Seminyak, Indonesia

Alright blog, it’s just you and me. Two days have slipped by without an update so let’s do this. One day held an inpromptu tour; I wandered downstairs from the room of 13 – chaotic but lovely – for breakfast to have Heidi say ‘some girls are going on a tour, to Tanah Lot and then South, would you like to join?’. Time for breakfast and a shower then we went.

Tanah Lot is a spectacular small temple on a rock out to sea. The idea is not to go to it – even at low tide you can only get closer, when the sea is in you can’t get to it at all – but to see it, watch the waves crashing in and check out the temples nearby. Also – shopping and eating, cheaply, if you like. I was with two swedes and a Dutch girl who were charming company, and our driver was a good guy – employed by the hostel, advice and driving, plus one eclectic cd of Britney, Bruno and Eminem amongst others who will now form the soundtrack to Bali memories for me.

Getting to Tanah Lot took over an hour even though it is only ten miles away, so we left straight after for Padang Padang beach, south coast, to get there and be in place for everything else we were to do. That took time, too, but we were straight into the water, the Dutch girl and I swimming and chatting a bit before rejoining Emily and Emma who were busy roasting (verbally) a man posing in speedos on the beach. Next we headed to Uluwata, another temple. We opted out of waiting two hours for the Balinese fire dance, instead fighting past the crowds, dressed in our Roman-Patrician purple sarongs, to the cliff top path. Well worth the walk, it is suddenly peaceful there, and a great spot to watch the sunset.

We left, for an evening sitting and chatting, though I joined the not-going-out crowd for a little more guitar and chat time. Which still involves sitting out till after midnight; it’s just glorious.

The next day took shape without effort. After breakfast, conversation with Scottish Mark and Canadian David turned to the night before and sex. Soon afternoon marched on, and we made it down to Granny’s hostel’s dedicated place on the beach. New girl Rebecca was straight off surfing, I chatted with an Indonesian translator who comes to Bali to chill out from Jakarta, and played pong with Kia. After a stunning sunset I managed to squeeze in a run before a barbecue, then beer and ginseng/arak shots livened us all up, we took turns throwing questions at each other in ‘the hot seat’ and headed for town. Marco and I, being too old to be going out after midnight really, kept our end up pretty well on the dance floor I thought, though a later mass exodus to the sky garden club ended with me becoming detached when my car load faffed, I ended up not finding people in the club and deciding that a wander home was preferable. Lovely day; thanks for the “I didn’t think you had it in you”, Aaron, though that was topped as a highlight by conspiracy theorist Jesse referring to my previous comment that ‘soon we’ll be on to lizards running the world’ and turning it into a lizard dance off. I think we both won, though not as much as that dance floor.

“I’ll do anything, you just have to ask.”

“Just checking the foam level, it seems right.”