Bali Java 2010: Ubud

Ubud is charming, the main phrase you here over and over and over again however, is "taxi" or men approach you making hand symbols that are to mean the revving of a motorcycle, a taxi is not needed as its quite a walkable city.

As much as the intense commercial aspect of a tourist city like Ubud can get on my nerves after 6 days, its been very nice. I've eaten in a lot of interesting places, but have returned several times to the Lotus Cafe where the food is excellent, unusual and there are many more things on the menu I'd like to try than days left in Ubud.

I've enjoyed both of my hotels, and particularly my present one, possibly one of the most luxurious I've had. Shopping is what one does here and the prices are geared to the European traveler so not to my tastes, particularly compared with the beautiful thing I regularly find in India, where I'll be in about a month. Outside of the commercial area, which I imagine has grown in all directions in recent years, there are nice walks in the rice paddies. So many of the buildings look new, that it does seem to be recent development.

There are cultural events every night, I've seen two concerts and a free shadow puppet theatre at my hotel that was being put on for another group, I think from what it sounded like, a group of American students. Tonight one can show up at the nicely organized tourist desk in the center of town and catch a free bus to a bamboo gamelan concert in a nearby village.

Its very very very hot, so I am on my usual routine of being up early and then again in the late afternoon and am thankful when its hazy, as I can be out walking earlier in the afternoon. One of the highlights, which you will see some photos of, is the Monkey Forest preserve, some interesting temples and a lot of monkeys and amazing densely tropical water and trees.

Today I braved public transportation to the capitol city of Denpasar, about 40 minutes away, not that its a problem once you are on it, but with so many potential taxi drivers and other types of transport services, actually ending up on a public bus and not on a more expensive "special" bus is a challenge, and not one I always met successfully, but I did get there and back. My impression is that people think you're plain nuts if you are a tourist and want to take a public bus, but for me, it spells liberation from bargaining with taxi drivers, which I must do later this week to get to some of the temples on my list that remain to be seen. Denpasar is not given much credit in my guidebook, but at least in the area around the beautiful museum, large park and main temple, it was gracious, shady and tree-lined and I enjoyed a long walk after I had visited the temple and museum.

I'm getting restless as I usually do, and rather than spending all of my remaining days here, I'll spend the last three at Sanur, described as a quiet beach in an authentic Balinese village on the south penninsula. Its described as a bit sleepy as its mostly populated by retired Brits. That will be fine for me, compared to my other beach experience in Kuta. Plus its near one of the most important temples, on a ridge that sticks out on the far south coast, an area that is not built up for tourism at all. Trying to see that from Ubud would have been quite a drive and probably at quite a price. I think saying good-by to Bali at the beach will be quite appropriate.