Semester 7 Chapter XXII: Bali Traffic & Reunions

Okay, back on this thing. Took a while simply because of the fact I was away from my laptop for a bit, busy driving around Bali and collecting memories. However, couple of hours ago, we arrived back to our Gili T base so it’s that time again. So just sit back, get some snacks, and get ready for another stream of thoughts from your favorite blogger. We’re back in the building!

Last week, we spent couple more days on Gili T, mostly just chilling and taking things super easy. Felt pretty good after the whole Lombok trip. I had a chance to spend some more quality father-son time with the old-timer... I’m talking beers, cigars, good food. The good life. We did some shopping over here for the nephew/grandson, spent a lotta time in our pool, and even met up with one of my favorite people on Sunday. She’s my Shanghai fam and she arrived on Sunday for one night with couple of her friends. We hung around the island, had a dinner at the night market, and Monday morning, all of us went for a dive. Two guys in the group were already certified so we did the earlier dive with them, and the following one as the whole gang – after the girls finished their pool tests. Visibility was good, turtles and fish were all over the place, but most importantly, it was all of us down there. Talk about great time.

After some GIli chilling, we packed our things, and Thursday morning, we were on our way to Padang Bai. Funny thing is, if you wanna go from Gilis to Bali, you have to invest 250k into a ticket that includes bus transport all the way to Denpasar – it is impossible to buy the ticket just to Padang Bai - trust me, I tried. Anyways, we arrived around noon, I managed to get us a scooter and right after that, a real fucking heavy storm started. And I’m talking that kinda rain that does not even allow you considering driving or walking in it. And it just wouldn’t stop. Eventually, we got stuck in a café in the town for the rest of the day and spent a night in a hostel right next to it. Traveling sometimes comes with such situations. It wasn’t too bad tho. The guys made me couple of vegan pancakes, my dad got himself a solid amount of beers, we were good.

Friday morning, the weather was beautiful again. I arranged another scooter (both of them 60k a day) and we took it to the Mount Batur, specifically to the Batur Lake right by it. After a bit of highway, we started climbing up. Unlike in Lombok, lotta roads in Bali are quite busy. Which makes driving a bit more challenging and the experience a bit less pleasant. Nevertheless, I still consider getting around with your scooter by far the best option when you’re in the area. We arrived to our accommodation early in the afternoon, dropped our things and took a walk up the mountain. We made it pretty close to the top and enjoyed some amazing views at the lake. After we made it back down, we drove to a village nearby for some dinner. We wrapped the day up with some rice wine arranged by our host. First, he brought us arak - some super strong homemade liquor, which we kindly declined, and then we got our favorite. It tastes different in Bali – a bit less sweet but still real tasty.

Saturday morning, we drove back to Padang Bai to return my dad’s scooter. We got some lunch while at it, and then me and my gf took it to Canggu on our bike, while my dad hopped on a bus to meet us later. That drive was insane. I was speeding through the highway but when we made it to the city, the real bullshit started. I’m talking traffic beyond crazy. Those 70km took us like 1,5 hours but that’s only cause I was basically breaking every traffic rule imaginable. Which is actually not so bad – all I did was following the flow – rules don’t mean much on the roads over here. We made it to our hostel and waited for our dad. The poor guy did the same route by bus and it took over 4 hours – you get the idea. I picked him up later in the afternoon and we did another nightmarish ride through the city. In the evening, all of us met up with the gang, that we dived with couple of days back on Gilis, and my Montenegrin sisters, who arrived earlier in the week. Everybody’s leaving Shanghai due to this coronavirus bullshit. Interesting times over there – no idea how my future’s gonna shape up at this point. Anyways, it felt super nice to catch up with the fam. We got some beers by the beach, walked to this skate bar to get some more drinks while watching skaters doing some crazy shit in the pool, and ended up in this club named Volt. Drinking, dancing, having a great time. Also, the first time me and my gf hit a club like that. We still have couple of firsts to do.

We made it home around 4am, and two hours later, we woke up to say bye to my dad. Again, I’m extremely happy he visited and the fact he enjoyed all the adventures and chilling makes me feel warm inside. I see you pops! And we got more of this in the barrel for the upcoming years, trust me... After he jumped into a cab, we rested for a bit more and went for a breakfast. Canggu feels like a Western colony for real. Restaurants, gyms, clothes stores, white people. Not the best for getting authentic Indonesian experience, but pretty cool to get the sense of the city again. I went for some great vegan burger and milkshake (aka the afterparty finest), and after that we jumped back on the scooter and took it all the way up north to Lovina Beach. I was kinda hoping for cute calm mountain roads, but that motherfucker was something else. Basically main road the whole time, spiced up by some rain. Fortunately, it did not get as bad as in Padang Bai, so we made it to the other side of the island, and later in afternoon, we checked into a place close to the beach. While drinking our welcome drinks (ice coffee), we got approached by a guy who offered us shit to do for the next day. We heard him out, and he actually came up with some solid, reasonably priced plan. We paid a million each, and went to grab a dinner. There’s huge dolphin statue on the beach (dolphin is the city’s symbol), under which we got into a conversation with a local. We had a nice chat, after which he showed us some necklaces he makes. He was not pushy at all, explained how he makes them, the vibe was really nice. I’m not the kinda guy who collects shit like that but it just felt right. I mean, initially, my gf just got some for her and her mom and sis, but we ended up taking one more for me. It’s a nice one, and I really enjoy wearing it (it symbolizes peace too!). Wonder if it’s the kinda thing that would not work outside of Indonesia, or if I’m gonna hippie up my style long-term. We had a delicious dinner in a Warung nearby. I’m talking some serious dinner date with wine and all. Lovina is tourism ready, but way less crowded than the southern part of the island, everything is a bit slower and chilled over there – overall, a nice change after the previous day.

Monday morning, we woke up before 6am to catch our first activity. We went to the beach and jumped into a boat. It was the two of us, some Japanese guy and a guy driving the boat. We took it further to the sea for some dolphins watching. There were quite a lot of small boats loaded with tourists gathered up in the area for the same exact reason. And yeah, there were a lot of fucking dolphins. Never seen any before – real beautiful. The whole thing took around 2 hours which felt just about right, and after that, we got ourselves some breakfast in the hotel. We followed the breakfast with a ride to the dive school around the corner to test our gear. That’s right, as a part of the package purchased the day before, we got 2 dives at Menjangan Island, which is located in a natural park in the norh-west part of Bali. For about 60km, I followed the school’s van on a highway, going 90km/h for the most part. After our arrival, my driving skills got complimented by the van’s driver – it’s nice to get some acknowledgement, as I feel I was killing it the whole time. After that, we hopped on another boat and to the island we went. And boy oh boy, those dives were awesome. Corals all alive, visibility beautiful, life everywhere. The only downside was, that our dive master (I’m guessing late 50s) didn’t give a shit about safety. I mean, I’m only open water and I was shocked how little he cared about all the basic explanations and procedures I consider essential. Anyways, our first dive took about 45 minutes before we got into a pretty strong current and since I didn’t manage to get under it, and after a while simply lost power to fight it, I got shot up to the surface. Quite an ascend – from like 15 meters almost all the way up there. Then, instead of doing 3 minutes’ safety stop at five meters, the guy just pulled me up to make it even worse. His explanation: his BCD was already inflated. That also meant we left my gf behind. Just like that. Fuck everything. We got some lunch on the island with some deer just roaming around – the island is actually nicknamed The Deer Island for that reason. They are not afraid of people, they’re just chilling. Our second dive was also great – an hour by a reef, we didn’t go too deep which allowed sunrays to light up the whole experience; breathtaking. Later in the afternoon, we were back on our scooter riding by the shore down south. We made a stop in a town of Negara and decided to spend a night over there. After we found a place, we went to buy some water, and found a supermarket with some arcades on the second floor – all super local. We spent a good part of the evening playing all kinds of games, eventually bringing home a lunchbox as a prize.
 

Tuesday morning marked another test of my scooter driving skills. We had to be in Denpasar at noon to make it for my gf laser appointment and that basically meant going as fast as possible. Overtaking everything on the highway and zigzagging through the city madness again. We made it tho, and while my gf was undergoing her thing, I went for a really nice lunch to a Thai place around the corner (shout out Happycow!) and even managed to bought us some cigarillos – our first pack of local ones. Later on, we made it back to Canggu to our place for the night, took a very needed nap, and went to a Pilates studio nearby. My gf is heavily into that thing and since I haven’t tried it before, she brought me along for a private couple class. Didn’t know much about it but it is a pretty elegant exercise. An hour of that gives you a feeling comparable to the one you get at gym. And all of my workout junkies know what the fuck I’m talking about. Was missing that feeling in my life. After the class, we drove around the city, stop by for a dinner at this neat local place, and ended up in a mall for a movie. Instead of getting regular 50k tickets, we invested double for a premium experience. After chilling in a fancy lounge, we watched the new Bad Boys in super comfortable foldable chairs with blankets. That shit really improves the whole thing by a ton. On top of that, the movie was not bad at all – one of the best action movies I’ve seen in a long time. We made it back to our spot around midnight, and I really felt like we milked all the city shit to the fullest. After weeks of this island life, it was refreshing.

Wednesday morning, we got some seitan steaks at this Sloth vegan place and then drove up north to Ubud to meet up with my Montenegrin sisters for some rafting. Early in the afternoon, we were sitting in a raft – the four of us, some random couple and the guy in charge. The river was pretty muddy and the guy was pretty annoying with his screaming, singing and jokes, but the ride was cool. Water was rather cold, there were lizards chilling on the rocks, the forest was green. The biggest downside was the amount of trash by the shores. They should really do something about it – it is pretty bad. Wouldn’t do this for the second time but it was an interesting experience. We had a meal and some coffee right after, and then we split up. The girls went back to Canggu, whereas we proceeded to our last stop in Bali – Sideman. We arrived to a lovely looking village in the evening, got some rice wine (on the house), some dinner, and chilled by our room talking and smoking. It was all beautiful – the area is right by mountains and it’s all green. The only annoying thing was insect – all over the place. Got way better when we shut down most of lights. However, it wasn’t too bad and I was just happy we decided to stay outside of Pandang Bai.

After 8am this morning, we hopped back on the bike and had a lovely drive back down to the port. We had some coffee, returned the scooter, bought a ticket back (bargained it to 150k), had an argument with an asshole whose feelings got hurt when we declined his ticket offer, and before 9:30, we were sitting on a boat. Sea was calm, weather was beautiful, and before 11:00, we were back home. We did some groceries shopping and before the noon, we were by our pool chilling and feeling happy we made it all. What a fucking trip!

So here we go. I’m still sitting by the pool listening to new Wayne, sun is shining, all is great. Gonna keep you in the loop, watch out for new blogs and vlogs! Sending some love to all my people in China and salute to all my people in general. One!

Highlights:

• Got scammed by an exchange stand fucker. No idea how he did it but I lost over 100 USD. Was in rush, the guy was giving me small notes, never happened to me before – a valuable life lesson.
• The whole Bali trip.
• My people, my dad, my gf – all of it!