 |
| Mom and baby at the Monkey Forest in Bali. |
We woke up after our first night in Ubud on the island of Bali. We went and had an absolutely delicious and plentiful buffet at the Hotel, the fruit here is soooo fresh, juicy and tasty.  |
| Water features, Hindu shrines and temples and statues are prolific here in Bali. |
We took the complimentary hotel shuttle to Ubud Center. The shuttle was open air and this does not mean fresh air in Bali.
 |
Stunning gates to homes and family Temples are everywhere. Each Hindu family has their own temple in their yard or house. Hinduism represents 80% of the people in Bali.
|
Exhaust from hundreds of scooters and vehicles on the road is not refreshing. Traffic has increased by about 90% on the roads and the infrastructure was not built for this many tourists.
We walked around the stores and the shops in the center of Ubud, stopped for an Iced Coffee and made our way to Monkey Forest. We walked about 11,000 steps in the Ubud Center area to get to the Monkey Forest. In this kind of heat and humidity it can be highly exhausting. |
| The Lotus Flower was made out of sugar. |
 |
| This was delish, they make excellent coffee in Bali. |
Monkey Forest has changed tremendously since we were here 14 years ago but I would have to say it actually has changed for the better. It was free 14 years ago and it simply was a park where a bunch of monkeys lived. Now it is a place where you pay to get into the park. The park now costs 100,000 Indonesian Rupiah which is equivalent to about $9 Canadian per person.
The park has been built up with a lot of statues to prettify it and the monkeys now are very well cared for which I like and there's even a veterinarian clinic in the park to care for them.
You can walk around but you have to keep your eyes open and your hands out of your pockets. You can easily accidentally step on a tail of a monkey or back into one or you might walk under a tree and a monkey might want to play with your hair. If you stick your hands in your pockets, they assume that you're going to give them something even though you are strictly forbidden to feed the monkeys. Stupid people are everywhere and they still continue to feed the monkeys. I had a small water bottle in my pocket and one monkey climbed up my leg and tried to grab it because he thought it might be something that he or she would like to own or eat. The monkey had very very soft, velvety hands and it didn't hurt me. It just scared me to death and I screamed and swore at the same time.
There are many baby monkeys and very tiny little cute things with big ears. The Mommies are very protective of their babies as they should be and usually turn their back to you with their baby hugged to their stomachs.
You are supposed to keep your distance and I definitely did. But once again there are very many stupid people on this planet and there was literally human moms and dads that let their toddlers touch the monkeys and play with the monkeys.
These monkeys have big teeth and there was a monkey that wanted the water tap turned on so Darren turned on the water tap and the monkey was thankful. Another monkey came to the water tap and I thought I would turn on the water tap for the monkey because they aren't strong enough to push it and he grabbed my finger and pulled it with his soft velvety little hands and hissed at me. He also scared the crap out of me, but maybe I wasn't that smart to do that for him or her? I might have been one of those stupid people that I had mentioned? |
| I love this photo, see Darren's thumb pressing the tap down and the little monkey hand in the water. |
 |
| The same monkey that Darren helped with his water situation. |
 |
| A different water tap and puzzled monkey. He could turn the tap on but when he bent down to drink he kept accidentally turning it off. I wanted to help but I had learned my lesson. |
We came across a little swimming pool for the monkeys and let me tell you they were having a blast in that pool. The younger monkeys were jumping in and out of the water and pushing each other in and one monkey even did a cannonball, which I captured in a photo. Then an older male decided to provide us with Monkey Porn. Apparently they have sex 6 or more times a day according to the workers. They have had to sterilize some males and females because their numbers are up to 1260 currently.
 |
| One monkey is doing a cannonball into the pool and there is a lurid seen to the left. |
No matter what, monkeys are one of the more entertaining animals and most likely because they are very similar to human beings and their family dynamics are similar. Humans and monkeys are highly protective of their own. Some of these monkey family units are much stronger than some of the human family units I experienced as an educator, unfortunately.  |
| Eating corn on the cob - monkey style. |
We had a great time at the Monkey Forest walking through the forest paths, seeing, experiencing and spending time with the various monkeys and their families.  |
| Very interesting Monkey States at the Monkey Forest. |
We took a cab for 400,000 rupiah to the Tagalalang Rice Terraces which were an incredibly disappointing adventure. In fact, when we arrived we could not believe what a grotesque commercialization of Balinese culture that was on display. These particular rice terraces are now no longer viable and so incredibly Disney, that it's sickening. Save yourself the disappointment and don't go. We literally got out of the van walked up to the top view point and realized what this was and went and told our driver to please go and get the car to take us back. We were not remotely interested in paying for a Swing over the rice terraces, Ziplining, or Biking on a High Wire over the rice terraces. There were photo shoot opportunities with large heart seats and other awful ways to profit off these once beautiful rice terraces. What did any of this have to do with Rice Terraces? You could pay to walk down into the terraces but why bother, they were dead. |
| This is what they look like now, they don't even have water in them. |
We had more authenticity driving past actual rice terraces and stopping to take pictures of the actual rice workers in their rice fields.  |
| Authentic rice field worker. |
 |
| Authentic rice field. |
We had asked our driver to take us back to Ubud Center where we had a chance to walk around Ubud Palace.
 |
| They had just dressed these guys in skirts last week for a festival. |
We caught a cab back to the Element Ubud Hotel for 100,000 rupiah.
 |
| Fruit for sale. |
 |
| I love these photos when people carry things on their heads and make it look so incredibly easy. |
 |
| Basket stores are very common and so are stray dogs. |
 |
| A family of 4 to a scooter. |
 |
| Ubud area is so safe that no one really locks up their stores. Theft is very uncommon. This photo was taken late at night as we walked by on our way to an Alfa Mart. |
 |
| Some of the candy for sale. |
 |
| This was the wrapper of a Yogurt, Fruit and Nut Bar. It was very different but I decided that I kind of liked it and bought another one. The chocolate is not good so this had to do. |
Later we went for a swim in the pools at the hotel.
 |
| From our balcony. |
We called it a night after a nice long cool shower which is very much needed in this climate.
The next day we woke up to a beautiful day  |
| Sunrise in Ubud. |
and had another fabulous complimentary buffet breakfast at the hotel due to my elite membership. I always have to try new fruits and there was one today that resembled a strawberry but you had to peel it first and then there were nuts covered in fruity flesh inside which tasted a bit like Bailey's or some sort of weird liqueur taste and it was a bit crunchy like a soft almond. None of us really cared for it too much and it is called a Snake Fruit and the skin does look like a snake. |
| Snake Fruit |
 |
Snake Fruit peeled.
|
We hired a taxi for 330,000 rupiah for a return trip to Ubud Traditional Spa.
This Spa had a 4.9 review rating which is extremely high and hundreds of reviews, so I chose this Spa for our Spa Day. The Spa was 5 kms away from the hotel but it took 35 minutes to get to which gives you some indication of how insane the traffic is here. The Spa was very pretty and had beautiful Couples Rooms with their own showers and toilet.
 |
This was a large bug that was about 1.5 inches long. I saw it at the Spa and I had to include it. It flew like a Bee but looked like a Hornet.
|
 |
| Following Wiwik to the Couple's Room |
We were seated first and had Lemongrass Mint drinks given to us to hydrate us. An wet ice cold cloths were given to us to wear on the back of our neck which was much appreciated in this climate.
Each of us got to pick out our massage oil from 4 choices of Lemongrass, Frangipany, Ylang Ylang and Mixed Flower.  |
| Frangipany Trees |
All four of us went for the Spa Day and there were two Couple Rooms, so it was nice and private. Each of us had a 90 minute Traditional Balinese Massage which is a lot of Myo-Fascia Release techniques. It was amazing and my lady called Wiwik was extremely strong and gave me a full-on pressure massage. Next was a 60 minute Traditional Balinese Reflexology for feet and calves which was intense and very much needed. Last was a 30 minute scrub which left our skin feeling very soft and moisturized. It was a concoction of Avacado, Rice Pulp and Frangipany which was rubbed and scrubbed into our skin and left to dry for 5 minutes and then rubbed off. All of the treatments were sensational! With taxes and gratuity the 3 hours each of treatments was 1,518,000 rupiah for each couple or 66 CND each person for 3 hours each, which is a definite bargain. The Reflexology was 90% better than the treatment I had in Saskatoon and the massage was just as good as I get in Saskatoon, if not better. The scrub and rub was more of a body mask and I would have preferred a real sugar scrub to buff my skin. Maybe next time.A warm tea was served after the treatments and it had a Lemongrass and Licorice flavor and it was really good.
We were all very relaxed and tired after the treatments and made our way back to the hotel.
We went for supper at the Andong Teras Restaurant again and had another fabulous Nasi Goreng dish which was super delicious!!
Comments
Post a Comment