I’m currently on a trip to Indonesia. I’ve spent the first month in Bali, mostly surfing. But I’ve also had a chance to do some other tourist activities. So, let’s dump some pictures here, with just a little textual context…
Uluwatu
Uluwatu (on the Bukit peninsula in Bali’s south) has some of the most popular surf spots on Bali. While I didn’t surf there myself, I dropped by to enjoy the sunset from the cliffs right above. If you look closely, you can see crowds of surfers out in the line up:
Earlier that day, I visited the Uluwatu temple (Pura Luhur Uluwatu), which is famous for its monkey inhabitants:
Garuda Wisnu Kencana
The Garuda Wisnu Kencana Cultural Park (GWK) is another tourist attraction on the Bukit peninsula. While it lacks the long history of Bali’s temples, it is also considered a site of religious significance. Like any place on Bali, it holds a couple of Hindu shrines.
The main attraction is clearly the ginormous statue of the deities Vishnu and Garuda though. It can be seen in the distance from Kuta’s beaches and anywhere else in southern Bali. I also liked the artificial cliffs that they’ve carved into the limestone rocks of the park.
Gunung Batur & Gunung Agung
Gunung Agung is Bali’s highest mountain, towering over the eastern part of the island. I had seen it from across the Lombok Strait when climbing Gunung Rinjani back in 2003. Ever since then I wanted to climb this “Great Mountain”, if I ever spent more time on Bali.
However, Gunung Agung isn’t the only volcano on Bali. There’s also the Bedugul volcanic area with Gunung Batukaru, and Gunung Batur, and some others. Gunung Batur has an impressive double caldera around it, with Lake Batur inside and Gunung Abang as the highest point on the caldera rim. Most of the caldera rim is inhabited and easily accessible, so I stayed at Batur View Homestay (close to Kintamani) in preparation of my mountain hike. I could see the whole Batur caldera right from my room, and even Gunung Agung looming in the distance:
For Gunung Agung itself, I booked a packaged tour with a local guide. Traveling alone, a “1-day-hike” without on-mountain accommodation seemed the only reasonable option. “1-night-hike” may be more accurate, since most guides offer this as a sunrise hike: you climb all night to reach the summit around sunrise.
The tour started near Besakih, approaching the Great Mountain from the west. There are multiple western routes up the mountain, we took the “Edelweiss Route”. It’s almost 2000m up from the trail-head to the summit, most of it in fairly steep terrain.
We made good progress initially, but we wanted to avoid arriving at the summit too early. No point freezing our asses off while waiting for sunrise. So we decided to take a short break (and a nap) at a campsite about 600m below the summit, in the wind-sheltered forest zone. We still had a third of the ascent left afterwards, measured in altitude. See the GPS metrics:
| GPX: | Ascent Pt.1 | Ascent Pt.2 | Descent |
| Distance: | 5km | 1.4km | 6.8km |
| Start – End Altitudes: | 1230m – 2486m (+1256m) | 2499m – 3062m (+563m) | 3063m – 1231m (-1832m) |
| Climb / Descent*: | 1475m / 220m | 616m / 53m | 77m / 1908m |
| Time: | 22:52 – 2:04 (3h 13m) | 4:03 – 5:30 (1h 27m) | 6:04 – 8:56 (2h 53m) |
* Overall climb and descent as calculated from GPS data. Numbers seem exaggerated, because GPS altitude measurements have a lot of jitter. Apparently more than the latitude/longitude measurements used to calculate distance.
After a steep climb, we arrived at the more mellow ridge to the western summit around dawn. Afaict, this is the highest peak of Gunung Agung. The view to the east was partially clouded, so we didn’t bother continuing to the other peak that lies about 5 minutes to the east.
It had been a fairly clear night, almost at full moon. And we could see a lot of lights below us, not just in the urban centers around Denpasar, but all over the slopes and foothills of the mountains. Just shows how densely populated most of Bali is. Doesn’t show well on photos though, so I’ll start with snapshots from the summit… Did I mention that the guide’s dog had followed us all the way up? Also, that (for reasons) we were the only ones on the summit this day?
If you look closely, you can spot parts of Lombok to the east, even get a glimpse of Gunung Rinjani and the Gilies. And Nusa Penida to the south, located closer to Bali.
Looking to the west, I just love the shadow that stratovolcanoes cast on their surroundings early in the day. Plus we had great views of Gunung Batur and many of the other volcanoes on Bali. And even the volcanic peaks on the eastern tip of Java.
We descended on the same route that we had come up, that is to the west. Due to the mountains own shadow, it didn’t get too hot initially. The descent was way less strenuous, but still challenging due to all the loose gravel and mud in the forest zone.
Further down the mountain, we encountered first signs of agriculture. Including plantations of Javanese Edelweiss, which explained the name of our route:
Around Ubud
After hiking the Great Mountain, I returned to my accommodation on the Batur caldera rim, and I had to rest for the remainder of the day. The next day, I headed back to the coast, to Seminyak. But I wanted to do more sight-seeing, too, so I stopped at Ubud along the way.
And I found a great way to get from Gunung Batur to Ubud: a relaxing mountain-bike tour, all down-hill, but at a mellow pace. The good folks from Dewa Bike Tours brought their bikes and a guide right to my homestay and took my bulky luggage on their van. They later dropped me off in the center of Ubud, and even kept my luggage safe at their base, where I could pick it up in the evening.
My bike was in good shape and seemed just right for this tour. It had a solid suspension fork and good disc breaks. I only struggled with the break levers being mounted the “wrong” way around. At home, we usually have the rear break on the right hand, but here it was on the left hand. (This seems to be the case more often in countries that drive on the left side of the road, though it does not seem to be a strict rule.) Anyway, I managed to avoid pulling the wrong break for a slide and going over the handlebars instead.
It was mostly sunny, but not too hot. We were still rather high up on the gentle mountain slopes, and the wind chill did the rest. We did a couple of sight-seeing stops, but frankly I enjoyed the landscape most. Palm trees and rice-paddies – my favorite tone of green:
I’ve got mixed feelings about Ubud itself. In a guide book I’ve read that visitors should take at least a week to explore this town and its surroundings. But frankly, I think my afternoon stopover was just about right.
Sure, Ubud may have the nicest temples and palaces on the island. And I really do like their style – as elaborate as European Baroque, but not quite as tacky. Then again, I can see this anywhere else on Bali. Plus I still feel reluctant to visit active religious sites.
So I picked just one such site at random, guided by geographic proximity. Turned out to be the Water Palace, which I really enjoyed. Traditional attire was mandatory, but rental garments were included in the entrance fee:
Otherwise I was just strolling through town. Loads of tourist-focused bars and restaurants. But not a single humble warung or bakso stand along my random walk. In the early afternoon it started raining, so I took shelter at some indoor souvenir stands. A superficial inspection did not reveal a single item that I’d wish to posses or gift to someone else.
Ubud is also famous for yoga and meditation. Nothing wrong with that, and it’s on me that I didn’t bring enough time for it. Then again, why not do this anywhere else on the planet?
In the end I just admired all the temple gates in passing – and the elaborate electric wiring:
Despite fearing this would be a treacherous tourist trap, I eventually made my way to the Sacred Monkey Forest in the south of Ubud. This turned out to be a rather pleasant experience. I do like monkeys, and though they are all over the place on Bali, these ones were particularly playful and approachable.
But it’s the forest itself that I’ve enjoyed most – or rather the well-maintained park. It had nice little gorge with a creek running through. And all sort of amazing trees, including many Banyan trees (or similar kinds of strangler figs). Human infrastructure and decoration complemented this nicely:
The Surf
Apart from all of the above, I did do loads of surfing. I was staying at two different surf camps for most of the time, each for about 2 weeks. One was Kima Surf in Seminyak, the other was Rapture Surf Greenbowl, in the south of the Bukit peninsula.
Here’s some impressions from the camps, mostly Rapture:
Both Kima and Rapture had great surf guiding (and coaching), which gave me a chance to get to know many different surf spots in southern Bali. This included the western beach breaks around Seminyak, Legian, and Kuta. Also many reef breaks on the Bukit peninsula, such as Balangan, Dreamland, Greenball, and several spots around Nusa Dua (Mushroom, Black Stone, Geger, Nico). We also had great boat-trips to Torotoro (close to Airport Rights).
I didn’t take detailed notes on the surf sessions, but one thing that I can say is that we had surfable waves almost every day. Except for three days towards the end of my stay on Bali, when it was just too flat everywhere.
While I did heaps of shopping on Bali, I still haven’t bought my own surfboard. Instead, I rented different boards, starting with an 8 foot foamy for the first couple of days, then various hard tops between 8’2″ and 7’6″.
Both Kima and Rapture had camera crews around on several sessions. This means that there now is tenfold the surfing footage of me than before this trip. Including video footage that helped me seeing my own mistakes, but also some nice pics that I can share. Still loads of room for improvement, but looking pretty good occasionally. At least on smaller waves:
Epilogue
As said initially, I’m still in Indonesia as I’m posting this. However, I have moved on from Bali by now. As I had learned on previous trips, other parts of Indonesia have quite a different vibe. Then again, even the more remote regions of Bali are very different from the tourist centers in southern Bali. I guess it’s fair to speak of over-tourism there. Of course, I was part of this problem myself.
I want to ends this post with some creative signage that I spotted on Bali. And with one of the mini gas-stations that are all over the place. Not sure why hadn’t noticed these on previous trips to Indonesia:
