Bali - it was closed

Well for the first 24 hours anyway and when I say closed I mean really closed. The airport, every shop, bar, restaurant. No one was allowed out on the streets.

I wasn't going to blog about Bali because Bali's Bali right? Rice terraces, beaches, yoga, temples, annoying Aussie surf dudes and (to quote Richard) lots of young women walking around in long floaty dresses trailed by their long suffering boyfriends, phone in hand, repeatedly attempting the perfect insta shot. We all know this. 

So why was it closed for a day? It was Nyepi, the Balinese new year. We did read this a few weeks before we arrived and I have to admit my heart sank a little, those week long Carnavale pan pipes and drums were still a very recent memory. However Nyepi is not a loud, riotous, crazy, South American style festival but rather a Hindu day of silence and self reflection, with no fires and no lights (we had to keep blinds closed after dark), no work, no entertainment or pleasure, no travelling and for some no eating or talking.

This genuinely was enforced with street patrols making sure no one went out. We were confined to barracks but having chosen our accommodation with this in mind, we had nothing to complain about. The peace was incredible, only broken by the birds, cicadas and raucous frogs in the rice field outside our room. We were able to eat from a limited menu and use the pool before it got dark. Our driver confirmed our suspicions a few days later, that the birth rate spikes in December in Bali!

We had arrived the evening before, in the midst of the pre Nyepi cleansing rituals , part of which involves the parading of giant like Ogoh-ogoh through the streets. These magnificent painted, demonic statues are made of bamboo, cloth, tinsel, styrofoam or papier mache. They symbolise negative elements or malevolent spirits, the same driver told us one year he saw a Bill Clinton effigy. After they have been paraded around the village, they are burned or destroyed. Our taxi chose to drive the wrong way down a dual carriageway to circumvent one parade. Fairly standard Balinese driving.

The day after Nyepi we realised we had been lulled into a false sense of security about the peacefulness of Bali as the dawn chorus of scooters started before the birds and frogs. 

After spending three nights in Ubud, the cultural centre aka hippy, turmeric drinking, yoga central where I was of course very happy, notwithstanding the traffic, we moved on for three nights in an Eco Resort on the east coast. "The best place we have ever stayed" pronounced Richard. I think I only slightly annoyed him by mentioning AGAIN the 6 night solo stay I did at an eco resort/barefoot luxury place on a remote Thai island several years ago. 

I was also very happy here as I had sand, sea and a snorkel, not to mention pre breakfast yoga every morning and a daily massage on the beach by a very sweet elderly Balinese lady for a fiver. Richard, the beach non enthusiast, was happy because he had a sun lounger, an umbrella and a life jacket. Slightly reminiscent of holidays with children, I had to keep him entertained with games. I eventually settled on the grown up equivalent of scavenger hunts (go and find me something pink, something made of wood, seven different types of shell etc) with go and find out the scooter per head of population for every country in the world....and stop boring me with GDP stats and the GINI coefficient of each country.

The snorkelling off the beach was very Finding Nemo, and only one hairy moment where a strong current appeared out of nowhere and started taking me out towards the shipping lane. I remembered to swim across a current not into it and was fortunately helped by shouted directions from one of the several boatmen who brought snorkellers to our bay. Richard hadn't noticed, he was snoozing on his sunbed!

It turns out that Bali isn't my favourite South East Asia destination, Myanmar still holds that crown with Laos a close second. The people we met were largely very kind and gentle but there was definitely too much traffic and the place felt somewhat tourist jaded. It was Richard's second visit. He came on his own four years ago for three days. He didn't love it as much this second time. Maybe this is simply about a different biopsy, or maybe there is a pre and post covid effect. Two years of no tourists will undoubtedly have made people more desperate for the tourist dollar as one of our yoga teachers suggested. Or maybe it is simply because the first time he was on his own!! However it suited our purposes for these five days well. We did very little other than sleep, read, swim, downward dog and a bit of rice field wandering. I know there are numerous fabulous sites and temples but we were Tired with a capital T after a very active 12 days in  New Zealand including a four day Hindu wedding. Richard, I am sure, would like it to be known he still went running a few times!

So we have come to the end. We have had the most exciting, adventurous, stimulating, interesting, challenging and fun seven and a half weeks of travel......and after all that time with mostly just each other's company we are still married. We naively said a couple of years ago that we had probably has enough of long haul travel......wrong! 

A final note.....very few dogs in Bali but two well dressed students did ask to take our blood pressure on the beach for their university project. Possibly the most bizarre moment of my life, definitely of the trip.

Now to go to the UK and remind our children who we are.