Activity Summary
Tuesday 31st October - Day 60
Ijen hike (blue flame crater) [previous post]
Travel to Bali
Wednesday 1st November - Day 61
Eat, sleep and rest
Thursday 2nd November - Day 62
Travel to Uluwatu
Beer and food watching the surf at Uluwatu beach
Friday 3rd November - Day 63
Luke attempted surf at Balangan beach
Suluban beach
Uluwatu temple & Kecak fire dance show
Saturday 4th November - Day 64
Luke surf at Padang Padang beach
Research day
Summary
Canggu
One of the best Bali nomadic hotspots. The area was lined with great food places, cafes, bars, surfers and stunners everywhere you looked. The vibe was chilled which allowed us to relax. Everything was a Complete contrast to Java and was a much welcomed change.
That said there isn’t a whole lot to do. This suited us perfectly as we barely left the higher end accommodation we signed up for, but apart from spending a lot of money at cafes/bars/restaurants and surfing along that side of the Bali coast (we decided against Canggu beach due to the waste run off directly into the sea).
Uluwatu
The little peninsula in the south east of Bali, we went down this way as Luke read it was good for surfing and also just to really complete our tour of the massive island. Again, not a whole lot to do apart from beach, eat and surf and Luke quickly found out the surf was a lot more challenging (and painful) than he anticipated. Overall we spent too long here but gave us more time to recover, eat healthy food and Luke did get his surf in Padang beach that he loved.
A bike however is quite a big requirement here. We rented one from the hotel and allowed us the freedom to roam but there was a lot of stress from the aggressive and road entitled users that takes a lot of getting used to although infinitely more relaxing than Java / big cities.
Accommodation
Canggu
La Rose Villas and suites - 2 nights - £32.50/n/p
Much needed break from the not so great accommodation we have frequented in Java. The place was amazing - incredibly comfortable, clean and all the amenities we wanted after not sleeping properly for what felt like an age.
Could we afford to keep this going longer than 2 days? Absolutely not. But the combination of the location in Canggu (not much happens here) and timing was perfect.
Uluwatu
Adi Bali Homestay - 3 nights - £6.60/n/p
Back to the cheaper accommodation but were very pleasantly surprised with this place for the most part. Big niggling point for Nicola was that the blanket provided was tiny and therefore couldn’t keep her warm / wrapped up at night.
The rest however was perfect. More centrally located so we could go anywhere within reasonable time on a bike was ideal and the place was comfortable enough while being affordable.
Travel
Canggu
Ijen Hotel -> [tour van] -> Keptapang Harbour -> [ferry] -> Pelabuhan Gilimanuk -> [local bus] -> Denpasar -> [grab] -> Canggu hotel
Uluwatu
Canggu hotel -> [grab] -> Uluwatu hotel
Diary
[continued from Ijen]
We stepped off the boat, had our covid passes checked and started making our way to the bus terminal as it was a 4 hour drive to Canggu where we would be staying and grab would have been extortionate. This didn’t stop the barrage of men flocking round us stating this fact and that they would drive us for 650k. Absolutely not sunshine.
Thankfully armed knowing the bus should have been 50k we told them to jog on and we were getting the bus. Now comes the scam part. One of the guys made it his mission to guide us to the bus, which we already very clearly knew where it was (especially in the days of modern tech and domestic sim cards). This was all a little odd but we stopped to buy some bananas just to get him to leave us alone a bit. Once we turned around we were hit by another guy carrying stacks of cash and opening the boot of the bus for our bags. When he tried charging us 100k each we were both baffled and told him no. After he decided to reduce his asking price Nicola remembered reading about this wonderful scam (in her infinite wisdom when researching Bali the other day) whereby this guy effectively cuts a fat slice of commission in falsely selling a ticket. The driver is the only guy who sells the tickets. So we flat out walked away from him and jumped on the bus. The bus driver didn’t speak any English so just held up 60k in notes and pointed. Job done and we were on the 5 hour pleb wagon to Denpasar but feeling pretty chuffed.
As the bus went on it got far busier and the comfort of space we had diminished. The seating spaces certainly were not designed for people of our leg length or shoulder width. We were very happy to be done with this and got a 45 minute grab to Canggu. Turns out Bali is huge and so so slow to drive around due to traffic.
Initially we were going to stay in Gilimanuk by the port but given we had so much time once on the island we changed our plan and opted to treat ourselves, given the lack of sleep of late. The hotel we chose was glorious and although considerably pricier than our usual accommodation cost wasn’t too bad. Spacious, clean, no mosques nearby, a pool and great sized TV. We decided to treat the next few days as our ‘weekend’ and really do very little but recover in comfort.
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Canggu is so different from Java. Full of cafes, hipster food joints, bars and masses of tourists (most of which were young and cut) so it was a great place for us to recover. That evening we went down the road for some much needed pizza and then spent the rest of the evening relaxing and bingeing Lord of the Rings on the large wall mounted TV.
Waking up after over 12 hours of sleep we were still tired. So the day's plan was to do as little as possible.
We walked over to Shady Shack for our first taste of a more balanced meal in Indonesia thus far and weren’t let down. Pretty much all the places in Canggu seem to have this hipster healthy vibe, although the prices certainly have increased (ended up spending closer to £10 a meal) which puts our daily budget under some strain but was decidedly needed.
Nicola had been feeling back pain for some time and decided a massage was needed. Sadly the hour long Balinese massage left a lot to be desired and that was before comparing to the glory that were the Thai massages we had. Shorting us 10 minutes, constantly walking in and out of the room and more like fluffing our aches rather than taking a deep sea drill to them as desired, we left pretty disappointed.
After a quick money change we retired to our hideaway so Nicola could cut Luke’s hair and wash our various hiking gear. We only resurfaced for dinner at an Italian restaurant and then continued the LOTR marathon. We would have stayed longer here if we could haggle down the price of the next day but sadly they were already fully booked.
We stayed in the hotel right up until check out at 12pm before getting some lunch in Canggu (called the Avocado factory - shows how yuppy this place is). We waited it out there until we would be able to check in to our accommodation at 2pm in Uluwatu, taking into account the grab taxi drive there would be about an hour (again - big ol island).
It was easy to hail a grab, the worst part being the car was incredibly warm so not an overly pleasant journey. Once at the hotel we checked in, Luke rented a bike from the hotel and we’re set to travel around the island. Except we did none of that and just vegged out for the early afternoon. Once feeling more alive we rode down to Uluwatu beach (there is a bike parking fee) and had a walk around the cliff face overlooking the beach. Up here we initially got a drink to chill out for a bit and watch the surfers that had infinitely more ability than Luke has (he had no intention of going to this surf spot - merely wanted to watch and admire) and then hit up a restaurant round the corner to continue watching the surf world go by.
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We called it an early night, got some bananas for the next morning and went back to the hotel.
While the hotel we stayed at was pretty good, the evening before just happened to be a weird one. There was a constant noise coming from outside that neither of us could work out what it was. It would start, carry on for what felt like and age before finally stopping. Then just as Luke was about to rest easy it would start all over again. This went on all night and plagued Luke greatly, sounding a metronome cross between a dog, cicada and god knows what else. We both woke up pretty tired still.
Once up and about in the late morning we biked over to Balangan beach. It was about 25 minutes there but the traffic and aggressive driving from the locals caused Nicola a lot of stress as she rode pillion on the back of the bike. They have a habit of pulling up on the inside and outside while cutting in without looking. Nicola’s spread legs as the passenger are the widest point of the bike and they were getting far too close. Fortunately the second half of the journey was through what appeared to be an abandoned high end real estate plot that was the failed plan of the prince of Bali in the 90s. Was very surreal.
At the beach there was a ‘donation’ to park. Which we took to be pay or we’ll fuck up your bike. Then carried on down.
The beach itself was pretty poor. Off the beaten track meant that there were limited places for Nicola to sit comfortably and after a while umming and arring settled on a place. She ended up getting a coke and an omelet that was less than appealing so was foregone.
[Luke piece: I rented a foam board (as I have no experience on hard boards or anything decent) and set off into the horrifically rocky reef break surf point. Greeted me were a ton of Black Sea urchins and a course reef bed without any wetsuit shoes on. Upon re-researching these were ‘advised’. It took me an age to get out as (all credit to the surf spot) there were consistent waves coming in. Duck diving a foam board when they are this consistent is quite hard work, if not completely futile. Now worn out, the first couples of waves absolutely nailed me, having more success with the white wash. The final nail in the surf coffin for the day was being dumped heavily by a wave that seemed to have managed to take most of the water out from the sea at the point it dropped me in and sliced my toe in about 4 different places. Pride wounded, foot throbbing and concern about Bali sewage finding its way into my open wounds I cried back to Nicola on the beach. She though I was just changing my board. Says a lot about how long I was actually out for…]
Both miserable we retreated back to the hotel. After showering we went out to a place called Drifters Surf Shop and Cafe for a nice hipster lunch and Luke felt a little better about himself.
Our plan was to go to the Uluwatu temple and the evening fire show so had some time to kill. We did some shopping to try and find Luke some new trunks (we failed), walked down to Suluban beach for the view of the water between the two rocky outcrops and again got a beer watching the surf world go by.
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The drive over to the temple was easy enough. The hardest part was trying to pay for a bike parking ticket. The one counter to get in was bustling with cars and bikes so Nicola needed to get off and pay the guy. What made it more difficult was Nicola not understanding the notes in the wad of cash Luke gave her and the cars trying to run her over as she went to the ticket guy. Cue Nicola shouting at a local lady who was being a pillock (was actually quite funny to watch from Luke’s perspective - she’s never usually aggressive like this) and we were finally in. It was hot and bustling with people, so once both of our sinly legs were covered we got tickets to the temple and then had to queue for a while to get the fire show tickets.
By this point, we were hot, bothered and fed up with the masses of people. We walked around the temple with a huff about us which exacerbated our scathing review of the not very good temple and then sat down early for the fire show.
Luke very much enjoyed the show. Nicola was on the it wasn’t very good side of the fence. The Kecak and fire show was an acapella performance telling the story of Rama, Sita and Hanuman in Hindu culture. It certainly got better over time, especially as Hanuman started kicking fire balls at his performing comrades that travelled further than they expected. Sitting on our asses for well over an hour on wooden benches however was not very comfortable and Luke was of the opinion the theatre took half of what little ass he has to give. Another sketch moment was them clearly overselling tickets and then putting customers in the designated ‘fire escape’ routes, one of which happened to be our fire escape route. Seems they haven’t really learned from the ropey health and safety issues of the recent past (the most recent one being the stampede at a football match in Malang).
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We left the show and temple as quickly as we could, although this was a little challenging given the mass of people. We went to a cafe called ‘The Loft’ for dinner which had a nice chilled vibe, decent food with live music.
Having failed in his attempt at surfing the day before, Luke, now armed with more concrete research, decided to set off to Padang beach alone. Nicola was left to do washing and research activities at a coffee shop for the morning.
[Luke piece: Riding a bike solo is a lot easier and getting to the beach was simple enough. More annoying was the 15k entrance fee (£1) that actually nearly made me turn away. The beach itself was predominantly sand break and I chose it mainly for this reason - the reef break having messed my foot up the day before. The surf was great and exactly what I was looking for. There was a mix between quite easy and more aggressive green waves (the latter messing me up quite nicely as expected) and an incredibly simple channel to get back to the peak. The array of other surfers and beginners with longboards also instals a level of confidence and makes it a lot more fun. Bad part - managed to wreck my foot on the reef worse than yesterday but was worth it. Just the end of my surfing and aggressive walking for a few days at least.]
We were reunited at the cafe Nicola was at then spent the rest of the afternoon at the Loft researching plans for Nusa and Lombok. Our attempt to get a cheaper local meal failed as the place was closed so we settled for the Turkish place round the corner. Luke was sporting serious food envy after being seriously disappointed with his lahmacun decision, swayed by memories of his school days.
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