Bali Indonesia (Part 6) - KUTA BEACH

After Mt. Batur climb and passing by Pura Ulun Danu Batur, we went back to Nick’s Cottages, had breakfast, packed and checked out. We went back to Legian and checked in Aquarius Star Hotel. Emman was so excited to go to the Kuta Beach to surf. He ran off as soon as he placed his stuff inside the hotel room. Neri & I followed him after a while.

 

Kuta Beach

Kuta Beach (Dec 1, 2009)

Kuta Beach is walking distance from Legian. The street is full of souvenir shops, restaurants, bars & hotels. We ate at McDonalds first near the beach. Then, we looked for Emman and watched him & other surfers while having fun with the waves & their surf boards.

 Waves

 Scene from Baywatch, hehe :-D

We also want to try surfing, Emman tried to assist us despite of his hesitance since he’s just new in this sport. But the waves were becoming bigger, so we weren’t able to go further. As a consolation, we just posed on Emman’s camera with the surf board :-)

All we can do is to have a picture with the surf board, hehe :) 

(Photo by Emman)

 Sunset 

(Photo by Emman)

We thought it's a preparation for a night party, 

it's a preparation for the night surfing exhibition, not bad 

(Photo by Emman)  

Night Surfing at Kuta Beach

We were lucky because there was a night surfing exhibition that night.

 Night Surfing

(Photo by Emman)

Night surfing video

 In action, women category

(Photo by Emman)

 While waiting for the waves

(Photo by Emman)

 He's the best surfer in men category, from what I've seen

(Photo by Emman)

This was the first time I've watched night surfing, for me it's more entertaining than watching surfers during the day, maybe it's because of the effect of the spotlight through the waves together with the music, making the ambiance more lively & appealing.

Bali Indonesia (Part 5) – MT. BATUR

Mt. Batur (Dec 1, 2009)

The driver of the tour agency fetched us at around 2am. We had a stopover at Mr. Pineh’s place, who provided us climb guide I think, part of his business is guided tour packages around Bali. He prepared breakfast for us while waiting for the climb guide, he served us banana pancake!  I'm not a fan of a pancake, but this was the best pancake I ate... great taste!  

Banana pancake at Mr. Pineh's place

We started to climb at 4am and arrived at the peak in less than 2 hours. Mt. Batur is much easier to climb (1,771m above sea level). It’s good that we climb Mt. Agung first.

Upon reaching the summit, we started our pictorial while our guide was busy preparing our snacks. He offered us ginger tea from the store behind us and pulled out some loaf from his bag with boiled banana filling (I remember Kutot, our guide in Mt Agung, brought us also boiled banana for snacks, I noticed there's a huge supply of banana here in Bali :), I miss/want the banana pancake, hehe :D

The view was magnificent! We got our best shots here. Below are the photos & video clips we've taken, I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I enjoyed it and still enjoying it whenever I look onto the photos specially the 'sunrise' photos. 

Emman

Neri

Medi (that's me ;-)

One of my friends asked me what technique we used to have these nice photos. I said it's all natural, it's the natural effect of the sunrise, we're just playing with the sunrise ;-) 

Neri & Medi

My favorite jump shot

Another favorite jump shot. I remember when I posted this photo in facebook, Manu (my Indian friend in Singapore) was amazed by this picture, he reposted/shared this in his FB wall.

Lake Batur, Mt Abang and Mt Agung behind

A lady & a monkey facing each other (CUTE! another favorite)
 

Neri & the monkey were in the same pose (another favorite shot)

Pasama naman sa picture

2   k  5 

I remember, the battery of Emman’s camera was drained already, fortunately, I had a camera with me with extra battery. I was actually prepared for this :) One or two days before my flight to Bali, I bought a new camera. Buying a new one was not part of the plan, it’s just that my old camera was malfunctioning that time. I can’t go to Bali without a camera, I didn’t want to miss capturing moments from the places I’m going to visit, and I was thinking it might be once in a lifetime. And the extra battery came with it was a bonus for me. And the pictures you've just seen shows that it’s worth the buy ;-)

Beside the crater

Piolo, is that you?

Enjoying the pictorial ;-)

Going around the crater. See how active this volcano is

I thought the smoke will light the cigarette, but it's the other way around, the smoke will not come out without the unlighted cigarette. Watch this video.

 

Romantic shot, isn't it? (another favorite)

If I only have the contact detail of these couple, i'll send this photo to them :)

The Mountiner Emman (Mt. Abang & Mt. Agung behind) 

If you will ask me, what's in my mind during this moment, I was actually talking to Mt. Agung  "if i'll be given a chance to climb you again, I'll make sure, I'll reach the crater :-), and will conquer the fear I felt while climbing the steep part where I can't hold onto anything "

According to our guide, this area was full of lava during the major eruption of Mt. Batur in 1963, since then, the affected area can't be used for livelihood anymore.

Going down

You see someone in the middle of this picture? (there are actually two persons). We met along the trail after several minutes, see picture below

They get food from the mountain for their cows
 

Mt. Batur from afar

Mt. Batur from afar

Pura Ulun Danu Batur

After climbing Mt. Batur, I still had the craving to visit a temple, since we weren't able to visit the biggest temple (Besakih Temple) near Mt. Agung, it's okay with me even other temple near Mt. Batur. Although, Emman & Neri were not interested, (Emman was actually more excited to go back to Kuta to surf), they granted my plea. We passed by Pura Ulun Danu Batur (pura means temple), the second most important temple in Bali ( second to Besakih) http://www.wonderfulbali.com/centralbali/ulundanu-batur.htm.
I was the only one who went inside, they waited me in the car.

Pura Ulun Danu Batur



Bali Indonesia (Part 4) – MONKEY FOREST

 After the climb (Mt. Agung), we went back to the hotel. Near the entrance, there were 2 men planting on the rice field this time. The previous day (from my previous post), you can see from the picture that this rice field was prepared for planting. 

Scenery near the gate of the hotel

We went straight to the eating lounge for breakfast. While eating, resting and breathing fresh air in the balcony lounge, we were exchanging bits of our life stories, and we can't help not to talk about our batchmates who weren't there, hehe :P

We took advantage of the small pool afterwards. 

MONKEY FOREST

After grabbing some sleep, we visited the monkey forest. We made sure that we have enough time to go around this time.

 Monkeys eating raw corn

While taking this video, I was hoping that this monkey will not grab my camera, thanks he's busy eating his food.

 Try to go nearer Emman :-P

Family & relatives of monkeys

The monkeys are very aggressive, they grab stuff, especially food from the tourist near them. They can make the tourists scream (one of those was me!) and they can make children cry. Take a look in the video I got:  

 (I uploaded this video just to show how aggressive the monkeys are. But, if you think it’s inappropriate for me to post this, please let me know, I’ll delete it. Thanks.)

)

 Going around the forest

I like this one, they are like vertical curtains

 Pictorial (Photo by Emman)

 I can't go near the real monkey, that's why (Photo by Emman)

 Nice one Neri :)) (Photo by Emman)

 Photo by Emman

Cafe Wayan along the Monkey Forest St.

We had our dinner in Cafe Wayan, where we had our dessert the previous day, it’s one of the coziest restaurants along the Monkey Forest St., I guess. Though we were all very tired after the climb and have no enough sleep, we still continued & enjoyed sharing our personal life stories. I can say that a good relationship was being formed among us, the advantage of just being three ;-)

 See the tiredness with that smiles?

 Another Bintang

 Our dinner

We went back to hotel at around 10pm and prepared our stuff for another climb in few hours, 

this time in Mt. Batur ;-)