The island of Bali is probably the most touristic of Indonesia. We found the island to be very beautiful, with tastefully finished houses, villas, shops, and restaurants. A genuine Hindu touch decorated the island, giving it a lovely air. There were many street decorations related to their beliefs, and also temples everywhere, both smaller individual ones for each house as well as the larger ones holding ceremonies quite frequently. Locals were dressed in colorful traditional attire, blessing their houses, stores, streets, and restaurants daily with offerings for their gods. These offerings were very special, prepared in square shaped recipients made from banana leaves, and held flowers, food such as rice or cookies, burning incense sticks, and sometimes even cigarettes. Often you would unfortunately step on one or two, as they were literally everywhere and normally in the middle of your walking path.

It is also not a secret that Bali is known to attract avid surfers worldwide due to the fantastic waves and tropical warm water. As we had both surfed before (especially Josep), we decided to sign up for a 2-week surf camp where we hoped to ameliorate our surfing skills. After a 6-hour boat and a bus trip from the island of Java, we arrived at The Bali Camp, an Austrian-owned surf camp that is located in Canggu, a lovely town on the western coast of Bali. Made for a maximum of 12 guests, the Bali Camp villa had a very relaxed atmosphere with a central mango-shaped swimming pool, served daily delicious Indonesian meals, and truly felt like being at home with a big family of surfers! Aside the lovely Indonesian staff, the housemates were Austrian, German, and Swiss, so for Josep it was also an intro to German course ;-).

Every day we would have surf lessons in the morning at one of the great reef breaks along the coast, and then relax in the afternoon either poolside at the villa, enjoying the nice beach bars and cafés of Canggu located at Old Man’s or Echo Beach. Some afternoons we would also go for a walk around and do some occasional shopping into the larger cities nearby such as Kuta or Seminyak. We quickly fell in love with Bali Camp, Bali, and especially the waves. We not only had a lot of fun out there in the water, but also felt as if we learned quite a lot. Martina, who only had a few days of previous surf experience, made outstanding progress. She quickly moved into green waters with a shorter board, catching quite some big waves next to Josep. She earned her new nickname: “Surfer Maverick”, given by Thomas, one of our Bali Camp friends.

Along with our housemates we visited the infamous Uluwatu surf break. This surf spot is one of the most well known reef breaks in the world, with waves reaching easily 10 feet high, and also some of the most impressive surfing we have yet seen. It was very cool to watch these almost professional surfers catch waves and do all sorts of great tricks in the water. Of course, we were admiring them from a safe and comfortable distance, sipping a coke at a bar.

Aside surfing and watching surfers, we also did some tourism as the island truly has a lot to offer. We visited Tanah Lot, a very special temple located on a limestone rock coming out of the ocean, and also went to visit Ubud and the nearby attractions together with our housemate Roman, a lovely Swiss guy. Ubud is located in central Bali, and known to be the cultural heart of the Island, holding the majority of artists and craftsmen. Before arriving there, we drove through many small villages, each highly skilled in its own craft: the roof tile village, the woodworks village, the stone carving village… It was very interesting to drive by and observe their talent displayed along the street. The city of Ubud itself was sweet, with many small cozy restaurants and boutique shops where we took a nice walk and also visited the central temple.

Our day trip further brought us to the famous rice terraces of Bali, as well as the Kintamani volcano. Whilst both were very nice to see and beautiful, they were not as impressive as past ones we had seen in this trip. What can we say, we have been very spoiled in these past months! Before coming back home to Canggu, we visited again one of the Luak coffee plantations, this famous coffee made from the beans pooped out by the Luak, as described in our previous post of Yogyakarta. Together with Roman, we tried a large assortment of teas and coffees of the region, bringing the day to an end.

Despite loving it here, we decided after 2 weeks to move onto a new destination to see something new and try out surfing on another island of Indonesia. Next stop: 30 minute boat trip southeast to Nusa Lembongan.