Haanism

We stayed at Dewi Ayu in Ubud, for a total of 4 days!!

Can't imagine, right? In between, supposed 1 day should be spent at Tulamben for scuba diving. But since I was sick, we canceled the plan to Tulamben.

Ubud is actually quite a nice place. The people are not as cunning as those in Kuta. There are terraced paddy fields in Ubud, and it's a much cultural place instead of a commercial one. At night, shops close early.


Monkey Forest is a famous place in Ubud, but we do not favor monkey. We stayed at the Monkey Forest Street, walked past the Monkey Forest a lot of times, but we never went in to pay a visit.

Dewi Ayu is also somewhere we got to find, after we arrived in Ubud. I went to a few places prior to Dewi Ayu, but those places were either too expensive, full, or the person-in-charge was away. Of course, I also spent some time with the "manager" (we called him like this to make him happy) to bargain. Originally, he didn't allow 3 of us to stay in the same room.


Eventually, we paid USD 25 for the first night, then USD 24 for the following 3 nights.

I could just say.. you can get a room for like USD 15 in Ubud also. But this place really worth the money. We visited some other places also (pretending that we intended to stay), especially those we got to know via the Internet before flying to Bali.


As we could see, the staff there is almost 100% male.

They are quite funny, and always smile. They will greet you whenever seeing you, and every morning they will ask if you wanna rent a motorcycle.

However, when you negotiate with the manager, please remember or record down what he told you. This is because when he is not around and the other staff attends to you, they might not feel okay with what the manager previously promised. They would think you are cheating.


For example, on the first day, the manager told us, the daily rental for each motorcycle costs 30,000 Rupiah (appx USD 3). You can get it anytime in the morning, but have to return by 6pm. One day, when we were going out at about 9am, they wanted to charge us more.

We are not stupid, and more importantly, we won't let others to take advantage on us that easily. For sure we didn't end up paying more. Anyway, remember that in Bali, bargaining is a basic skill. If you feel shy to bargain, then you would be ripped off easily.

Do not complain then!!


Okay, last but not least, it's time to share with you the contacts of Dewi Ayu.


I will still consider it as a "budget accommodation". Would you?

If you get to stay here, please share with me your experience too :)

After visiting the monument in Denpasar, we headed to Uluwatu, the holy temple at the southern part of Bali with Kecak dance and spectacular sunset.

On the way, we passed by the Dreamland, which was originally named Cimongka.

It's built to be the "new Kuta" while Kuta gets flooded by visitors. We didn't go in, due to lack of time.

Before reaching, the driver has told us about we should get seats at which part, so that in the middle of Kecak Dance, we could still snap good sunset photos.




The admission is just 3,000 Rupiah, inclusive of Sarong. This is a rule to follow while visiting the temples in Bali. You can get rid of this if you are wearing long pants.

We really didn't take many group photos consisting of 3 people. This is one of the few.

Nice sunset?

Considered not too bad, but nothing is truly amazing also.

Before you visit Uluwatu, please make sure that you take off any unnecessary items, especially the decoration stuff. The monkeys here are very naughty. They would take away your things.

Spectacles are something they favor the most.

Don't play play with me.

We had gotta be careful with the monkeys around while shooting photos.

He grabbed a lady's glasses. I witnessed it with my own eyes. Just in a second, without you noticing, he got it.

To watch the Kecak dance, we paid 50,000 Rupiah (appx USD 5) per person.

The driver ushered us to the place, to get a good location. We actually didn't spend much time going around Uluwatu. The show started at 6pm.

The venue of the Kecak Dance.

Got a place on the left.

We were given a synopsis of the story of the dance. Wooi Yee is reading it.

I don't have much sense in understanding dance, so I also read it prior to the starting of the show. (you can click for larger image to read the storyline)

The Kecak Dance started.

The people sitting around were there making the sound effect of "cak cak cak".

The bad character in the story.

Something gets burned!! I see the people stepping on the fire with bare feet!!

Took a photo with the female characters after the show.

It's not easy to get a photo with him.

If you ask me how's the dance, I'd answer you very honestly - I've no idea what was going on. Perhaps not to say understand 0%, but I think I only understood about 50% of it.

If you ask me if the show worth the money, I'd also say, NO. This is why later we decided to cancel our plan to watch Barong Dance at Batubulan.

After we were driven back to Simpang Inn, due to the laziness to walk again, we just took dinner at the Simpang Cafe, where the Simpang Inn breakfast was served. Someone gave us 15% discount some more :P

My favorite avocado juice. Not everyone likes avocado.

The dinner for 3 spent us USD 13 in total.

That's all for the day. That's also the last night we stayed in Kuta. The next day, we were going up to Lovina, which is located at the north of Bali.

Denpasar is the largest city and capital of the island of Bali. This is also where the Ngurah Rai airport is located.

We visited the Bajra Sandhi Monument and were quite excited with its beauty. Initially we thought to just take a photo outside then leave. We ended up spending quite some time snapping photos around the area.


The admission fee is just 10,000 Rupiah, which is equivalent to approximately USD 1. We didn't put much hope prior to visiting, coz it's like not a famous MUST-GO place according to people's travelogue or trip photos.

Anyway, when we do not put much hope, there is surprise!





In Indonesia Language, its full name is Monumen Perjuangan Rakyat Bali (translation: Bali People's Struggle Monument). It is a large monument and park dedicated to the struggle and history of the people of Bali.

This monument contains a museum with the important parts of Balinese history pictured in dioramas, displays with dolls and paintings. Actually I feel it's quite similar to the National Monument (MONAS) in Jakarta.

Huge building and a small visitor.

Min and Haan.

Hide and seek.

The leaves are too small to cover me.

The museum inside.

Go up for a bird-eye view of Denpasar. Again, women in menstrual period are not allowed to go up.

After not-sure-how-many rounds, we arrived at the top.

Wooi Yee is wiping her sweat?

The diorama.

The car park.

According to the data from the Denpasar Tourism Agency, the city of Denpasar remains unattractive tour destination. The tourists coming to Denpasar are not here to enjoy the tourism attractions but only to walk around the town.

Denpasar has a number of tourist attractions. Apart from this Bajra Sandhi Monument, there are Bali Museum and the Art Center Cultural Park. We were basically obsessed with the complex or impressive architecture of this monument.