We hope you all had a nice Christmas! Ours was spent in a small mountainside village called Tretes which is about 50 km or so northwest of Malang. A very nice place that is a popular weekend get-a-way spot for the locals. We were quite proud of ourselves in getting there because we were finally able to negotiate the public transport system almost as seemlessly as the locals and for the same price they pay. It only took us 4 weeks, but we finally did it. I wish I would have taken a picture of Keith sitting in this bemo (minivan - aka public bus) - he was sitting next to this cute, very small lady, and she just made him look like a giant, with his head nearly touching the ceiling. Then there's our enormous backpacks spread across our laps...no we don't stick out at all.
Arriving in Tretes, we were fortunate to meet a friendly ex-pat who steered us in the direction of a great hotel. Very reasonably priced, and views from the common dining areas that were amazing - overlooking steep mountain valleys, distant mosques, and a big ol mountain. There are hikes in this area that take you to the top of some mountains, but we opted not to do it as the rainy season could make the walk treacherous and unpleasant. Yes, we are still getting the daily 2:00 downpours.
We had a nice stay in Tretes. Although we were literally the only tourists there, so we became a bigger attraction for the locals than any of the scenery and mountains that they originally came to see. We took some short walks to some waterfalls, the more popular of the two was packed with local tourists (this was the Saturday of Christmas, so there were lots of locals up for the weekend), and student groups. The kids in particular got a kick out of us, and I now have a small indication for what it might be like to be famous. "Excuse me missus...may I photo?" Giggle, giggle, giggle, photo taken, shrieks of delight. It was pretty cute, but it did get old after a while. So many eyes on us the whole weekend. We were weary by the end. We went into the local pool hall to play, and I am already a pretty bad pool player, but when I have 30 pairs of Indonesian eyes relentlessly staring at me, I get even worse.
We spent Christmas night having dinner with two ex-patriots (one from Australia, one from Britain) who were clearly starved for some Western conversation because they both talked at the same time throughout the entire dinner. It was interesting (and a little frustrating) to hear their perspective. They are clearly jaded by many aspects of Indonesia, so we wonder why they are hear at all, but the answer comes the more they talk - they like to not have to work much and live inexpensively, and they love the women - both have married much younger local women. Interesting evening.
So what of this travel nightmare I mentioned? Well, it's a bit of a long story but to summarize, we essentially learned two lessons:
1) Never pre-book your transportati0n.
2) If you violate #1, forgo the money you spent on that prebooked transportation and carry on. It is not worth saving a few bucks for the inconvenience of trying to make good on your earlier purchase.
So way back in Probolingo, we foolishly got talked into through tickets from Bromo to Yogyakarta (jo-ja karta), as that was our next destination planned. As we were hanging out in Bromo, and hanging out with Steve and BB, we found some other places we wanted to go in between (Malang, Tretes). No problem, our booking "agent" says, just call me from where you want to be picked up on the day you want to be picked up (along the main route to Yogya), and we'll come get you. So the day we left Tretes, we arranged for the night bus to come get us at the spot of our choice. We headed down the mountain, didn't find the first town to our liking, so went a bit further to another town where there was a decent train station that made a good waiting place. Called the guy. No problem, be there about 8:00. It was about 3:30 when we got there - we deliberately went early to avoid missing him. Long wait at the train station, playing cards, getting stared at. As we get closer to the time, we move out on the street. Wait, get stared at, eat a little from a vendor, get stared at. It's now 9:00, no sign of this guy. Keith calls, and finds out his bus broke down! About 3 hours ago! He wasn't going to try to come find us or let us know somehow! Keith let him know how frustrated we were, and within two minutes we jumped onto a public bus headed for Surabaya. Upon getting off the bus in Surabaya, we were completely swarmed by taxi drivers. It was like pushing our way through an angry mob. We were so irritated at that point, that out of spite we went walked over to the bemos to take public transport to our hotel. So we got on a bemo, asked the guy if it took us to city center, of which he assured us it did. 5 minutes into the ride, the guy who handles the money took my money, then asked where we were going (we had already told him 3 times). Communication was already difficult, but adding insult to injury, the radio was blasting awful music right into our ears, so not only could we not understand him, but we couldn't hear him. Plus, in trying to communicate where we were trying to go, he and everyone on the bus would periodically laugh like crazy at us. We were already on such a thin thread, this was the breaking point, and we eventually got the message that we were on the wrong bemo. So he dropped us off at a bus stop of which we had no idea where it was (Surabaya is a city of 2 million), and where now we were being ignored by all the transport people. Finally after taking out our frustrations on each other, we recoverd, found a taxi and after much discussion with all the taxi drivers in the area, they figured out where and how to get to our hotel, and after we had to tell him to turn his meter on, we were off. We arrived at our hotel at about 11:00 and crashed.
We caught the early AM train to Yogyakarta (which is what we could have done all along if we could have just let the $30 go). So next day we board an executive class train (don't get too excited....in means air conditioning, reclining seats (of which one of ours was broken) and a snack). Nice enough way to go though and by 2:00 we were in the town of Yogyakarta - a city similar to Ubud as it is known for its culture and art.
We found a great place to stay with the most creative murals painted on the walls of our rooms. We'll get a picture of it. Nice city, with plenty to do. We spent today walking around. Tons of shopping here, but neither of us were in the mood to tackle the bargaining today, so we just wandered around (jalan jalan), trying our best to learn to ignore the constant offers for transport. "Yes, excuse me mister. Transport? Bromo? Borobudur? Yes please?" I think we dream those words now.
We'll get some pictures up over the next few days. We'll hang around here for a few days, then spend New Years in a mountain town, back here for one day, then fly to Singapore on the 3rd.
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Friday, December 23, 2005
Merry Christmas from Malang
OK, so Em updated everyone on Mount Bromo. Here is my take on the description: Drain Crater Lake, re-fill with sand. Add one more wizard island, remove all snow. And add Mt Hood in the background….Got It?
So yeah…we are in Malang. We have been staying at an old Dutch colonial mansion that was long ago converted to a hotel. The common areas are very nice. There are about 6 sitting rooms, with couches and international TV (CNN, BBC, HBO). So we got caught up in international news and even watched a movie. We are still traveling with Steve and BB from Belgium we have had fun dinners and rounds of billiards over Bintang (Indonesian beer).
The room was OK. The hot water didn’t work if our neighbors next door were using it. But that was not the least of are worries. Just outside the front desk the hotel they kept a big Rooster in a small cage. We commented that the only way he was ever going to come out the small door was in pieces. So needless to say, he was bored. He started making his morning “cuck a doodle doo’s” at about 2:00 a.m. We wish we would have brought Em’s Ambien because we’d had fed him a nice snack. The next day we had a long conversation with him, and last night he was much better. Sunrise only.
On our first night we went out to a nicer diner at the Amsterdam restaurant. It was about 4 km from the hotel and it being night, we didn’t want to walk. So, we grabbed a Becak, a three wheeled bicycle with the driver in the back and Em and I up front. All XXXX lbs of us. It was slightly uphill. The driver was small. Physics! He ended up pushing us in places. Very embarrassing! It turns out however, that this is normal and we saw becak drivers pushing their passengers around fairly often once we started noticing. Is was good for a laugh at ourselves though.
We will enjoy a quiet Christmas in the mountains to the North, a little town called Tretes. We are thinking af all of you over the holidays.
Emily here now....here are some pictures from the past week or so....
First, back to Ubud, and our cooking class. Keith learning the Bali technique of using the hands in all of the Balinese cooking:
Here's a look at the agricultural area around Bromo from the hike we did to the viewpoint:
And another picture of the village that I just really like:
A look into Mt Bromo - the most active of the volcanoes:
Here's the vast wasteland from the viewpoint on our second attempt at the sunrise:
Here is our transport that we took across the sand sea from Bromo to Malang:
Workers doing their daily chores of gathering grass to feed the cows and horses. They carry this so far and it looks SO heavy. No riding tractors here.
So yeah…we are in Malang. We have been staying at an old Dutch colonial mansion that was long ago converted to a hotel. The common areas are very nice. There are about 6 sitting rooms, with couches and international TV (CNN, BBC, HBO). So we got caught up in international news and even watched a movie. We are still traveling with Steve and BB from Belgium we have had fun dinners and rounds of billiards over Bintang (Indonesian beer).
The room was OK. The hot water didn’t work if our neighbors next door were using it. But that was not the least of are worries. Just outside the front desk the hotel they kept a big Rooster in a small cage. We commented that the only way he was ever going to come out the small door was in pieces. So needless to say, he was bored. He started making his morning “cuck a doodle doo’s” at about 2:00 a.m. We wish we would have brought Em’s Ambien because we’d had fed him a nice snack. The next day we had a long conversation with him, and last night he was much better. Sunrise only.
On our first night we went out to a nicer diner at the Amsterdam restaurant. It was about 4 km from the hotel and it being night, we didn’t want to walk. So, we grabbed a Becak, a three wheeled bicycle with the driver in the back and Em and I up front. All XXXX lbs of us. It was slightly uphill. The driver was small. Physics! He ended up pushing us in places. Very embarrassing! It turns out however, that this is normal and we saw becak drivers pushing their passengers around fairly often once we started noticing. Is was good for a laugh at ourselves though.
We will enjoy a quiet Christmas in the mountains to the North, a little town called Tretes. We are thinking af all of you over the holidays.
Emily here now....here are some pictures from the past week or so....
First, back to Ubud, and our cooking class. Keith learning the Bali technique of using the hands in all of the Balinese cooking:
Here's a look at the agricultural area around Bromo from the hike we did to the viewpoint:
And another picture of the village that I just really like:
A look into Mt Bromo - the most active of the volcanoes:
Here's the vast wasteland from the viewpoint on our second attempt at the sunrise:
Here is our transport that we took across the sand sea from Bromo to Malang:
Workers doing their daily chores of gathering grass to feed the cows and horses. They carry this so far and it looks SO heavy. No riding tractors here.
Thursday, December 22, 2005
We're Not On Bali Anymore!
It’s been a while. The town we’ve been in for the past 4 days did not have internet connection. We are currently in the town of Malang, Java. A “small” town of 700,000 people or so in the Eastern reginon Java. It actually isn’t that bad for how many people are here.
Our crossing from Bali to Java was uneventful, but it was a long day, and landing on Java we immediately knew we weren’t on Bali anymore (duh, that’s cause we just left Bali…). What I mean, is, Java, being the island that holds over 60% of the population of Indonesia, is not dependent on tourism. What this means is that they don’t all speak English! Can you believe the nerve! Just kidding. Glad we bought a phrasebook. Now we can ask questions and not understand the answers. So getting to our main destination brought some frustrations, and a good schooling in how the public bus transportation works and how to not have to pay more than the locals (which we did of course…arghhh).
The main destination being Cemeru Lawang (or Bromo as they all call it), which is a cute little mountain village located right on the edge of a HUGE caldera. Inside the crater of this volcano, is several other mountains…all of which are pretty active, and the smallest of which is Mt Bromo. Argh. This is so hard to explain. It is such a weird setting. Flat, flat sea of sand inside the crater with 3-4 mountains poking out of it. The locals drive you all over the sand sea to the base of Bromo, which you “climb” up (walk up stairs), and stare down into a sulfur inferno. You need to see the pictures to understand, but this connection is terrible, and I’ll be lucky to get these words posted. The main tourist activity is to hire a jeep and get driven to a viewpoint overlooking the whole wasteland to watch the sunrise. We walked up to the viewpoint the first day (starting the walk at 3:00 AM!), but were covered in clouds, so hired a jeep the next day and got some nice views.
It was a lovely village to relax in, and take the occasional walk. Very mountainous, with farming everywhere. Every hillside is covered in either potato, onion, or cabbage fields. And some of these fields are STEEP. These people work so hard. Carrying everything on their backs - even the grass to feed the cows and horses. We've got some great pics we'll post one of these days. And being up high, it was cool (as in lower temps)! We were actually a touch cold at night. Ahhhhh.
Now we are a bit further west in a town called Malang . From here we'll go to some more small mountain side towns, and in between the rain showers try to get some walks/hikes in. It's not likely we'll have loads of internet connection options, so don't worry if you don't hear from us for a while.
Our crossing from Bali to Java was uneventful, but it was a long day, and landing on Java we immediately knew we weren’t on Bali anymore (duh, that’s cause we just left Bali…). What I mean, is, Java, being the island that holds over 60% of the population of Indonesia, is not dependent on tourism. What this means is that they don’t all speak English! Can you believe the nerve! Just kidding. Glad we bought a phrasebook. Now we can ask questions and not understand the answers. So getting to our main destination brought some frustrations, and a good schooling in how the public bus transportation works and how to not have to pay more than the locals (which we did of course…arghhh).
The main destination being Cemeru Lawang (or Bromo as they all call it), which is a cute little mountain village located right on the edge of a HUGE caldera. Inside the crater of this volcano, is several other mountains…all of which are pretty active, and the smallest of which is Mt Bromo. Argh. This is so hard to explain. It is such a weird setting. Flat, flat sea of sand inside the crater with 3-4 mountains poking out of it. The locals drive you all over the sand sea to the base of Bromo, which you “climb” up (walk up stairs), and stare down into a sulfur inferno. You need to see the pictures to understand, but this connection is terrible, and I’ll be lucky to get these words posted. The main tourist activity is to hire a jeep and get driven to a viewpoint overlooking the whole wasteland to watch the sunrise. We walked up to the viewpoint the first day (starting the walk at 3:00 AM!), but were covered in clouds, so hired a jeep the next day and got some nice views.
It was a lovely village to relax in, and take the occasional walk. Very mountainous, with farming everywhere. Every hillside is covered in either potato, onion, or cabbage fields. And some of these fields are STEEP. These people work so hard. Carrying everything on their backs - even the grass to feed the cows and horses. We've got some great pics we'll post one of these days. And being up high, it was cool (as in lower temps)! We were actually a touch cold at night. Ahhhhh.
Now we are a bit further west in a town called Malang . From here we'll go to some more small mountain side towns, and in between the rain showers try to get some walks/hikes in. It's not likely we'll have loads of internet connection options, so don't worry if you don't hear from us for a while.
Does everyone know that in less than two weeks, we'll be traveling with BOTH of my parents through Thailand?? Yes, my dad is going too. Hooray! I'll let them do the blog postings for that month. :)
Merry Christmas! They set up the funniest looking Christmas tree at the last place we were staying. It looked like a bunch of droopy tropical branches in a bucket with lights on it. Not a lot of talk about Christmas here obviously, but most of the hotels try to do some kind of decorating for the "Westerners".
All right, signing off for now....
Saturday, December 17, 2005
Monsoon Season on North Bali
Um, was I mentioning a while back that it wasn't feeling like the rainy season here? Well, I eat my words. We are in the midst of the monsoon season for sure. Back in Ubud, we would get some seriously heavy (and seriously punctual) rain showers every day about 2:00. They would usually let up by 5:00 or so. Now we are on the north coast of Bali, in a small town (or stretch of even smaller towns) called Lovina. And man has it been raining. Torrential downpours for the better part of the three days we've been here. Rivers running down the streets, waterfalls coming over the roofs, crazy.
So we ended in Ubud on a good and bad note. We had that cooking class on our last full day there, and it was nice because we learned some good stuff, and there were only the two of us in class, so we got lots of special attention. But we were the only two in class, so we had to eat everything we made! Keep in mind we made 5 main dishes! No we didn't eat it all, but we sure ate too much and literally spent the rest of the day not moving any more than necessary. We also at this point had picked up some kind of relatively small bug, so that helped in keeping us close to the room. Nothing too awfully bad, but enough to be uncomfortable. We're still both having lingering effects, but we can see vast improvements in the near future.
So we left the next day, and had a lovely ride from Ubud to the north coast through lush and dramatic mountian scenery. The bus stopped at one of the higer elevation mountain villages, and we were both surprised to actually be cold! We arrived at the bus depot in Lovina only to be greeted with business cards being shoved in our faces before the bus even came to a stop. We were both a bit weary from traveling (and that pesky bug), and both became instantly intolerant of dealing with the touts (as our book calls them). We tried to be as nice as possible, but essentially made a beeline for our planned hotel.
North Bali is known for its black sand beaches and very swimmable waters as the reef is quite far out providing nice calm waters. So we walked out to the beach to get a look, and after beating off the touts, became immensley disappointed. The black sand was nice, and might have made for a nice lounging beach had it not been for the garbage also lining the beach and the brown stream waters (containing who knows what) draining into the swimming area. Needless to say we did not swim, but took a walk along the beach instead, contemplating the seeming hopelessness of the scattered environmental efforts throughout the world. What a battle humans are up against! Not to mention the albatross! (There was an exhibit at the Sydney aquarium about how many sea animals are killed from ingesting plastic from the seas). As we were driving over, we got a good look at one of the "landfills" off the side of the road that was literally spilling into the river. This country was not ready for the influx of plastic that the Western societies introduced.
As you can tell, we hit a bit of a travel wall here,and have spent most of our time just hanging out in our room, watching the rain, playing cards, and reading (and recovering). Really, it's still not a bad life. We've also been trying to plan the rest of our time in Indonesia, and are finding ourselves with extra time that we're not sure how we're going to spend, so we ended up staying here an extra night. We moved today to a place more centrally located and with a pool, so in between storms, we've been able to get a few swims in.
Tomorrow we leave to the very northwestern corner of Bali, where we will stay the night, then the next day catch a ferry over to the island of Java, where we will then hop on a train and head to the base of Mt Bromo, which we will climb (short, easy climb) to get some hopefully stunning, volcanic views.
Hope holiday preparations are going well for everyone!
So we ended in Ubud on a good and bad note. We had that cooking class on our last full day there, and it was nice because we learned some good stuff, and there were only the two of us in class, so we got lots of special attention. But we were the only two in class, so we had to eat everything we made! Keep in mind we made 5 main dishes! No we didn't eat it all, but we sure ate too much and literally spent the rest of the day not moving any more than necessary. We also at this point had picked up some kind of relatively small bug, so that helped in keeping us close to the room. Nothing too awfully bad, but enough to be uncomfortable. We're still both having lingering effects, but we can see vast improvements in the near future.
So we left the next day, and had a lovely ride from Ubud to the north coast through lush and dramatic mountian scenery. The bus stopped at one of the higer elevation mountain villages, and we were both surprised to actually be cold! We arrived at the bus depot in Lovina only to be greeted with business cards being shoved in our faces before the bus even came to a stop. We were both a bit weary from traveling (and that pesky bug), and both became instantly intolerant of dealing with the touts (as our book calls them). We tried to be as nice as possible, but essentially made a beeline for our planned hotel.
North Bali is known for its black sand beaches and very swimmable waters as the reef is quite far out providing nice calm waters. So we walked out to the beach to get a look, and after beating off the touts, became immensley disappointed. The black sand was nice, and might have made for a nice lounging beach had it not been for the garbage also lining the beach and the brown stream waters (containing who knows what) draining into the swimming area. Needless to say we did not swim, but took a walk along the beach instead, contemplating the seeming hopelessness of the scattered environmental efforts throughout the world. What a battle humans are up against! Not to mention the albatross! (There was an exhibit at the Sydney aquarium about how many sea animals are killed from ingesting plastic from the seas). As we were driving over, we got a good look at one of the "landfills" off the side of the road that was literally spilling into the river. This country was not ready for the influx of plastic that the Western societies introduced.
As you can tell, we hit a bit of a travel wall here,and have spent most of our time just hanging out in our room, watching the rain, playing cards, and reading (and recovering). Really, it's still not a bad life. We've also been trying to plan the rest of our time in Indonesia, and are finding ourselves with extra time that we're not sure how we're going to spend, so we ended up staying here an extra night. We moved today to a place more centrally located and with a pool, so in between storms, we've been able to get a few swims in.
Tomorrow we leave to the very northwestern corner of Bali, where we will stay the night, then the next day catch a ferry over to the island of Java, where we will then hop on a train and head to the base of Mt Bromo, which we will climb (short, easy climb) to get some hopefully stunning, volcanic views.
Hope holiday preparations are going well for everyone!
Monday, December 12, 2005
Ubud - The Cultural Heart of Bali
Hi all. We have been here in Ubud for the last two days, and have really taken a liking to it. It is in the central part of Bali, and is known as the cultural heart of Bali. There are lots of arts and crafts to buy, dances to attend, and temples to go to. But first I digress....
Some random information about Indonesia:
I forgot to talk about the driving here. It is crazy! One guy described it perfectly as organized confusion. Most people drive scooters, nobody signals, and people are just weaving in and out at leisure. The horn is used as the turn indicator, or just to let people know you are coming. About 1/3 of them wear helmets, and there is usually 2 or 3 people on each scooter. In the bigger cities (like Denpasar) it is utter madness to a westerner that comes from deluxe-width, organized roads.
Most think of Indonesia as the Muslim capital of the world, and indeed it is the most populous Muslim nation, but there is actually quite an array of religions throughout the archipelego. Bali, in particular is predominantly Hindu, while Lombock is Muslim. And there are some very easily noticed differences that we have observed. From a ceremonial standpoint, Bali is lovely because each morning and evening, women walk around with trays full of offering/blessings made up of bamboo leaves, flowers and incense and place them on various statues, on cars, outside certain rooms, and over doorways, then splash them with holy water. In Lombock, on the Gilis, the Islam religion was noticable by the daily prayers that are broadcast over speakers, and the observance of Friday as a very holy day where the town shuts down and everyone heads to the mosque from 11:00 to 2:00. Many more temples in Bali. And in Bali, there are dogs everywhere....in Lombock on the Gilis it was cats (dogs are seen as quite dirty, and not to be touched in the Islamic regligion).
Some people asked more about costs of things.....A typical, sit-down dinner at a nice restaurant costs us between 30,000 and 50,000 rupiah (equates to $3-5 USD). Where if you eat off a street vendor's cart, you might pay 6,000Rp for the two of us. Not bad, eh? And internet is quite prevalent. At least in the areas that tourists tend to frequent. The smaller the town, the slower the connection, but they all have it to offer. It usually cost about 300 Rp a minute ($2-3 an hour).
No sunburns yet. We are pretty diligent about lathering up on the sunscreen and wearing the hats. I have to say, we are getting quite brown though.....:)
I think that was it....back to what we've been doing.
We ended our stay in the Gili's with a night dive! (Notice I don't mention these things until after the fact for the sake of the parents!). It was my first night dive and it was spectacular....and it puts me one-fifth of the way to becoming an Advanced Open Water diver. We had great weather for it and saw some interesting anenomes, clams (huge ones), and a frog fish (a fish that cannot swim and walks on its "elbows").
Keith wanted me to include this photo - our first stop at a street vendor. Apparently he likes how I tower over the local. This is on Gili Trawangan:
The next day was entirely given to travel and we reversed our course back to Padangbai, and carried on another two hours until we reached Ubud. Thankfully we arrived before dark and had no problems finding the place we wanted to stay. It is called Sania's House, and looks like a Hindu temple all on it's own. It is very hard to describe, but lots of ornate buildings/huts/bungalows surrounding a lush, tropical garden and a pool! That was one of our requirements since we are no longer by the ocean. Yes, we had to pay a bit more for the pool. Now we are up to $6 a night. It was heavan yesterday, as when the sun comes out, it gets quite hot.
We are now definitely seeing the rainy season. Just when we thought we were going to break from the heat yesterday, the clouds rolled in, and the rains fell. And fell. And fell. Such a torrential downpour for about 4 hours! And it did the same thing today, but did not last nearly as long. The nice thing of course, is that it definitely cools the air down.
We've really enjoyed this town so far - I think when tourism is up, it can become quite overrun with tourists, as it is an easy day trip from Kuta. We feel like there are quite a few tourists here, but that is only because we have come from much smaller cities. There are still many deserted hotels and restaurants. They've got a great public market. We made our way into first thing yesterday morning and came away with some nice souveniers, and we think we did OK with the bargaining. It also runs into a huge produce market, where we saw tables full of dead chickens (bird flu!) - we only looked from afar, and had no desire to walk by it. Then we went to the Monkey Forest, where we saw lots of....you got it....monkeys!! They are living freely in this forest, and not behind cages, and are used to being fed by tourists. So like dummies, we showed up with a handful of bananas and almost got mauled by these creatures. A couple even jumped up on Keith. They are known to get aggressive, so I didn't want one on me and did a typical girl scream and jump up and down when they tried to get on me, and got rid of the bananas as soon as I could. It was kind of weird, but I guess cool to see the monkeys.
Here's a monkey enjoying our banana:
That evening we went to see a fire/monkey dance (ketchet), which was so cool. There were at least 100 performers and 6 audience members. Because of the rain, they had to move it into a barn type structure, but it was still a need experience. Most of the performers were men in sarongs that sat on the floor and did this really cool chanting that provided the beat for the dancers. Then the dancers came out with very ornate costumes and did their traditional dance that told a story of a king and his wife as they fought the evil empire. The chanting was my favorite part.
Here's a look at the dance:
Today, we decided it was time to get some exercise, so we rented bikes, and road outside of town about 15 km to a famous temple called Gulung Kawi. It was a nice ride. Uphill all the way, and no rain, so we had sweat pouring out of every pore, but we were rewarded with a dramatic temple, great scenery along the way, and a downhill trip home. It was nice to see more of the smaller villages and people going about their everyday life, and every child we passed screamed out with joy, "Hellloooo!".
Here's Keith outside one of the main parts of the temple (I forget what they called this part....):
Here's the scenic rice paddies surrounding the temple:
And now you're caught up. The afternoon rain has ceased, and we're scheduled for a massage at 5:00 so we must be going! Tomorrow, we'll do a cooking class, and probably take off for the north part of the island the next day.
Some random information about Indonesia:
I forgot to talk about the driving here. It is crazy! One guy described it perfectly as organized confusion. Most people drive scooters, nobody signals, and people are just weaving in and out at leisure. The horn is used as the turn indicator, or just to let people know you are coming. About 1/3 of them wear helmets, and there is usually 2 or 3 people on each scooter. In the bigger cities (like Denpasar) it is utter madness to a westerner that comes from deluxe-width, organized roads.
Most think of Indonesia as the Muslim capital of the world, and indeed it is the most populous Muslim nation, but there is actually quite an array of religions throughout the archipelego. Bali, in particular is predominantly Hindu, while Lombock is Muslim. And there are some very easily noticed differences that we have observed. From a ceremonial standpoint, Bali is lovely because each morning and evening, women walk around with trays full of offering/blessings made up of bamboo leaves, flowers and incense and place them on various statues, on cars, outside certain rooms, and over doorways, then splash them with holy water. In Lombock, on the Gilis, the Islam religion was noticable by the daily prayers that are broadcast over speakers, and the observance of Friday as a very holy day where the town shuts down and everyone heads to the mosque from 11:00 to 2:00. Many more temples in Bali. And in Bali, there are dogs everywhere....in Lombock on the Gilis it was cats (dogs are seen as quite dirty, and not to be touched in the Islamic regligion).
Some people asked more about costs of things.....A typical, sit-down dinner at a nice restaurant costs us between 30,000 and 50,000 rupiah (equates to $3-5 USD). Where if you eat off a street vendor's cart, you might pay 6,000Rp for the two of us. Not bad, eh? And internet is quite prevalent. At least in the areas that tourists tend to frequent. The smaller the town, the slower the connection, but they all have it to offer. It usually cost about 300 Rp a minute ($2-3 an hour).
No sunburns yet. We are pretty diligent about lathering up on the sunscreen and wearing the hats. I have to say, we are getting quite brown though.....:)
I think that was it....back to what we've been doing.
We ended our stay in the Gili's with a night dive! (Notice I don't mention these things until after the fact for the sake of the parents!). It was my first night dive and it was spectacular....and it puts me one-fifth of the way to becoming an Advanced Open Water diver. We had great weather for it and saw some interesting anenomes, clams (huge ones), and a frog fish (a fish that cannot swim and walks on its "elbows").
Keith wanted me to include this photo - our first stop at a street vendor. Apparently he likes how I tower over the local. This is on Gili Trawangan:
The next day was entirely given to travel and we reversed our course back to Padangbai, and carried on another two hours until we reached Ubud. Thankfully we arrived before dark and had no problems finding the place we wanted to stay. It is called Sania's House, and looks like a Hindu temple all on it's own. It is very hard to describe, but lots of ornate buildings/huts/bungalows surrounding a lush, tropical garden and a pool! That was one of our requirements since we are no longer by the ocean. Yes, we had to pay a bit more for the pool. Now we are up to $6 a night. It was heavan yesterday, as when the sun comes out, it gets quite hot.
We are now definitely seeing the rainy season. Just when we thought we were going to break from the heat yesterday, the clouds rolled in, and the rains fell. And fell. And fell. Such a torrential downpour for about 4 hours! And it did the same thing today, but did not last nearly as long. The nice thing of course, is that it definitely cools the air down.
We've really enjoyed this town so far - I think when tourism is up, it can become quite overrun with tourists, as it is an easy day trip from Kuta. We feel like there are quite a few tourists here, but that is only because we have come from much smaller cities. There are still many deserted hotels and restaurants. They've got a great public market. We made our way into first thing yesterday morning and came away with some nice souveniers, and we think we did OK with the bargaining. It also runs into a huge produce market, where we saw tables full of dead chickens (bird flu!) - we only looked from afar, and had no desire to walk by it. Then we went to the Monkey Forest, where we saw lots of....you got it....monkeys!! They are living freely in this forest, and not behind cages, and are used to being fed by tourists. So like dummies, we showed up with a handful of bananas and almost got mauled by these creatures. A couple even jumped up on Keith. They are known to get aggressive, so I didn't want one on me and did a typical girl scream and jump up and down when they tried to get on me, and got rid of the bananas as soon as I could. It was kind of weird, but I guess cool to see the monkeys.
Here's a monkey enjoying our banana:
That evening we went to see a fire/monkey dance (ketchet), which was so cool. There were at least 100 performers and 6 audience members. Because of the rain, they had to move it into a barn type structure, but it was still a need experience. Most of the performers were men in sarongs that sat on the floor and did this really cool chanting that provided the beat for the dancers. Then the dancers came out with very ornate costumes and did their traditional dance that told a story of a king and his wife as they fought the evil empire. The chanting was my favorite part.
Here's a look at the dance:
Today, we decided it was time to get some exercise, so we rented bikes, and road outside of town about 15 km to a famous temple called Gulung Kawi. It was a nice ride. Uphill all the way, and no rain, so we had sweat pouring out of every pore, but we were rewarded with a dramatic temple, great scenery along the way, and a downhill trip home. It was nice to see more of the smaller villages and people going about their everyday life, and every child we passed screamed out with joy, "Hellloooo!".
Here's Keith outside one of the main parts of the temple (I forget what they called this part....):
Here's the scenic rice paddies surrounding the temple:
And now you're caught up. The afternoon rain has ceased, and we're scheduled for a massage at 5:00 so we must be going! Tomorrow, we'll do a cooking class, and probably take off for the north part of the island the next day.
Friday, December 09, 2005
Tranquility on Gili Trawangan, Indonesia
I think we've entered paradise. We've settled in nicely to island life here on Gili (Island) Trawangan - one of three small islands off the northwest coast of Lombock. It was quite the travel day to get here from Padangbai involving a 4 hour ferry ride (thank goodness it was cloudy that day), then a 2 hour bus ride, waiting for an hour at what Lonely Planet calls the "armpit of Indonesia", then another 45 mintues on a smaller outrigger boat, and we're here. Life is pretty easy here, once we found a decent room ($5 a night) with a working fan (the first room had a fan that didn't move any air making for a hot, sticky night), all we've got left to do is try and stay cool in the pristine aqua waters, and find places to eat.
Here's Keith relaxing outside the room we've called home the last few days, Trawangan Cottages:
Once again, we have breakfast included in our rooms, and banana pancakes and Lombok coffee delivered to our patio is becoming one of my favorite times of the day. The pancakes are SO good! The village here is small, and the locals are lovely. We've been trying to improve our Indonesian, but it is still pretty limited. Nevertheless whenever we say selamat pagi (good morning), we see faces just light up at our efforts. And they literally sing it back to us...selamat paggggiiiii! So cute.
The town consists of one main road that lines the waterfront, with tons of restaurants and places to stay. The sad part is, there is hardly anyone here to fill them all up. I think I've mentioned in other blogs (I can't remember what I've said and not said), but it is low season here, and even so, we've had more than one person tell me that even in low seasons in the past this place is usually full. They are openly very frustrated with the effect the bombings have had on tourism here. They say things like, "nobody comes anymore", "fucking bombings", and we've seen lots of t-shirts and signs to the same effect. After all my nervousness in coming here, I am so glad that we did. I feel nothing but safe here, and any little bit we are doing to help their economy makes us feel good.
Here is our big heads in front of the waters where we snorkel and try to stay cool:
The soliciting is way less here to. Only when you walk the strip do you get constant invitations to eat a meal, get a room or book a snorkeling trip. But they take no very nicely. No vendors on the beaches, so by dealing with it all on the way over here, you are rewarded by some honest to goodness peace. We've mixed with the locals a little bit. Mostly Keith who joined in two different soccer games. They were only a touch faster than him - but he had a blast, and they seemed to enjoy him being there. Yesterday we did our first diving trip. Beautiful, clear water, 28 degrees celsius (aka WARM), and lots of nice coral and colorful fish. On the second dive, we saw three whitetip sharks! They were pretty small (2 meters or so), but still pretty cool the way they just kind of circled around where we were.
Here's me on the dive boat yesterday:
It is definitely hot. The first half of the day is the hardest - the air is very still, and the sun is out. Not much to do but hit the water and try to find shade. We don't put up the big bucks for AC so our room is quite hot during the day. Then, being the rainy season, the afternoons usually bring some releif in clouds and wind. We haven't really gotten rained on, just the wonderful sea breeze when it decides to show up. We have thoroughly enjoyed eating (big surprise there). The food is fantastic. Some of our favorites have become the gado gado (a potato and veggie mix in peanut sauce), barracuda and the way they cook any of their tempe and tofu. Yum.
We'll stay tonight, then take off back to Bali tomorrow. We'll head to central Bali first to look at (and buy) arts and crafts, then up to the north coast of Bali before heading to the island of Java. Thanks for the emails and comments....we love hearing from back home!
Here's Keith relaxing outside the room we've called home the last few days, Trawangan Cottages:
Once again, we have breakfast included in our rooms, and banana pancakes and Lombok coffee delivered to our patio is becoming one of my favorite times of the day. The pancakes are SO good! The village here is small, and the locals are lovely. We've been trying to improve our Indonesian, but it is still pretty limited. Nevertheless whenever we say selamat pagi (good morning), we see faces just light up at our efforts. And they literally sing it back to us...selamat paggggiiiii! So cute.
The town consists of one main road that lines the waterfront, with tons of restaurants and places to stay. The sad part is, there is hardly anyone here to fill them all up. I think I've mentioned in other blogs (I can't remember what I've said and not said), but it is low season here, and even so, we've had more than one person tell me that even in low seasons in the past this place is usually full. They are openly very frustrated with the effect the bombings have had on tourism here. They say things like, "nobody comes anymore", "fucking bombings", and we've seen lots of t-shirts and signs to the same effect. After all my nervousness in coming here, I am so glad that we did. I feel nothing but safe here, and any little bit we are doing to help their economy makes us feel good.
Here is our big heads in front of the waters where we snorkel and try to stay cool:
The soliciting is way less here to. Only when you walk the strip do you get constant invitations to eat a meal, get a room or book a snorkeling trip. But they take no very nicely. No vendors on the beaches, so by dealing with it all on the way over here, you are rewarded by some honest to goodness peace. We've mixed with the locals a little bit. Mostly Keith who joined in two different soccer games. They were only a touch faster than him - but he had a blast, and they seemed to enjoy him being there. Yesterday we did our first diving trip. Beautiful, clear water, 28 degrees celsius (aka WARM), and lots of nice coral and colorful fish. On the second dive, we saw three whitetip sharks! They were pretty small (2 meters or so), but still pretty cool the way they just kind of circled around where we were.
Here's me on the dive boat yesterday:
It is definitely hot. The first half of the day is the hardest - the air is very still, and the sun is out. Not much to do but hit the water and try to find shade. We don't put up the big bucks for AC so our room is quite hot during the day. Then, being the rainy season, the afternoons usually bring some releif in clouds and wind. We haven't really gotten rained on, just the wonderful sea breeze when it decides to show up. We have thoroughly enjoyed eating (big surprise there). The food is fantastic. Some of our favorites have become the gado gado (a potato and veggie mix in peanut sauce), barracuda and the way they cook any of their tempe and tofu. Yum.
We'll stay tonight, then take off back to Bali tomorrow. We'll head to central Bali first to look at (and buy) arts and crafts, then up to the north coast of Bali before heading to the island of Java. Thanks for the emails and comments....we love hearing from back home!
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Welcome to Indonesia!
Well, we made it. I am writing to you from an internet cafe that is in the 'inn' where we are staying. It is a dial up connection, so, sorry, no pictures today. I don't have the patience. And yes, I'm sweating. A lot. It's 7:00 pm here and while it is quite pleasant outside, it is hot and muggy in this little room. We are on the island of Bali (not to be insulting, but for those of you who don't have a handle on world geography - I am equally guilty - Indonesia is a mass of islands, and Bali is one of them. Bali is not the city where all the bombings happen. It is actually quite a large island, and the southern part is the beach town of Kuta, where the bombings happened both times). Anyway, we flew into Densapar without any difficulties and hardly a glance from the customs agent, and made our way outside where we were bombarded constantly by taxi drivers. We tried dutifully to save money and find the bemo (minivan/public transport), but failed, and ended up paying 100,000 rupiah ($10) to get to a town where we were supposed to then be able to easily find a Bemo to our desired destination of Padangbai (on the eastern side of Bali). Problem was it was late, and the official bemos were not running, but they were happy to hire one out to us for a much increased price. We were out of options, so we took it, and showed up to Padangbai after dark, which is a newly realized travel no-no. We had no sense of orientation, and even though it is a small town, we couldn't even figure out which side the water was on! This coupled with the fact that we were being approached from all sides to buy tickets to Lombok, nights in a hotel, etc. And they are relentless. Keith almost reached a breaking point, but luckily I convinced him to just walk a little further, because we ended up finding a very quaint, clean and pleasant bungalow style place to stay, off the main drag (if you can call it a main drag) of town.
So we checked in for a mere $4 US a night! And we have a private bathroom. And the burning question on everyone's mind....the toilet. Yes, it is a sit-down toilet. No, it does not flush - you have to scoop water into it to move the stuff along. No TP provided, so we're glad we had bought some ahead of time in Sydney. And cold showers only, which is just fine - I can't imagine taking a hot one.
Today, we spent a relaxing day around town, getting a feel for what the next three months of our travels are going to be like (or at least the next 30 days here in Indonesia). The biggest adjustment will be the sellers of the crafts....or peddlars, I guess you could call them. They are relentless. You learn very quickly some tricks.
Number 1 - As soon as you show interest in a product, you are toast - not only will the person not leave until you cave in, but 5 others will join in the fun with their own goods.
Number 2 - Don't tell anyone, you'll come back later. They remember you and what you said.
Number 3 - It is best to just say No, thank you (Tidak, Terima kasih). Yes, you have to say it about 10 times before they will actually leave, but that's the only way to not purchase something.
That being said, we did make a handful of purchases today. Some intended, some not. We both bought sarongs - a must have here, Keith got a nice light shirt, and then we inadvertently bought a Balinese calendar and a 15 minute massage. And yes, everything is inexpensive here, so it's really not a big deal. We will be able to get nicely back on budget here soon after overspending in NZ. Right now we figure we'll be spending about $30 a day on average - it was closer to $100 a day in NZ.
Language is going OK. We're trying to learn as many phrases as possible, but most folks here speak enough English to get the necessities taken care of. We will continue to learn, and hopefully use it more. The saddest thing about the constant solicitations is that it makes you not want to talk to the locals. You do all you can to avoid someone coming at you - one of these days it will be someone genuinely wanting to talk and not trying to sell something, but we won't know. Even when they're not carrying things in their hands, they want to sell you tickets somewhere, anywhere.
It is a totally different culture here, and I think we will enjoy learning more about it. It is sad to see such a poor country, and we've had more than one person tell us how hard it is when no tourists come. They say this year has been quite bad for them. Very sad.
There is also a huge opportunity to open a recycling plant here! Keith and I went through about 5 liters of water today (4 separate plastic jug containers) - and it just kills me to think where all that plastic is going to end up - and how much we are contributing to that by staying healthily hydrated.
On a happier note, we spent the rest of the day lounging on a very small, hidden away beach. Played in some waves and played some frisbee. The water is a nice refreshing temperature. We're going to have to get used to being "bored" for a while. Poor us. The scenery here is gorgeous. Random temples everywhere, and this little harbor is chock full of colorful outrigger fishing/rice moving boats. Will try to get some pictures up one of these days.
We take a 4 hour ferry ride tomorrow to the next island east of here which is Lombok. Then off to an even smaller island off of Lombok, where we may chill for about 5 days.
So we checked in for a mere $4 US a night! And we have a private bathroom. And the burning question on everyone's mind....the toilet. Yes, it is a sit-down toilet. No, it does not flush - you have to scoop water into it to move the stuff along. No TP provided, so we're glad we had bought some ahead of time in Sydney. And cold showers only, which is just fine - I can't imagine taking a hot one.
Today, we spent a relaxing day around town, getting a feel for what the next three months of our travels are going to be like (or at least the next 30 days here in Indonesia). The biggest adjustment will be the sellers of the crafts....or peddlars, I guess you could call them. They are relentless. You learn very quickly some tricks.
Number 1 - As soon as you show interest in a product, you are toast - not only will the person not leave until you cave in, but 5 others will join in the fun with their own goods.
Number 2 - Don't tell anyone, you'll come back later. They remember you and what you said.
Number 3 - It is best to just say No, thank you (Tidak, Terima kasih). Yes, you have to say it about 10 times before they will actually leave, but that's the only way to not purchase something.
That being said, we did make a handful of purchases today. Some intended, some not. We both bought sarongs - a must have here, Keith got a nice light shirt, and then we inadvertently bought a Balinese calendar and a 15 minute massage. And yes, everything is inexpensive here, so it's really not a big deal. We will be able to get nicely back on budget here soon after overspending in NZ. Right now we figure we'll be spending about $30 a day on average - it was closer to $100 a day in NZ.
Language is going OK. We're trying to learn as many phrases as possible, but most folks here speak enough English to get the necessities taken care of. We will continue to learn, and hopefully use it more. The saddest thing about the constant solicitations is that it makes you not want to talk to the locals. You do all you can to avoid someone coming at you - one of these days it will be someone genuinely wanting to talk and not trying to sell something, but we won't know. Even when they're not carrying things in their hands, they want to sell you tickets somewhere, anywhere.
It is a totally different culture here, and I think we will enjoy learning more about it. It is sad to see such a poor country, and we've had more than one person tell us how hard it is when no tourists come. They say this year has been quite bad for them. Very sad.
There is also a huge opportunity to open a recycling plant here! Keith and I went through about 5 liters of water today (4 separate plastic jug containers) - and it just kills me to think where all that plastic is going to end up - and how much we are contributing to that by staying healthily hydrated.
On a happier note, we spent the rest of the day lounging on a very small, hidden away beach. Played in some waves and played some frisbee. The water is a nice refreshing temperature. We're going to have to get used to being "bored" for a while. Poor us. The scenery here is gorgeous. Random temples everywhere, and this little harbor is chock full of colorful outrigger fishing/rice moving boats. Will try to get some pictures up one of these days.
We take a 4 hour ferry ride tomorrow to the next island east of here which is Lombok. Then off to an even smaller island off of Lombok, where we may chill for about 5 days.
Saturday, December 03, 2005
Seeing the Sights of Sydney
We've been good tourists, and have been seeing some of the obligatory sights of Sydney....but to be honest, as of yesterday, my thoughts have been preoccupied with the fact that we will be landing in Bali sometime tomorrow! Crazy. All of our creature comforts and ease of travel will be suddenly stripped from us. In most ways I am excited, as in some ways it feels like the true start of our trip, but I will not deny there is some nervousness there as well. I have to remember, that this is exactly how I felt 10 years ago when Cari and I took off for Mexico with no expectations, and it turned into one of the best experiences of my life. I'm sure this will be the same. Our plan, after landing in Denpasar, Bali, is to head northeast immediately to lesser populated areas. We will not be dawdling in the big cities for any longer than necessary and are going to skip the southern part of Bali entirely (you know, where all that bad stuff happens). We will go to a small town on the east coast, and the plan is to head to the island of Lombok the next day.
Anyway, back to Sydney. After exalting on how great the local transportation is here, we are coming off the public transportation day from hell yesterday. Just as we had the subway/trains all figured out, we came to see that for this weekend only, the trains running to our neighborhood will be shut down for maintenance. Great. Then we go out to catch the bus yesterday, only to find that the bus won't be coming to our busstop due to a local festival/fair. It was quite comical. We eventually made it via bus to another train stop, where EVERYONE was rerouted and everyone was headed into the city. So once the train came we had to literally cram ourselves into the car....it reminded me of those TV shots I've seen from China or Japan, where they literally shove people into subway cars. It wasn't that bad, but it was pretty tight. 1 hour and 45 minutes later after being on a bus, a subway and a ferry, we arrived at our destination of Manly Beach. An oceanside beach where people just go to chill. We did the same, soaking up some sunshine, playing in some waves, then heading back to the mainland. Then in trying to plan our evening missed two more buses, but eventually got back to the hostel, showered, got back on a bus (I know, I think half of our day was spent on public transport), then treated ourselves to a play and dessert. We were going to see something at the opera house, but nothing there was anything we wanted to spend our money on, so we picked a comedy at the university theatre. It was pretty good - not great, but good.
The day before, we basically got ourselves familiar with the city. Walking around a good chunk of it and taking a ferry around the harbor. Here are two of the more famous sites, although not very good photographs.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge:
And the Opera House:
From there, we walked around Darling Harbor, took in a not very good Imax show (the largest screen on earth), and a very good digeridoo show which was free. We discovered that I can make my lips vibrate (necessary to play the digeridoo), but Keith cannot. Must be linked to the curling-your-tounge gene.
Today, we're going to take in the aquarium, then do all our last minute travel preps for tomorrow. Keith is trying to confirm that we even have a flight as we speak....we're not finding our flight online....oh boy. Always check a couple days ahead on your flights when you're flying internationally! They can change on you!
Ok, I think that's it for now. I think you can count on the blogs either sharply decreasing in length and/or frequency. Who knows what Indonesia has to offer. And pictures may become much harder to show you. I hope not, but we'll find out soon.
Think safe travel thoughts for us, and we'll be in touch!
Anyway, back to Sydney. After exalting on how great the local transportation is here, we are coming off the public transportation day from hell yesterday. Just as we had the subway/trains all figured out, we came to see that for this weekend only, the trains running to our neighborhood will be shut down for maintenance. Great. Then we go out to catch the bus yesterday, only to find that the bus won't be coming to our busstop due to a local festival/fair. It was quite comical. We eventually made it via bus to another train stop, where EVERYONE was rerouted and everyone was headed into the city. So once the train came we had to literally cram ourselves into the car....it reminded me of those TV shots I've seen from China or Japan, where they literally shove people into subway cars. It wasn't that bad, but it was pretty tight. 1 hour and 45 minutes later after being on a bus, a subway and a ferry, we arrived at our destination of Manly Beach. An oceanside beach where people just go to chill. We did the same, soaking up some sunshine, playing in some waves, then heading back to the mainland. Then in trying to plan our evening missed two more buses, but eventually got back to the hostel, showered, got back on a bus (I know, I think half of our day was spent on public transport), then treated ourselves to a play and dessert. We were going to see something at the opera house, but nothing there was anything we wanted to spend our money on, so we picked a comedy at the university theatre. It was pretty good - not great, but good.
The day before, we basically got ourselves familiar with the city. Walking around a good chunk of it and taking a ferry around the harbor. Here are two of the more famous sites, although not very good photographs.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge:
And the Opera House:
From there, we walked around Darling Harbor, took in a not very good Imax show (the largest screen on earth), and a very good digeridoo show which was free. We discovered that I can make my lips vibrate (necessary to play the digeridoo), but Keith cannot. Must be linked to the curling-your-tounge gene.
Today, we're going to take in the aquarium, then do all our last minute travel preps for tomorrow. Keith is trying to confirm that we even have a flight as we speak....we're not finding our flight online....oh boy. Always check a couple days ahead on your flights when you're flying internationally! They can change on you!
Ok, I think that's it for now. I think you can count on the blogs either sharply decreasing in length and/or frequency. Who knows what Indonesia has to offer. And pictures may become much harder to show you. I hope not, but we'll find out soon.
Think safe travel thoughts for us, and we'll be in touch!
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