The Wednesday morning Air Asia flight to Denpasar was without incident. It wasn’t the freak fest that it had been last year. It still felt strange landing at the new airport, which completely lacks the true Balinese ambience of the old airport. My luggage took forever to show up on the baggage carousel, but I quickly grabbed it after going through passport control and immigration, changed currency and got a taxi to Ubud. The new taxi fare from DPS to Ubud is 350,000. I think it used to be 250,000. They must have raised the prices in accordance with the new gas prices, as well as to pay for the new airport!
After an hour in traffic (during which time I couldn’t help dozing off), we arrived at Honeymoon Guesthouse. They’d given me a nice room on the ground floor, but it wasn’t my favorite Krishna room on the second floor. That one wasn’t available at all, so I toughed it out in the other room, which was nearly as nice. The first order of business was to immediately lay by the pool for an hour! When the sun disappeared behind some clouds, I decided it might be in my best interest to grab something to eat before heading to my massage appointment at Lily Spa. My first attempt was to find a small locally-owned warung in a family compound across the street from the start of Jalan Bisma. I wandered into the family compound and looked around, but my inquiries were only met with smiles and confusion. Maybe it didn’t open until later in the day. My second choice was to go much further down the street to find Hujan Locale, Will Meyrick’s newest venture, which had only somewhat recently opened. The restaurant was deserted, though a few other customers showed up. Seated downstairs, I ordered the watermelon-cucumber salad, plus the deep-fried spring rolls. Although the watermelon-cucumber salad wouldn’t normally appeal to me, it was time to be a little adventurous and try something different. The combination was surprisingly good – light, fresh, a little sweet and a little acidic. The deep-fried spring rolls didn’t fare as well. They were far too oily, the filling was bland, they were kind of mushy and the sauce didn’t taste like the real Vietnamese sauce; think it was too tart. Service was nice enough, but slow. I rushed them along, however, as I had to go all the way back to the hotel and get ready for my massage appointment.
Lily Spa is directly across from Honeymoon Guesthouse. My appointment had been made on-line about a month in advance. The massage was relaxing, as usual – without unexpected chiropractic cracking or vigorous breast massaging (although, truth be told, they DO sometimes massage your breasts and buttocks at Lily Spa)!
An Italian friend of mine, A., lives in Ubud. We met in Bali in 2011. Although we’d seen each other twice in Bali in 2012, we did not in 2013 because I went to Vietnam instead. We also didn’t see each other in 2014 because we got our days mixed up a bit. He thought I’d be in Bali at the beginning of October, but I arrived during the second half of October… when he’d gone back to Italy for a visit. So we were finally set to see each other again and had planned to have dinner and drinks on my first night back in Bali. Of course, shortly after my arrival, he sent a message saying that he’d got dengue fever on Saturday (it was now Wednesday). He wasn’t feeling well enough to go out, but said that I could go to his house, if I wanted to. He sent the address to me. What I did NOT see was that he’d sent me another message saying to contact him before or when I got a driver. Having not seen that message yet, I went out on the street and haggled with a motorbike driver to take me to his street. Once we got there, I remembered that most streets in Bali don’t have an exact address. Although A. had given me a numbered address of a smaller street off of the main street, we rode aimlessly for at least 20 minutes. I said to the driver that we might have to call A. to get more specific directions, but the driver didn’t have a cell phone. At that point, I told him that he’d have to take me back to the main part of Ubud, so I could get WiFi on my iPad Mini to message A. again. Right about then, the driver spied the little street we’d been looking for. The little street was dark and lined with several houses. I had no idea which one A. lived in. When a local woman walked by, I asked her if she knew a young Italian guy that lived on the street. She pointed at the house I was standing directly in front of! I called his name and he came out. Once he hugged me, I paid the driver and we went inside. We sat on the couch and drank guave juice while he opened the presents I’d brought for him; a shadowbox canvas, a T-shirt, a silk dress shirt from Thailand and two DVDs. He then explained what having dengue fever is like; said it was his second time having it since being in Bali. After talking quite awhile, he said that he needed to lay down because he was aching all over. We rearranged the pillows all over the carved wooden Balinese couch and cuddled up to continue talking. It wasn’t comfortable for me, though, because my head was half hanging off the couch, which was giving me a crick in my neck! I eventually had to sit up. He mentioned that I might have to stay overnight because he wasn’t feeling well enough to take me back to my hotel via his motorbike. I planned to simply go back out on the street and hire another driver. He explained that, since this was not the main part of Ubud, there were NO drivers in the area. I thought he was kidding, but he wasn’t. Why didn’t he tell me before I let my original driver go then?! I could have told the driver to come back and pick me up in two hours. Although I assured A. that I wouldn’t normally mind staying over, I had a photography tour scheduled for the following day and the guy was supposed to meet me at my hotel at 7:00 a.m. If A. could guarantee that he’d be feeling well enough to get me back to my hotel by 6:00 a.m. (to shower and get my camera equipment ready), it wasn’t a problem for me. He couldn’t guarantee that, though. So… we hemmed and hawed a bit. I didn’t mind walking, but he insisted that it was too far. Eventually, he came up with a plan. He called my hotel and asked if they knew me. (Of course, they did because I stay there nearly every year!) He explained that I was at his house, but had no way to return to the hotel because he was too sick to drive me and there were no drivers in the area. He asked if there was any way that someone could pick me up. Wouldn’t you know it? About twenty minutes later, a guy arrived on a motorbike to transport me back to the hotel for FREE. I LOVE Bali! Plus, I got to stay in my lovely hotel room in my big bed surrounded by mosquito netting!
Flower Vendor at Ubud Market
Ubud Landscape
Lunch at Hujan Locale