Well… How do we describe today? Today was a day of recovery… After eating some food yesterday that was washed in some contaminated water, we both were feeling quite under the weather. I spent the morning in the beautiful hotel lobby editing photos between bathroom breaks, while Julie hung out in the room. The view outside of the lobby was pretty spectacular.
For lunch I had some Japanese Curry Ramen, which was delicious. In the afternoon we watched some comedy on Netflix. We found a hilarious young lady named Taylor Tomlinson and watched one of her shows, as well as 14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible, about a guy named Nirmal Purja, who summited the tallest 14 mountains in the world, in under 7 months! Such a good movie!
We both fell asleep for a bit, and woke up around 5:30pm. Despite not feeling great, I was feeling hungry so I went for dinner solo. I had the same burger that Julie had yesterday, however they added an egg to it, which I shouldn’t have had, because it ended up making me feel worse. After dinner we ended up watching more comedy on Netflix, before calling it a night.
Today was a day of exploring waterfalls. We ended up hiring another driver from Bali Customized Tours, however I forget what his name was this time… I think it was Ali. We had breakfast at the Westin hotel again, and was picked up at 7:00am.
First stop was Leke Leke Falls. The last few kilometres of driving took nearly half an hour because of how bumpy and uneven the road was. The waterfall isn’t frequented as many others around Bali, so we were the only ones there. Standing at 32 metres high, the water sources are from springs in the mountains, so the water is quite clear. The entrance fee to the waterfall is about $4/pp and the hike takes about 30 minutes return.
After visiting Leke Leke falls we drove to Sekumpul Waterfall, about another hour away. You need to hire a local guide to bring you down to the waterfall, because its a protected area. Our guide introduced us to his family, and he had a pretty cute dog named Molly that ended up following us for a while. The hike to the 80 metre high waterfall takes about 45 minutes, and involves going down about 350 steps. At the beginning of the hike there’s some beautiful rice terraces.
After exploring Sekumpul Waterfall our guide showed us another waterfall, just 10 minutes away, which involved two water crossings. This is the fifth time I’ve had to do a water crossing in my hiking adventures, and I really enjoyed it.
Now it was time to climb those 350 stairs to head back to the car. It wasn’t too bad, but it’s certainly not fun in 32°C heat!
We then drove to a local warung to have some lunch. Unfortunately this was a very bad choice to eat this time round, because Julie and I both ended up getting quite sick for a few days, as you’ll find out in subsequent blogs.
After lunch we visited Aling Aling Waterfall, which was just a few minutes away. Aling Aling Waterfall stands over 35 metres tall. We had the opportunity to also go down a natural waterslide, or jump into the water, however we were really beginning to not feel well, so we asked to just go to our hotel. The drive to the hotel was about another hour, which made for an uncomfortable ride.
Our accommodation tonight was at Handara Golf Resort. Handara Golf Resort is a beautiful mid-century hotel that was the brainchild of Ibnu Sutowo, known as the “father” of Golf in Indonesia. The resort took two years to build, and was opened in 1976. The resort was completely renovated in 2015, however still maintains its mid-century charm. In 1979 the golf course at the resort was rated as one of the Top 50 greatest courses in the world.
For dinner we had some western style food, since we wanted something we were used to, and were not feeling very good. Julie had an open faced burger with beef bacon, and I had some Japanese Ramen. Since we were not feeling well we decided to watch Netflix in bed, and head to bed early.
Ian Griffin Photography 