Year-end Bali holiday - Instalment 1

Yes. We went to Bali!!

To be honest, Bali was never on my list of top destinations. Nowadays I find I have to be really wired and excited about a destination for me to get into the mood of doing some kickass planning :) Which I was not about Bali. We decided to spend a week there (which most people told us was too much – they were wrong, as it turned out) and end the holiday with 3 days in Singapore.

I did some basic research (if I’d done more, I think I would have planned it very differently; more on that later), talked to friends who had travelled there recently, used our miles to buy tickets, booked the hotels, organized visas, and finally, we were all set. 

We transited through Singapore to land in Denpasar on a windy rainy day. Our first 4 days were booked at a hotel in Sanur, which CN traveller has rated as one of the best family-friendly beaches in Asia. Family-friendly took on a new meaning – I did not expect super-calm waters, tiny little waves, and the ability to walk in deep and still be only waist deep in the Indian ocean :) The protected lagoon was fabulous because I could just let Ads go in with no fear whatsoever though I still had to keep a tight rein on Y. S used to keep showing off by floating on his back in the ocean while Ads did some gymnastics in the water and pretended to swim while I was so pathetic that I could not even float (yes all my swimming lessons and achievements have come to nought thanks to zero practice). The hotel (which I later found was one of the oldest boutique hotels in Bali) was very old-world, built in traditional Balinese style, right on Sanur beach and the Sanur boardwalk. We had to walk a few steps to reach the beach from our quaint “village bungalow”, and we were happy to spend the first 24 hours doing nothing but exploring the resort, the beach and the one long main street in Sanur.

The bathroom with a lovely mosaic bathtub, lots of green outside and you can't see it, but outside is an open air shower!

The sitting room

Killer app - a little gazebo outside the bungalow. Perfect for drawing, or (for me) reading with a cup of Earl Grey beside me:)

Sanur beach. Very clean and calm.

Day 2 - we hired a car and driver to explore South Bali, which is the more touristy crowded part of Bali (Sanur is north-eastern Bali). We drove to Pandawa beach which was nice and filled with families enjoying themselves in the water unmindful of a steady drizzle. 

Pandawa Beach under a grey stormy sky

By the time we reached Uluwatu temple, the drizzle was a downpour and we struggled to hold onto our umbrellas as we ascended to the clifftop temple. The views were magnificent and made even more majestic under the stormy skies. Thanks to the rain, we missed the Kecak and fire dance which I was looking forward. Later after I found out that it was not a traditional dance but had been invented by a German painter/musician who had created it primarily for western audiences, I did not particularly care to see it performed.

View as we climbed upto the temple

So that was the end of a very wet Day 2- Days 3 and 4 coming up!