Our time in Bali has come to and end! We spent the last week taking in as much of Bali as possible. Echo Beach and Old Man beach, both near our hotel in Canggu, have seen a lot of us for both lounging and surfing. Renting a board is only 50 000 IDR ($5.00) for 2 hours! The ocean feels like bath water, the downfall of swimming in Bali is the heaps of plastic hitting you in the face with each wave. The plastic problem in Bali is really disheartening, there were quite a few people cleaning the beaches and we did our small part to reduce waste but it's pretty awful. We saw this problem throughout Bali and it's the major draw back for this country when it comes to tourism. People just leave their plastic bottles and cigg butts all over the beach and streets, really disgusting way to treat a country you're visiting. Despite the state of garbage we made the most of our time. We hit the gym and the pool at our hotel most mornings, working off the Bintangs from the day before. Our hotel had a nice gym with glass walls overlooking rice terraces. The glass walls turned the gym into a greenhouse however which made the pool that much more welcoming! Bali's rainy season starts in late October so we've been treated to lightening storms almost every night and the odd afternoon shower. The rain doesn't last long and helps to lift the humidity at least. A rainy afternoon is also the perfect excuse to get a massage which we've been doing every other day. The Kirana Spa is excellent and super affordable. The south of Bali is filled with excellent beaches and temples so Chris and I arranged a driver for the afternoon to check some of them. Unfortunately for us we booked a cookie cutter itinerary from the hotel which turned out to be a bit hit and miss. The first stop was a water sport park. We knew going in we probably would regret this one but hoped it'd be a nice beach and a fun place to hang out for a bit in the morning. It turned out to be a 30 minute sales pitch until we finally gave in a did one of the paid activities. We chose the sea-dooing largely because it was the least expensive thing to do and Chris had never done it. It was 20 minutes of fun which we took full advantage off but in the end probably would have rather skipped it. Our next stop was better, we stopped at the Bali Cultural Park. It's a large park that was constructed to show the story of Wisnu with sculptures and also a place for worship. The sculptures are immensely big and there are more going up as we speak. The park itself has an odd landscape of carved out hills. It was an odd park and worth the visit. After this we stopped for a quick lunch and headed to Padang Padang Beach. This place is pretty cool, you walk through a small temple complex down a steep stairwell lined by boulders until you reach the beach. The beach has rock formations scattered around the beach revealed at low tide. The only down side is how touristy it is. There was an endless parade of selfies and burnt tourists walking through the small beach but was still pretty nice little spot. After an hour of tanning and swimming we headed to Blue Point Beach just up the road. We preferred this beach over Padang Padang for sure. It was filled with surfers, excellent sand, and some fantastic cliff side bars overlooking the beach. Great place to hang out, meet new people and watch surfers go for it. By this point is was around 5pm so we headed to Uluwatu Temple. Uluwatu is an active temple built on a cliff over looking the ocean. At sunset it makes for a spectacular view. They do cultural dances here as well but we skipped these in favour for a more secluded section of the cliff side that gave us an uninterrupted view of the sunset, temple and the rain coming in. We were here on the full moon (super moon in fact) so there were tons of locals here praying and having festivals for the full moon. Our last stop was Jimbaran Bay. It's a section of beach filled with outdoor restaurants. There are dozens of restaurants with candle lit beach tables set up. Each restaurant had a small stage as well where they would have short cultural dances take place as your eating. It's supposed to be the best place for seafood in this part of Bali, unfortunately we were extremely let down. The calamari was tougher than liquorice and the crab, fish and clams weren't that fantastic either. The real kicker is how freaking expensive it was! Up to this point we've been getting a full dinner and drinks for two for under $30.00 per night no problem. Here was over $100 and it wasn't good. Definitely a let down but at least we had ocean views with lightening, fireworks and the large full moon to enjoy. We loved Bali and can't say enough good things about it but we are excited to move onto somewhere new. Next stop is Kuala Lumpur where we have a few days before heading to Cambodia, can't wait to take advantage of our time there!
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