DAY TWO ON THE ISLAND OF BALI

We spent the day exploring the village and its surroundings and enjoyed our first breakfast. This was served outside our accommodation by a pleasant young man who made the coffee and toast and collected other cooked food from somewhere on the compound.  There was an good menu to choose from and it started with fruit salad and then a choice.  The first day we had a pineapple and a banana pancake which we had read about in reviews of the guest house.  They turned out to be as excellent as reviews had led us to  believe.

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Fruit Salad for breakfast

followed by a banana pancake

After breakfast we took a taxi, very cheap, so we could walk on the Campuan Ridge.  We started early because we knew that the day would be hot, it always is in Bali.  We passed rice fields, lovely fruits and flowers.

 

This was a resort

 Walking along the ridge

Coming off the ridge we re-entered the village and on the main street came across this popular tourist attraction, getting you feet cleaned by fish.

Lunch time for the fishes

 One characteristic of Bali is the very large number of scooters, they are everywhere and there are far more of them than cars.  You have to keep you wits about you as they come at you from all directions.

 

Always scooters

After a quick lunch, there were many good restaurants in Ubud, we walked down to the famous Sacred Monkey Forest Sanctuary.  The sanctuary is inhabited by a band of grey-haired and greedy long-tailed Balinese macaques.  It contains three temples (covered in monkeys).

 

Map of the Sanctuary

You asked not to feed the monkeys (unless you buy biscuits from the staff!)

The monkeys come in all sizes

They are very friendly, if they think you have food.

We had our evening meal back at the Fair Warung Bale, we had so enjoyed the food and the service from the staff. For evening entertainment we went to the Ubud Palace, one of many venues to see traditional Balinese dancing and just one of the locations for dancing.

Part of the large crowd awaiting the dancers

The dancers are accompanied by a Gamelan orchestra which consists of bamboo and bronze instruments that are hit with hammers and great gusto.  The dance form was called Kerak, and the dancers are accompanied by a large  chanting male chorus which sits around the floor in a circle.  The colourful dance drama involves kings, queens, good and evil folk including the white monkey. We can't say we followed all that was going on but it was fun evening

 A good time was had by all

End of Part 6 of 16