Sanur

05.11.11

We had quite a leisurely start as Bobby arrived quite late

and then headed down to the beach. We hired a sunbed each

as there is no shade otherwise. It was exciting for Martin

and I as so far on the trip we had only been swimming together

once before as usually we play ti safe and one of us stays with

the bags. Very boring!

The water here is very shallow and there is loads of seaweed so

we just bobbed around in the shallows, picking up shells etc.

Again there is so much coral washed up on the beach, it's really

sad to see.

As we were leaving the beach, we noticed worshippers all dressed

in white sarongs, with gold underneath, gold sashes and white

sashes walking enmasse towards the beach. Some were carrying baskets

on their heads and colourful umbrellas. On the beach a

teepee types structure had already been built and some offerings

left. We decided to stay and see the ceremony. A large congregation

arrived and seated themselves in rows facing out to sea. Umbrellas

were closed and lent up against the 'tee-pee'. They all sat

quietly waiting while the odd couple of worshippers took small

baskets of offerings to the shore and laid them down. After about

15 minutes a gentle murmur of song began. There didn't seem to

be anyone leading the ceremony. We were sat a fair distand away

on the pier and already felt a little intrusive, especially as

we didn't know what the ceremony was about. But other tourists

were walking straight in to the corregation and snapping away with

no respect. We decided we didn't want to be associated with this

kind of behaviour so continued out walk along the beach!!

When we came back 30 minutes or so later the ceremony was still

going on. I keep meaning to find out more about this religion,

I've only read a little in a Lonely PLanet guide that we borrowed.

I'll update the blog once I have more info!

This evening we headed to a sports bar for happy hour and something

to eat. I had my first cocktail of the trip! There were about 8

people in the bar when a 6 piece band came on and began

playing western 'hits', they were suprisingly good. But not

really what you want when you're in a sports bar trying to watch

the football!

Bobby Arrives!

04.11.11

Luckily Martin was feeling better this morning, so we lugged

our bags to the Perama office and booked ourselves on a bus

to Sanur. This was where we had arranged to meet Bobby who

was due to arrive this evening and where you can go to the

island Nusa Lembongan from.

We had a few hours to kill so I led Martin to the turning for

the beach we had read about-Pantai Cecil. It was a steep

walk up a gravel path. At the top of the rise they had started

and abandoned building villas. We then had to scramble down

a path throught the undergrowth and piles of gravel down to

the beach. It was a stunning little secluded cove with 3 or

4 little warungs offering shade and food and drink. There were

probably only 15 other tourists on the beach. 1 of which

happened to be from Southampton. We have met 3 English people

to speak to so far on this trip and 2 have been from Southampton!

We spent a happy few hours relaxing on the beach and then got on

the bus to Sanur, which only took a couple of hours via Ubud.

When arrived we decided to pay the extra 10,000 each to take us

to a guesthouse we wanted to check in to as Sanur is very spread

out. In the end we chose the 3rd guesthouse we looked at, Coco

Homestay.

Bobby wasn't arriving until around 11pm so went to look for somewhere

to eat and explore the surroundings. At first we couldn't reconcile

the map we had with these orange signs we kept seeing with a

picture of a beach on. According to the map the signs were pointing

away from the beach and we couldn't work out why. We eventually

realised that the picture actually depicted a person running

away from a large wave, and the sign were showing you which way

to run away from the beach,ie. in case of a Tsunami.

Martin was still feeling a bit fragile after a day of tummy upset

the day before so didn't want to eat Indonesian, so as a treat

we went to Pizza Hut. Which was actually very similar to

England, taste-wise and cheap. We shared a medium tuna pizza

for 50,000R, which is less than £4. So no big trauma to our

budget as feared!

Sanur is incredibly geared up for tourists, but a nice place to

spend a day or two. There are lots of places to eat, medium priced

places to stay with beach view bungalows and pools. Needless to

say our budget didn't quite stretch to that. But Coco's was only

a ten minute walk to the beach and on a road where there was

plenty of choice of places to eat. There is even a wedding chapel

made of glass and shaped like a diamond! Along the beach there are

small pavillions and walk ways out in to the sea. The water

is very shallow and the waves break about 100 metres out, you can

tell why the surfers call it 'Snore'.

As we explored the streets away from the beach every few minutes

a taxi would beep at us and pull over to ply for business, which

gets a little annoying! The road our guest house is on seemed

to go on for miles, with restuarant after another, 3 'Paul Smith'

outlets, several Croc shops and loads of souvenir shops.

After a jaunt of a few hours we headed back to our guesthouse to

await Bobby's arrival.