2020.03.09 – Munduk – Ubud (Indonesia) – We continued to enjoy the mountain view during our last breakfast in Munduk. Our hired car showed up promptly at 10:30am for our 2h ride to Ubud. We had requested a stop along the way to take advantage of one of the selfie sites around Twin Lakes. We understood that selfie sites, which started to show up all over the world, were setup to provide Instagram-able scenery (e.g. giant swing, bird nest, heart shape, etc). We stopped at one of the sites which according to comments on Maps.me was much cheaper than other selfie site around. Unfortunately, we had to pass on the photo opportunity as even this latest site wanted over $10cdn per person to access their small Instagram-able site. On route, we retraced some of the road we had taken during our one-day Lovina tour. Upon our arrival in Ubud, we quickly realized that it was a tourist mecca with all its accommodations and restaurants. After our driver dropped us off, we were able to check-in into our room. After settling in, we visited the nearby large and popular yoga business for some information but we were not impressed by the welcome. Later we had lunch and struggled with the menu prices. On our walk back to the hotel, we checked several restaurant menus for breakfast and concluded that the food prices were twice as expensive than other towns we had visited. We bought some snacks at a nearby grocery store. Back at our room, we reviewed our excursions/activity options for our stay in Ubud. We also spent a fair amount of time on TripAdvisor reading restaurant reviews. We ended up having our evening meal at a restaurant across the street from our accommodation.
2020.03.10 – Ubud – Ubud (Indonesia) – Exceptionally, our accommodation booking had not included a breakfast. At check-in yesterday, we thought that their breakfast buffet at $7.5cdn was very expensive. We had to reconsider our view as the breakfast offering from other restaurants were at least as expensive if not more. After filling-up at the buffet, we went out to explore Ubud’s streets, temple sites and market. As Jenny was hoping to enjoy a spa treatment tomorrow and we had not heard back from our online booking yesterday, we decided to drop by their facilities. Jenny was able to register on-site for their Holistic Spa Treatment (5.5h) with free lunch and hotel pick-up/drop-off. On our walk back to our accommodation, we bought another SD card for our camera as we started to have additional memory card issues yesterday. We bought a few snacks and beers before returning to our hotel. After a rest in our room, we went for a visit of the famous Monkey Forest which was very near to our accommodation. The site was home to over 700 monkeys roaming freely. It was hailed as both a great tourist attraction and a tourist hell. After reading many of the bad tourist stories, it was apparent that those folks had not followed the park’s guidelines for dealing with the monkeys. Before our visit, we made sure we had no food, no water bottle, no backpack with us to avoid tempting any of the monkeys. Our one hour and half visit was uneventful with the monkeys. Nonetheless, at the end of the day, Jenny felt like she had aged a few years as a result of her fear of the monkeys. Late afternoon, we enjoyed our hotel’s infinity pool. We visited a nearby warung for our evening meal.
2020.03.11 – Ubud – Ubud (Indonesia) – After breakfast, Jenny was picked up at our hotel lobby by the Spa salon for her 10am appointment for her Holistic Spa Treatment package (5.5h) that included: a traditional Balinese Massage (60m); body scrub and mask (120m); facial treatment(60m); hair spa (30m); manicure(30m) and pedicure(30m). While Jenny relaxed at the Spa, I tracked down a bicycle rental outfit and rented one of their mountain bicycles for $3cdn/day. Soon after, I was riding in Ubud’s countryside along rice fields. Even along busier road and drenched in sweat, the cycling was still very much enjoyable. I managed to visit the Goa Gajah (Elephant Cave) before returning to Ubud and dropping the bicycle off after a good 25km ride. Jenny and I showed up at the hotel almost at the same time. We enjoyed another swim in the infinity pool before heading out for our last evening meal in Ubud.
2020.03.12 – Ubud – Seminyak (Indonesia) – Throughout our walks on the streets of Ubud we kept on being offered taxi/transport services. The local drivers were apparently on all-out war against online car sharing services such as Grab or Go-Jek. They had posted large signs all over the city indicating that the use of such services were banned in Ubud. After breakfast, we still managed to book discretely our GrabCar for the drive to Seminyak – some 25kms further. While waiting for the car to arrive, the driver had even texted us reminding us to avoid saying we were using our Grab application. We managed to sneak into our car for an uneventful ride to Seminyak. We helped our driver locate our accommodation using Maps.me. After our check-in, we enjoyed a swim at our accommodation’s small pool. It rained late afternoon after which we headed out for our evening meal at a nearby restaurant.
2020.03.13 – Seminyak – Seminyak (Indonesia) – We had a great and plentiful breakfast at our small hotel. Later, the hotel staff offered us a ride to the beach where we walked on the sand for a few kms under the hot sun. We returned to our hotel for a long cool down and rest in our room. It rained heavily most of the afternoon. In the evening, as the rain had stopped, we took a GrabCar to a restaurant for our evening meal. We started to walk back to our accommodation but we got caught in another downpour. We ended calling a GrabCar for the last km back to our hotel. The rain continued for most of the evening and night.
2020.03.14 – Seminyak – Seminyak (Indonesia) – After another fabulous breakfast, we headed out for a visit of the Seminyak shopping mall. Although Jenny browsed many clothes store for a top to help block the sun, she was not successful at finding the right clothes… at the right price. We stopped for a popular cafe for a latte. On the walk back to the hotel, we stopped at a grocery store for snack and beers and managed to withdraw more funds at an ATM. Back at our room, we rested for the later part of the afternoon before returning for a swim at our hotel’s pool. We went out to nearby restaurant for our last evening meal in Seminyak. We also made a gelato stop on the way back to our hotel.
2020.03.15 – Seminyak – Pemuteran (Indonesia) – After an early breakfast, we took a GrabCar from our hotel to the Ubung Bus terminal. Upon our arrival there, we were quickly ushered in a waiting bus and asked to pay our travel immediately. Although we probably paid an extra 2-3 cdn as foreigner on the bus, we were just happy for not have to wait for a transport. After a 3.5h bus ride, we were dropped off at an important roadside intersection. We bargained with a bemo driver for a ride to Pemuteran some 20kms on a side road. As only three passengers from the bus boarded the bemo, the driver waited for more passengers to show up. In the meantime, we looked up our Grab application and discovered we could order a car to Pemuteran. Some 10 minutes after our request, the GrabCar showed up and we boarded the car. Unfortunately, the Grab driver got caught in argument with the bemos drivers waiting for fares. Ultimately, the Grab driver was very apologetic and he explained that he could not take us to Pemuteran. By then the bemo had filled up with more passengers and we started on the road as soon as we boarded. The bemo dropped us off on the main road in Pemuteran just 100m away from our accommodation. After checking in our nice bungalow, we went for a swim in the pool. We enjoyed having a latte and cappuccino from the poolside bar. We were so impressed by the peaceful town and our comfortable accommodation. It had so many activities nearby that we opted to extend our stay by another day before moving on to the island of Java. We were very thankful that we modified our travel itinerary to include a stop in Pemuteran where quickly appeared to be our favorite destination in Bali. In the evening, we ate at our accommodation’s restaurant.
2020.03.16 – Pemuteran – Pemuteran (Indonesia) – After breakfast, we showed up at the reception at 8:45am for the start of our half-day snorkeling excursion around Menjangan Island. We were joined on the tour by five other travelers (3 Korean and 2 Denmark). We experienced some of the best snorkeling we had in Indonesia to date. Unfortunately, the recent rain and current had brought enormous quantity of rubbish – mostly plastic bags, wrappers and containers in the sea strait between Java and Bali. It was a sad view to see so many wonderful fishes and coral under water while facing floating rubbish in the water. Towards the end of snorkeling activity, we joined our tour guide at collecting plastic rubbish from the water as we swam around. Back at our accommodation, we enjoyed once again a swim in the pool and some coffee from the poolside bar. We also had our evening meal at our accommodation. Over the past week, we noticed governments from Europe and North America took increasing measures to battle the Covid-19 pandemic. Today, we learned that the Canadian government was urging their citizen abroad to come home as quickly as possible – while they still could.
2020.03.17 – Pemuteran – Pemuteran (Indonesia) – During our breakfast, we discussed our travel options as to whether we should stop our travel and attempt to fly back home as per the government’s request. As we currently feel quite comfortable on the road and no one has been fighting over toilet paper, we’ve agreed to continue our journey until Jakarta after which we’ll reassess our options. We had planned for a nearby hike to a temple but we opted to take it easy due to the hot weather. Nonetheless, we spent some time investigating our home internet outage since the last couple of days. With the generous help of our neighbor friends, they were able to get our internet access at home working again. In the afternoon, we went snorkeling from the beach to explore the Biorock site. Under the Biorock rehabilitation project, the locals had built metal structures at the bottom of the seabed and fed it with some low voltage to help accelerate the formation of coral. It was an interesting snorkeling discovery. We finished the afternoon in our accommodation’s pool. In the evening, we walked back to the main street to try a different restaurant for our last night meal in Pemuteran.
