Category: Semarapura

Narita, Tokyo to Denpasar, Bali to Jimbaran

Friday, September 20, 2024: We left Narita right on time; the doors to the plane were closed at 10:45 a.m. and we took off directly at 11:00. The total distance to Bali from Narita, Japan was 5,677 km, or 3,527.5 miles. Mike and I sat on the right side of the plane in two seats: he at the window and me in the aisle seat, 25 K & H.

Mike and I shared an onigiri with tuna mayonnaise and a small can of Pringles. I read some of my book, All the Lives We Never Lived by Anuradha Roy. None of the movies interested me. The flight attendants were beautiful, gentle and kind (Indonesian I think). They wore brightly colored skirts and tops made of gorgeous fabric. They were a breath of fresh air after the black/white/navy & beige styles of the Japanese. I used my new trtl pillow and took a Valium after lunch. I may have slept about 2-3 hours. 

We flew into Denpasar Airport (Ngurah Rai International Airport) in Bali after our 7 1/2 hour flight at around 5:15 p.m., earlier than expected. We then had to go through a health check, Visa on Arrival, Immigration and Customs. We had arranged a ride to the Movenpick Resort & Spa Jimbaran Bali through Bali Fast Track. The traffic coming out of the airport was crazy. It felt like we were driving in the middle of Bangkok! 

Jimbaran

We checked into Movenpick Resort & Spa Jimbaran Bali on Friday evening around 7:00 p.m. We’re not normally resort-type people but there were several reasons we picked this for our first stop in Bali, having to do with our late-ish arrival time and its proximity to the airport, its relative proximity to Uluwatu and its attached big stretch of beach (for Mike). I personally could care less about the beach.

We promptly went out in search of dinner at an adjacent outdoor shopping mall with many eateries. We found a pizza place called Pepenero and got some small pizzas and the local beer, Bintang.

While Mike was paying, I got up to walk out of the restaurant and ran full force into the glass pane to the left of the door (the photo after the pizza shows the spot but in this view it’s the pane to the right) It was a full-on head bang that made a loud noise and I yelled, “What the heck??!!” It startled everyone in the restaurant. I hadn’t realized it wasn’t the doorway.🤣🤣 I felt sorry for the glass because my hard head didn’t feel a thing!

Steps: 6,757; Miles 2.86. Weather in Denpasar: Hi 89°, Lo 73°. Partly cloudy.

Saturday, September 21: The breakfast Saturday morning was astounding, with what seemed like hundreds of choices, but we grabbed all of our breakfast at the first omelette station without checking out the many options. We would know better on Sunday!

This was a place with lots of families, most of them Aussies. I loved hearing their accents all around. It was pretty convenient for them to come to Bali as it’s only a 2-3 hour flight. We hadn’t run into any Americans.

Nusa Dua & Museum Pasifika

Saturday morning we took a Gojek taxi from our hotel in Jimbaran, which sits at the western neck of the Bukit Peninsula, to Nusa Dua, a popular resort area in Bali along the southeastern coast in the Bukit Peninsula.

We wandered around an upscale outdoor shopping mall, Bali Collection. We seemed to be going around in circles for a long time, looking in vain for the Museum Pasifika.

We eventually made our way to the Museum Pasifika. The museum had no air conditioning so our goal to escape the heat for an hour or two proved to be sadly elusive.

Museum Pasifika features 600 artworks of 200 artists from Indonesia, Pacific Island, Polynesia, Indochina, Asia and European countries. We walked through pavilions to see the impressive collection of historical and masterpiece paintings and sculptures. The art was colorful and tropical and captured the South Pacific vibe.

We started in a section with various Balinese and Italian painters.

There was an entire section by Dutch-Indonesian artist Arie Smit (1916-2016). Born in the Netherlands in 1916, he was captured by the Japanese during World War II and spent three years doing forced labor in Burma, building civil structures and architecture. When he was released in 1945, he went to what was then the Republic  of Indonesia and became an Indonesian citizen. In 1956, he went to Bali and spent the rest of his life there. His art was heavily influenced by three Pauls:  Signac, Gauguin and Cézanne.

I loved these colorful paintings.

Then we found more wonderful paintings by Dutch, Austrian, French, Belgian, German, Australian and Mexican artists. I especially loved the magnificent painting: Women Offering to the Sacred Pond by Adrien-Jean Le Mayeur 1948.

In another building at the museum, we enjoyed paintings by Swiss artist Theo Meier (1908-1982), who lived in Bali for twenty years, from 1934-1955. He immersed himself in Balinese culture in a bohemian way and forged friendships with many other artists. He was captivated by Balinese Modernism and assembled a large number of paintings before, during and after WWII. His paintings reminded me of Paul Gauguin’s work.

Within this section were more interesting exhibits.

We finished up our visit to the museum in the Indochina Room and the Asia Room.

After visiting this fabulous museum, we stopped at a Starbucks and got some iced coffees and pastries. It was the only place we could find to sit down in air conditioning.

We shopped a bit in some of the stores then made our way to the Nusa Dua Beach Promenade, a paved walkway along the Indian Ocean that stretches 5km long.

There we strolled until coming to Tamarind where we ordered some lunch. Why I got fish and chips I’ll never know; it was a huge meal and very hot. I could barely eat a third of it. Mike got a lamb kebab on a pita.

We made our way to a main road through a beautiful hotel, the name of which I don’t know. From there we caught a Gojek back to our hotel.

We returned to our hotel to relax for a bit at the pool until our evening outing to Uluwatu.

Pura Luhur Uluwatu & the Kecak Dance

Our hired driver, Darma, drove us from The Movenpick in Jimbaran to Uluwatu on Saturday night. Because there was a traffic jam on the main road, we drove on windy, narrow and rutted backroads for around 45 minutes to get there. The traffic everywhere in Bali was INSANE!

Uluwatu, home of the important 1,000 year old temple Pura Luhur Uluwatu, is at the westerly end of the Bukit Peninsula and borders the Indian Ocean. The complex is set on limestone cliffs with crashing surf below. It is also home to a large colony of mischievous monkeys who are expert thieves. They love to steal any loose thing carried by tourists, including phones. We saw one snatch a pair of sunglasses 😎 from a young woman.

The present Uluwatu temple complex was built under the instructions of a Javanese Hindu sage in the 11th century and later developed by Hindu priests. However, it is said to have been the site of a temple for much longer. It is considered to protect the island of Bali from evil spirits.

Sadly the temple, which seemed in rather derelict shape, was not open to visitors. We walked around and admired the cliff top views and tried to keep our possessions away from the thieving monkeys.

We met three young Chinese ladies all decked out in colorful batik. I asked them if they got their outfits in Bali and they said, yes, in Kuta, north of Jimbaran.

Kecak dances are regularly performed here at sunset. There are two shows nightly, one at 6:00 and one at 7:00. We didn’t buy the tickets (6:00) online and thus missed our opportunity for the sunset show. However our driver Darma helped us get tickets at the temple for the 7:00 show.

After walking along the cliff top at Uluwatu, at around 6:20, our driver handed over our 7:00 tickets and told us to wait in line near the stage until they opened the doors to the amphitheater. People were packed in together waiting, unable to move or to sit, sweltering the entire time. I couldn’t help but think of being caught in a stampede if some loud noise went off. I really despise being in the midst of these kinds of crowds. At around 7:15 we could see they finally opened the doors to the 7:00 show and were letting in the tour groups first. Finally around 7:20 we were allowed to enter and then packed into the amphitheater, with no aisles or passageways left open for escape. I think they sold tickets with no regard to keeping control of crowd size.

After being in the super-efficient and well-organized Japan, with its excellent crowd-moving systems, this utter lack of a system was hard to take. I hate chaos such as this; I also hate when places don’t limit crowd size to match the size of the space.

Anyway, we were captive and we watched the Kecak dance which was certainly interesting but all the other hassle and crowds detracted from the experience.

Kecak (pronounced “kechak”) is a form of Balinese Hindu dance and music drama that was developed in the 1930s. Also known as the Ramayana monkey chant, the dance is not accompanied by any orchestra/gamelan but by a choir of seventy men wearing checked cloths around their waists, percussively chanting “chak”, and moving their hands and arms. The performance depicts a battle of the Ramayana, in which the monkey-like Vanaras, led by Hanuman, helps Prince Rama fight the evil King Ravana. Kecak has roots in sanghyang, a trance-inducing exorcism dance, in which a person in a state of trance communicates with deities or ancestors. Using the dancers as a medium, the deities or ancestors convey their wishes.

In the 1930s the old Indian epic Ramayana was included in the dance. Briefly the story runs as follows :

Due to a wise prince of Ayodya, Rama the legal heir to the throne of Ayodya, was exiled from the realm of his father Dasarata. Accompanied by his wife Sita and his younger brother Laksamana, they went into a forest called Dandaka. While they were in the forest the demon king Rahwana found them and lusted after the beautiful Sita. Accompanied by his prime minister Marica, they made a trick to steal Sita. Using his magic power Marica transformed himself into golden deer and succeeded in luring Rama and Laksamana away from Sita. Rahwana, making use of this opportunity, kidnapped Sita and took her to his palace Alengka. Discovering the deception, Rama and Laksamana set out to rescue Sita from the clutches of the demon king assisted by the huge army of monkeys under the command of their king (Hanoman).

Rama succeeded in getting his wife back safely.

After our 45 minute drive back to Jimbaran, we had a light dinner with a beet salad and other light fare.

Steps: 15,769; Miles 6.67. Weather: Hi 88°, Lo 77°. Sunny.

Seminyak

Sunday, September 22: Sunday morning we planned to go to Seminyak to check out the boutiques & restaurants but instead, after seeing the three young Chinese women at Uluwatu on Saturday night wearing batik, I was on a quest to find batik shirts such as theirs. They said they had gotten them at a shop in Kuta, so we asked around at the hotel and did some research and found a good place to buy batik was Krisna Oleh Oleh Bali at the bypass. A Gojek driver took us there and we spent over an hour looking around the sprawling multi-level store. I found two shirts (not as nice as the Chinese girls’ shirts), one sarong and a pair of pants. Everything was very cheap; we spent less than $25 for everything! I wasn’t sure it was the right place but it was close enough.

We had decided the rest of the day we would spend at Jimbaran Beach and at the Movenpick pool. I really don’t enjoy the beach anymore but I had to do my duty since Mike puts up with my shopping expeditions.

Jimbaran

After our shopping spree at Krisna Oleh Oleh, we returned to the hotel where we had pizza for lunch then headed to Jimbaran Beach for a couple of hours. BORING 😑 😴 , but I managed to survive the endless moments while Mike splashed around in the water, swam parallel to the shore and tried to ride a small wave in. Finally my duty was done and we returned to the hotel pool. Thank goodness that was the end of my beach time in Bali!

From the beach, we returned to the hotel pool where I rinsed off the infernal sand, got in the pool and went directly to the swim up bar. Now that was what I was talking about. We enjoyed Bintang beers and lounged around the pool for the afternoon.

Later in the evening we went back to the beach and ate fish tacos and pork belly rice at Akusuka Bali and watched all the sunset watchers and families at the beach. It was a whole different vibe than when we’d come down earlier in the afternoon. And it was just a tad bit cooler too.

Steps: 10,876; Miles 4.6. Weather: Hi 88°, Lo 77°. Partly cloudy.

Monday, September 23: We left the Movenpick in Jimbaran at 9:00 a.m. Monday and began our 1 1/2 hour traffic-congested drive to Sidemen on Bali’s east side. We would make a stop at Klungkung Royal Palace and then on to Sidemen, where we planned to spend 3 nights.

Weather Jimbaran: Hi 88°, Lo 78°.