Today, we said goodbye to the endless stream of different German guys smoking and coughing in their underpants on the balconies around us. No. They weren't coughing into their underpants. You know what I meant. Don't be silly.
We were heading north!
The trip from Nusa Dua, where we have spent the last week, to Lovina, where we will spend our last week in Bali is 60-70 miles. Without stops, it would be safe to plan on 4-5 hours to make that trip because of traffic and the fact that most roads in Bali look, from above, like a piece of cooked spaghetti tossed on a carpet.
The driver who picked us up to bring us to our Airbnb was named Putu. We had asked for an 11:00 pick up and he told us he had left his home at 6:00 to make sure he arrived in time. Putu was the oldest driver we've had (maybe 55?). Like all the other drivers, he was very nice and had limited English, though certainly enough so that we could have a fun, if occasionally baffling, conversation.
He is also, by far, the most aggressive driver we've had in Bali, passing and honking at other drivers with gleeful abandon. Unlike American lunatics, the drivers in Bali pass and honk with no animosity. They are just filling available spaces and, somehow, it works.
Our first stop was a water temple that was only a slight detour from our route. As we wound our way north through the center of the island, I watched with growing alarm as the fuel gauge dropped from the quarter tank he had when he picked us up, to conspicuously below the dreaded E. I mentioned it in a smooth, casual way, as if he maybe just hadn't noticed that we were coasting on fumes.
"Do you need to stop for petrol?"
"Later."
Once we got north of Ubud, the traffic lessened considerably, as did the opportunities to buy petrol. We drove a serpentine path through thick, lush jungles, along the tops of high ridges overlooking deep, green valleys, and, as with everywhere else in Bali, each hairpin turn revealed another thrilling surprise in the road.
Maybe there's a small child splashing in a puddle.
Maybe there is a flock of wild dogs languidly stretched out across the street.
Maybe there's a huge dump truck full of black sand barreling toward you on the wrong side of the road.
Maybe it's a topless old lady with a huge bundle of banana leaves on her head.
Yes. We saw all of those many, many times. The only one I managed to photograph was the huge pile of stones dropped in the road just after a sharp corner. The topless old ladies are surprisingly hard to photograph.
Or so I've been told.
The pile of rocks was certainly for some future repair project involving rickety bamboo scaffolding and workers in flip flops juggling flaming chainsaws or something.

We dodged everything Bali threw in our path and, with -4 gallons of gas in the tank, pulled into the parking lot for Gunung Kawi Sebatu Temple, which was amazing.
The temple; not the parking lot. Don't be silly.
The temple (and the parking lot) were set deeply in a lush, verdant jungle valley. It was beautiful and, once again, almost devoid of tourists, which was lovely. We had time to stroll around and really appreciate the gorgeously ornate architecture.

I'm still uncertain of what makes some temples popular tourist destinations. The ones that seem the most crowded are, invariably, ones I enjoy less than the crowded ones. Not because of the crowds (okay, yes, because of the crowds, but mostly I find that the quiet ones are just prettier).
The Balinese people are very devout in their religion, but they are very welcoming to visitors as well. They do make money from tourists, which they share with the village where the temple is located. Putu explained that the villages, as a whole, collect and save the money they earn from tourist destinations and then use it to help villagers.
"Your house burned down? Okay. Here's a bunch of the village's money. Rebuild and pay us back whenever you can; if you can."
They truly live the concept of it taking a village and it's beautiful.
They also welcome visitors because they are proud of the temples and happy to share them with people. All they ask is that you be respectful and you will be very welcomed. Again, it's such a contrast to much of the attitudes about space and privacy that we commonly experience in America, it's really delightful.
As was the rest of the temple. So here are more photos for you to enjoy.

I love how ornately detailed everything is, right down to the stones that form the walking paths. I wanted to photograph the largest of the sacred pools, but there were people using it and it's considered rude to photograph people purifying themselves.

This temple also had a koi pond with some of the biggest koi I have ever seen. They were easily 36 inches long. It was like a pool full of golden whales.

All those koi made me hungry so we found our new Putu and headed up the street to a very swanky resort for lunch. I got tuna with sambal mattah and a drink made from lemongrass, ginger, and lemon. It was easily the best restaurant meal we've had so far. Kerri got very brave and tried a burrito.
Balinese people have a shaky concept of Mexican food, but she enjoyed it because it was 100% fish-free and did not actively hurt her face with insane levels of chili that Balinese people are so very fond of.
After lunch, we hopped back into Putu's van and continued to test the limits of how far it could drive along mountainous roads with no fuel at all.
"Don't you want to stop for some petrol?" I asked again, trying hard to keep the panicky quaver out of my voice.
"Later, later," he murmured.
"Okay," I said, "You're the boss."
He will also be the one walking to buy an Absolut bottle of petrol if we run out of gas.
We passed through a lot of farm land where they were growing coffee, peppers, melons, oranges, and bananas.
This is probably the best video I got of what it is actually like to sit in the passenger seat and drive in Bali. Life is lived very close to the road here and I know the first little bit is a bit dizzying, but the video is like 2 minutes long. If you stick with it and don't barf on your screen, the views are incredible.

We drove through small villages and eventually found ourselves in a dense tourist area with incredible views of Mt. Batur, another volcano on the island. The tourist areas are easy to identify. in addition to the obvious tourists, the shacks that might be selling babi gueling or gado gado are replaced by upscale restaurants with names like Montana and Cowboy Burger, both of which, I am sad to report, are totally real.
I'm sorry, world.
We made our way up the crowded, Westernized street and passed a gas station. I silently hoped that Putu would pull in.
He didn't.
He drove on before suddenly pulling into a parking lot a few hundred yards up the road.
"Petrol," he announced.
I breathed a sigh of relief. He turned around and headed back toward the gas station, and drove right past it.
"But first, picture!" he said brightly.
He pulled into a parking lot of a restaurant with a huge balcony overlooking Mt. Batur.
"Go in and take photo," he said. "Don't get caught."
I did.
And I didn't.

Putu did, finally, splurge on a few liters of gas. Now, with less than a quarter of a tank, we resumed our ride toward the norther coast, still more than two hours away.

It was a mostly beautiful ride. The landscape was amazing. It's sad to see the conditions that so many of the locals live in, though.
When we finally arrived in Lovina, we stopped at a local supermarket called Pepito's that was clearly designed for the tourists. It had a lot of western and Japanese food, including Happitos!
Yay!
They will pair marvelously with the fruit and juice and rum I also bought.
The villa we're staying in is called Villa Lumba Lumba. As with BoSofie, we turned off the main road and the road got smaller and smaller as we wound through rice fields and eventually ended up at the villa, which was spectacular.
We were greeted by another Putu, this one a delightful young lady with a huge smile and a loud laugh. She was one of the two cooks at the villa and was eager to show us around.
It did not disappoint.Putu made us a complimentary welcome dinner of Nasi Goreng and Chicken Satay, which was amazing.When we were done eating, she cleaned up and headed out for the night.We dropped into bed to rest up for a big day of lounging by the pool tomorrow.

We have been trying for several days to go to the turtle conservancy. It just hasn't worked out. Until today, baby.
Kadek picked us up at the resort and we headed out to see some turtles and, if our luck held out, maybe to adopt one.
I'm thinking that we can bring it home and train it to make us delicious Arak-based cocktails. Maybe it can deliver them to us and then go make more. I was very excited about this possibility and eager to ask about the training process when our tour began.
We arrived at the conservancy and were paired up with a lovely young volunteer from Argentina who told us more facts about turtles than we had ever even considered were factually possible.

Fact #1. Turtles cannot mix Arak-based cocktails.

Fact #2. No, sir. Turtles cannot make rum-based beverages, either.

Honestly, I tuned out a bit after learning that and had to rely on Kerri to fill me in on the rest of the facts. I spent my time being sullen and far, far less enthusiastic about adopting a turtle than I had been.

Fact #3. Turtles kind of suck.

Kerri tells me that this is actually not a fact, but an opinion. She is wrong. If a turtle can't make me a cocktail; it sucks.

Fact #4. A turtle's sex is determined by the temperature of the sand that the egg sits in while it is incubating. Higher temperatures make female turtles.

Fact #5. The climate crisis is raising the temperature of the sand on beaches all over the world.

Fact #6. Almost all turtles hatching in the wild are female.

Fact #7. All female turtles means no more baby turtles.

At the conservancy, they have incubators set to lower temperatures to try to assure that some of the turtles are born male. After they are born, the turtles are placed in a small box with sand in it. The turtles walk across the sand because:

Fact #8. When turtles walk across the sand, it scrapes off their placenta.

Fact #9. Ew.

Once again, Kerri is wrong. "Ew" is not an opinion. Scraping Placenta, while an excellent name for a Deathcore band, is, objectively, "Ew".

We enjoyed our tour and then were offered a chance to adopt a turtle.
"Pffft," I scoffed. "No Arak-based cocktails? Not even a simple rum-based drink? Hard pass. Turtles suck."
As I was scoffing, Kerri was filling out paperwork and adopting a turtle.

They give you a half of a coconut shell and you scoop out the turtle that you want to adopt. Kerri picked out the livliest, feistiest little guy and scooped him into the coconut bowl. All the other ones are, I assume, fed to sharks for the amusement of tourists.

We named out turtle Lil' Kadek, after our driver, Kadek. I carried him out to Kadek, who was making new friends with the other drivers. I introduced him and told him that we named our turtle Lil' Kadek after him.
Honestly, he just seemed confused by the entire thing, but he rolled with it.

We thought that was the end of it, that we paid to get a certificate naming our turtle Lil' Kadek and that the conservancy got a few bucks. But no! There was more. So much more!

"After you choose a turtle, the shuttle will take you to the marina where you will get on a boat and release the turtle into the ocean," the lady behind the desk explained when I asked her what I was supposed to do with this bowl of cold turtle soup I was walking around with.

Oh. Hell. Yes.

And, if you're wondering if there is video evidence of Lil' Kadek's release, there is.

The water where we released Lil' Kadek was about 15' deep and crystal clear. The boat driver showed us where they were farming coral to help repopulate reefs that have been devastated by climate change and pollution. We passed a lot of small shacks floating on 55 gallon drums. They were fishing rafts where locals smoked, fished, and generally hung out in the shade, like fishermen all over the universe. We also passed huge ships that looked eerily like pirate ships. It turns out that they are actually floating Airbnbs, which was pretty cool.

Our next planned visits were to Taman Ujung and Tirta Gangga, two temples that we were eager to explore. The farther we got from Denpassar, the less traffic there was  and the prettier the scenery became. Okay. I know. It's not pretty yet, but it will get pretty. I promise.

As we drove to the first temple, we passed a building that had an airplane mounted on top.
"Restaurant," Kadek murmured. "You want to eat lunch in an airplane?"
He was clearly very excited by the opportunity.
"Absolutely!" we said.
And that's how we found ourselves eating Sambal Matah pizza near an airplane. Not exactly in it.

My pizza  gave me a lot of insight about how not to make a Sambal Mattah pizza and we will never speak of it again, please. After lunch, we headed off for the temples. The drive up the east coast of Bali was really beautiful. If you've ever wondered what it looks like to sit in the passenger seat and drive for 1 minute and 57 seconds in Bali, have I got a treat for you.

The 40 minute drive to Taman Ujung took about 90 minutes, but it was a gorgeous drive through rice fields, jungles, mountains, and monkey clusters which, I realize, sounds like another great band name, or, possibly, a candy bar.
"New Monkey Clusters! Now with 26% more monkey in every bite!"
Maybe not.
There was an oddly specific area where there were a LOT of monkeys along the side of the road. So many, in fact, that a new temple had been built in the area. It was, sadly, not called Monkey Cluster Temple. It was still under construction, but I imagine that in a year or so, it will be swarming with tourists all losing their hats, glasses, and phones to monkeys.

The road was also lined with dozens and dozens of women, all sitting about 20 yards apart from one another, all selling fish from big plastic buckets.

Who would buy fish from women selling it out of buckets, you may wonder.

We also saw people selling 1 liter bottles that looked exactly like the petrol bottles for sale all over the island, but the liquid inside was a hazy yellow color.
"What is that?" I asked Kadek.
He explained that it is a drink called Tuwak. It's homemade moonshine distilled from coconuts.
"You do not drink that, okay?" he warned. "Very dangerous for you."
I'm glad he was so concerned for our safety, but the warning was completely unnecessary. The idea of buying coconut moonshine from a fishmonger on the side of the road hadn't actually crossed my mind.
Until then...

As we talked with Kadek about our plans for the day, which may now include Tuwak, he said that Tirta Gangga would probably be very crowded. We were done with very crowded, so we opted to visit Taman Ujung and call it a day.
"Is Taman Ujung very pretty?" I asked Kadek.
He thought for a moment.
"Nahhhh."
I suspect he thought I was asking if it would be crowded because Taman Ujung was absolutely stunning.
And, as a wonderful bonus, almost completely free from any other tourists.
Photo dump of Taman Ujung:

I'm not going to include explanations. Just enjoy the beauty of the place. Or don't.
After exploring and enjoying Taman Ujung, we headed back to the resort for our last night in Nusa Dua.
Tomorrow, we head to Lovina on the northern coast of Bali for our last week here.
Everyone tells us that it's very quiet there.
We're really looking forward to it.
Maybe there will be Tuwak for sale along the way...

Today Kadek was scheduled to pick us up at 9, so we were sure to be ready when he actually arrived at 8:30. He had planned out a route for the several things we wanted to do today, ostensibly to avoid traffic which, in Bali, is akin to trying to avoid getting wet while swimming.
Or first stop was "The Big Statue", so named because it is, indeed, a BIG statue. It's actually the most noticeable landmark when you land at the airport, though it's actually many miles away from the airport. I mean, it's massive.
We arrived at GWK Cultural Park (where the statue is located) very early and, mercifully, ahead of any crowds. This would prove to be in direct contradistinction to the end of our day, which we shared with 73.6 million other people on monkey-infested cliff overlooking the ocean.
The Cultural Park is a surreal place. The bedrock of the entire area has been carved away so I suspect that from the sky, the area looks like a giant checkerboard. You walk through man-made alleys with 50' sheer stone cliffs on every side of you.
It's stunning.

The big statue lives up to its name. I mean, that thing is huge. It's a massive statue of Lord Vishnu riding on a huge eagle. Kadek explained that several people had died during its construction because "construction isn't very safe in Bali", which should get some sort of understatement of the millennium award. I've seen people welding in flip flops with no eye protection, running huge stone cutting saws dressed the same way, and hanging precariously off cartoonishly unstable scaffolding, high above the ground. To hear that people had died during the construction of this statue is sad, but inevitable.

Inside the base of the statue is a museum with about 2 dozen glass cases containing sculptures of the Hindu pantheon. They were made by a variety of artists with varying and eclectic artistic sensibilities and levels of ability. Kadek gave us a really fascinating overview of what each statue represented. I won't even try to relate it here, primarily because I was totally distracted by a small group of employees who were valiantly trying to remove some sort of rodent from the base under one of the sculptures. Please just enjoy the visuals.

While recovering from the sculptures, we explored the exquisite grounds of the cultural park, which included mock-ups of The Big Statue as well as several other fun statues and beautiful temples. And, of course, Instagram people.

After exiting through the gift shop, we headed off to Tanah Lot Temple, which we were very excited to see. We stopped for lunch at a quiet restaurant set in rice fields. I had Gado Gado, which is tempeh, tofu, vegetables, and peanut sauce.

We also got to enjoy the elaborate intricacies of the Balinese electrical grid on our drive. It's really quite incredible.

Tanah Lot Temple was absolutely amazing. It is a series of many temples, all set along the dramatic cliffs of the Indian Ocean. We wandered through narrow pathways lined with vendors selling wooden penises and watched the waves crash gloriously on the cliffs. In one memorable moment, we also saw the waves crash on a group of old ladies posing for an Instagrammy photo in front of the barriers that clearly warned of high water and dangerous tides. A spectacular wave thundered in and sent them scattering and shrieking. it was wonderfully amusing.
For me.
Not them.
In fact they didn't seem very amused at all.

For as crowded as the entrance to the temple complex was, most of it was really lovely and not crowded at all. It was a huge area that was delightful to explore. When we were done, we met Kadek, who was making new friends in the parking lot. We headed off to our final stop for the day, Uluwatu Temple, where we will fight off monkeys and watch a Kachak fire dance. We were supposed to go to the turtle conservancy, but opted to postpone that because of the traffic. I know I keep harping about it, but it is just amazing.

Pura Uluwatu is a seaside temple known for gorgeous sunsets, fiercely aggressive monkeys, and the Kechak fire dance that they perform there in an open-air amphitheater. It was 26 miles from Tanah Lot to Uluwatu and the drive took over 2 hours. We were exhausted when we arrived, we hadn't had dinner, and sadly, I have no idea how to properly prepare monkey.
We finally found a parking spot and Kadek graciously ran ahead to buy us tickets for the dance while we bought tickets for the temple itself. He found us again and handed us tickets. "Your show starts at 7," he explained. "You should get in line by 6:30."
Wise words, Kadek. Wise words.
The temple at sunset, as promised, was spectacular.
Here are some photos, including my behind-the-scenes "carefully cropped" and "actual view" photo comparisons.

Everything - absolutely everything you read about Uluwatu temple warns you about the aggressive monkeys. They will steal phones, hats, food, and glasses off your face. The entire evening was punctuated by shrieks and screams of people who did not heed the warnings, engaged with the monkeys, and got their stuff stolen. It was delightful.
At about 6:30 we got into line for the dance. Soon, we were smooshed in with hundreds and hundreds of people, all gently pressing inexorably forward toward the gates. That were closed. We stood there, a solid, sweating, throbbing mass of humanity for over 30 minutes. Occasionally, shrill shrieks and screams would alert us to monkey activity in the area and we would watch as people tried in vain to get back their personal belongings.
Monkeys, you may be surprised to learn, do not respond to pleading in any language. I suspect they have a thriving black market operating where they sell stolen hats, glasses, and electronics.

Soon, but not soon enough, the gates opened and, as the Australians might say, people lost their fuckin' minds. There was a general stampeding rush into the amphitheater as if there were a pack of wild monkeys chasing people and stealing their phones. Kerri and I avoided any serious bodily injury and managed to score some great seats on the floor level right next to the stage.
And that's how I wound up dancing with a Barong a short time later.
The entire dance was amazing.
It started with a group of men coming out and chanting  "Chek! Chek! Chek!" in layered polyrythms. That's how the dance gets its name.

It was really amazing. If you don't believe me check out how fascinated the lady next to me was:

The dance was really fun. The audience was not. I have to bitch a bit here. As a guy that basically presents to people for a living, I've seen a startling decline in audience behavior over the past few years, but the people here were awful.
Many of them had loud conversations throughout the entire performance. And at the end, many, many people started getting up before it was actually over, I assume, to avoid a line getting out.
The only way out, though, was across the stage. Where the performers were still performing. I actually saw one guy go up to a dancer, WHO WAS STILL DANCING AND SINGING, and throw his arm around him so his wife could take a photo. It was jaw-droppingly rude.
I know. I know. It was a beautiful place and the performance was incredible and I should focus on that, but wow, people. Just be cool.
When it actually ended, we found Kadek and, perhaps because so many people left early, we got out of the parking lot with no trouble.
The 12 mile ride back to the resort took over an hour because of traffic, but we got there safely and, after a healthy dinner of sweet crackers and Biscoff spread, we dropped into bed, exhausted.
Tomorrow, we will finally get to see those turtles.
I hope.

Today was probably our only day in Bali devoted exclusively to going to the beach.
And to the grocery store.
And dinner.
But totally, only, exclusively, the beach.
The resort we're staying in is actually located a short distance from the beach. They offer a shuttle that runs every 15 minutes. It takes you along a lovely, private, bamboo-lined road and plops you out on the renowned white sand beaches of Nusa Dua, Bali, known the world over for their unspoiled beauty.
And for the dismembered corpse that we found washed up on shore.
Yes.
Really.

Once we recovered from the shock of the horrible sight, we signed out a couple towels from the friendly guys at the towel signing out place and sat down in two free seats that had a free umbrella. Near the free showers and the absolutely not free bar.
So, suck it, Crystal Beach!

I'm going to harp on this a bit here.
This beach was a meticulously maintained beach that was owned by a swanky resort and it was still absolutely covered with trash.

So, what you are seeing here is a beach that is cleaned all day every day.
Please imagine what the unmaintained beaches look like and think twice before you grab that water in the plastic bottle.
It doesn't get recycled.
It goes to the beach in Bali.
Seriously.
Think hard about single use plastics and how you can stop using them.
Please.

I'm trying not to turn this into an environmental screed, but it's hard not to see the damage and not say anything. I'm not knocking Bali or the Balinese people at all. They are to blame for some of it, of course, but a lot of this is washing up from offshore.

We stepped into the water, which was delightfully warm, especially in comparison with the frigid bone-cracking cold water of the North Atlantic that we are accustomed to suffering in at home. The surf was especially rough, which was probably why there were flags all along the beach saying that swimming is prohibited.
Bali, however, as we have seen, tends to be a bit lax regarding safety. There were no lifeguards at the beach and I suppose that they operate under the reasonable philosophy that, if you are stupid enough to swim in these rough seas, it may be best to have you removed from the gene pool.
It's possible that the dismembered torso we found was once a happy tourist, like us.
Kerri opted to be smart and go sit in the shade with the giant bottle of Bali Bangers we had toted along with us.
I opted to risk all and try snorkeling.
I saw a dad and, I assume, his teenage daughter walking up the beach with snorkeling equipment, I I asked them if there were good spots on this beach. He pointed to a small boat, moored about 150' offshore.
"Swim out there to that boat and the current will grab you and take you down the shore," he said.
This explained why I had seen them walking up the beach at least 3 times in the same direction. It was like a marine ski lift. Walk up the beach then ride back down in the surf.
They let me tag along with them for one run. As we walked and chatted, he said he was from Australia, but I have my doubts because he never once said the word "fuck".
We swam out toward the small boat and, as promised, as soon as we got near it, a playful current snatched me and dragged me parallel with the shore at a fantastic speed. I tried to pretend that the floating trash in the water was alien spaceships that I was blasting past in an intergalactic race.
It didn't work as well as I would have hoped.
Soon, the ocean got tired of playing with me and it burped me out into a pile of garbage on the beach.
I slowly made my way back to Kerri, tugging straws and Pepsodent toothpaste tubes out of my hair.
For all my crabbing about the trash here, we did have an enjoyable few hours on the beach. When we were ready to head back to the resort, we brought our towels to the towel guys.
"Omsuasiastu!" I greeted them.
Their eyes grew wide and they burst into huge peals of happy laughter.
"You speak Balinese!" one of them cried, clearly delighted.
"Only a tiny bit," I said. I demonstrated a few other select phrases. "Good morning. Good evening. How are you? I am fine, thank you. Where is the bathroom?"
"Your accent is very good," the kid said.
I gave him a You are full of shit look.
"For a beginner," he added with another huge laugh.
We talked with these two guys for a while. When the shuttle arrived, we opted not to take it so we could keep talking with them. They told us about Bali, the Balinese people and culture, and life on the island. We told them about America and how big it is.
"The Australians would say 'It's fucking huge!'" one of them laughed.
We also told them about the weather we get in the winter.
"It can be minus 15 or 20 degrees," I said.
"MEEENUS?!?" they both gasped with their wonderful accents. "MEEEEEENUS?!? I would die! How do you live?"
We explained the concept of coats to them.
I asked them where they had learned English. Theirs was some of the best we'd heard on Bali.
"Oh," one of them said, smiling. "I'm from Scotland."
I gave this dark-skinned, eminently Balinese kid another You are full of shit look.
"I like feeeesh and cheeeeeps," he said, affecting a dreadful Scottish accent before bursting into guffaws of laughter.
We talked about working at the resort and they said they mostly liked it.
"Except for the Russians," they added. "They're the worst."
We've heard this from several drivers and guides. They do not like Russians in Bali. They complain that Russians, in general, have no respect for the people or culture on the island. They said that most people are fine, but sometimes guests are rude to them or treat them badly. Mostly, they just get ignored because they are just "the help".
I said I was sorry to hear that that happened.
The kid shrugged. "I don't care. That's about them; not us."
The kid is a bodhisattva.
The kids were so warm and genuine and clearly proud of their country and culture. Talking with them was one of the highlights of the entire trip.
When the shuttle came back again, we snapped a selfie and reluctantly said our goodbyes.

Back at the resort, we got some french fries and drank Bali Bangers by the pool and it was wonderful.

For dinner, we decided to return to the restaurant where we had ordered pizza the other night. The manager, Suzie, remembered us by name, which was incredibly impressive.

The band played Pink Floyd and Tom Petty covers and we had another really fun night there.

After dinner, we strolled to the Cocomart for more Javanese rum and Jungle Juice. We don't want to get scurvy!
Tomorrow, we're sightseeing with The Original Kadek™.

To be clear, we have been planning this trip to Bail for several years. It involved a tremendous amount of planning and saving money to make it happen. And when the photo on our kitchen calendar in May was a photo of a beach in Bali, it seemed like some sort of... well, a funny coincidence, but it was sort of cool.
We had been looking at that photo daily for 30 days before we boarded a plane and it seemed like that beach, called Kelingking Beach, was somewhere we should go.
People, I am here to tell you, don't let your calendars boss you around.
This was not an enjoyable day.
At all.
Kelingking Beach is actually on a very small island off the south eastern coast of Bali canned Nusa Penida. We have heard many people in Bali talk about how beautiful and quiet Nusa Penida is.
I am here to tell you that they are a bunch of filthy liars.
We booked a tour to Nusa Penida through a tour company at the hotel, something that we have done a few times over the years while traveling and, weirdly, something I always regret.
I just don't learn.
We were told to meet our driver in the hotel lobby at 6:00.
Kadek was there waiting for us. This was not our Kadek, but a different substitute Kadek, who was very nice, but it just didn't feel right somehow.
He drove us through the oddly empty streets of Denpassar to the marina where we were to board a Fast Boat to take us to Nusa Penida. Once in the marina parking lot, we realized that the streets were empty because everybody in Bali was, apparently, going on a boat today.

Kadek was kind enough to bring us to the boat office and help us make sure we got our tickets. It was a slow, laborious process and the office was small, hot, and crowded. Again, a portent for the day to come.
We did get our tickets, Kadek snapped a photo of us "to send to my boss" and we sat down to wait.
Instructions were vague, but we understood that we'd be going to the boat in a group. And, eventually, we did. But so did the people waiting at every other boat company along the street. As if on cue, guides walked out of each building, each waving a tattered, filthy pennant on a thin bamboo pole.
"Follow me to your boat!"
And then he set off at a breakneck pace through the thousands of people who were all headed for different boats at the same marina.
Somehow, we managed to get on the right boat and we zipped out to Nusa Penida.

Once in Nusa Penida, we walked into the most crowded parking lot I have ever seen. Cars were parked in every conceivable space, at every conceivable angle. It was what my Australian friends would have called "A proper clusterfuck." and they wouldn't have been wrong.

The edge of the parking lot was crowded with hundreds of drivers, all holding signs with guest names on them. As we searched for our names, a young man came running up to us.
"Marrrrrty? Kerrrrrri?"
Oh, those beautiful Indonesian rolled R's.
We nodded. "That's us."
"I am Ketut."
We were both disappointed that his birth order had prevented us from having a 100% Kadek day, but we rolled with it.
He pointed to a stand of coconut trees at the far side of the parking mess. "I park in coconuts... Otherwise..."
He waved a hand to generally indicate the mayhem that was happening in the parking lot as hundreds and hundreds of poorly parked cars tried to leave as hundreds and hundreds of tourists wandered through the lot, looking for a driver.
Ketut's car was a tiny, tricked out Toyota Avanza with a tight rally suspension and low profile tires on racing rims. Absolutely the worst car you could possibly choose to drive on the roads which were, without doubt, the worst roads I've ever driven on.

We got in and he cranked up some country music, because we are Americans?, and raced forward about 4 feet before he had to stop because a line of parked cars was blocking the entire road out of the parking lot. He quickly jumped out of his car and hopped into two cars with no drivers in them, moved them out of the way, and got back into his car.
I suppose a benefit of living on a very, very tiny island is that if someone did steal your car, they wouldn't get far with it.
Here are a couple photos to give you a sense of what the best, widest road on the island looked like. It quickly got much much more thrilling.

The roads were the windiest, most damaged roads I have ever seen. Ketut took each hairpin turn and steep incline like a rally driver, dodging the constant stream of scooters, motorbikes, dogs, old ladies with piles of palm leaves on their heads, and giant holes in the road with the calm, careless aloofness that only a 24 year old can possibly muster.
We quickly realized that we were simply one part of a nearly endless parade of cars that was circling the island to see 3 tourist spots.
We also quickly realized that Ketut spoke almost no English at all.
He was very nice, but unable to tell us anything about what we were seeing.
Our first stop was a double-feature: Broken Beach and Angel Billabong.
Ketut introduced Broken Beach with his only joke of the day "Also on broken road."
We bounced and shuddered along the road before skidding into the Broken Beach parking lot like the Dukes of Hazzard, as Buck Redneck and Earle Moonshine yodeled on his Worst of County Music playlist. The walk to the beach was lined with stands of vendors offering food, drinks, coconuts, and toilets.
Toilets are a hot commodity (commode-ity?) and they are not free.
And they are not clean.
At least one toilet I saw posted different prices depending on what you deposited there.
5,000 rupia for a pee, 10,000 for a poop.
I have no idea whose job it was to check, but I would have crapped my pants a hundred times and sat in it for the rest of this trip before using any of the toilets we saw.

To be fair, Broken Beach and Angel Billabong were very pretty. They were also crowded with my favorites! 20-something Japanese girls posing for their Instagram feeds. Oh, how I love to see the careful preparation that goes into each of the hundreds of photos they will take, heedlessly blocking paths, preventing anyone else from seeing the views, and generally being ridiculous. And I adore getting in their photos with them. They typically are less than thrilled about my photobombings. Sadly, Kerri thinks I'm being a jerk and refuses to photograph me with my new Instagram friends.
And, yes, I am being a jerk. I know that.
I'm not proud of it, but here we are.

Kerri was having a hard time navigating the rough walkways so Ketut kindly took her bag from her and offered to get his car and drive around to meet us so we wouldn't have to walk back up the path we'd come down. We realized, as we watched the nearly endless stream of cars leaving and entering the parking lot, that the drivers were essentially racing to get to the next spot before all the other drivers so they could have a parking spot.
When he skidded to a stop in front of us, we hopped into his car through the open windows like Bo and Luke Duke and we took off for our next stop...
Kelingking Beach!

Right now, I'm going to ask you to please go back to the beginning of this post so you can refresh your memory of what the beach looks like on our calendar at home.
I will now take you on a visual tour of what it is really like, my friends...

I tried valiantly to got to the spot where the photo on our calendar had been taken. This was as close as I could get:

From Kelingking beach, we went to lunch, which, because we had booked through a tour company, was included.
And for exactly the same reasons, it was the worst food we'd had out in Bali.
We were given what I can only assume was the "Tour People"  menu, with a half dozen selections, none of them good.

Our final stop for the day was a visit to Crystal Beach for a few hours of swimming. Many of the drivers were clearly in a race to get their passengers to the beach so they could hang around for a while and gossip. We joined the parade of vehicles making our way to Crystal Beach.

Yes. That really is part of the beach.
But if I'm being honest, most of it was clean enough. It was high tide when we arrived and there was no dry place to put your things. It was also insanely hot and there was no shade save for the umbrellas set up over the chairs enticingly arranged along the beach. We sat down in a couple and were immediately swarmed by 3 guys who worked at the beach. 
"Chairs are 100,000 rupia."
I channeled my inner Australian.
"What the fuck, mate? For real?"
It was, indeed, for real.
I pulled out 100,000 and handed it over.
Then they started to close the umbrella and tie it up.
"We want the umbrella open, please," I said. "Otherwise we will ignite and leave a greasy, smoky stain on these chairs and you'll never extort 100,000 for them if they smell like fried tourist."
"Umbrella is 100,000 more."
"Or you tie it closed?"
"Yes."
So I forked over another 100,000 and harbored uncharitable thoughts.

There was no place to change or get out of the sun at all and I really felt awful for the people who arrived after us. We got one of the few remaining sets of chairs. Most of the people who arrived after us crowded at the edge of the beach, holding their belongings and trying not to incinerate in the sun. This was the end of the tour so all they could do was wait around until 3:00, when it was time to drive back to the marina and play "Escape from Nusa Penida".
But first, we had to escape from the parking lot.
As we tried to get out, a steady stream of cars was pouring in to the already overfilled lot. It was absolute gridlock. At one point, another driver hopped out of his car and directed Ketut through two cars with, I am not exaggerating, no more than 1.5" on either side. He pulled in his mirrors and crept along.
Here is a thrilling photographic documentary of our escape from Crystal Beach:

It was absolutely mental.
But somehow, we escaped!
And we raced back to the marina where even more traffic awaited us in parking lot hell.

We got on the boat and the ride back afforded beautiful views of Mt. Agung poking up out of the clouds. I wasn't able to get many pictures because the spray from the boat was flying hard and drenching the passengers on the other side of the boat. It was jolly fun.
For us.
On the dry side of the boat.

I opted not to photograph the incandescently angry people on the wet side of the boat, screaming at other passengers to "Close the WINDOWS!!!" That didn't seem like a hornet's nest that needed any poking.
Once safely back on land, we ran the gauntlet of taxi drivers asking "You need a ride, Boss?" and found Kadek 2.0 waiting just where he said he would be.
We would have found him sooner if either of us could remember where he said he would be waiting for us.
I think lunch erased our minds. But sadly, not the memory of lunch.

We got back to the hotel and went in for a long, cool swim before dinner, which was instant Ramen noodles in our room.
It was, at least compared to lunch, surprisingly delicious. The Balinese people take their Ramen seriously. The packages come, not only with the packet of flavored salt that you might find in American versions, but three little packages of sweet soy sauce, spicy chili oil, and something else that I couldn't identify, but I ate anyway.
This is how we learn, people.
We washed the day away with a coupe Bali Bangers and fell asleep meditating.
Again.

Today we saw the largest, oldest temple complex in Bali. It's called Pura Besakih, referred to by locals as The Mother Temple. Kadek made the drive from Ubud to drive us to Besakih for the day. Along the way, we saw the usual Balinese sights: Mind-twisting traffic, 2,547 stray dogs, 36.9 million scooters, 27,374 warungs selling Babi Gueling, and, because we were headed up the southeast coast of Bali, a nearly endless parade of dump trucks carrying black sand.
Mt. Agung is an active volcano. It last erupted in 1963, destroying the area around it and covering a large area of land under black volcanic rock and sand. That rock and sand is now considered a luxury commodity and builders from all over Bali want to use it when constructing high-end villas.
Lemonade from lemons, I guess.
Here is a visual guide to driving from our hotel to Pura Besakih:

When we arrived at the temple complex, we were assigned to a "free" tour guide, who came with our tickets unfortunately. He was a dour, wizened old man with rheumy eyes who never told us his name. He was supposed to take us through the complex and explain things to us. He sort of did, in the way that a mob enforcer might explain that if you don't pay back the money you borrowed from Vito "Bent Knuckles" Cabrone, you might wind up sleeping with cement slippers on.
The temple complex was huge with thousands of stairs. Kerri's back was bothering her quite a bit so she and Kadek hung around near the entrance to the temple while I went off–alone–with the guide, whom I've come to think of as Mario "Two Bucks" Bologna.
We passed the throngs of Instagram People crowding certain spirit gate, but completely absent from others and Mario explained that in the eruption of 1963, 80% of this entire complex of 18 temples was destroyed. It has since been rebuilt so much of this ancient looking place is actually from the 60's.
About half way through our intimate walk, Mario casually slipped in that I was his only tour for today and, probably his only work that week and that many people, when he takes them for tours, tip him $20 or, sometimes, much, much more.
I feel the need to add here that I do tip. I try to be generous, but I hate feeling extorted. And, to put his wild claim if $20 tips into perspective, we had been told, by Balinese people, that a generous tip for A WEEK of work by house staff who cook and clean in Bali is about $10 per person. For a week of work. This guy is telling me he is expecting twice that for an hour of work where he mostly walked ahead of me and smoked.
"Ahhh," I said, "My toes curling. That must be great."
"Yes," he said. "Especially when it's my only work for the week."
"Okay. I'll tip you when we get back down. Don't worry."
"It's better here," he said, stopping and holding out his hand.
I won't lie. I was mad.
I reached into my wallet and peeled off a 50,000 bill and handed it to Mario.
He looked at it as if I'd farted in his hand. "This is only two bucks," he complained.
First, it wasn't. It was about $3.50. And secondly, that is, by any measure, a very generous tip in Bali.
I grumbled and forked over another 100,000 rupias.
He eyeballed me again. "That's all I have" I lied and kept walking.
Despite my fears that he might have my knees broken, we did make it back to Kerri and Kadek in one piece.
Kadek leaned over and whispered that these guys are very poor and that I might consider tipping him. I told him that I had slipped him $150k, which Kadek seemed to deem fair, which made me feel a bit better.
I still couldn't lose the feeling that I'd been shaken down. I'm not proud of that, but there it is.
Despite the low-level mob vibes, Pura Besikah is stunningly beautiful.
I won't try to explain what things are, but the entire complex was incredibly gorgeous. It was not nearly as crowded as we had expected. The misty, foggy day added to the ethereal beauty for me.

Hi! Hello. You can wake up now. I'm done sharing 25,000 pictures.
For now.
I was just totally blown away by how stunning it was there.
After the temple, we had lunch at a swanky hotel that was built into the side of a cliff overlooking lush jungle.

We once again bought Kadek lunch. We all ordered chicken burgers and Kadek was comically amused that we had all ordered the same thing. He'd never had a chicken burger before and, I suspect, that he never will again.
Our plan had been to go from lunch to a scenic overlook, but the clouds scrapped that plan, and from there to go to a turtle conservancy, but it turns out they're closed on Sundays.
We decided to head back to the resort.
Along the way, we stopped at a strange spot - caves that had been carved into the rock where Balinese people hid during the Japanese occupation during WW2. It was a surreal sort of tourist spot. As I headed into one of the caves to take a photo, Kadek casually mentioned that there were likely a lot of venomous snakes sleeping in there during the day.
 Kerri broke 15 land speed records sprinting across the parking lot.

On our ride back, Kadek taught me the phrase "Omsuasiastu" which is a casual, "Hey, how's it going?" greeting in Balinese.
I practiced it over and over and when we got back to the resort, I used it on the people in the lobby, who lit up and smiled in return. "Suasiastu!" they all said, clasping their hands in front of their faces and bowing slightly.
I felt like Kadek had taught us a magic word.
It is totally amazing the effect it has.
We cleaned up at the hotel and headed out in search of Balinese pizza, which, Kadek said, can be had with chicken and sambal mattah, my new favorite obsession here. It's a fiery, fresh mix of shallots, hot peppers, lemongrass, and salt and it is delicious.
As we walked to search for a restaurant, I kept greeting people and getting delighted smiles and returned greetings. We found a restaurant that had wood-fired pizza (none with sambal mattah, alas), but we had a wonderful dinner and delightful evening. The band was two guys who clearly had a lot of fun playing together. The staff was delightful, and the manager, Susie, said she was impressed by my pronouns (my pronunciation, I assume) and wrote down a few more phrases for me to learn. So, we found ourselves eating pizza in Bali while listening to two guys mangle a John Denver tune.
As one does.
On our way back to the hotel, I greeted two guys who laughed and started talking to me in Balinese. I confessed that I was a fraud who only knew a few phrases. They gave me a new one and said "Say that to the guards at your hotel."
All the resorts have guards out front and all cars are stopped and given a cursory check for bombs after a tragic bombing that happened in Bali about 20 years ago.
When a couple young guys tell me to say something to guards, I am reminded of my misspent youth.
"If I say this, will I get my teeth punched down my throat?" I asked, like the ugly American I obviously am.
"No, no, no, "they assured me. "It's good, it's good. It means 'Good evening' in Balinese."
When we got to the guard house, I poked my head in the window and tried the greeting. They both looked at me blankly.
Oh no.
"Was that rude?" I asked. I explained the circumstances as well as I could, but they spoke very little English. One of them got on his radio and talked quietly into it.
"We are going to jail," I mumbled to Kerri. "Sorry. At least dinner was tasty."
The guards both started laughing. They were asking their supervisor what the phrase meant. Both of the guards were Javanese and neither of them spoke Balinese.
It did, indeed, mean "good evening" and Kerri and I were not going to jail.
We went back to our room and headed to bed. It had been a long day and we have a boat ride booked for tomorrow morning.

I'm not trying to start this post off with a whiny first world problem sort of complaining rant, but when you book a week in a fully equipped apartment with a kitchen, making breakfast shouldn't be this hard. There's no coffee maker and there's no toaster.
To be fair, bread is fairly uncommon on Bali. The locals prefer rice and bread is only available in tourist stores and Indomarets, which is where I bought the 1/4 loaf that I am trying to toast a piece of this morning. So, I didn't really expect a toaster, but I was hoping for some sort of coffee maker because EVERYBODY IN THE WORLD DRINKS COFFEE!! And Bali is known for its coffee.
I tried dumping some grounds in a paper towel and putting that in a coffee cup and pouring hot water over it. I succeeded in getting a cup full of coffee-flavored paper pulp and I made a mess of the counter. Balinese coffee is ground to a powder so I eventually decided to just put the coffee in the cup, add the water, stir it, and let it settle.
It wasn't the world's greatest cup of coffee, but the thick silt of grounds on the bottom provided some extra incentive to drink it slowly and attempt to savor it.
For my toast, I added some coconut oil to a pan and fried the toast - sort of like making a grilled cheese sandwich. But with one slice of bread.
And no cheese.
I've had worse breakfasts.
And I got to enjoy it on the balcony with my new friend.

Far, far from the quiet footfalls of the mysterious dudes with machetes and the gentle mooing of the cow next door to the villa in East Ubud, our balcony is one of about 75,000 balconies in this resort. The German guy on the balcony, clad only in his saggy, black briefs (not tighty-whities; saggy-blackies?) spent the morning smoking and coughing and trundling over to the edge of his balcony to hawk chunky, ropy gobs of his blackened lungs down onto the patio of the villa below us.
It was a less soul-satisfying morning than the quiet ones we had at the villa, but it's going to be great here.

We spent the day bobbing around in the pool and, occasionally, chatting with other guests. Most of them are Australian. Australia is very close and Bali is very inexpensive so Australians flock here the way some Americans, for reasons known only to themselves and their god, flock to Florida or The Caribbean.
Australians, on the whole, use the word 'fuck' more often than most people breathe. I was delighted listening to casual conversations between friends that were so peppered with fucks, that it was occasionally hard to follow the story.

"I was fuckin' down at the fuckin' pool and fucked if the fuckin' fucker there didn't fuck with my fucking Bintang. No fuckers fuck with my fuckin' Bintang. You fucking know what the fuck I mean?"

No. Honestly, I don't. There's rarely animosity attached with it. They use it the way some people use "like" or "umm" in conversations. Sort of a placeholder. It was fucking charming.

An Australian couple we chatted with told us all about all the incredible restaurants just a block away from the resort.

"The what, now?" I asked, thinking back upon last night's abominable dinner of the damned.
"Oh, yeah," the wife said. "A whole fuckin' street full of fuckin' restaurants. And there's a big, fuckin' Cocomart if you want fuckin' groceries."
"Where?" I asked.
"Out the back of the resort and take a right. It's like 100 fuckin' meters away. You can walk there in 5 fuckin' minutes."
To get to the convenience store last night, I had walked out the back of the resort and turned left and walked 100 meters.
Left.
180 degrees separated me from delicious food.
Kerri eyeballed me. Clearly last nights dinner had made a similarly profound impact on her.
"And," the husband added, "On the way, you'll pass fuckin' Lover's Massage. It sounds dodgy, but they give great fuckin' massages."
His wife eyeballed him then and Kerri and I excused ourselves so the couple could fight in private. At the pool.
We had dinner to find.
And maybe a massage.

The supermarket and the restaurants were, as fuckin' promised, very close and very safe to eat at.
It was only getting there that was challenging. Here are two short videos of the street we were on and the quietest moment we saw at  the traffic circle we needed to traverse.

And here are some more scenes from our big night out.

Next door to the restaurant, two musicians were doing a creditable job singing Margaritaville. Especially for a couple guys who likely speak very little English.

I've mentioned before, and it bears mentioning again, making an effort to learn a bit of the local language has paid such huge rewards. People are genuinely happy to hear you mangle their mother tongue. It never fails to get a smile and a warm response. It's only when they assume that I actually speak Bahasa of Balinese and start a conversation that it gets challenging. I have to learn to say, "Sorry! That's all I've got!"

Back at the resort, we sat on the balcony with a cocktail and listened to the old guy next door cough and spit. It was very romantic.

Today was the restful day we needed. Tomorrow, we're templing again!

Today is our last day at Villa Bo Sophie. It's been a great introduction to Bali and we've had a great time. This vacation started, in part, because of a time-share resort stay that Kerri's mom generously gifted us. We got a free week at a resort and booked Airbnbs for the other two weeks. Today, we're heading to the resort.
We booked a ride through Wayan, our ever-efficient house manager and he is sending Wysuk (pronounced Wee-Suk) to drive us today. I didn't even laugh. Because I am an adult, dammit. People in Bali tend to use What's App for communication. When I clicked on Wysuk's profile, his name came up as Man Suk.
I just want to reiterate that I am an adult. That is all.
When we booked the ride, we hoped to see some places along Bali's east coast on our drive to the resort, which is in Nusa Dua on the very southern part of the island. Wayan suggested a few places that might be good to stop, among them were a few we were familiar with from some research we did ahead of time. One was a place called Kertha Gosa, the Justice Palace, located in the Klungkung Regency. I looked it up online and it seemed like one nice building with some very cool paintings on the ceiling, so we decided to check it out since it was basically on our way.
We had arranged a ride for 12:00, but were ready very early so I texted Wysuk and said we were ready whenever he was. He sent 3 messages in reply:
Yes, I do.
I come.
On the way.
With a slightly different structure, it would be a beautiful haiku.
About 10 minutes later, he arrived with a retinue of cleaning people who were there to clean out the villa and get it ready for the next guests. As with all our other drivers, Wysuk was kind and chatty. His English was spotty, but, as we've been doing, we got by with a bit of improvisational charades, simple sentences, and laughter. When we asked him to detour through Kerta Gosa, he said "Client is king!" and off we went.
He kept up a running dialog about Bali; the people, the culture everything. He punctuated his sentences with lots of hand gestures (which was alarming, given the winding roads and dense traffic) and sound effects.
"Oh! It's Instagram People Season! Click Clack Click Clack Click Clack!"
He'd beep his horn if other drivers didn't start driving before the lights turned green, but then he'd drop to 3 mph on a busy highway while he was telling a story that needed extra emphasis with hand gestures.
But he got us there safely and parked alongside a huge monument that looked like a huge, ummm... well...

Turns out that is supposed to look like a giant... um... Lingga Yoni! Way to go, ancient Balinese people!

So, inside the penis there are dioramas?!?
That is a sentence I never considered writing before. But it's true.

I do genuinely love the slightly fractured English on all the signs in Bali. The dioramas were the sort of thing one might expect to find in the historical society of a small town in the U.S. that some dubious claim to fame.
"Miltonsburg: Home of the factory that made buttons to close the flaps on the long underwear worn by the 33rd regiment in the Civil War".
There was a guy sitting on the floor inside the giant penis. there is another of those sentences I never thought I'd write. I assumed the guy was a guide. I struck up a conversation with him. He smiled and chatted a bit before sitting back and asking me for a cigarette. It was only then that I realized he didn't work there, he was just hanging out inside the penis until it stopped raining outside.
As one does.
The penis motif is going to continue. In fact, it's going to get much more intense. Brace yourself.
From the giant penis, we walked across the street to a gorgeous and, miraculously, almost empty area that,  if I understood the signs correctly, was one of the first governmental meeting places in Bali.
The building was the one I had seen on the internet. It was a small, open-sided building set in a small, bright green man-made pond like the floating temples we'd visited. It was really breathtakingly ornate and beautiful.

There was a kiosk explaining that the ceiling was painted with graphic descriptions of the gods punishing people for all sorts of things in truly sadistic ways. Most alarmingly was the fact that the audio portion was read by a child. Hearing a child saying "Burning the vagina and penis of those who liked to have illegal intercourse" was unsettling at best. But, to keep things light, I made a game for you. It's called "Match the description with the depiction!"
Are you ready?

Let's make it more interesting. Here is the entire ceiling. This will be like Where's Waldo, except that this game can be called "Whose Genitals Are Being Mutilated Here and Why?"

The final stop in The Justice Palace was the museum. Fearing more dioramas, I was reluctant to go in, but I dutifully drudged into the humid, dusty museum past the crew of guys painting the outside walls.

We plodded through the museum. There were a few interesting things to see, but it wasn't until we came to the last room that things got really exciting. There were two bamboo instruments, called rindiks, on a small pedestal. As I was looking at them, one of the guys painting the walls came in and started playing one. He offered the mallets to Kerri who tried to dive out a window to escape and not have to play music. I, however, nearly jumped over it to sit down and play. He showed me the rhythm I was supposed to play.  When I got it wrong, he snapped, "No! No! I play the melody! You play along!"
One of the other painters, came up and pulled the mallets out of my hands to show me how to play.
I realized that these guys were actually museum docents, not, in fact, painters.
I figured it out eventually and it was a blast.
Here is a 2 minute video of me getting my mallets taken away because, you may be shocked to learn, I am a sucky rindik player BECAUSE I HAVE NEVER EVEN SEEN THIS INSTRUMENT BEFORE, GUY!
But we practiced a bit.
Next is a 30 second video of me rockin' my rindik.
When we finished, he laughed and asked, "You play music?"
"No," I admitted. "I'm just a drummer."
"I thought so!" he laughed. Then he pantomimed an epic 80's style hair band drum solo.
For about 45 seconds.
It got weird.

From there, the echoes of the rindik still bouncing around in my earholes, we were off to Nusa Dua to stay at the resort.

The farther we got from Ubud and the closer we got to the big city of Denpassar, the more Wysuk began to lose his polish of being a wise old guide and the more he began to look like a bumbling yokel in the big city. At one point he tossed me his phone and asked me to help him navigate, which may possibly have been fine if the satellite connection he used hadn't been very laggy and if all the directions hadn't been in Indonesian. And since none of the directions were "Hello. How are you? I like spicy food. Thank you." I was sort of lost.
Literally.
We did, eventually, find our way to the resort, which is a huge complex of apartments with a giant pool, restaurants, bars, and games so the kids can be occupied while mom and dad drink Arak at the pool.

It was clearly designed to appeal to a Western crowd, right down to the 100% beige motif for the interior colors and Wednesday nights being an all-you-can-eat Italian Night Buffet in the restaurant. I'll be elsewhere on Wednesday night. And, in fact, every night.
The resort is lovely. I just don't need Italian food when I'm half way around the world.
So, rather than resort food, I went out to get some food to cook in the apartment. We were both exhausted and didn't want to go out to eat. I wandered around and eventually found an Indomaret, a ubiquitous convenience store in Bali. It seemed to be the only place in the area to get food.
And food is a loose term here.
Our dinner was a hilariously awful mess of Indonesian boxed macaroni and cheese flavor, Happitos (which are awesome Doritos knock-offs) and several Bali Bangers to help us ward off scurvy, which is an ever-present threat everywhere in the world.
We showered and both fell asleep on the couch while meditating.
Tomorrow, we hang around at the pool and drink rum.
I hope.

Today began with another beautiful sunrise over the rice fields. But you probably knew that since you just looked at that photo and read the caption. And you're smart like that.

This morning, the farmer who tends the field in that photo was beginning to plant his rice crop. They plant 3-4 times each year. The rice begins as a small, dense patch of "baby rice".

And, as I appreciated the labor involved in growing the rice, Ayu arrived, quizzed me on my Balinese, corrected my pronunciation, and made us black rice pudding for breakfast. It was my least favorite breakfast we've had, but it was definitely not bad. It was a rice porridge that was served with palm sugar syrup and toasted coconut milk, which Ayu made fresh. She broke open a coconut, toasted the pieces on the open flame of the gas burner, scooped out the flesh, blended it, and squeezed out the liquid through a sieve. Time consuming, but tasty.
After a rice-intensive morning, Wayan arrived to take us on his long-anticipated tour of The Real Bali. Wayan is a compact man with a wide smile and long dark hair tied back in a pony tail. In bold contradistinction to all the other guides we've seen, who wear traditional Balinese sarongs and headwear, Wayan wore a white, buttondown shirt, tight, flair-leg jeans and pointy leather boots. He looked far more Mexican or Native American than Balinese, but regardless of what he wore, that dude has STYLE!
Wayan has been a tour guide in Bali for over 30 years. He began as a taxi driver when he was 17. He co-owns 4 villas with investors from other countries. They front the money, he manages the construction and day-to-day running of the villas and he gets 10% of the profits. It seemed to me that he got the shitty end of the sharing stick in those deals, but he seems very happy and is clearly doing well relative to many other locals. As we drove, he explained that Ubud, the bustling, crowded tourist mess we visited yesterday was a sleepy little town before the movie Eat, Pray, Love was released. Now, it's a congested, stifling mess with a goddamned Starbucks.
I totally understand the irony of me, a tourist, complaining about tourists. And I've thought a lot about this. As excited as I was to visit Bali, if I had known before what I know now, there is no way I'd visit. It seems to me that tourism is going to destroy this beautiful place. There's no infrastructure in place to handle the ever increasing loads of tourists who swarm over the small island.
Wayan wasn't happy about the outside companies (yes, I'm looking at you, Starbucks) getting a foothold in Bali, but he and almost everyone we've met is totally pro-tourism. Except for Russian tourists. Every singe person involved in tourism in Bali has complained about Russian tourists being rude and having no respect for the people, the land, or the culture. But the Balinese will happily take their money and not get flustered by them. The money has improved their lives immensely and I can understand that. I just don't see how it can possibly be sustainable. However, that's not my decision to make and I'll get off my soapbox now.
Today is all about culture and art!
And road repairs.
We started by attending a traditional Barong dace that featured a bewildering cast of characters, an utterly incomprehensible plot, and, what sounded to my untrained Ugly American ear like a single, repeating  song, hammered out on xylophone-like instruments for 90 minutes. There was a cheat sheet supplied for uneducated tourists like us, but the English version was a delicious mélange of confusing word soup and I opted just to absorb the essence of the play.
Here is my synopsis:
The play featured a Baron, a mythical, lion-like creature symbolizing good, and a monkey who appeared at the beginning of the play and was later inexplicably killed and eviscerated in a spectacularly gory scene featuring witches, a dagger, an enormous monkey penis and an amputated nose as well as many, many other delights.
It was A+ musical theater at its best and I absolutely loved it, though I will admit that my overriding thought throughout was, "Wow. It must be SO hot in those costumes!"
The play seemed a bit long in places where each movement of the feet or fingers in a dance have very specific meanings that I could not comprehend. But, a decade after it started, the play ended when everyone died.
I think.
It was a little confusing and the monkey penis was rather distracting.

After the dance, we met Wayan back at his car. He asked us what we thought of the dance and I said that I liked it, but it was a bit confusing because I didn't have the cultural background necessary to give context and meaning. He looked a bit hurt so I added that the monkey dick scene was exciting. I guess. But probably not for the monkey. Can we just go now, Wayan?
On the drive to our next stop, Wayan explained that we had seen the tourist version, which is basically just a summary. The actual, traditional performance can last 6 or 7 hours.
Our next stop was a silversmith. There are, for want of a better description, districts in Bali where artisans sort of cluster together. There are districts full of silversmiths, woodcarvers, painters, people selling Absolut bottles full of gasoline, etc.
The silversmith we went to see gave us a fascinating demonstration of how they make silver and create jewelry using the most basic of tools. The work was gorgeous, the talk was fascinating, but ALL I could focus on was the silversmith's feet.

He did still appear to have the full assortment of toes. But goodness knows how. I'm still shocked that anybody in Bali has more than 3 toes, but they all seem to be doing okay.
I really should have taken more photos of the silver, which was beautiful. They make rings, necklaces, ornaments, and a Balinese specialty box that is designed to hold a piece of a baby's umbilical cord after they're born. The babies wear it (or keep it handy, I suppose) and if the child ever gets sick, they open the box and eat the dried umbilical cord after preparing it with a variety of herbs. True story. And I would have gotten a photo of these lovely boxes, but I got distracted by the statues outside the shop doors.

Kerri bought a few small rings and we headed off to watch woodcarvers narrowly miss impaling themselves.

There were no photos allowed in the gallery, but I was allowed to take a few of the pieces that were on display outside. And, honestly, the work inside was absolutely breathtaking and none of it seemed to be spattered with blood from a slipped chisel, which was nice. It was some of the most intricate and amazing wood carving I have ever seen. I bought myself a small Buddha statue made from crocodile wood. Be careful looking crocodile wood up online.
Just sayin'...

From there, we visited an art gallery that featured the work of over 150 local artists. It was much better than the previous one we had seen. At all these places, as I mentioned before, an employee stays with you the entire time you are walking around a store or gallery. It's nice to have the personal attention, but it can make it hard to adequately mock the really, really bad art when you find it.
Our guide at the gallery was very quiet and low-key funny, but I was distracted the entire time by the spiraling tufts of ear hair that was cascading from his ears. It was the lushest, most luxurious ear hair I have ever seen. It was like a mohair sweater was unraveling inside his head and pouring out his ears.
It seemed rude to ask for a photo, so please just imagine it. Or maybe go look up crocodile wood.

When we were so full of Balinese culture that it threatened to leak out our ears like ear hair, we headed back to the villa. We passed some almost ordinary Balinese street repair on the way. What separated this from other street repairs was the unusual use of safety cones. Typically, you just drive around a corner and find:

a) A gaping hole in the road.
b) a pile of rocks the size of a '56 Buick
c) Both of the above

I am not making fun of them at all. The people of Bali seem to have a very healthy relationship with cause and effect. If you are dumb enough to fall in the hole, maybe you'll be smarter next time. Or you'll be snuffed out of the gene pool. Either way, problem solved.

Back at the villa, Ayu gave me more lessons in Bailnese and prepared yet another amazing meal for us. Tonight was the night I had to pay for all the meals that had been prepared for us at the villa this week. The total came to about $125. For a week's worth of spectacular breakfasts and dinners. It is amazingly inexpensive to eat in Bali. Even less expensive if you are willing to eat in the local warungs, but you will probably lose those savings in toilet paper expenses afterward. It's all about balance.

After dinner, I went for a walk up past our villa and had one of my favorite interactions in Bali so far.

I walked up the road, smiling and greeting everyone I passed. They all smiled and waved and greeted me. I walked until I spotted a naked man climbing up out of the drainage ditch where he had been taking a bath. Several people passed him on scooters or motorbikes and it didn't seem like anything out of the ordinary. I decided that strolling by at a leisurely pace and chatting with him was just a bit too intimate for me, so I turned around. Maybe it was his laundry that had been abandoned in the road the other day.
On my way back, I passed more people including a couple boys who were maybe 9 or 10 years old. Rather than warning them about the naked man up the street, I greeted them in Balinese. They smiled hugely and one asked me where I was from and how long I had been in Bali. He complimented my Balinese accent and asked me if it was my first trip to Bali. The kid's English was great. I answered his questions and made my way back to the villa, where I waved at the rice farmer who was finished planting and was leaving an offering in his temple.

As soon as I got back inside, I started thinking about how friendly everyone was and I thought I should have engaged more with the two boys. They were curious and friendly and, while I wasn't rude, I didn't talk for long and they were clearly interested in chatting. I went back outside. The boys were gone, but the rice farmer was still there. I greeted him and struck up a conversation with him. His English was way better than my Balinese or Bahasa, but was very limited. We laughed and talked about rice and birds and Mt. Agung and tried to pronounce each others' names for about 10 minutes. He explained the rice fields, the offerings he was making in his temple, and told me that the birds in the field right now eat insects and frogs, not rice. It was 50% charades and I'm guessing that we each understood 10% of the other's conversation, but it was a wonderful moment of connection that made me very happy I went back out to talk with him.
And that he wasn't naked.

Today, I am happy to report that there are no dead bats on the chairs. There are no dudes with machetes behind the villa. There will be sweat, however. And worse, most of it won't be ours.
Ayu arrived just a little early today to make breakfast. We've decided that Balinese time is the opposite of African time. In Bali, rather than being late, everyone is early. So, we had breakfast early. And it was lovely.

And it appears that I took a few more pictures of the villa:

Ayu quizzed me on my Balinese and unleashed a few more tasty phrases on me. I"m trying very hard to learn as much as I can. I'm finding it hard to keep the Balinese separate from the Bahasa, though it seems that they are used pretty interchangeably here.
We were supposed to go to Ubud Center with Kadek today, but he's picking his mother up at the hospital, where she was being treated for Beri Beri, which is a disease I sort of mentally lump with leprosy, Dengue Fever, and Smallpox. Yes, of course they're real, but they're so far removed from my life generally, that that may as well be fictional.
Only they aren't.
And I should probably be drinking more bug spray here.
So, I gargled some DEET before another driver came to collect us. His name was Ari. But Everyone called him Dego. But, of course, his real name was Kadek. He explained that he was called Dego because when he was a baby, he was always on the go.
Kadek + go = Dego. The math checks out.
He was a smiling guy with a sporty little car and a big smile.
The drive to Ubud center was the usual thrilling mix of traffic, broken roads, motor bikes and complete gridlock.
There were no mysteriouos piles of laundry blocking the road and we didn't see the ancient topless lady who has been wandering around on one stretch of road for the past few trips. On the last trip, she was joined by a man, who, while topless, was also bottomless, because he was taking a bath in one of the deep drainage ditches that line nearly every road in Bail. 
Maybe it was his laundry?
Honestly, I didn't care to ask. I wouldn't have known where to look as he bobbed in the filthy water running in the ditch.
No. I don't have any photos, you freak.
Ubud is billed as the cultural center of Bali, which I translate as One of the Few Cities to Have a Starbucks. Which is not a point in its favor. Ubud was packed. Ari/Dego/Kadek 2.0 parked in a parking lot that was 50% puddles and 50% trash. He walked us up to the center of the city. Our plan was to see The Royal Palace, the Royal Water Temple, and The Ubud Art Market, where, it is alleged, you can find great art from local artisans. Dego pointed out the palace, the temple, and the art market and told us he'd meet us back at the car.
Ubud Center was alive with preparations for a cremation ceremony. As I explained earlier, people in small villages in Bali bury their dead and then dig them up to cremate them every few years. Dego explained that because the royal family was so wealthy, they can burn their dead ones "directly".
I love the small language oddities that I'm hearing from people. The other day, Kadek told us that while locals enjoy durian fruit, non-locals found the flavor "too narrow". I wonder now if he meant "sharp". The sharp edge of a blade is narrow. I don't know, but I love the phrases and they all do a much better job with English than I am doing with Bahasa or Balinese.
So, off we went to explore the Royal Palace.

I'm still sort of in awe of how carefree the Balinese people are about things like personal safety. I know that, as an American, we are a bit coddled by our society. Signs warn us that our coffee may be hot and that clothes should not be ironed when you are wearing them, but the people in Bali swing the pendulum hard in the other direction.
Most of the workers we saw creating these elaborate displays were wearing sarongs and flip flops - maybe a shirt, bit rarely anything else. They all smoked as they teetered precariously on homemade bamboo ladders, dangling over busy city streets, cut wood with a power saw in one hand and a board in the other, squatted carelessly 3" from traffic whizzing by as they painted decoration, no doubt using lead paint.
It was sort of refreshing, really.
Our next stop was the Royal Water Temple, just a block or two away. When we tired of watching other people work, we headed off to see the temple, described as an oasis in the bustling streets of Ubud. And possibly it was. The problem was finding it. The gates were huge and clearly visible over the tops of the low buildings (no buildings can be higher than the coconut trees in Bali - true fact!), but try as we did, they seemed to elude us. The streets naturally wanted us to wander down a pedestrian alleyway that was lined with vendors selling cheap Chinese crap. We could not escape their gravity and were sucked in.
"Madam? Sundress?"
"Mister, you need a hat?"
"Madam, you like these huge penis can openers?"
"Mister, do you? I have a 5 pack. Only 50,000."
We wandered down the alleyway, unable to break free of it's thrumming pull. And then we realized that it wasn't actually a pedestrian alleyway. Dozens of motorbikes whizzed by. They were followed by a car that drove through with about 2 inches of clearance on either side. I can't imagine the conversation if the car hit a vendor stall and got all scratched up.
"I'm sorry... a what?"
"It was a 12" wooden penis. It scratched my paint."
"I'm sorry... a what?"
"A wooden penis 12 inches long. Maybe 13."
"I'm going to connect you to my manager, sir."
"Is there a penis deductible on my policy?"
*click*

As we wandered down the endless alley of vendors, i found a tiny street leading off to the left. It was quiet and tree-lined and, most importantly, totally free form vendors. I dipped in and started walking into what was pretty clearly not a public space.
I went through a small doorway that opened into a beautiful garden. There was a lady making an offering at a temple. When she saw me, she smiled. I smiled and waved and greeted her in Balinese. She smiled more. I pointed to the ground and to myself. "Okay here?"
She nodded. "Yes."
Then she just walked away. There are a lot of things I don't understand about Bali at all, but the people have all been absolutely delightful. I was just losing myself in that reverie when I realized Kerri was nowhere to be seen. Fearing that she was being harangued into buying a 25 pack of penis bottle openers, I raced back to where I had seen her last. She was standing in the shade, enjoying a respite from the brutal sun, and opening 25 bottles with her 25 brand new penis bottle openers.
That is not true.
"You shouldn't be in there," she said. "It looks like someone's yard."
"Yeah. It is," I agreed, "But it's cool. We can go in."
"Who said that?" she asked, peering past me into the decidedly empty garden.
"Some lady," I said.
"What lady?"
"That lady that isn't here any more. Duh."
That was good enough for Kerri. We strolled through the lovely, private garden from which, somehow, against all the laws of physics, not a bit of the nearby traffic could be heard at all. It was a tiny moment of silence in the middle of wooden penis chaos.
We did, after many arduous miles of hiking through a gauntlet of vendors, find the Royal Water Temple. The temple is a sacred place for the royal family and, as such , it is a place of solemn, respectful reverence.
And you get 10% off at the on-site restaurant with the purchase of a ticket!
Who could resist? We bought our tickets and were just putting on our sarongs when a ticket seller informed us that we had to wear THEIR sarongs. in fact, we had to wear an entire outfit. But don't worry, it's all included in the ticket price. AND 10% off at the restaurant!!
Here's the thing...
Bali is a very, very hot country. It's also very humid. As a result, everyone gets sweaty. Very, very sweaty.
And when you are visiting a popular temple and you have to wear the sarong, coat, and headware that they make every visitor wear, if you are not the first person to wear it, you are in for an unpleasant experience involving the sweat of many, many other people. Putting on a coat in that heat is decidedly unpleasant. Putting on a coat that 17 other people have sweated in is even less pleasant.
But there is 10% off at the restaurant to look forward to!

The temple was almost worth the $3 admission fee and may have been if we had taken advantage of the 10% off coupon.
We peeled off our jackets and hung them back up for the next suckers. A small puddle of sweat pooled under the rack where they hung.
We were stupendously brave (or, possibly stupid) and risked lunch at a small cafe on a side street.

After lunch, we headed to the Ubud Art Market. Something we had both been looking forward to since we started planning this trip. It is a place where artisans from all over Bali sell their traditional wares. We were really excited.
For about 2 minutes.

vaguely I'm not going to dwell on this, but the Ubud Art Market was just another version of the street vendors that are everywhere in Bali. Rather than selling handmade crafts, they were selling the exact same cheap plastic crap that was for sale everywhere else. It was rows and rows and aisles and aisles of cramped stalls. Vendors were sort of like carnival automatons. When we passed by, they popped to life.
"You want umbrella, madam?"
"Hey, Boss. Bintang t-shirt? Cheap!"
It must be a brutal, soul-sucking way to make a living. It was really sort of heart-breaking to see how many vendors had young children with them, spending all day, every day trying to sell trinkets.

Slightly disappointed, we headed back to the car. On the way there, I saw a small sign for a library that pointed down a dark alley.
I ask you, WHO COULD RESIST??
Not me, baby.
It was a library AND guesthouse! How cool is that?
It was at the end of a long, winding alley, but the library itself was a delightful open-air place with lots of books and a big space for events. When we wandered through, there was one lady being given a lesson in traditional Balinese dancing. We stood and watched just long enough to make her uncomfortable and then we headed back to the parking lot where Ari/Dego/Kadek 2.0 was waiting.

Back at the villa after a very long day, we had a few cocktails and practiced snorkeling in the pool; a totally classic combination. Drinks and diving. We've gone native with regard to safety. Ayu made us a delicious dinner of tofu curry with egg, gado gado, chicken sausages steamed in banana leaves, pork, rice, and sambal. It was delicious.
There was a gorgeous sunset and great view of Mt. Agung over the rice fields across the street.

After dinner, I went for a walk down the road. It was the first time I'd walked down the street where the villa was located. There were far more houses along the road than I realized, including several that were being built. The new homes were villas for tourists and the construction workers were mostly migrant workers from Java. They live in the houses as they're building them.
Once again, I was treated to delighted smiles and friendly greetings by everyone I passed. Except for the tiny calf that was wandering on the side of the road. He didn't say hello, but he mooed in a friendly way. It wasn't the sort of moo that would make me run off and abandon my laundry in the middle of the road.
But I may have solved that mystery.
On my walk, I kept hearing a voice talking very loudly in the distance. At first, I thought it may be someone having a fight in a house. Raised voices are VERY rude in Bali, so that didn't seem too likely. Then I thought it was some loud, obnoxious radio show, like the Balinese equivalent of Rush Limbaugh or something. Even more unlikely.
The noise grew louder and louder. I eventually realized it was a van with a huge Blues Brothers-style speaker attached to the top with a rubber band and some old gum or something.
The driver was barking into the microphone about...
The cheap plastic crap that his van was full of.
The vendors are mobile.
Abandon your laundry and RUN!