have noticed ;).

As the day was sunny I actually spent it at the pool after having lunch at Warung Wayan and I think I found my favorite one. It´s a bit mosquito infested but with Mosquito spray, it isn´t too bad. The food is delicious and the prices are awesome. The dessert (crepés with banana and palm sugar syrup) was bigger than the soup though but still, both were delicious. A soup, crepés and a drink for 2,60€…you´ve got to love these little Warungs!

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 18

OMG!…only 12 days to go and I haven´t even been at the beach yet…well at least not properly with laying down, going into the water, relaxing and these crazy things :).

Today was the day my scooter rental timeframe was running out and I was kind of bound to the hotel as the guys wanted to come around at 4pm to pick it up…well, I wanted to prolongate the rental for another week, they just don´t know about their luck yet. I´ve paid 490.000 IDR for two weeks which is around 30€, means approx. 2€ per day which is pretty cheap. A motorcycle with a manual transmission comes with approx. 3.50€ per day if you´d rent it for 30 days. So next time I am here I will have a proper license for motorcycles and will rent a bigger machine to be able to go further and on steeper roads. My scooter requires fuel every 45km and it isn´t said that you´ll always find a petrol station when needed.

So as I was kind of expecting the guy to show up at around 4 I started my day slowly and in no rush at all. The morning if I have nothing planned for it I usually do my blog and to see what the day could bring. Lunch I had in a vegan / vegetarian restaurant called Sage. It´s absolutely yummy there just a bit overpriced. The prices though are because of the co-working and Yoga space next / close to it which is usually filled with western vegan and vegetarian people. I had a Teriyaki salad bowl with steamed broccoli, boc choy, green beans, carrots, bean sprouts, brown rice, grilled pineapple and sesame tempeh sticks with teriyaki sauce. So good and the portion was big enough to allow me a carrot cake as a desert which had a very interesting but very yummy taste to it.

As I was more or less already on my way into that direction I directly went after to the coco supermarket to do my grocery as I wanted to enjoy a cold ginger beer at the pool.

Pool, sun, something to drink and a good book…that was my afternoon. Couldn´t be better. The evening was quiet and I couldn’t anyway stay up too long as I´d booked a car and driver for the next morning. So the alarm was set for 3.50 on a Sunday…who cares ;). I was looking forward to a sunrise in the mountain and went to bed a bit earlier than usual.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 17

Day 17 and the volcano awakens!

The next day and Bali is on the news once more. Volcano Agung is awake again and spits ash clouds 2,500m into the air. Here in Ubud you don´t feel anything of that activity though, not even an earthquake. A volcanic eruption or an earthquake is something tragic on its own but I am eager to experience to see and feel such force. So I am currently planning to go again to Mt. Batur for sunrise and hope to get an eruption on a picture.

As I am writing this I have the live webcam on via youtube from Mt. Agung on my screen and just saw it vibrating quite a lot. I am wondering though if it was just the wind or a real tremor. If it was a tremor though it should have been felt here in Ubud as the camera was shaking quite a lot.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 12

Day 12. I really start to like this writing thing :). It´s supposed to be a travel blog but at the same time it is a kind of diary but it´s kind of hard to keep up with the days.

So yesterday 24th of June…the Alarm went off quite early at 3.50 and it was chucking down with rain. Ok, the rain thing became quite normal during the last days here in Ubud and I was confident that the rain would be gone once we are outside of town and in the mountains.

The tour was about to go to Mt. Batur to one of the currently “sleeping” volcanos that erupted the last time in 2000. Amazingly the old crater formed around 29300 years ago is inhabited by roughly 16000 people. If this thing erupts again a lot of lives are at stake.

30 DAYS ON BALI – DAY 11

Another day in paradise and I took my scooter for a ride and damn this thing becomes hot. Not because of the sun and the heating leather but more because of the engine that is heating up.

I still feel a bit dodgy driving around on Bali but I am getting used to it. Unfortunately, my scooter does not have something where I could attach my mobile for GPS assistance so I have it in my pocket and an earplug in my right ear where I have Stephen Fry providing directions in his very charming British accent. The streets here on Bali of the beaten track are mostly used by Balinese people and are a bit rougher than the main roads. At least though you see something from the island and not only the main roads with the tourist souvenir shops.