place we headed out to explore the town. One of our goals was to dive so we went to a shop that arranges diving trips. Sarah, the only non-diver, was going to surf the next day so the three of us arranged a dive Thursday. By the time we had arranged the dive it was around 10:30 and the local guys (Hogan and his friend) that were working at the dive shop asked if we wanted to go out to the club with them. We walked to the street know for its clubs and were pretty shocked by the size and scope of some of the clubs. Most of the clubs were crawling with Aussies because of Bali's proximity to Australia. And for some unknown reason the unofficial dress code was shirtless guys with sweatbands or local wife beaters with local beer logos. The place was pretty fun but we didn't stay long because we had a dive in the morning.Thursday: We had to wake up early because diving is a lot better in the morning. We got a wake up call from the front desk because our driver was already there waiting to bring us to the dive site. The place was about a 30 minute drive. After trying on the equipment we boarded the boat and we were on our way. On the boat ride over we counted several banana boats and 7 para sailing boats. It was quite chaotic. The water was very clear.
The first dive was pretty similar to the dives in Phuket but the dive masters brought bread in plastic bags down for us. When we got to the bottom we opened the bags and were immediately swarmed with fish. They were so close that we were able to easily touch them. We swam around the reef and went deeper than we had ever been which was about 15 meters. We got back on the boat and headed to another reef for another
dive.The second dive was a bit deeper (22 meters). The sights and reefs were similar but near the end of the dive one of the guides caught a puffer fish under a rock, inflated it, and swam around with the volleyball shaped puffer fish for about 5 minutes. Another highlight was when one of the guides decided to turn off the others air under water. Requiring him to use my back up regulator until it was turned back on. It was hilarious.
Lunch was provided at the dive shop as was the transportation. All of it together was about $35 USD for everything together.
After showering at the hotel we went to find a converter so we could plug in Samm's computer. He was the only one that brought one and without it we wouldn't be able to charge any of our cameras or ipods. While shopping we ran into Guy and some of his friends (Grace, Lisa, and Heather).
They were having lunch so we pulled up some chairs and grabbed a snack while discussing plans for the night. Without phones it was somewhat difficult to arrange meetings etc. The group decided that they wanted to try some of the famous (and legal) mushroom shakes (not me). So after discussing a game plan on when and where we would meet up we went our separate ways. We relaxed around the pool and then headed out to dinner. We went to a food court where I stumbled across some locals playing chess. I watched for a little bit and when the current game ended the winner challenged me. Naturally I had to accept. He was a lot better than I thought. It came down to the end game where I was finally able to finish him off.Some other friends (Frank, Stephane, and Alexi) were suppose to be joining as well but ended up just missing the group. Hogan, our local friend, was going to meet us and take the group to a good place for the shakes. We stayed at the first place for a little bit but decide to take the shakes to go and having a swim at the pool would be more fun for everyone.
Friday: We slept in late. Guy (who had planned on staying with the 3 girls throughout the trip) decided to make the switch and join our traveling party. He wanted to join us on the wreck dive but the girls weren't certified so he just joined our party. Arnuad and Stephanie also joined us. After an easy morning we decided to head to the beach to try and surf. Unknown to us was the fact that Kuta Beach is known for the dead fish that are killed by the break. The later in the day the more dead fish. The water smelled terrible. After surfing (trying to) for over an hour I finally stood up on the board for about 2.5 seconds. I quit after that momentous victory and waited a little bit for everyone else to finish up. We took showers and grabbed dinner. The plan was to go out to the Sky Garden where some more NUS students were going to meet us. When we got to the club we saw a lot of friends from NUS. We stayed pretty late before finally heading home (but not before we stopped by the 24 hour McDonald's)
Saturday: We hired a driver for the day for 10 hours (it only cost
$40) to take us around Bali to the various temples. The van was designed to seat nine (which would have been perfect for the seven of us...unfortunately we all had our luggage). The van was pretty packed but we were able to fit everyone somewhat comfortably. We started north west towards the island temple (all of the temples have actual names but I don't remember them). It was built on a tiny rock island and during the low tide can be accesses by wading across the water.Next we headed much further north to check out the floating temple on
one of the largest lakes in Bali. It is surrounded by mountains so the drive there was actually very interesting all to itself. At the the top of one of these mountains our driver pulled over so we could take some pretty cool pictures. The temple itself was very ornate and different from the first temple but not that exciting (partially to do with the weather). However, it did provide some pretty sweet photo ops and right before we left the clouds began to break revealing the lake and the surrounding mountains. It reminded 
me a lot of Lake Como. We stopped at an all you can eat buffet ($10) on the way there at the perfect time because just as we arrived it began to rain very hard. The restaurant also had a pretty amazing view of some rice terracing. Next we headed to Ubud (considered the cultural capital of Bali). The plan was to check out some pretty cool views of more rice terracing but decided we had enough of the cramped car conditions and would prefer to spend more time walking around Ubud.After checking in to the hostel we headed to the market which was closing up as we got there. I made a few t-shirt purchases (hopefully you like them Chris/Evan/Patrick...you'll have to wait). We were told that
going to the traditional dances was pretty interesting, and it was for about 15 minutes. Unfortunately for us it lasted an hour and a half. After that we headed back to grab dinner. Mike and Guy made the wise decision to skip the dance and instead checked out the monkey forest and booked the wreck dive for the next day. By the time they got there it was already pretty dark so when Mike found himself under attack they ran as fast as they could out of the forest. Turns out monkeys do enjoy throwing their feces in the wild, not just at the zoo.We heard the place called the Dirty Duck was good but as we arrived they were already closing. We wandered around for a bit till we found a place that was open. It was actually very good (and had wireless Internet). People took turns using my itouch to check their email/etc which was very handy (thanks mom).
Sunday: We woke up at sunrise to go to the monkey forest located just on the edge of Ubud. It was about a 10 minute walk from out hostel. It was pretty eerie because we were the only people in the forest. We finally came
across a large troop of monkeys feasting on some potatoes that the locals throw out to them. They were a lot more aggressive and intimidating then I thought they would be 
based on their size. I got more comfortable around them eventually but still kept my distance. Samm got much closer, so close that he actually had his water bottle stolen from him. The monkey proceeded to open the bottle and drink from it (quite impressive). We were on the way out when a monkey was able to mark his territory by urinating on Stephanie from the trees. She was not happy.When we got back it was already time to load up the car and headed to Tulamben. It was about a 2.5 hour drive and we wanted to get there in the morning while the diving is still good. On the way there I witnessed my first motorbike accident. It wasn't that serious but I knew it was only a matter of time before I would see one because of the way everyone drives. The town of Tulamben is tiny, so tiny that the directions were "It's on the left side of the road". Sure enough it
was. We got fitted for our gears and then went to grab lunch. Arnuad, Stephanie, and Sarah weren't certified so they had to do an instructional course before being able to dive with instructors holding on to them. While they did the first course we went ahead with out first wreck dive in the USS Liberty (A US ship sunk by a Japanese sub during WWII). It was incredible. As soon as we were underwater you could see schools of neon fish everywhere. The wreck was amazing. The fish were much bigger than we had ever seen before and the fact that we were swimming through a ship made it that much cooler. Not to mention the depth beneath during parts of the dive. We swam down half of the ship and then through the old engine room and then back to shore. The current back to shore was incredibly strong so it took a lot of en
ergy to swim in. Just as we were leaving the other group was doing their first dive. We went back to the pool to relax and decompress while we waited for them to finish. When both groups were done we planned on heading to the hotel to unpack while waiting to do the second dive. We planned on getting 2 rooms between the 7 of us. The dive company suggested we check out one of the villas because they thought it would be a lot more comfortable for such a large group. They were right. They took us to a private villa with 3 bedrooms, 3 bath, a full kitchen, living area, a private pool, and sun area. It was incredible. But the original price range was still out of our budget so we opted to take only 2 of the rooms and have a few people sleep on coaches etc. Eventually they lowered the price per room to it worked out to $20 per person for 3 rooms which made us all very happy. Even the smallest things at the villa like a toaster was a cause for celebration. It was nice to treat ourselves although we knew it was only going to be for the night.That night we had food delivered and ate dinner as the sun set.
It was pretty cool. Our dive master helped us acquire the necessary amounts of beer at a fair price and some of the local moonshine called Araq. We spent almost all of the night playing King's in the pool. Arnuad, who is Swiss, especially enjoyed the new game. We were also able to significantly grow his vocabulary with various words that he used repeatedly throughout the remainder of the trip. The original plan was to wake up early to drive back to Kuta to catch the bus to Java but none of us wanted to leave the Villa any earlier than we had to. Instead we all slept in.Monday: When we woke up walked right next door to grab the breakfast that was included. Then we were on our way south. The plan was to stop a few times to check out the surfing but when we arrived in a few places the surf had already gone out. We went back to Kuta for the night and checked back into the Suji Bungalows. We met up with German Mike and his friend for Mike's birthday. After a long night it was finally time for bed. The mini-bus was coming at noon for the trip to Java that I will continue in my next blog post.
As always check out my Picasa/ facebook for more pictures.
http://picasaweb.google.com/WilliamStoudt
