Well anyway the beginning part of the trip was mostly diving, diving and more diving. After those first few days, we had time to explore Bali a bit. We stayed at Sanur, and on the last night changed to another hotel in Kuta. The other places we covered was Tulamben when diving, and we also spent a whole day wondering about Ubud, which was my favourite. I find the artsy fartsy Ubud much more pleasant than Kuta.
Though Kuta is also cool in it's own way; the whole place is like a big party! With more and more people from around the world flying in everyday to join in the fun! Hubby was just amazed at the number of planes you could see flying in every evening. They were like 5 mins apart and coming in non-stop!
The first few nights, we spent at Puri Mesari, a hotel in Sanur. It is a secluded hotel, tucked away in a quiet enclave and is a quaint place with the mandatory Balinese touches like frangipani trees, plenty of water features and outdoor bathrooms! I can see why many people are smitten with Balinese architecture and interior decor.
So on our first no-dive day, we went looking for vanilla pods which SIL and I wanted for our baking adventures! :) Thus we headed in the direction if Ubud.
Along the way, we passed an amazingly breathtaking sight! It was the Tagalalang rice terraces. Like everyone else, we just had to stop and take some photos.
After quite a bit more driving, we reached Alam Bali Agriculture, the so called coffee and vanilla farm.
Here we tasted kopi luwak (civet coffee), the most expensive coffee in the world. Civet coffee is made from coffee beans eaten and passed out (yes, shit) by the civet cat!!! So we tried the kopi luwak for Rp50,000 a cup (around RM17) and it tasted pretty normal to me, though I am not a coffee drinker so...
Anyway, as I said, SIL and I were there mainly to hunt for vanilla, but in the end we realized this place was a scam. It was just a small, sad garden with a few assorted plants like coffee, vanilla and cinnamon. There was no large scale farm at all.
When you asked the staff where the farm was, they would point vaguely down a valley which looked like secondary jungle to me. Then when I asked how they processed the vanilla extract (cause it was labelled vanilla oil and I have never heard of vanilla oil), they said that only the boss knew, as they sent the raw materials to Denpasar to be processed. When Hubby asked where the factory at Denpasar was ( I wanted to find wholesale vanilla), he replied he didn't know and quickly excused himself, saying he was busy.
So we bought some vanilla and other things like ginger tea at the shop. I bought the vanilla oil (as I suspected, it was actually not oil at all, but an alcohol based extract) at Rp90,000 per bottle. It was labelled with their sticker, but later on I noticed that the bottle's plastic seal at the cap was printed with a different company's name and address (Surabaya).
Sure enough, when we went to the Ubud market, we found the exact same bottle of vanilla extract (same brand as was printed on the seal) for a fraction of the price! Only Rp10,000 for a bottle! Boy had we been ripped off! I was really pissed off, but Hubby says one just has to be prepared to get fleeced every time you go for a holiday! It happens, more often that not! *Sigh*
I suppose it's not such a big deal, but the thought of them duping innocent tourists all year long and getting away with it really bugged me, so I complained on Tripadvisor. It was the least I could do, maybe I can 'save' one or two innocent tourists from wasting their time...
So anyway, after the 'farm', the next stop was lunch! Babi Guling at Ibu Oka, which I raved about in a previous post! Allow me to rave a bit more here:
A whole pig, hand roasted for 4 hours, over real firewood! What's not to love???
Okay, okay, moving on... Next, we went for a heavenly massage at Sang Spa, then, it was time for shopping! The next stop was the Ubud market, where tourists flock to find a good bargain. It is full of souvenirs, handicraft, clothes, jewellery, etc.. It was fun haggling with the merchants, though at times hazardous! SIL suspects she was cursed by a young lady when she did not buy an item! The young lady was very rude and scolding in her native tongue, so we didn't know exactly what she was saying, but it was obviously nothing nice! There were some nicer and friendlier merchants, but on the whole they were very pushy.
The ladies ready for a 2 hour shopping spree (the men waited patiently at a cafe across the road).
So after dinner at Bumbu Bali, we went back to Sanur and the next day, transferred to our hotel in Kuta, the Sun Island.
It was a gorgeous hotel with a great location. So we had a day to explore Kuta, before flying home early next morning.
Hubby and I went about on a rented motorbike and SIL and friend hung out at Discovery Mall which among other things, housed a spa and most importantly for them, Starbucks!
Traffic in Kuta is pretty scary, and there is honking everywhere! I was so scared of banging my knee on a car or something, as we weaved through traffic.
Anyway, Hubby stopped when he smelled coffee and we discovered another coffee joint which was more authentic looking, Kopi Domba. Since the last coffee farm place was so dodgy, we suspected that the kopi luwak we had there was most probably not even kopi luwak! So once again we tried it, just to see if there was something to this hype that we just didn't get.
Well, it still tasted like normal good(ish) coffee to me and Hubby. Actually I'm probably the last person who you should ask, as my idea of coffee is the ice blended at Coffee Bean! It was even more expensive here, around RM100+ for a cup.
Well, at least we learned that kopi luwak is not farmed (as claimed by the dodgy farm place). It is apparently illegal to rear civets for this purpose, so Kopi Domba claims to pick the civet droppings from the wild! Thus our very expensive conclusion is this; kopi luwak is over rated.
The most fruitful outcome of our explorations of Kuta was the out-of-this-world satay babi we found at a roadside!! This again I raved about two posts ago...
Since we were in Bali, we of course had to set foot on the infamous Kuta beach!
Then it was dinner at Discovery Mall, by the beach to wait for the sunset. The sun was unfortunately behind the clouds, but it was okay. We did glimpse the gorgeous, huge, red sun just seconds before it set (it was setting so fast!) on Kuta beach on the second night of our stay when we ventured there from our hotel in Sanur.
So that was it, an amazing holiday! I do love Bali and the carefree hippie, beach bum vibe that rubs off on you when you're there. I wouldn't mind returning at all! :)
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