Catching up

Hello dear readers. It's time to get caught up on my blog. It's Tuesday today. I last wrote, on Sunday night, about Saturday and included a photo from our Mexican restaurant experience that night. There really isn't much else to say about Sunday. We walked a lot in the blazing heat, ultimately ending up at a department store where we bought a big, I'm talking big, suitcase. We love our Rick Steve's carryon type bag, but this, we decided, is an emergency, as we have only begun to shop.

Monday, on the other hand, was a bit more interesting. Let's begin with breakfast. Here are James and Glynn, two guys from the Green Lake area of Seattle who were staying at Artini 3 in Ubud and whom we got to know over breakfast.

They design and sell jewelry and are also more and more buying jewelry in Asia and reselling it. They are great guys and we hope to get together in Seattle, perhaps with the guys across the street who also are constantly traveling. It'll be a challenge to find a time. If it happens it will be yet one more time when Nancy feels somewhat left out, because despite the fact we've invited couples for dinner everyone there, except for her, is male.

We also had fun chatting with a couple from Santa Fe who are planning on living in Bali. They're young with a young daughter. He's landscaping and has worked, as it turns out, with Bern's son-in-law (well, Bern and Diane weren't actually married, but you get the idea). The wife of the couple went to Evergreen State College in Washington which, if you know anything about Evergreen, makes perfect sense.

At 11:00 our driver, Mr. Big again, picked us up for our trip to the east coast via a temple or two and a couple of view locations. This was a good thing for Mr. B because he lives in the area to which we were going. It would be a chance for him to see his kids whom he hadn't seen in over 10 days.

Off we went toward Candidasa via the scenic route. I apologize for not posting maps. You're just going to have to deal with that yourselves. Our first stop was Klungkung Palace, once the site of the highest court in Bali and also the site of the Klungkung massacre in which, in 1908, Dutch troops slaughtered the Klungkung aristocracy, men women and children, who had come out armed with ceremonial daggers in a suicidal gesture against the Dutch. In the museum on the grounds hangs this painting purporting to show the event.

The grounds are lovely.

Then it was back on the road, up into the mountains, as we headed toward the east coast. We stopped along the way to take in the view

Eventually we arrived at a lovely place for lunch. We were still in the mountains, with a gorgeous view over the terraced rice paddies.

As you might surmise from the photo, things were about to get very interesting.

The venue was lovely and the food delicious, but it began to rain. No, it began to RAIN! It was like a Michigan thunderstorm but with more water, and it went on and on. We're talking major rain, here.

Good thing Ganesh has his little parasol, although I'm not sure it did him much good. The rain wasn't going to stop so we made a run for it

and started off again. No more sightseeing for us on this drive!

Now the drive became much more interesting. The road was in the mountains and not all that great in the first place. Torrents of water rushing down it did not improve the situation. I took these photos from the car. Here's huge rock in the middle of the road.

With water totally covering the road it's hard to tell where the edge is when you're trying to not get hit by huge trucks.

That light in the distance is a motorbike passing a van. The water spray is us plowing though.

I'm sure you get the idea. Mr. B was definitely earning the $30 or so he would be paid for all this driving.

Eventually we arrived at Candidassa and, as Mr. B had predicted, the sun came out. We found a very adequate place for $35 a night with a lovely garden

and a sort of beach.

I say "sort of" because the beach is a strip of sand behind a seawall. Apparently, in an effort to make cement locally for the building boom that followed the discovery of the beautiful beach that used to be here, people dynamited the reef that was keeping the sand there in the first place. Now there's a seawall to hold the sand and breakwater to protect the seawall.

There is a spot for a few fishing boats,

that's all blown up coral underneath them. And there was a spot for a girl to photograph her friend doing yoga moves,

while avoiding the surf.

And so ended Monday. More adventures to follow.