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In addition to the Enchanted Monkey Forrest, the other main activity to do in Ubud is to see an "authentic" Balinese dance. We checked out a show one night and it was fairly entertaining even if the music was a little headache-inducing.
This guy looks more than thrilled:
Some dancer shots:
Continue reading "Beautiful views and Bali dancers - Ubud, Bali" »
After hitting the beach in Nusa Lembogan, we headed back to mainland Bali to visit the cultural heart, Ubud. Ubud is where Elizabeth Gilbert of "Eat, Pray, Love" found herself. Well, Tom and I found ourselves too... well, we found ourselves seeing some monkeys and doing some cultural excursions.
We first headed to the Enchanted Monkey Forest which is a temple complex with... you guessed it, a bunch of monkeys!
I spotted my first monkey. No, wait, that's just Tom. Easy to get confused. Isn't his purple poncho just precious?
There were so many monkeys I got a little concerned we would catch some crazy monkey disease, like rabies, monkey flu, or lupus. Not to worry and some of them were even awfully cute.
Here is a baby monkey nursing:
We heard that the big touristy towns on south Bali were a little too much of a party scene so we decided to try the quieter Nusa Lembongan, a smaller island just off the coast of Southeast Bali. Getting a reservation was not easy, but we secured a place that was associated with a dive shop so that we could do some diving. We checked into our quaint bungalow which had a giant circular bed (no it didn't rotate) and an outside bathroom/shower.
The courtyard was well landscaped and very serene.
Continue reading "Chilling on an island next to Bali - Nusa Lembongan, Indonesia" »
After Vietnam, we took a quick detour to Singapore where we spent a few days enjoying things like clean sidewalks and reliable public transportation. Seriously, we enjoyed the trappings of a more Westernized culture, but the drawback was the expense. After cheaper countries like Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, we felt like we put the "poor" in Singapore. The hostel was one of the most expensive places we stayed on our trip and the renowned zoo we wanted to hit up was $50 for both of us to go. To save money, we skipped out on the zoo and hit the hawker markets to enjoy some the cheap, good food Singapore is known for.
Victorian architecture at one of the hawkers market:
One of the great things to see in Singapore was some of the cool new buildings going up. We especially liked the one that looks like a boat:
