BALI, the most amazing, fantastic, best place ever and leaving us wanting more!

We couldn't decide if we should name this post "Bali, the most amazing/fantastic place" or "Bali, the best place we have ever been" or "Bali, leaving us wanting more?" It was a toss up so we went with all three! Well the good news is after every horrid trip there is always a fantastic trip and Bali was just that, where as Tioman island we can quickly begin to forget. We booked this great trip with a few of our new Singapore friends, Katie, Quinn, Crystal, Merry and Fred! I feel like I should also add our driver as part of the group, Made. We grew to love his Sean Connery/Balinese accent as he took us all over town explaining things. He said he learned to speak English from watching movies and his favorite was James Bond, that explained it all...

So we haven't quite decided on how to show all 1200 of the photos we took and describe all the things we jammed packed into our week so we will do our "Best of Bali" and if you want to see the Full Bali trip in photos you will have to come to Singapore to view them!

So here goes...our week of Highlights in Ubud, Bali

The Villa Saraswati Staff :)

We arrived at our fantastic (I might use this word a lot in this post) 4 bedroom villa with a surprise welcome from our staff! Yes that's right not only did we have a 4 bedroom villa all to ourselves in this tiny yet wonderful town called Ubud but the villa came with staff. I mean I read the small print when I was booking but I didn't really expect there to be a whole staff just for us? It was amazing to say the least, not to mention that our room had two showers - an indoor and an outdoor one, I asked Jason if we could have an outdoor shower some day in SF, he said yes, I'm holding him to it even if its 20 degrees out! The first night we ate in and were blown away by our chef, Miss Made's cuisine! She made a Balinese style fish and fried duck...yum...I think we all took at least 20 photos of the presentation before sitting down to eat. I think I will insert some Bali facts here for the inquisitive mind:
Quoted from the one and only book, Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert:

"There are only four names that the majority of the population give to their children, regardless of whether the baby is a boy or a girl. The names are Wayan (pronounced “Why-Ann”), Made (“mah-DAY”), Nyoman and Ketut. Translated, these names mean simply First, Second, Third and Fourth, and they connote birth order. If you have a fifth child, you start the name cycle all over again ... it’s totally possible (indeed, quite common) that two Wayans would marry each other. And then their firstborn would be named, of course: Wayan."

I'll let that one sink in a bit and move on to the next morning when we went off to explore the town of Ubud, a town in the middle of Bali that is best described as a mecca of artistic expression, or you better do art, make rice or get out.

We toured the windy, jungle streets that were dotted with one gallery after another and landed at the bottom where we found the Monkey Forest Sanctuary. Monkey's were the highlight for us but a little bit of a fright for others. These deceivingly cute long-tailed macaques were aggressive and it probably didn't help that when we entered the Forest they offered us bananas to feed them. No fewer then 2 seconds did they notice we had the bananas and were begging, tugging on Jason's pants, crawling up us to get them! This video will give you a good idea.

And some photos:

Hey got any bananas up there for me?

He must have been one of the smallest babies we saw, his eyes were still blue!

And maybe they could still smell the bananas on Jason after he had distributed them all or maybe its just that babies and animals will always love Jason (Or because he says he is the Beast Masta) but this little guy took a liking to him and crawled right up on him and began rolling his rock in his hand and checking him for bugs. It was pretty incredible and for a slight moment the monkey seemed cute and sweet.

This is by far my favorite monkey shot - I thought he was dead but no just relaxing

Another video of this secret river spot we found :):

After a long day with the monkey's we headed back to the villa to enjoy the pool and my outdoor shower :) Here is a picture of it!

Here are some photos from our trip to the Ubud marketplace and to another one of my highlights of the trip, meeting Ketut Liyer, the famous healer and medicine man. We got to practice our newly found skill of haggling at the marketplace and I got to pay $25 to hear my fortune read outloud in front of 20 tourists at an ancient, toothless but merry Balinese healer's house, and not only did I pay for that fortune but my friend Katie paid for that exact same fortune. Funny that he predicted we would both live until we were 100 and that our lips were both sweet as sugar and that we were VERY pretty, almost rehearsed on repeat over and over again. But alas, he was "VERY happy that we came to see him and he did tell me someone was VERY in love with me", but I predicted that before he read my palm.

Offerings that are everywhere in Ubud. They place them on the ground of storefronts too and sometimes they get stuck under your shoe...I hope that's not bad karma

Whats another country without a Vespa photo...

Ketut Liyer

Handmaking Jewelry

Another highlight of the trip was the bike ride we took with one of the locals, Wayan, across the rice paddies and little villages and a coffee plantation, where we drank the most expensive coffee in the world, kopi luwak, you have to check out what this is! It was an unforgettable 9 mile bike ride that seemed much longer considering the 90 degree humid heat, but truly a remarkable experience.

This darling old woman that allowed us to have breakfast at her house before our bike ride

Dad this ones for you! Take a look at that stone work!

Every stalk of rice is planted by hand one by one...makes you not want to waste one piece of rice ever again!

Two school girls telling their Mom about their day

Some locals along the way...

Women out in the fields

Here is a video of of me filming on the bike:

The last days were filled with temples, Balinese dancing and finding that perfect piece of art to take home to remind us of this fantastic journey. I think Jason had a hard time choosing which painting he liked most, ok I did too, which is probably why we ended up with 4 pieces of art! Our friends probably found the best deal in town when their art dealer decided that beer made art even better and popped open a few in the gallery with us!

Tanah Lot temple

Katie and I got blessed...rice on our foreheads and a flower

Jason snapped this fantastic shot of this little girl striking a pose as she sells postcards

Women are seen all over town carrying these huge loads on their heads!

Jason blessing everyone with holy water before they entered the Temple

Gunung Kawi Temple

Stray dogs are everywhere in Bali

Tirta Empul - is said to have magical powers

Jason's great shot of Gunung Agung, the volcano

a wood carver hard at work

Our artist, Jito Saputro, and our ONE of our four paintings!

Legong & Barong Balinese Dancing

We have decided that we will retire to a rice paddy some day, or maybe just to a 4 bedroom villa in Ubud with an outdoor shower.