Exploring Bali

Phil and I both slept well, it shouldn't have been a surprise as it was the first real bed in three days.  So this morning during a full yummy buffet breakfast we decided to venture out in the area.

But first last night.... Here is a large mechanized  face (8 feet tall) at the Sydney airport.  The shop sold sunglasses. So cool, the eyes blinked and moved, the mouth moved too. Just a little creepy, it was creepy real looking.

Breakfast was in an open air restaurant, with international choices, we stuck to the American buffet.  The passionfruit smoothie was so colorful, I couldn't resist. The shot glass in front of Phil was a cinnamon drink, one of several choices claimed to aid in digestion.  

After breakfast, the hotel helped us organize a private tour to last 4-6 hours.  Phil had a list of 8 possible stops, we hit about 5, sort of.  Our driver was Wayad, he followed our list and added two additional stops, shopping for clothing and wood carving.  He wanted us to purchase souvenirs from Bali.  We cooperated - I decided these could be the best deals of the whole trip!

 Let the tour begin. There were more motorized bikes on the busy 2 lane roads than cars.  This one was so cute.

First stop was the Monkey Forest, Ubud's most popular tourist stop. Ashley would  love this one! They had a couple of rules: 1- don't look eye to eye with the monkeys 2- keep a safe distance from the monkeys.

Second stop was the rice fields, another popular attraction in the Ubud area.  They  had several fun rides (swings), suspended very high over the demo rice fields.  We watched.  Look  carefully in  two of the photos for the swings.  Hint - one is a double seated bike (on high wire).  We logged in 15 flights of stairs at this one stop, Bali sure is hilly! If you are afraid of heights skip this one.  Many of the stairs and walkways did not have hand rails.  Phil kept saying, 'this would never be allowed in the US."

Third stop was a temple, which we ended up skipping.  They did not take credit cards and we did not have local currency.  Our driver was obviouly disappointed that we missed the temple after he drove us all the way out there, so much so that he offered to pay for us.  We took him up on that offer later (coconut drinks, entrance to water falls).  Below is the waterfall, a stop for coconut water, and some amazing wood carvings.  Our driver/tour guide is the one carrying our coconut waters.

Enough for today....I've passed my self imposed limit of posting no more than10 photos per day. Maybe I'll rethink that limit.