Tegalalang and Ubud

After a hot ride on our rickety scooter and waaaaay too much luggage, we safely arrived at our next destination. We decided to stay two nights in the rice fields around Tegalalang. We stayed in a super nice bungalow in the green with a great pool. Overall, there wasn't much going on here, as soon as you got on the scooter, you were always driving through the beautiful endless rice fields. We visited the famous Tegalalang rice terraces, which you can walk through for a small entrance fee. Usually it's really crowded here, but once again we were lucky because it's still low season. But that's the price you pay for the daily rain. The next day we also took a scooter tour to the national park in the north, where the famous Mount Batur is located. We went to a hip cafe with a nice view of the surrounding volcanoes and Lake Batur. Then we drove there and visited a small Hindu temple on the water. On the way back, we stopped at one of the many fruit stalls by the roadside and got to try everything we didn't know. So we bought over a kilo of fruit - plus all the fruits we had already eaten on site. Near our accommodation, we also visited a water temple that looked a bit like an enchanted garden. In the evening, we had delicious vegan food again in a small restaurant with sensational vegan Satay skewers and ridiculously cheap prices 🙈

The next day, we packed our poor scooter again and headed to the south to Ubud. This actually small town became disproportionately famous since the movie "Eat-Pray-Love" with Julia Roberts. There were again many very good restaurants and cafes as well as numerous yoga studios. Jana did yoga twice, which she really liked. In Ubud there are also rice fields, which, however, were not as impressive as the large terraces in Tegalalang - there probably used to be more green space here before the yoga boom. The days in Ubud were pretty relaxed and quiet, we drove around with our scooter and indulged in the large culinary offerings. Unfortunately, we both caught a little cold, so the quiet days were good for that too. Thanks to the widely available Tolakangin, a drink packet with a mixture of honey, ginger and various herbs, we were largely recovered after a few days. One day we decided to take a slightly longer tour to the east of Bali, we drove through endless and lush green rice fields, which we just can't get enough of (that's why there are so many pictures of them 😁). And unlike the very touristy Ubud, we were almost the only tourists on the scooter here again. Our first destination was the Gembleng Waterfall. This one is actually not as touristy as many other places in Bali, although it's beautiful. The path leads through narrow alleys over rocks and stones and we wondered if we were even in the right place. But in the end, the journey was absolutely worth it. After climbing a long staircase, you come to natural pools and look down from above at the waterfall and the surrounding jungle. If the water hadn't been so cold, you could have lingered there forever. Next, we wanted to visit the Lempuyang Gate, which is known from many trendy Instagram photos. It belongs to a temple and we thought, well, so far there hasn't been much going on everywhere and it's already late in the afternoon - so there won't be much activity. Spoiler: yes, there was. But we want to tell you all the details about our first tourist flop. We had assumed that we could drive to the temple ourselves, but you are directed to a parking lot where the ticket booth is located and a shuttle bus is waiting. We were welcomed with the question to Jana: "Do you have your period?" I looked stupid at first. But then I remembered that we had seen signs at temples in Thailand before that indicate that menstruating people are not allowed in. Because then you "desecrate" the temple - well, you can think what you want about it. I said no and we were allowed to buy tickets. It was also said that we should better take the shuttle bus up instead of walking, as the temple closes in about 1 hour. So we bought an extra ticket for the bus and off we went. After at most 100m we were glad that we didn't walk or - even worse - drive up there ourselves with our clattering box. It was super steep! The bus took us to a second house, where we got a piece of paper with a number for the photo. Yeah, we didn't think much of it, in Kuala Lumpur we also got a number to take a photo on the popular KL Tower in the glass box. Afterwards, you were supposed to choose a sarong, which was mandatory. We got one tied around us by a pretty pregnant woman, behind her another sign with the rules for the temple. Besides menstruating people, babies under 105 days were also not allowed to enter the temple - a strange age limit, but freshly hatched babies rarely crawl into temples alone 😉 When we arrived at the top, we realized what a flop it was. The temple itself could not be entered, unless you wanted to pray there, and there was only a small place and the aforementioned photo motif, the Lempuyang Gate. A large stone gate that looks like it leads to heaven behind it, because you can't see the ground behind it due to the location. The numbers were called out via a microphone and then people posed like crazy, Heidi Klum would have been proud. People really did their best to take as many poses as possible in the time they had, the photos were taken by an employee there who held a mirror under the phone so that it looked like everything was reflected on the ground. So it was pretty disappointing considering the long way and the relatively expensive entrance fee. We waited patiently and hoped that maybe we would be next just before sunset - supposedly the temple closes at 6 p.m. But no luck, we waited and waited. Unfortunately, it started to rain at some point and then it got completely dark, but we had already held out so long that we at least wanted to have a photo. Eventually, we were second to last, we put our previously rehearsed choreography of photo poses on the floor and then trudged back to the shuttle bus. Overall, it wasn't really worth it despite the beautiful photos - except for the story, which we can laugh about now. Unfortunately, our journey back was a little torture, as we had to drive through the rain for over two hours to get home - and obviously the Balinese don't like street lighting very much. Thanks to Philips driving skills and our iron will to eventually arrive, we made it safely to our hotel, where of course it stopped raining as soon as we were indoors. We ordered food and tried to sleep quickly, because we were picked up at 2 a.m. to go hiking on a volcano again. This time it was Mount Batur, which we had already inspected from a distance in daylight. In our group was a family from Holland who has been living in Dubai for many years, he works there as a surgeon, and a couple from Australia. We hiked up in the dark, and then watched the very, very beautiful sunrise from the top. Overall, the volcano was a bit easier to climb and it was very crowded. Mount Batur is a rather peaceful volcano and only emits a little smoke, the crater is completely covered in green and looks very calm. There were also a few monkeys running around, who stole some breakfast here and there. We rested at home and then wanted to go back to the city with our brave scooter, but unfortunately we had a flat tire for the first time. But the problem was quickly solved, in a small garage workshop, they ruled out that there was a hole in the tire using water and soap. Apparently, we had just lost air due to the long scooter ride the day before, and they refilled it for 30 cents including the "inspection". The next day we went to the capital Denpasar to extend our visa, which surprisingly went quickly and easily. On our last day, we strolled around the area around the Monkey Forest a bit - a sanctuary for monkeys in Ubud. We didn't want to go in, especially Jana didn't feel like having the monkeys crawl on her, which apparently happens quite often. But we didn't even have to go inside to see numerous monkeys on roofs and power lines everywhere.

Overall, we liked the atmosphere in Tegalalang and Ubud. We ate very well, the area especially towards the east is very beautiful and hardly touristy, and in Ubud itself, you can practice your downward dog in many beautiful yoga studios. Now we are heading to the island "Gili Air", which belongs to Lombok, the neighboring island of Bali.