Beautiful Blissful Bali

Leaving Bali today was tougher than anywhere we have left so far. Staying in such an amazing place (http://www.desaseni.com/ – and see description/pic's below) with a great group of people made this stop of the tour really feel like home. We totally unpacked for the first time and really settled into a great routine of yoga, surfing, exploring, cultural events and great food. A highlight was our final night where the whole group went to the Uluwatu Temple that was built in the 1530's. The temple is on the southern most point of Bali, set on high cliffs overlooking the ocean and the most amazing sunsets. The famous Uluwatu surf break is right below – the biggest and heaviest wave in all of Bali (Mark and Chuck surfed there prior to the evening temple activities). The grounds are weaving through gardens which are overrun with rather aggressive monkeys – not the first time we've seen this, but Mark still got too close to a big male that went after him with his teeth fully bared and after a quick chase he got away unscathed and a little smarter about getting too close to them.

Each night at sunset, the local village puts on a Kecuk (ka-chuk) performance which is a dance and show highlighting the great legendary story of Rama and Sita and the battle to rescue her. The show is anchored by a choir of 70 men who for an hour sing in a trance-like state "kachuck, kachuck, kachuck, kachuck…." endlessly with a variety of tones and variations that make a harmonious rhythmical background to the performers dressed in elaborate costumes. The highlight is "Hanoman" – the white monkey – who is the hero and escapes from a certain fiery death. The combination of setting and performance made it quite the mystical Balinese night (click on the panorama picture at the top to get a bit of the feel of the setting).

After the Uluwatu temple we went to Jimbaron beach for a great seafood dinner with the whole gang. It was a great way to finish off the trip on our final night and we know we have met some great new friends we will see again soon. In fact, Sva, a Canadian now living in Byron Bay, Australia will be seeing us in a week and showing us some of the sights there, in fact we're are on the plane to Australia right now! We have a camper van waiting for us in Sydney that we will be driving up the entire east coast of Australia over the next 9 days.

SURF REPORT: Paula finally got in the water at Kuta where the rest of the gang took lessons with the Rip Curl surf-school (the best surf school program we have ever seen) – problem was that they teach in the reform white water from the 10 foot crashing huge close out waves. It all works good with instructors holding boards and only playing in waist to knee deep water – but for Paula trying to practice at the next level there was a crazy rip running down the beach and the white water was way too strong. Unfortunately there isn't much for learning surfers after their first couple days as all the breaks seem to be pretty heavy requiring some experience. I spent the last week surfing all over the island with Eion, Chuck and the odd tag along from the group who unfortunately were not as experienced and were lashed with some serous beatings. I raved about Sanur in the last update – and a few other highlights. Keramas is a throwing fast wave breaking off a beautiful black sand beach on the east coast. Saw lots of barrels and some incredible surfing by the local crew as they warm up for a contest at this break next month. See picture of me - we were all running out in front of the barrel section but had a lot of fast fun waves! We also took a boat trip to Nusa Lambongin one day with about 10 of us from our group – snorkeling and surfing were the ticket for all and we anchored in the channel between two breaks. Unfortunately this break is very overrun with Japanese surfers who behave like they are in downtown Tokyo which makes for tough surfing. It was a great day trip though and some OK surf at a wave called "Lacerations" but unfortunately the big famous wave 1km away is Shipwrecks but we couldn't make it work to go down there with the group as we needed to be anchored central to the snorkeling and the intermediate surfing break called Playgrounds.

Saving the best for last and a highlight of my surfing career I will never forget – Uluwatu! Eoin unfortunately had a bad cold and it was just Chuck and I who ventured there. We timed it to arrive at high tide so we could feel it out this heavy reef break in safer conditions. The walk down the long stairway down a rocky canyon leads to a mishmash village set on a rocky outcrop overlooking the three breaks of Uluwatu. It is such an eclectic mix of Indo Surf culture with warangs (food/drink/storage), surf shops, board repair huts and even some sketchy looking hostels that is so totally steeped in surfing history you feel you are walking on surfing's sacred ground. We scoped out the waves and the tricky cave launch to get our confidence and game plan. The launch is down a steep staircase into the cave that you paddle out of – and at high tide you feel like you are in the "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride but hoping you don't get pushed into the rocky walls as the waves smack through and rebound wall to wall up to the back of the cave. We chose to go out top to "Temples" – named after the Uluwatu temple that sits high on the cliffs above – and is about 800m away but you have to paddle the long route to avoid been taken down with big waves at the middle break "race tracks" and takes about 15 minutes. We were both very nervous but by taking in some big sets from the shoulder we slowly built our confidence to join the other few guys who were out then at Temples. My first wave was about 2-3 ft overhead and I was screaming down the line backside, shades of Cloudbreak in Fiji, but I made it through the drop and the really fast first section to a fun long section. This turned out to be my first of about a dozen 200-300m long waves. We had about 1.5 hours with just Chuck, a guy from Florida and I out as the wave got better and better as the tide dropped. I watched the best barrel ride of the trip when the guy from Florida took a nice wave that held him inside for at least 8 seconds. About every ½ hour a set of bombs would come through that send us scurrying. 12-15 foot faces and no one able to get into them - very scary and hard paddles to just try to stay safe. The scare of the day went to Chuck, who dropped into a serious throwing wave with a great hoot and backside rail grab that unfortunately led him into a close out section, big slam and a broken leash. He had to swim into a beach that was nowhere near the launch – and on the following waves as he actually held onto the reef trying to avoid being dragged over the shallows and then lost his contact lenses!?!? The Balinese lifegaurds had whistles and flags and tried to direct him from the cliff – but without his contacts in he couldn't make out their gestures and one guy that was out with us directed him where to swim to nearest safety. The local board repair guy scampered down and rescued the board – knowing he would have a new customer (broken fin plug and some good rock punctures). Chuck fortunately made it in safely and I stayed out for a while as Temples got more and more sectioned up with the low tide and after a few drops into close-out on the head, I paddled over to Race Tracks that was now full of 40 surfers. I managed to picked off a mid size wave that took me right to where I could drop down and belly whomp into the mouth of the cave – just barely clearing reef 6 inches of water as the low tide was on. 10 minutes after I was out the reef was fully exposed and you would have to reef walk in/out. It is one of the most amazing surf days of my life!