This week of our trip is I think our biggest splurge on accommodation and food. Relative to an equivalent hotel in North America / Europe it’s still fairly inexpensive, but we chose this week to treat ourselves to a bit of luxury, more than we would usually spend, and it’s been so much fun. It may have tainted us of course to our upcoming more frugal accommodation but still worth it I think. We can adjust to roughing it quite quickly 🙂

We are staying at the Puri Ganesha villas in Pemuteran, which is on the north-west part of Bali. There are only 4 villas here and we have our own 3 bedroom villa right on the water with our own pool right in front. We also had the resort to ourselves most of this week so it’s as tranquil as can be. The staff was tremendous and the food is apparently the best on the island (not that we’ve eaten anywhere else yet, but that’s what the official reviews say, and from what we’ve eaten, we have been blown away). Steve, Nicholas and I did a small cooking class here to learn about spices and sauces to use to create a huge variety of dishes, so I’m inspired to try that at home. I also can’t neglect to mention that the villa came with a super cute cat who was great company. I could go on and on about our dreamy accommodation, with an amazing manager dedicated to filling our week with unique, off-the-beaten-track activities, but I’ll leave it there with a “highly recommend” although there are recent ownership changes which may mean an uncertain future.

Bali is a fascinating place. We’re far away from the mayhem of the very touristy south (going there next week) so we are lucky to have been able to see more of the local’s way of life. It was the end of Ramadan this past week so with Indonesia being a Muslim country, life was quieter than usual, but with Bali being about 90% Hindu, there was still much activity. It’s the first developing country that the children have visited, so I think very eye opening for them to witness the different standard of living and lack of government involvement in things like road safety, infrastructure (water!) and waste management. Each night over dinner we try to get a conversation going with the kids about the history, geography, religion, fauna/flora etc of the country we’re in as part of our “world schooling” approach. And while we are often not successful, we have had some great conversations about Indonesia and I think the kids are learning a bit at least. We’ve done some great exploring of this area of the island are here are some of our highlights.

Water fun

Lots of our activities this week centered around the water. The ocean here is calm due to its position facing the Bali sea, so our surfing careers are taking a hiatus, but the water is warm, almost too warm, and incredibly inviting. Unfortunately though, we did see a lot of plastic garbage in the water and on the beach. Until recently there has been very little attention paid here to keeping the environment clean so the beaches and surrounding coral reefs are paying the price. The good news though is that there’s a lot of people with passion to clean things up which is amazing.

Much to our surprise, there are incredible coral reefs and a huge variety of fish right at the beach near our villa. We were all able to go snorkeling there and see an amazing variety of underwater life. This is all thanks to an organization called Biorock Indonesia who have been experimenting for the last couple of decades with the rebuilding coral reefs in the area that had been killed off due to dynamite and cyanide fishing (!!). They build large metal structures, attach pieces of broken coral and run low currents of electricity through the surrounding water and the result is coral that grows 5 times faster than naturally. And with this new coral, the fish also came back to an area that was previously depleted – such a win! Also on our beach was a non-profit turtle hatchery trying to increase the turtle population by keeping eggs out of the hands of poachers (turtle eggs are apparently a delicacy to some here).

We also did a snorkeling trip within the Bali Barat national park at Menjangan island. The coral and fish there were incredible and comparable to what I’ve seen in the past on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. We were lucky to see a huge turtle (the size of Lucas!) and two massive eagle rays. There’s been a lot of work done by the Friends of the Menjangan organization, which was started up by our snorkeling guide, to keep the coral safe and clean. One of their big mandates is to keep plastic waste out of the ocean through local education but it’s a long road – sadly we did see a lot of plastic waste while snorkeling, some of which we picked up.

One morning we woke up before sunrise to see a pod of dolphins that frequent the area early morning. After a difficult start when the boat didn’t have any lifejackets and we had to scramble to get some at 5:30am, we did get out in time to see hundreds of dolphins so close we could have reached out and touched them from the boat. We also tried our hand at fishing and caught two small rainbow runners which were cooked up for dinner, and also caught a few plastic pieces…. I think you can follow the theme here…

Temples

With the very faithful Hindu population here, temples are a huge focus. While most homes have a shrine at their house, there are also a number of community temples. Families will visit from all around Bali to worship at a particular temple. We met a group travelling with 70 extended family members in two buses to pray at a variety of temples that day. We prayed alongside them at the beautiful local Melanting temple where we received a blessing from the priest. We donned sarongs and sashes for the occasion although still stuck out as the only white people there. The local kids we met there seemed particularly intrigued with Nicholas we think because of his blond hair!

We also visited the local Batu Kursi temple where people visit for help with their businesses. The kids pointed out that I might have benefited from a visit there over the past few years for the businesses I worked on! True true. It also had amazing views of the island. Lastly we went to the Jayaprana temple in the national park, dedicated to Bali’s own Romeo and Juliet story. Most fascinating about that visit was meeting a family who were giving a whole pig as an offering to the gods at that temple. They had carried it up steps for about 500 meters on a big stick and it was butchered right on the temple floor so they could leave some behind for the priests after the blessing.

Volcano Viewing

This next section was guest-written by Steve:

Lucas and I were alone for a picturesque hike up the Ijen volcano across the Bali strait in Java.  Unfortunately, the older brothers had a 24-hour bug and Fiona stayed back to make sure they were OK.  It was a serious hike, with steep inclines and a treacherous route down into  the crater. We wore canister masks to protect against the toxic sulphur fumes, all in the pitch black at 4 AM with hundreds of other tourists flocking to the site.  The descent proved too much for our running shoe grip, so we diverted from the highly touted blue flames of burning sulphur at the crater lake edge and instead hiked to a beautiful sunrise lookout along the rim.  Lucas was a trooper, outclimbing our guide and staying happy and excited through the entire trek (if a little cold). We were rewarded with gorgeous views of the rising sun over adjacent volcanoes, of the highly acidic but blue opaque crater lake as well as with a hundred comments of startled climbers asking how a little boy could hike so fast.  Despite the crowds, this is a site well worth visiting, just maybe not on a holiday weekend.

Coming up next

We have another week in Bali, but this time in a more touristy and urban location. Stay tuned!