The Southeast Asia Adventure Begins

After some last minute preparations in Cairns and Darwin, we were psyched to start the Southeast Asia leg of our adventure! Vaccines out of the way and malaria pills packed, we flew to Bali, a 2 hour flight from Darwin. The difference hit me right away; we walked out of the airport and suddenly had to shift into "SE Asia Mode." Amidst the late night chaos, we managed to get a taxi to Balangan Beach where we spent the first three days of Bali, and the only accommodation that we had booked. Balangan Beach is known for great surf and incredible sunsets, and for good reason! We enjoyed the beach, went for a surf session, met new friends, ate Indonesian food, and drank Bintang while watching the sun set. Paradise!!


After Balangan Beach, we headed to an inland city called Ubud, where we finally found a guest house to stay after about 15 tries! It is high season here, so we knew we might have some trouble finding accommodation. We eventually found a cheap place to stay and were pleasantly surprised by the delicious banana pancakes for breakfast! The market in Ubud is awesome and it was tough not going crazy with all the cool knick knacks and souveniers for sale, but we had to keep in mind we would come across markets all over Asia. Just a few things, haha! In Ubud we visited the Monkey Forest, a sanctuary inhabited by hundreds of crazy Balinese Macquaques. Kent had an interesting time...One monkey took a liking to him and ate a banana while sittng on his back. Later on, after a little mishap, a mother macquaque tried to attack him, but he escaped with only minor scratches. Another night we watched the dance troupe Peliatan Masters perform a traditional Balinese Legong dance at the Arma Museum. From Ubud we made our way to Padangbai, a little fishing village on the coast, from where we ferried east to the island Lombok.