Showing posts with label Bali. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bali. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
More Bali pictures
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Bali to Lombok to Gili and Back
hi mom!
hows it going? sorry for being out of touch, we have been busy relaxing, while also trying to see and do lots of things. plus jin was sick for a few days so we didnt do a whole lot(she is fine now.) about a week ago, we went to Lombok. We took a shared minivan(bus, called bemo) to a town on the beach called Sengigi. It was really pretty, but not a whole lot to see or do. Lombok is really pretty, but its culture is sorely lacking compared to bali, and it is filled with thousands of absolute asshole punk kids who are about as rude and obnoxious as any idiots in the world. We rented a scooter one day and drove around to a bunch of really pretty secluded beaches and saw a bunch of tiny towns and indigenous villages that barely any tourists make it to. travel on lombok is very very difficult without your own transport as most bemos only go between towns about 15 or 20 miles apart, so if you want to go somewhere far, you have to pay for a hired car, which is very expensive(30 plus bucks a day) or argue with bemo drivers every half an hour as they try to charge you 10x more than the local price, 5 dollars each instead of 50 cents. we enjoyed our time on lombok, but were happy to leave. after that, we hopped a boat to gili trawangan, a tiny island off the west side of lombok. it only has about 2k people and no cars, roads or anything besides bars, restaurants, tourist stuff, and hotels..... its really nice and is supposed to be the next big thing in indonesia. the fast boat back to bali from there is like 35 dollars a person, so we hopped the slow ferry back to lombok for 1 dollar each, then argued with some more bemo drivers to get us to mataram, then lembar(?) where the ferry leaves back to bali, which is 4 hours and 3 dollars. on the ferry more punk kids harassed us telling us that the seats were for VIPs and we had to pay 2 dollars to sit there. after arguing with them, asking for ID, asking for a VIP ticket, none of which they had, i told them to go get the police, and obviously they never came back! woo hoo, very minor victory. By this time, jin was kinda sick, so when we got back to bali and padang bai, we chilled for the night, then the whole next day. Yesterday, Jin was feeling better, so we took another bemo to Ubud, the cultural capital of bali. we relaxed all last night, mostly cause it was raining. today we decided to be lazy, and rented a scooter for 4 dollars to drive around to all the museums and stuff in town. We went to the house of Antonio Blanco(the blanco renaissance museum), and the museum puri lukisan(fine arts museum), where we saw tons of awesome balinese art from the "young artist" collective that came after WWII. today, we also went to the Monkey forest sanctuary, which holds a couple of moss covered hindu temples surrounded by a jungle like forrest, complete with rivers, springs, and of course, tons of monkeys. Tomorrow, we are planning on takin the scooter to Tanah Lot, one of the most famous temples in bali, and maybe seeing another temple or just exploring some small towns before we come back to Ubud for the night.
hows it going? sorry for being out of touch, we have been busy relaxing, while also trying to see and do lots of things. plus jin was sick for a few days so we didnt do a whole lot(she is fine now.) about a week ago, we went to Lombok. We took a shared minivan(bus, called bemo) to a town on the beach called Sengigi. It was really pretty, but not a whole lot to see or do. Lombok is really pretty, but its culture is sorely lacking compared to bali, and it is filled with thousands of absolute asshole punk kids who are about as rude and obnoxious as any idiots in the world. We rented a scooter one day and drove around to a bunch of really pretty secluded beaches and saw a bunch of tiny towns and indigenous villages that barely any tourists make it to. travel on lombok is very very difficult without your own transport as most bemos only go between towns about 15 or 20 miles apart, so if you want to go somewhere far, you have to pay for a hired car, which is very expensive(30 plus bucks a day) or argue with bemo drivers every half an hour as they try to charge you 10x more than the local price, 5 dollars each instead of 50 cents. we enjoyed our time on lombok, but were happy to leave. after that, we hopped a boat to gili trawangan, a tiny island off the west side of lombok. it only has about 2k people and no cars, roads or anything besides bars, restaurants, tourist stuff, and hotels..... its really nice and is supposed to be the next big thing in indonesia. the fast boat back to bali from there is like 35 dollars a person, so we hopped the slow ferry back to lombok for 1 dollar each, then argued with some more bemo drivers to get us to mataram, then lembar(?) where the ferry leaves back to bali, which is 4 hours and 3 dollars. on the ferry more punk kids harassed us telling us that the seats were for VIPs and we had to pay 2 dollars to sit there. after arguing with them, asking for ID, asking for a VIP ticket, none of which they had, i told them to go get the police, and obviously they never came back! woo hoo, very minor victory. By this time, jin was kinda sick, so when we got back to bali and padang bai, we chilled for the night, then the whole next day. Yesterday, Jin was feeling better, so we took another bemo to Ubud, the cultural capital of bali. we relaxed all last night, mostly cause it was raining. today we decided to be lazy, and rented a scooter for 4 dollars to drive around to all the museums and stuff in town. We went to the house of Antonio Blanco(the blanco renaissance museum), and the museum puri lukisan(fine arts museum), where we saw tons of awesome balinese art from the "young artist" collective that came after WWII. today, we also went to the Monkey forest sanctuary, which holds a couple of moss covered hindu temples surrounded by a jungle like forrest, complete with rivers, springs, and of course, tons of monkeys. Tomorrow, we are planning on takin the scooter to Tanah Lot, one of the most famous temples in bali, and maybe seeing another temple or just exploring some small towns before we come back to Ubud for the night.
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Chiang Mai to Pai
Hello!
We are now in Pai, up in the NW corner of Thailand. We have been here for 2 nights now. It is a really small little mountain town, not unlike most of the smaller towns nestled among the rockies in colorado(nederland?) There is nothing much really going on in Pai, just lots of tourists and places selling tshirts and funny design stuff, restaurants, bars, hotels, etc. The town is really quaint and is right next door to a very muddy river. The highlights so far are the really quiet vibe, the terraced rice fields(with rice blooming), and our Elephant Ride!
Just to fill in the past 10 days or so, we took a boat from Ko Pha Ngan to Surat Thani, then a bus up to Bangkok. We spent 2 nights in BKK, before hopping on an overnight bus to Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai is unofficially known as the culture capital of Thailand, and has tons of things to do. It is a small college town, kind of like Boulder. It is really pretty, and there is a nice, central old town area that is surrounded by a moat and wall. There isn't a whole lot to do in Chiang Mai. We mostly walked around and checked out the old town and the Wat's(buddhist temples), went to the markets, we rented a scooter and drove around the town, read our books, and cooked Thai Food! Yes, we actually got to cook something!
Our first night in Chiang Mai, we stayed in the most popular guest house, the Julie Guest House, lol. That was fun, and there was tons of people hanging out, but it was a verrry young scene, and most of the people were just kind of rushing about, not really trying to relax and kick back like us. We were wandering around our second day, after going to the market, and I saw a cool reggae bar, and just wanted to take a look. We walked in and bumped in to a really nice guy from England, named Dan, and soon made friends. We found out that the Giant Guest House, where Dan was staying offered free water, WIFI, coffee and tea, free bicycles to ride, and often times free rides to fun places. We were sold immedietely, so we switched hotels, and moved to the slightly more expensive Giant Guest House. Julie was 180 baht, Giant was 250(6dollars vs 8.) The extra money was well worth it, as one of the owners(?) of the place was an experienced professional Thai cook, Mama! Mama was really funny and spoke almost no english, but her thai cooking was amazing! every day, she would give someone a list of things to buy at the market, then we would go, buy them and come back. Once home, Mama would cook them for us while we watched, or instruct us on how to cook them. Often times, we even made things two or three different times in a row just so moma could make sure that we followed along. Sometimes Mama would cook something, then watch while we cooked it immedietely after. It was so fun, and we really learned a lot! It was very impressive and interesting being in the presence of someone who so easily cooked such amazing food! The market was great too, having bean sprouts for 15 cents(a strawberry container size), baby corn for 15 cents, and enough crushed peanuts for 15 pad thais for 15 cents.... Eggs were 10cents each,a pound of fresh noodles was 15 cents, and a pound of chicken or shrimp was roughly 1 dollar! So, we could make Pad Thai or Pad Se Ew for 6 people for about 3 to 5 dollars easy!
It was so nice to have a kitchen for the first time in months, and Jin and I really took advantage of it(esp Jin!) We saved lots of money on cooking and didnt have to go out to eat for a few days, which was great! The highlight was the Masaman curry that we made from scratch. It took about an hour just to crush up the curry paste in the mortar in pestle, but it was welllll worth it! Mama told us before hand that it was lots of work, but we wanted to make it anyways, and it was lots of work, but we had curry for about 4 days straight.... We were both so happy to finally get sick of Thai Food after 6 weeks of nothing but.
So, we had a great time relaxing at our reggae wifi cooking school guest house, but after 8 days, we decided to move on to Pai, 4 hours up in to the mountains from Chiang Mai. We are now in Pai, and it is really hot! Today is super sunny and we are currently sitting in an air conditioned internet cafe trying to figure out our next moves. We are hopping on a bus to Chiang Mai tomorrow, then another overnight bus to Bangkok tomorrow night. Tuesday, we will wake up in Bangkok, and then catch another bus for 14 hours down to Phuket. We are hoping to spend 2 nights or so on Ko Phi Phi before our flight to Jakarta on the 22nd. As I have been writing this, I just booked us 2 tickets from Bali to Singapore on the 20th of September, thus fulfilling our requirements to get Indonesian Visas(proof of departure.) So, all is now in place, and we are thinking about coming back to Thailand for another month or so to study more with Mama, or whether to go back to China.... Details to come.
However, it is worth noting that our trip to Singapore almost perfectly corresponds with the F1 night race going on on the streets of Singapore from the 24th to 26th of Sept! So, we could be in for another bout with the F1!!!!
Ok, we are now ready to go back to the heat! Pictures to follow!
We are now in Pai, up in the NW corner of Thailand. We have been here for 2 nights now. It is a really small little mountain town, not unlike most of the smaller towns nestled among the rockies in colorado(nederland?) There is nothing much really going on in Pai, just lots of tourists and places selling tshirts and funny design stuff, restaurants, bars, hotels, etc. The town is really quaint and is right next door to a very muddy river. The highlights so far are the really quiet vibe, the terraced rice fields(with rice blooming), and our Elephant Ride!
Just to fill in the past 10 days or so, we took a boat from Ko Pha Ngan to Surat Thani, then a bus up to Bangkok. We spent 2 nights in BKK, before hopping on an overnight bus to Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai is unofficially known as the culture capital of Thailand, and has tons of things to do. It is a small college town, kind of like Boulder. It is really pretty, and there is a nice, central old town area that is surrounded by a moat and wall. There isn't a whole lot to do in Chiang Mai. We mostly walked around and checked out the old town and the Wat's(buddhist temples), went to the markets, we rented a scooter and drove around the town, read our books, and cooked Thai Food! Yes, we actually got to cook something!
Our first night in Chiang Mai, we stayed in the most popular guest house, the Julie Guest House, lol. That was fun, and there was tons of people hanging out, but it was a verrry young scene, and most of the people were just kind of rushing about, not really trying to relax and kick back like us. We were wandering around our second day, after going to the market, and I saw a cool reggae bar, and just wanted to take a look. We walked in and bumped in to a really nice guy from England, named Dan, and soon made friends. We found out that the Giant Guest House, where Dan was staying offered free water, WIFI, coffee and tea, free bicycles to ride, and often times free rides to fun places. We were sold immedietely, so we switched hotels, and moved to the slightly more expensive Giant Guest House. Julie was 180 baht, Giant was 250(6dollars vs 8.) The extra money was well worth it, as one of the owners(?) of the place was an experienced professional Thai cook, Mama! Mama was really funny and spoke almost no english, but her thai cooking was amazing! every day, she would give someone a list of things to buy at the market, then we would go, buy them and come back. Once home, Mama would cook them for us while we watched, or instruct us on how to cook them. Often times, we even made things two or three different times in a row just so moma could make sure that we followed along. Sometimes Mama would cook something, then watch while we cooked it immedietely after. It was so fun, and we really learned a lot! It was very impressive and interesting being in the presence of someone who so easily cooked such amazing food! The market was great too, having bean sprouts for 15 cents(a strawberry container size), baby corn for 15 cents, and enough crushed peanuts for 15 pad thais for 15 cents.... Eggs were 10cents each,a pound of fresh noodles was 15 cents, and a pound of chicken or shrimp was roughly 1 dollar! So, we could make Pad Thai or Pad Se Ew for 6 people for about 3 to 5 dollars easy!
It was so nice to have a kitchen for the first time in months, and Jin and I really took advantage of it(esp Jin!) We saved lots of money on cooking and didnt have to go out to eat for a few days, which was great! The highlight was the Masaman curry that we made from scratch. It took about an hour just to crush up the curry paste in the mortar in pestle, but it was welllll worth it! Mama told us before hand that it was lots of work, but we wanted to make it anyways, and it was lots of work, but we had curry for about 4 days straight.... We were both so happy to finally get sick of Thai Food after 6 weeks of nothing but.
So, we had a great time relaxing at our reggae wifi cooking school guest house, but after 8 days, we decided to move on to Pai, 4 hours up in to the mountains from Chiang Mai. We are now in Pai, and it is really hot! Today is super sunny and we are currently sitting in an air conditioned internet cafe trying to figure out our next moves. We are hopping on a bus to Chiang Mai tomorrow, then another overnight bus to Bangkok tomorrow night. Tuesday, we will wake up in Bangkok, and then catch another bus for 14 hours down to Phuket. We are hoping to spend 2 nights or so on Ko Phi Phi before our flight to Jakarta on the 22nd. As I have been writing this, I just booked us 2 tickets from Bali to Singapore on the 20th of September, thus fulfilling our requirements to get Indonesian Visas(proof of departure.) So, all is now in place, and we are thinking about coming back to Thailand for another month or so to study more with Mama, or whether to go back to China.... Details to come.
However, it is worth noting that our trip to Singapore almost perfectly corresponds with the F1 night race going on on the streets of Singapore from the 24th to 26th of Sept! So, we could be in for another bout with the F1!!!!
Ok, we are now ready to go back to the heat! Pictures to follow!
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