Day 265: 100 Days Left!! A Gorgeous Morning Trek From Kastala to Tenganan
[Slow internet; pics to be added later]
We were up and out the door early this morning in order to head out for a trek through a nearby rice terrace and local village.
But first, at breakfast, James politely and clearly ordered his breakfast, which seemed to impress the waiter. The guy asked, “How old are you?” James told him five, to which the guy replied, “Wowww – I thought seven or eight!” This little bit of flattery went a long way with James, who was sitting there sheepishly beaming with pride at the compliment. I’ll come back to this later.
Guide Murdika, who’s worked at the hotel for 23 years, joined us as we were driven 30-minutes to the starting point of the trek.
This walk was gorgeous. The first 30-40 minutes were through lush green rice terraces. Unlike the ones in Ubud, there weren’t other tourists here. Just ancient farmland and the occasional farmer for as far as you could see.
“Mom, this looks like a first draft of a bridge!” – Willa
We stopped to examine plants and colorful wild fruit and flowers and chickens and plenty more. Did you know that cotton grows in pods on tall trees here? And that young, wild pineapples are electric pink?
At one point toward the top of a steep part of the terraces, James announced with urgency that he needed to go to the bathroom…and it wasn’t pee. He started jumping up and down and holding the seat of his pants.
WULP!
I played lookout while Teddy assisted with squatting. It was over in a matter of minutes and we carried on. Worth noting that the most modest of all four of us is the only one who’s sh*t in the outdoors this year…and not just once, but twice! (Mongolia).
We stopped for a coconut water and banana at souvenir shack. There was a baby duck (and a sad little monkey on a chain – ugh).
The next leg of the trek was hillier and more jungly. Reminded us of our time in the Amazon! The only difference here was that the background noise was a constant din of roosters and dogs barking, since people actually live out here.
We passed two public showers aka cinder block huts with a few local guys in flip flops and shorts and towels who’d ridden there on motorbikes.
James had been walking up ahead with our guide holding his hand most of the way. At one point I heard him recount the story of this morning at breakfast with the waiter. He was SO proud of it still. Adorable.
We stopped at a bee farm to see the process and sample some honey with a local farmer. We tasted typical honey and then we tasted Balinese honey made from these tiny black bees that look like mosquitos until you see them up close. The honey is very sour! Like it’s got lemon in it or something. Apparently used for medicine, not eating.
He also served us this stuff called cang wood tea (pronounced “chong”), which is made by putting a chunk of 100-year-old cang wood in boiling water. The water turns bright hot pink. Apparently a good antioxidant that all the rice farmers drink in this part of Bali. One stick of wood can make a cup of tea every day for a month.
Honestly, this could be a “thing” in the US among people who care about stuff like beautiful photogenic antioxidant tea from Bali. The idea of figuring out how to import wood tea — a foreign plant AND a consumable — sounds too daunting for me, though. On to the next idea.
We carried on to the village of Tenganan, which was beautiful and old but also packed with caged roosters being groomed for cockfights. We learned that cock fighting is actually illegal in Bali. What a joke!!! It’s freaking everywhere.
To add insult to injury, the white roosters have their feathers dyed bright yellow and pink.
Eventually our van picked us up and took us back to the hotel where we had lunch.
The rest of the afternoon was spent enjoying time outside at Alila — swimming, playing catch, kicking the soccer ball, etc.
James and Willa love to set up a “picnic” near the tea time cart. We don’t object because it’s 30 minutes where they’re off alone not bothering us or anyone else.
The tea from the cart also seems to, ahem, accelerate digestion. James noticed this and said, “It’s like a special potion that makes little boys go poo!” Not just little boys, pal!
At one point, James surveyed the pool scene — all adults snoozing and reading in tranquil silence — and asked Teddy, “How come there are so many lazy grownups around?”
On that note, at about 5:30 pm a family with two small boys — maybe 3 and 5? 4 and 6? — showed up to swim. They were the first other kids we’d seen our whole time here in this place of honeymooners and couples. Don’t know where they were from, but they were screeching and yelling and splashing and crying and running and generally being super disruptive and annoying.
It’s hard for me to overstate how little interest/patience Teddy and I have in hyper/loud kids out of context. Chuck E. Cheese? Disneyland? School playground? Go ahead! Screech your annoying little heads off!! But tranquil, totally silent Bali hotel pool filled with reading and sleeping adults?? Oh my god. Please, please, do not screech here.
I want to die when my own kids disturb the peace in grownup places — mostly because I am a grownup and I don’t like being disturbed by screeching kids! So I’m definitely not interested in someone else’s rando kids disturbing the ambiance.
Is that harsh? Sorry. Our aversion to kids running amok means we’ve been extra intense on hammering home the whole manners and “library voices” thing with our kids. They’ve got other issues, but knowing how to act in a grownup place is something we’ve got pretty much down.
Sorry for the rant! Anyway!
We ate dinner at the beach bar again but this time we tried something different.
We sat together as a couple while Willa and James posted up at the bar with a card game. They ate dinner there (quietly!) and didn’t bother us! It was awesome. After eating Willa read her Kindle (“Harry Potter is like magic on me”) and James attempted to build a house of cards. We enjoyed our meal and our wine in peace, warm Bali ocean breeze and all. Aahhh.
MISC:
Glad to see Bali actually has a whole world out here without tourists. I was starting to think it was one giant t-shirt shop. Starting to realize there’s a lot more to this place if you’re willing to get off the beaten path–East Bali seems to be the answer for those craving something more removed from the fray.
Tonight James referred to our trek guide as “kid-friendly.” Ha!
I’m not sure if we’ve explained our whole “Minutes” discipline system? If the kids are naughty or misbehave, we dock minutes off their precious, coveted, sacred screen time (screen time = flights). Infractions include whining and complaining (usually one minute a pop), not listening to grownups when we ask them to do something (also 1-2 minutes), punching/hitting/shoving (5 minutes) and the rare biting or comparable attack (10 minutes). At any given moment, the kids know their current balance of minutes. When we get to a gate at the airport, the kids “start the clock” and wait out their sentences. Not surprisingly, James usually has more minutes accrued than Willa, and the waiting is *excruciating* for him.
The good news is they have the chance to earn minutes back (you can’t earn back biting minutes though — those are mandatory).
This system grew organically and has been refined over the months — and really works.
I write all this because I told them that if they were good on the trek, they’d wipe out all the minutes they’d picked up so far in Indonesia, an unprecedented offer (they had more than usual, since we haven’t been on a plane in three weeks) This reward was even more enticing than a Coke! They were really good, with minimal whining and complaining, despite a three-hour walk. We had a great time and they got all their minutes eliminated. Win win!
I did something I’d been meaning to do for ages: Write an email to Alan and Carol Magner, the doting grandparent-like figures we met at the Gobi Desert in Mongolia. They’re back in Philly and we were overdue to check in with them. For people like them whom we adore but who aren’t on Instagram, we’re trying to make an effort to stay in touch. Just like Laura Calabi, the retired Brazilian solo traveler we met on the Amazon rainforest river boat. She gifted us a small stuffed jaguar back in February and we take pictures of “Juma” all over the world and WhatsApp them back to her. She LOVES it. Juma came with us to the rice terraces today so we were also in touch today.
