Bali

  Bali, Indonesia
Sunday, July 20, 2008

Yes, that is right, I am now in Indonesia. I actually flew there cause it made things easier sometimes, rather than those loud karaoke long bus rides. No, I am not getting tired of them, well I'd better not cause I have a lot more to come, but sometimes, it feels good to just go the fast way. So I flew direct from Kuala Lumpur to Bali, 3 hours flight and amazing views of Indonesia all the way. Once in Bali, I took a taxi (once again there is no public transportation, they make it on purpose so that you use taxis) to Kuta beach, which is like the legend, the beach of Australian surfer land. There are very little locals there and 95% of the population is tall blond hair, a surf board glued under their arm or on their motorbike and they all speak Australian or French actually. Because it is holiday season in France, their are also a lot of French families coming for 2 or 3 weeks of holidays.

So far, when I have told people what I do, they rarely comprehend the concept of selling glasses to opticians. Glasses ? you mean sunglasses ? Oakley ? That is all I hear and when I talked to that girl

My friend from Brighton

that was next to me on the plane and told her that I was living in Brighton and working for an eyewear designer, without any hesitation, she replied "ah yes, Kirk Originals !" I felt the brand was famous and made it all the way to South east asia. Then realised that we were living 200 metres from each other in Brighton and that she is a very good friend of our dear Jacko who used to work with us in the office.

Basically, I hated Kuta.

Kuta beach

I stayed there two days because I have always heard so much about it that I wanted to give it a second chance to find out what it is that people love so much about Kuta beach in Bali ? Well I have not found out. The beach, along the road, is very busy, the waves are only ok for beginners, there are Mcdonalds, KFC, Starbucks and Boots at every corner. It is polluted, there is very heavy traffic with cars and mopeds are riding everywhere so you have to move in order to let them go as there are no sidewalks but when you are lucky to find one. it barely has enough room for one at a time. A real nightmare. Kuta is well know for its parties, so I tried to mingle, but I could not managed. 95% of the crowd was in between 17 and 19 years old of age, half naked, fully drunk (all drinks are served in giant fish bowls and it is happy hour all night long), dancing, smoking, loud music with lingerie cat walks or drag queens shows within the club and of course prostitutes are easy to spot. An extreme to the point of desolation. I guess I must sound old writing about that but all this just did not seem right to me. So I got out of there as soon as I could and ended up in Ubud.

Ubud

Fantastic place. Ubud is in the centre of the island and is the place for art, wood carving, painting, jewelry, delicious food.

From there, I rented a car with a Filipino friend and we ended up driving all around the island for the following four days. Even if renting a car is quite stressful and not legal when none of us had their international driving license, it allowed us to discover places that we would have never seen cause as soon as you get out of the touristy tracks, transportation is non existent in Indonesia. Only about 20 minutes after we rented the car, we got pulled over by the cops. I was the one driving (apparently. I got to drive first cause I am used to drive on the left ...) and of course, they wanted to see our international driving license. Well, we did not have any. They also asked for the car papers but they have not been updated since 2004, but he was not blaming us for it and did not really seem to care about that. He was caring more about our driving licenses. The only way to get out of there was the usual way so far : pay him. So we did, well I negotiated a bit to get the bribe down as much as possible and we were out of there with an advice from the cops : do not get into an accident as you have no driving license hence no insurance !(whatever insurance you can get in a country such as Indonesia!) Well, it would have been a shame to miss out on what we saw and not sure insurance or not makes a big difference in Bali so we thanked him for his advice and drove off.

We started of with the volcano,

Gunung Agung

Gunung Agung, wich is located in the north center of the island. Absolutely amazing views but shitty roads. No signs, no pavement and a lot of hills, which was way too much for our little car to handle. We had to push a couple of times, even in first gear, our car did not have the power to drive up. Quite challenging, but all worth it. After hours of driving on and in holes and dirt and dust, we made it to the beach up north in a little town called Lovina.

Lovina beach

The next day, we drove all around the national park east of the island, on the coastal road. Nice views of the beach, tiny little roads though peaceful villages, we looped around and made our way back to Kuta but no way we were staying out there again (It was quite obvious that I was not the only one to hate Kuta). Driving through it with traffic was painful enough, so we continued further south to the surfers paradise little Bukit peninsula. Over there, if you do not surf, there is absolutely nothing for you to do, but nothing at all. There are no beaches really as it is all rocks, cliffs and reef. It makes the landscape and the views absolutely stunning but prevent you from swimming. By 9 pm, everybody is sleeping to make sure they can enjoy a have an early start for a long surf day the next day. I have to say the surf is fantastic though. The little houses, ding repair places, surf shops and cafes perched on top of the rocks dominating one of the best wave in the world did it quite well for me. The world competition was about to take place in Padang padang , so a lot of pros were already in the water practicing, a nice scene for us to enjoy breakfast on top of the cliffs.

Breafast in Uluwatu

After a great morning watching the waves and surfers, we made our way up north again but following the east side of the island but a bit more inland.

Uluwatu

We drove through tiny concentration of what looked like houses surrounded by kids who are so happy to see you that they come after you, running, saluting you and screaming "hello"..and "money. money, money". It was still a very peaceful environment, in every way far away from the entertainment of Kuta. We spent the night in a delightful place, it was really one the best of my entire trip (so far), brand new bungalows, swimming pool, nice garden, sea view, absolutely luxury and we paid next to nothing because we were diving with the hotel company the next day, so we got a big discount on the price of the room. The diving was in Tulamben where the US cargo Liberty was torpedoed by a japanese submarine in 1946, so you can dive inside the wreck. That was awesome. It is crazy to see how much vegetation has grown on the wreck, going in it, you can only imagine how where you are was the living room and the machine room and the engine room and so on as you dive along. We spent the rest of the day enjoying the hotel amenities, also because they were nice enough to not really care about what time we were checking out at. To drive away, we took a slightly different road in order to drive along the coast. Great views, tiny villages again and nice beaches, black volcanic sand though.

As I was taking the ferry to Lombock (island east of Bali) the next day, my friend was kind enough to drop me of at the harbour and drive the car back on his own to Ubud. Thanks again for that dude !