Day 3 – Thursday June 23^rd

We decided it was time to ride around town Bali style – on a scooter. Hey if the Balinese can do it smoothly while carrying a baby or holding onto a 50-pound suitcase, we can too! Scooters are very economical and cost about $5/day to rent. Your introduction to the scooter should include figuring out where the registration is in case you get stopped by the police and how to honk the horn. I was on the back of the scooter while Mashrur drove. He felt off balance with me on the back and tried giving just the right amount of gas at the right time to keep us stable, but my sneakers were firmly pressed against the foot pegs ready to jump off at any moment if things became perilous. It was a bit unwieldy navigating the bumpy streets and lawless traffic, but we made it to the gym without any incidents. Later, we did feel a bit uneasy about whether we were supposed to give money to a man sitting in a small toll booth (official or unofficial) along the narrow beach road, so we drove right passed it. We found out later that he collects a legit fee for street parking, so we just have to let him know we’re parking at the gym garage.

Whether you’re driving a scooter, taking a taxi, or walking around town, directions in Bali are not how we know them in the western world. You have to get accustomed to the landmarks because it’s rare to have clearly labeled street signs. Businesses and villas pick their own building numbers so you can have the number 3 next to the number 8. Even the main street near our villa has 2 names – the formal name is Jl. Camplung Tanduk but the locals refer to it as Dhayana Pura.

Café – Jl. Camplung Tanduk / Dhayana Pura 101

We were craving a hearty breakfast after the gym, so we went to a café, cleverly named Café. Like many restaurants, it’s open air covered by an awning for shade and a few fans to keep the heat bearable. I would say it was a pretty standard American-style breakfast: eggs, toast, chicken sausage and an iced latte. The food was good but nothing to rave about compared to many other meals we’ve tried.

I really miss whole wheat bread, crackers, rice – it’s not as common to find here; however, I’ll trade the farm fresh eggs over the hormone-injected chicken eggs that are typically several weeks old in American grocery stores any day.

The days are hot and humid, so we’re getting used to being a bit damp all the time. The afternoons are best spent either:

1. Embracing the sun in all its glory poolside and riding the waves at the beach or
2. Chilling out under the villa veranda with the fan blasting full speed, finding one of the few air conditioned hideouts whether it’s in your bedroom, at a spa, gym, or in one of the few shops and restaurants that are like sealed refrigerators to accommodate the delicate tourists

For us it’s a combo of the two, we love being outdoors and enjoying the sun, but we’re grateful to have a few hideaways from the burning heat when we just can’t take the dripping sweat anymore!

In the evening, we decided to take a long walk on the beach. Unfortunately, we discovered a few drain runouts from the city going directly into the ocean. We needed a running start to jump over the waterways and continue down the beach. There wasn’t garbage flowing from them, but there was definitely an unpleasant dank and musky smell. The beach close to where we live feels like a reasonably safe distance away from the runout area, but our perfect blue ocean water was a bit tarnished.

We were welcomed back to the beach near our home with a phenomenal sunset spilling a spectrum of yellow, orange, red, purple, and blues across the sky which reflected seamlessly in the ocean’s low tide giving the illusion it was all part of one continuous horizon. Children and adults alike ran around and played in mirth across the wet sand. All I could do was lift up my arms feeling free in this spiritual moment as we became wrapped up in the blanket of night.