Friday 30 May 2014

Ubud


With a boat and A bus ride we found ourselves in Ubud; Cultural darling of Bali that in recent years got alot of attention from that Eat Pray Love book. 


For four nights we stayed in a home stay right in the centre of it all.  If someone was to ask me what I did in Ubud, my first thought would be not a lot, just chilled. However, when I look through my pictures it tells another story....

We went to the Monkey Forest


This is where tourists come to take pictures of monkeys, whilst the gang of hooligans steal anything they can and fornicate amongst forest entrapped temples. And yep I bloody loved it! Monkeys playing in water, monkeys messing with bamboo, monkeys doing what the hell they wanted. 

They even had punk monkeys -check out the Mohawk on this guy.



Although my outfit choice of the day wasn't the best, as many baby monkeys liked my skirt so much that they kept trying to pull it down.


And it turned out the temples in the complex were pretty cool and definitely worth a look. 


We relaxed with a capital R


Watching the sunset and rise from our room's balcony was pretty cool.  Over looking several family compounds (turns out no one moves out here, only sideways and up) and hearing the sound of roosters, scooters, kids playing, temple prayers and dance shows from the palace, we got a good feel from Ubud. Although I didn't like the row after row of tourist clothing shops selling overpriced hippy clothes and their aggressive owners, I did enjoy getting a massage and just getting that chilled out feeling.


View of rice fields from an Ubud Cafe.

We went to a traditional dance show


These guys can put on a show.  Great costumes ,a little humour and fantastic choreography.



Only major annoyance was this woman raising her camera every two seconds into the view of those behind her and not actually watching the show. I mean sure, I too took photos but I spent the majority of the time watching the show I payed to watch. What a doughnut.

We got fat to help others


What's better than eating the best food in the whole of Bali? Knowing that all the profits of the restaurant go to a community hospital that's what!  Wandering the streets we came across Fair Warung Bale, a restaurant set up to give Ubud's neediest medical help.  The food wasn't good; it was amazing. I actually believe it was the best we tasted in Bali! We made multiple trips during our stay in Bali.


Mosquito dusting from our balcony through out the lanes of Ubud.

We took in the sights on our way down to South Bali


As we needed to relocate to South Bali to spend some fun times with Zim's family (more on that next time!), yet still wanted to see some of the countryside and other sights, we decided to kill two birds with one stone by hiring a driver to take us to Nusa Dua and stop and stop at some sights along the way.  Our driver, Edy, was a family member of our home stay and was really chilled and helpful.  Sights included a rice terrace, Goa Gajah (elephant caves) and a really wicked temple that to my shame I can't remember the name of. Yeah I really am that lame!  By starting early we also missed the crowds and had many areas to ourselves.



Offering over rice terrace.


Bali traffic.




Walking over bamboo 'bridge' to caves-I decided to crawl...



Ancient Caves





And that was our time in Ubud.  It was touristy, it was relaxed (Except for the stupid calls for taxi as you walk passed idol drivers) and it was fun.  Then it was time spend a few days in South Bali...

3 comments:

Unknown said...

We had such a similar experience in Ubud! We spent a ton of time relaxing. It has so many great restaraunts, too. But it was very touristy. The taxi drivers got old after a while, but some of them had a great sense of humor about it. I loved the Balinese people!

Rika said...

Looks lovely!! Great photos. Would love to see more about the food :)

Unknown said...

Yep I definitely enjoyed the relax aspect of Ubud (especially after the more lively crowds of the gillis) and the Balinese were pretty cheeky!

Rike - will definitely be writing more about the food. Its all blowing my mind right now!

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